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NASCAR America: The Big 3 have separated from the field, but not one another

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The Big 3 of Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. continue to rack up all the playoff points and it's forcingdrivers to change how they race.

The hottest topic this season has been the domination of the Big 3. That extends to what they are doing in regard to playoff points. By dominating victory lane, Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. have also earned the five playoff bonus points that go along with those wins.

The Big 3 have also combined to earn almost as many segment win bonus points as the rest of the field combined. They have banked 21 segment win points; 11 other drivers have combined for 22 points.

That means that the Big 3 have separated from the field as much as Truex did in 2017.

At this time last year, Martin Truex Jr. had a 19-point advantage over Ricky Stenhouse Jr. - the fifth-place driver in the playoff hunt - in playoff points.

This year, Truex also has a 19-point advantage over fifth-place driver Joey Logano in playoff points. Kyle Busch has a 23-point lead on Logano; Harvick is 25 points ahead of Logano.

“The guys in fifth, sixth, seventh, eighth – they’re just not gaining points,” Jeff Burton said on Tuesday edition of NASCAR America.

But the equal distribution of the playoff points among the Big 3 means that they have not been able to separate from one another. Harvick has six more bonus points than Truex.

“These three are by far favored to go to the last round. … But one of these three is probably not going to make it to Miami,” Burton said.

For more, watch the video above.

Follow Dan Beaver on Twitter.