Kurt Busch’s return to Atlanta Motor Speedway’s victory lane will likely be overshadowed by Carl Edwards’s intentional wreck with Brad Keselowski.
“We weren't excellent in any area, but good overall with the different stints you have to run on tires, said Busch who just about dedicated the win to his new crew chief.
“Steve Addington has taught me how to drive cars different, how to look at them differently. When you want to get up on the wheel for somebody like Steve, good things happen,” he said after his 21st Cup win.
In the closing laps of the Atlanta 500, Busch, who had dominated the late portion of the race, saw his lead shrink to about half-a-second over the rapidly closing Juan Pablo Montoya with six laps to go. Busch should have been able to hold Montoya off.
The only problem was that Carl Edwards, who was running over 170 laps down, was closing in on Brad Keselowski, then running sixth, who he blamed for the wreck which caused his lengthy repair. There has been a history of bad blood between the two drivers.
Edwards spun Keselowski’s car which flipped over against the outside fence, rolled on its’ nose and ended up with all four wheels on the ground. Keselowski said “to come back and just intentionally wreck someone, that's not cool. Could have killed someone in the grandstands.”
Edwards admitted causing the wreck, which also resulted in a green-white-chequered finish. “Brad knows the deal between him and I. Not at all what I expected at the end of the day. I wish it didn’t go like it did,” Edwards said.
On the first restart Paul Menard, having the best run of his career bogged down with only two new tires. That allowed Busch to run up the middle in-between Menard and Clint Bowyer and pull away with Montoya following.
Just a little distance behind them, Jamie McMurray, the Daytona 500 winner, started a seven-car collision causing a second, and what would be final, green-white-finish.
That set up the final restart, which went off without any major incidents. Busch anticipated the restart and there was nothing Montoya, who got beat by Matt Kenseth for second, could do.
Montoya said “you know we have those two lines we are supposed to start with and he went for it like 40 yards before the first one. It really surprised me. It is not a big deal, he deserves to win.”
Kenseth felt lucky to get second place. “We really good pit stops, good adjustments. Got lucky. Got a couple good restarts at the end, and slid into second.”
Busch said “I felt like we had great restarts all day long. There's a restart zone. You get into that vicinity and hammer down on the gas. I feel like we didn't have any tire spin at all and that squirted us ahead. We had the bite. I feel he spun his tires.”
NASCAR officials are deferring announcing any penalties until the situation is reviewed. Penalties, if any, are likely to be announced until Tuesday afternoon.
“We weren't excellent in any area, but good overall with the different stints you have to run on tires, said Busch who just about dedicated the win to his new crew chief.
“Steve Addington has taught me how to drive cars different, how to look at them differently. When you want to get up on the wheel for somebody like Steve, good things happen,” he said after his 21st Cup win.
In the closing laps of the Atlanta 500, Busch, who had dominated the late portion of the race, saw his lead shrink to about half-a-second over the rapidly closing Juan Pablo Montoya with six laps to go. Busch should have been able to hold Montoya off.
The only problem was that Carl Edwards, who was running over 170 laps down, was closing in on Brad Keselowski, then running sixth, who he blamed for the wreck which caused his lengthy repair. There has been a history of bad blood between the two drivers.
Edwards spun Keselowski’s car which flipped over against the outside fence, rolled on its’ nose and ended up with all four wheels on the ground. Keselowski said “to come back and just intentionally wreck someone, that's not cool. Could have killed someone in the grandstands.”
Edwards admitted causing the wreck, which also resulted in a green-white-chequered finish. “Brad knows the deal between him and I. Not at all what I expected at the end of the day. I wish it didn’t go like it did,” Edwards said.
On the first restart Paul Menard, having the best run of his career bogged down with only two new tires. That allowed Busch to run up the middle in-between Menard and Clint Bowyer and pull away with Montoya following.
Just a little distance behind them, Jamie McMurray, the Daytona 500 winner, started a seven-car collision causing a second, and what would be final, green-white-finish.
That set up the final restart, which went off without any major incidents. Busch anticipated the restart and there was nothing Montoya, who got beat by Matt Kenseth for second, could do.
Montoya said “you know we have those two lines we are supposed to start with and he went for it like 40 yards before the first one. It really surprised me. It is not a big deal, he deserves to win.”
Kenseth felt lucky to get second place. “We really good pit stops, good adjustments. Got lucky. Got a couple good restarts at the end, and slid into second.”
Busch said “I felt like we had great restarts all day long. There's a restart zone. You get into that vicinity and hammer down on the gas. I feel like we didn't have any tire spin at all and that squirted us ahead. We had the bite. I feel he spun his tires.”
NASCAR officials are deferring announcing any penalties until the situation is reviewed. Penalties, if any, are likely to be announced until Tuesday afternoon.