Kyle Busch beat Carl Edwards to the line again

The yearly competition to see which steed and driver combination is the fastest over a series of races which we call the Nationwide Series championship seems to be a two man race so far this season. Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards have both maneuvered back and forth into the over all championship at times like they were conducting their own personal two-man race.

While it’s certainly too early to hand either of them the trophy, Friday night at the Richmond International Raceway Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards continued their two-man race for the Nationwide Series championship.

Friday night in a five lap race to the line after the 10^th caution of the night, Busch managed to beat Edwards to the finish line by .584 seconds to take the Lipton Tea 250 and increase his points lead in the Nationwide Series by 82 points over his nemesis, Carl Edwards.

The win was Busch’s third of the year in the Nationwide Series, his third at Richmond International Raceway, 24^th victory in the illustrious Nationwide Series, and certainly one of many more to come for a racer who has shown outstanding driving skill and a love for the sport.

The difference in the race seemed to be the difference in the way each driver, car and team handled the restarts, and Busch, his team, and especially his car were just faster off the line. On this day Carl Edwards was just in the unfortunate position of having the second fastest car, but he still managed a pretty good points total and managed to keep Busch from extending his lead with skillful driving and car management.

The field was a few seconds behind the leaders, with Matt Kenseth taking third place, followed by Brad Keselowski in fourth, Kevin Harvick managed fifth, and Joey Logano out-raced Mark Martin for sixth. Rookie driver Michael McDowell had a good showing in eighth place, just ahead of Jason Keller who finished ninth, and Jason Leffler rounded out the top ten places.

The tenth caution of the night turned out to tell the difference, as Kenny Wallace’s unfortunate spin on Lap 243 resulted in a restart and a final race to the line, which Kyle Busch won.

Image: Newscom

Post from: EveryJoe

Kyle Busch Wins Lipton Tea 250

The win makes Hamlin nearly perfect at his native tracks this year in Virginia. Denny won his first race of the season in April by winning the race in Martinsville, he won Friday’s Nationwide race in Richmond, and he will start Saturday night’s Sprint Cup race in Richmond from the pole position. The win also gives Joe Gibbs Racing five consecutive victories in the series.

For Harvick, it was a bit of disappointment despite finishing 2nd. He is still in search of his first win of the year, and more importantly, the first win while driving his own car for Kevin Harvick, Inc., and he almost had it – leading nearly a hundred consecutive laps before being passed by Hamlin with 11 laps to go.  Kyle Busch had found himself a lap down earlier in the night, but was able to bounce back for a third place finish. He held off Steve Wallace on the final lap of the race, who finished fourth. David Ragan completed the top-five.

Nationwide points leader, Clint Bowyer, finished ninth, while his pursuer, Carl Edwards, finished two spots ahead in seventh. Edwards was able to gain a few more points on Bowyer in the standings and now trails first place by only nine points.

Nationwide Standings:

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