Ambrose slides into victory lane at Watkins Glen

[media-credit name=”Credit: By Jared Wickerham, Getty Images” align=”alignright” width=”233″][/media-credit]Marcos Ambrose battled it out with Kyle Busch and Brad Keselowski in the final laps and won Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) Finger Lakes 355 at the Glen at Watkins Glen International.

This was Ambrose’s second career NSCS win and the second straight at Watkins Glen.

“It just feels so good to be back in Victory Lane. Thank you to Sprint, Stanley, DeWalt, MAC Tools, Ford, Richard Petty Motorsports and everybody that gets us here. It just feels so good. This year is pure joy. It’s a great day.” Ambrose said in victory lane.

Keselowski held onto second, Jimmie Johnson third, Clint Bowyer fourth and Sam Hornish Jr. finished fifth.

Johnson’s third place finish was enough to take over the series points lead by 1 point over Greg Biffle, who finished sixth.

“Those last two laps were just out of control with the oil down. You are studying the road trying to see if you can see an oil trail and there really wasn’t a large visible one to dodge. But you could feel the oil on your tires and slipping and sliding and then guys are spinning all over. It was chaos, but I’m glad we got back to the finish line, finished third very solid day for this Lowe’s team.” Johnson said.

Busch had built up a size able lead with two laps remaining until everyone started slipping on oil. Busch slipped and that allowed Keselowski and Ambrose to quickly catch-up and make a 3-car battle for the lead.

Keselowski got into Busch in the esses, causing him to spin. The final lap Keselowski and Ambrose slipped, bumped and traded the lead until the final turn in which Keselowski got loose again and Ambrose pulled away and won.

“I was the first one to slip in the oil and it was just getting worse and worse. You could tell the car was staying out there because the oil was moving around the race track and you just take your chances. You’ve got to commit at that point in the race and it was great racing with Kyle and Brad. They’re the two best guys to race. It’s just awesome fun and that’s the way racing should be and we got the No. 9 Stanley Ford in Victory Lane.”

Busch got his car back on track and finished seventh.

“Well the 47 broke, you can see him, he just went by smoking, he left oil down all over the track. Kyle hit the oil and it allowed the 2 car to get to us and he kind of raced us the way he raced us.” Dave Rogers, crew chief of the No.18 said.

Jeff Gordon was also a victim of oil. Gordon struggled all day with his setup but the team finally got it working and he was back into the top-10 until the final lap when he slipped in oil and spun out.

“Oil all over the race track, it’s pretty ridiculous they don’t want to end a race under caution and put that many cars in jeopardy. I had no idea that there was oil out there. I knew there was all kinds of havoc happening all around, but it was a great effort by our Drive To End Hunger Chevrolet.” Gordon said.

Gordon finished 21st.

“To work that hard all day long, come all the way from way back all the way up into the top 10 and have it taken away because they don’t want to throw a caution it’s pretty disappointing.” Gordon said.

“It’s just unfortunate that that gets taken away from you because NASCAR doesn’t want to end the race under yellow (caution). I understand. You want to keep it entertaining and give the winner a shot at it but there are a lot of other things going on our there too. I think they completely disregarded that and hey, it’s over now. We’ll move on.” Gordon added.