Harvick wins chaotic finish at Phoenix; Keselowski takes over series points lead

[media-credit name=”Photo Credit: Noel Lanier” align=”alignright” width=”225″][/media-credit]Wow! That is all I have to say! What a chaotic finish to the end of the AdvoCare 500! It was so insane, I can’t even speak! It was simply heart-pounding what happened. Lets first begin with the recap of the race.

Martin Truex Jr. began complaining of his engine starting to lay down by the second lap. By Lap 10, Truex Jr. said that “something broke in the top end and just started eating itself up, so we’re done for the day. “It’s just a shame. We’ve had such a good race car all weekend long and really felt like we were going to have a shot at maybe challenging for the win today.”

The race was dominated for most of the event by the No.18 of Kyle Busch. Busch won the pole on Friday evening and led all three practice sessions on Saturday.

The tide turned when the No.48 of Jimmie Johnson blew a right-front tire off turn 4 and slammed the outside wall. The crowd cheered as the No.48 team was unable to fix the damage on pit road and spent over 30 laps behind the wall. The No.48 finished in 33rd and Brad Keselowski now has a 20 point lead coming into Homestead after finishing in sixth place.

Near the end of the race, Clint Bowyer and Jeff Gordon tangled coming out of turn 2. Bowyer put Gordon into the wall. A very unhappy Gordon attempted to retaliate, but cut a tire and slammed the wall a second time. Gordon waited for Bowyer to come back around the track to retaliate and Gordon was successful.  But the retaliation also took out Joey Logano and Aric Almirola in the process.

Gordon drove back to the hauler where a huge fight broke out between the crews and Gordon.  Bowyer parked his destroyed No.15 in the pit lane before sprinting to the No.24 hauler, but was held back by NASCAR officials and Gordon’s crew. Logano later said on Twitter after the race, “When I was young, I thought Jeff Gordon was the best driver. Now, I’ve lost a lot of respect for him.”

This takes Bowyer out of the championship, but he can’t say that he didn’t see this coming. Bowyer and Gordon have been getting together all season and enough was enough. I think Gordon was justified to take out Bowyer, but he could have done it in a way to not take out other drivers.

Jeff Burton spun out Danica Patrick coming to the white flag and she backed it into the turn 3 wall. She was able to re-fire the engine and keep going, but was dropping oil all over the race track.

Kevin Harvick took the checkered flag as Mark Martin, Ryan Newman, Brad Keselowski, Kurt Busch, and Paul Menard all crashed across the finish line. Harvick stated afterwards that, “There was more oil than asphalt and it was very visible.” Richard Childress, who was sitting next to Harvick said, “It was dangerous.” Harvick also chimed in that the people officiating the race, “Need to go look themselves in the mirror and check if they are really doing a good job.”

Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch, Kasey Kahne, and Newman rounded out the top-5. Keselowski, Greg Biffle, Kurt Busch, Paul Menard, and Mark Martin rounded out the top-10.

Dustin Long from SI was able to catch up with Jeff Gordon. When asked if he was concerned about penalties Gordon responded, “They have to do what they got to do.”

Gordon needed to stand up for himself. I just think that he could have retaliated in a better fashion. It will be interesting to see if this carries on to Homestead. It gave me a headache just trying to process everything that happened!