May 4, 2008
By Ron Felix
CIA Stock Photo
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In his 83rd Sprint Cup race, twenty-eight year-old Clint Bowyer held off Kyle Busch and Mark Martin to win the Crown Royal 400 at Richmond International Raceway on Saturday night. It was Bowyer's first series victory of the year and the second of his career. He also won at New Hampshire in 2007. Bowyer took over the lead with two laps to go -- while running in the third position behind Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Kyle Busch. The pair were running side-by-side for the lead and contact was made between the two. Earnhardt spun and smacked the wall but the caution set up a green-white-checkers finish. On the restart Bowyer got a good jump on the field and held on to win the event.
“This is just awesome, I just love this place," said an excited Bowyer. "I really messed up in qualifying for these guys. We just dug deep and worked hard, and things worked out. We took advantage of a misfortune there up front, but I am just really happy for BB&T (sponsor), the Chevrolet was fast all day.
Earnhardt was near tears when a reporter asked him if what happened between him and Kyle Busch was fair?
“Whether it is fair or not, he is going to need some security," Earnhardt said. "I haven’t seen the replay, Tony, Jr. (Eury) said it looked like Kyle got loose underneath me. That happens. I wasn’t good on the bottom so I moved up to the top to run as good as I could up there. He had been running the bottom, so I figured we would race that out. I got a great run around one and two, and he nearly got by me. He gave me room off the outside of two so, I wouldn’t say that was intentional going in to three -- because if he had wanted to, he could have just thrown me in the fence off two. We had been racing each other earlier and had no problems. I have done that before. That is what happens if he got loose underneath me.
“The worst part about it, is that I have been priding myself on running good all year and I was in position for a win. I ran hard and got wrecked. I had a top-three car and should have finished in the top-three. So, I was going for the win. Just ended up on the hook today. Just disappointed.”
Kyle Busch saw the incident between he and Earnhardt, just a racing accident.
“It was a tough battle there, we were really racing each other pretty hard there. His car took up off the race track on the start of those first couple laps and he started running the top side. I got my car pinned down on the bottom and just started getting loose down there. It’s just a product of good, hard racing getting into turn three.
"I apologize to those guys that the whole incident happened, I didn’t mean to do it on purpose. It was just something where two cars got together and unfortunately it was Dale Earnhardt Jr. and I was able to go on and continue and salvage a good day for us. Our Pedigree Camry was good all day, but I believe Denny Hamlin was the class of the field and obviously had everybody covered. He deserved to win tonight, but if it wasn’t for myself, (Dale Earnhardt) Jr. probably could have won or finished second.”
It was pole sitter Denny Hamlin's race to lose. He had a fast racecar and led a record 381 laps of the 410 that were run but succumbed to a right front flat tire and then to make matters worse, Hamlin stopped on the track to bring out the caution and was penalized two laps for intentionally bringing out the yellow flag. Hamlin was devastated that he didn't win.
“It's tough to say. I mean, you can't whine about it," Hamlin said. "It wasn't meant to be. God didn't want me to win today, and there's a better time for us to win, evidently. Today is just not our day. -- You don't have days like this. Dominating days like this just don't happen. Usually, when it does you have an issue at the end. To me, it almost wasn't that surprising. I've had these issues before at Bristol and some other race tracks."
Tony Stewart finished in the fourth spot and Martin Truex Jr. brought his Chevrolet home in fifth.
Ryan Newman garnered sixth place followed by Carl Edwards, Kevin Harvick, Jeff Gordon and Kasey Kahne to round out the top ten.
The race had eleven cautions for a total of 62 laps and featured a 14-car pileup on lap 230.
Another note on the incident between Casey Mears and Michael Waltrip: The two drivers got into a shoving match and on lap 354 Waltrip stuffed Mears into the wall and then shoved him, engine wide open, down the straight-away. NASCAR called Waltrip to the hauler and parked him for the remainder of the race.
Waltrip made himself unavailable for comment following the race. Also Mears was nowhere to be found for comment.
Regan Smith scored a 21st-place finish and claimed Raybestos Rookie of the Race honors for the second consecutive race and for the fifth time in 10 races this season. Unofficially Smith leads the Raybestos Rookie standings by one point (97-96) over Sam Hornish Jr.
“We were smart all night and used our head," said Smith. "I know how races go here and how dirty they get and how ridiculous they get. The car was good in the beginning, real good in the beginning, and we just got off a little bit there. About halfway through we got a little bit off and we struggled to get it back and I felt like we got it back at the end but it was too late at that point.”
The Sprint Cup Series moves to Darlington Raceway next Saturday May 10th, 2008, for the Dodge Challenger 500. The race is scheduled to start at 7:00 PM / Eastern Time on Fox.
For full final race results...
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