Brian Vickers in Victory Lane. Chad Knaus out-cyphered. Red Bull Racing on the verge of making the Chase this season. Surprising stuff except that it shouldn’t be. There is nothing fluky about that team and driver.

In fact, Red Bull has some wonderful pieces in place. So wonderful that it’s more surprising that it had not won a race until it did so on Sunday at Michigan International Speedway.

Vickers is a driver and a half. Tough and skilled. (Kyle Busch was quite lucky that people were there to separate him from Vickers during their post-Nationwide-race dust up Saturday.)

When I tell people how much I think of Vickers, the doubters often cite his lack of success during his three full seasons as a Cup driver at Hendrick Motorsports.

But you have to remember, he raced out of the shop up on the hill at Hendrick. That is, the non-Gordon/Johnson shop. For a time, the shop up top did not get as much attention as the one where the Gordon/Johnson teams were located.

It was out of the upper shop that Kyle Busch raced to middling success and similar charges that he didn’t have game.

A lot of people on Papa Joe Hendrick Blvd. hated to see Vickers leave, and the comments by both Gordon and Johnson after Sunday’s race at Michigan indicated that the respect for the kid -- he’s just 25 -- remains high among his former teammates.

On top of the box is one of the most underrated crew chiefs in Cup, Ryan Pemberton. Pemberton is that new breed of crew chief. Knaus-like. He understands the sport in the way the older crew chiefs did/do, but also understands the physics.

When Jay Frye took over as head of Red Bull a couple years back, an early thought was that it would just be a matter of time before Pemberton was brought on board. They had worked together at MB2. Through the disastrous Bobby Ginn days and during times when they had very little money, Pemberton was achieving way over his budgetary head.

And sure enough, as soon as Pemberton became available after a stint with Michael Waltrip Racing, he was hired by Frye.

And then there is Frye. The opinion here is that he is among the best in Cup at running a race team. He learned the biz under Rick Hendrick, and the two of them remain very good friends to this day.

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He is so good that Tony Stewart wanted him on board when Stewart Haas Racing was assembling its team. Two things came between that.

First, the reclusive Austrian owner of Red Bull reportedly summoned Frye to Europe when rumors of the Stewart courtship surfaced and, reportedly, gave him something Frye has never had much of -- money. Second, Frye is loyal above all else and could not leave the folks he had hired at Red Bull.

A member of the old MB2 organization has told me that it was loyalty to Frye that caused him and many of the others to stay with the team during times when getting paid wasn't taken for granted.

And then there is, yes, the money. I have been told that the check the NASCAR Red Bull has been given by owner Dietrich Mateschitz is far from being blank. But, the team does have enough money to operate and then perhaps a bit more.

My colleague Nick and I got to talking about Red Bull and Vickers on Monday. We both agreed that Sunday represented a breakout for them, that more victories and Chases will follow and that Red Bull and Vickers bore watching.

Hey, good people and money ... it’s what makes the auto racing world go 'round.

Jim Pedley is managing editor of Racin’ Today. Read more NASCAR news at racintoday.com.

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