Keselowski targets Vegas stage-sweep

After snatching the pole for Sunday's Kobalt 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Brad Keselowski now has eyes on the next goal: Keselowski believes his No. 2 Team Penske team can win all three stages in the 267-lap event.

"I think there has only been one team to do so and that's been in the Truck race at Atlanta," Keselowski said. "Winning all three stages is a max-points day, and with this format, you can earn more points than ever in a race and distance yourself more than ever from your competition, and that's certainly what we're looking to try to accomplish."

As the defending winner at Las Vegas, a victory Sunday would be Keselowski's second straight at the speedway as well as third in the last four years. He's also coming off a win last weekend at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

NASCAR's new race format of breaking each event into three stages comes with awarding additional points to the top-10 finishers of the first two stages as well as playoff points to the winner of a stage. It has left Keselowski to view qualifying as important as ever. With points now on the line during the event, more of an emphasis has been put on qualifying.

The breakdown of Sunday's stage lengths is 80-80-107. The first two stages are five laps shorter than what was run last weekend at Atlanta (85), another mile-and-a-half track.

When asked how he would approach the stages, Keselowski first said his Paul Wolfe-led team would have to be flexible. Then he equated it to boxing.

"I don't want to sound cheesy and cliché, but the Mike Tyson saying, 'Everybody has a plan until (they get punched in the mouth),'" Keselowski said. "That's how racing is. Everybody has a plan before the race starts until they drop the green, and that's because things happen.

"You have yellows that throw you off your preferred strategy and you have to be flexible. You have to adapt and overcome, so we're gonna do everything we can to win both stages and win the race, and I don't know if there's really one set strategy to do so that I would have confidence in, but I know that we're gonna have to have a lot of speed to be able to stay up front."

Last year, Keselowski led just 24 laps on his way to the win. Last week in Atlanta he led 21 as the race was dominated by Kevin Harvick. Keselowski acknowledged Harvick, who qualified an uncharacteristic 19th, won't waste time charging to the front and putting himself in contention.

The same goes for Keselowski's teammate, Joey Logano, who qualified sixth. The third Penske car, Ryan Blaney, won't be far behind Keselowski at the start of the race either as Blaney qualified third.

Meaning while Keselowski has plans to win all three stages, he knows what they say about best-laid plans.

"It's really stiff competition out there," Keselowski said. "We're gonna have to just dig all day."