Today for a change of pace I’ve asked Diana Moss, a frequent commenter, to join me in making picks for this weekend.

In addition to keeping me honest when I goof up on a name (Ed: which happens much too often, by the way.), Diana gave me the tip on Carl Skerlong, the Mukilteo driver competing in the Champ Atlantic series this year.

Diana picked ALL the national races this weekend, including the ARCA/Re/Max series and the NHRA.

Since I only need the Sprint Cup for my self-declared Grand Slam of Prognostication, I’ll just pick the Richmond Cup race and the locals at Evergreen Speedway.

Guests first.

Diana’s picks are taken verbatim from an email she sent me, although I’ve taken the liberty to make a comment here or there.

NASCAR at Richmond

Nationwide-Lipton TEA 250 — Denny Hamlin or Kyle Busch.

Sprint Cup-Dan Lowry 400 — Dale Earnhardt Jr. (Richmond May 2006, last Cup win).

ARCA-Re/Max at Rockingham

Carolina 500 — Joey Logano (debut in ARCA, but he’s a Joe Gibbs Racing development driver &stunk up the NASCAR Grand National East/West series last year) (Ed: If by “stunk up” you mean he won the Busch East title last year, then yes he did 🙂)

Local boys entered in the race (same team):

— No. 59 Nick Tucker/Bremerton WA (Team &Car) Comp Cal Dodge (Owner) Mark Gibson;

— No. 4 Tayler Malsam/Monroe WA (Team &Car) Dodge Development-Cunningham Motorsports Dodge (Owner) Kerry Scherer.

NHRA at Madison, Illinois

Midwest Nationals

Top Fuel — Tony Schumacher.

Funny Car — John Force (going for his 1000th career round win &it’s his birthday). (Ed: I’ll go outside my comfort zone and say Jack Beckman will keep Force from the century mark one more round 🙂 )

Pro Stock — Jason Line.

Pro Stock Motorcycles — Chip Ellis.

Scott’s picks

NASCAR Sprint Cup Dan Lowry 400 I was very, very tempted to agree with Diana and say Junior gets off the schneid, but I’m o-fer picking him and something tells me it’ll be no fairy tale ending this week.

Just for grins I’ll go way off the page and say Matt Kenseth or just maybe Greg Biffle wins it.

Evergreen Speedway

Super stocks: John Zaretzke gave me grief last week for not picking him to win the championship this year.

I did pick Zaretzke to win last Saturday’s race, but it looked to me like he was content to finish fourth and take over the season points lead from Naima Lang, who dropped a couple laps down after an early accident.

This is shaping up to be a very competitive season in the top-tier division at Evergreen. Good for fans, tough for me to make picks week-to-week because I’m not sure any one driver will dominate.

I was impressed with the way sophomores Jeff Knight and Mike Holden battled up front last week, but don’t miss sight of rookie James Mugge — my pick for this week — who drove a smart, consistent race and finished fifth.

Bombers: Do I have to? Another division where it is highly likely there will be a different winner every weekend.

Points leader Jim Foti has been consistent, winning two-of-two heat races and recording two top-10 main finishes.

But for Saturday, I’m going to go with fast and say Travis Blackwood climbs victory stage.

Super Figure 8: A driver who always seems to be near the front this year is Nick Gunderson. On Saturday he’ll stay ahead of everyone else to take the checkered.