May 26, 2008
By Ron Felix
CIA Stock Photo
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Kahne Makes Winning Pass On Stewart
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Kasey Kahne was barely finished counting the million dollars that he pocketed last week. Kahne won the Sprint All-Star race at Lowe's Motor Speedway last Saturday night after he was voted into the race by the fans.
Sometimes you have a little bit of luck, sometimes fate intervenes and other times you just have to be really good to get a victory in the Sprint Cup Series. The last two races, the Sprint All-Star Challenge and the Coca-Cola 600, Kasey Kahne has been the beneficiary of all three of those. Kahne won his eighth career Sprint Cup race on Sunday in 156 tries and became only the sixth driver in NASCAR history to win the All-Star race and the Coca-Cola 600 in the same year. The others were Darrell Waltrip (1985), Davey Allison (1991), Dale Earnhardt (1993), Jeff Gordon (1997) and Jimmie Johnson (2003)
With three laps remaining, Tony Stewart was the leader with a five second lead over Kahne. Stewart blew a tire and smacked the outside wall handing the lead over to Kahne and all he had to do to win was to finish. No one was pressuring him so he skated to another victory at Lowe's Motor Speedway.
"This is my favorite track now," said Kahne, who was aware of the incredible luck he has on this day. "It was Atlanta, but after last week and this week, this is it now.
"I definitely have smiled a lot more the past couple of weeks," Kahne continued. "I feel like we try hard to run up front and ... I've been upset. Since last Saturday I haven't been such a bear.”
Greg Biffle, who ironically finished second in the All-Star race, managed to put his Ford in the same position on Sunday and Kyle Busch was third.
“We’ll take it (third-place) -- we just didn’t have the car capable on the long runs to run up front tonight and win this thing," said Busch. "It’s just unfortunate for us, but we’ll take it and go on with a good points night. We had battery issues -- the battery just kept going dead for whatever reason. I don’t know if the alternator broke or if we broke a wire or what happened to it. We’ll figure it out.”
Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. finished fourth and fifth respectively in the Coca-Cola 600. With less than 20 laps to go in the 400-lap/600-mile race, drivers began diving down pit road for a final gas-and-go. crew chiefs Steve Letarte (Gordon) and Tony Eury, Jr. (Earnhardt) decided to gamble and stretch the fuel.
The gamble paid off and eased the pain for Earnhardt Jr., who had dropped back in the field following a brush with wall after leading for 75 laps.
"We got lucky at the end. Got gas and made it last," Earnhardt explained. "They beat us real bad last year. Casey (Mears) won in kind of sort of the same way. I don't know what happened getting in Turn 3. I think we blew a right rear tire. I hate it for my guys. We were running really strong, I sure want to get me a win here. It was gas mileage man, I was working that throttle or not working the throttle actually and made it work. Made it last more than it should. We were about two laps short, we saved and saved and come home good."
Gordon got lucky also finishing fourth when he spent most of the day running anywhere from tenth to twenty-fifth.
“It was a crazy one for us," said Gordon. "I guess you get them any way you can. You know, at the beginning of the race we were a little bit too tight. We freed it up too much one run and got way behind and lost our lap. We had to fight really hard to get it back from that point on. But you’ve got to give a lot of credit to this team, all the guys on the DuPont Chevrolet. Steve Letarte made some great calls and got the car better."
Jeff Burton battled to the sixth spot followed by Matt Kenseth, Elliott Sadler, Carl Edwards and David Reutimann to round out the top ten.
Jimmie Johnson led some laps but lost the handle on his Chevrolet late in the race and eventually blew an engine.
"About three or four laps before I came to pit road, it dropped a cylinder and we were just running around on seven cylinders," said Johnson. "I knew it was just a matter of time before it went and sure enough it went. We’re disappointed with the night and with the outcome, but we’re pleased with the performance. We had great pit stops and a great race car. All the hard work is paying off now. I just wish we could have made it 60 more laps and got a good finish out of it."
Kyle Busch stretched his lead in the Sprint Cup standings by 94 points over Jeff Burton and 139 over Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Sam Hornish Jr. scored a 13th-place finish, his best in 14 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series starts and claimed Raybestos Rookie of the Race honors for the fourth time in 12 races this season.
“I’m really happy with the way that the guys performed tonight," Hornish said. "It took us a long time to get back on the lead lap. We probably got ourselves behind a little bit on adjustments just because we didn’t want to make too big of a one and then not be able to try to be the lucky dog. I’m really happy with all the guys on the Mobil 1 Dodge. The car was good. Everything ran pretty flawlessly.
"The only thing that kind of hurt us was we got a flat going into the pits one time and that was a slow stop and we lost a bunch of spots. I guess we need to work on fuel mileage a little bit. We got beat by some guys [smiles] but I’m pretty happy. I told the guys this is like a win for me. I wanted to come here and finish all 600 miles. It took me seven tries at Indy before I finished the whole race so I’m pretty happy that I was able to do that tonight. And not only finish the race but finish on the lead lap.”
Unofficially Regan Smith leads Hornish Jr. by one point (117-116) in the Raybestos Rookie standings.
The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule is the June 1 Best Buy 400 at Dover (Del.) International Speedway. The race begins at 2 p.m. EDT with live, high-definition coverage provided by FOX beginning with its pre-race show at 1:30 p.m. The race will also be broadcast live on SIRIUS Satellite Radio Channel 128.
For full final race results...
(Insider Racing News)
For top-40 Sprint Cup drivers points...
(Insider Racing News)
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