Biffle breaks drought at Las Vegas
Despite having a less than perfect race, Greg Biffle won an eventful Sam's Town 300 Nationwide Series race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway
The Roush Fenway racer ended a three-year winless streak in NASCAR's second-tier series but not without some drama. Early on he had to serve a penalty for speeding on pitroad and then later in the race he ran out of fuel while leading.
On the last restart, he had fuel pressure issues again and almost lost the lead on the penultimate lap to his teammate Carl Edwards, who nearly lost control while trying to perform the pass on the green-white-chequered finish.
While Edwards kept his car pointing forwards and avoiding crashing into his teammate, Biffle took advantage to remain up front and drive to victory lane after 77 races without a Nationwide Series win.
"It was definitely not short of action," said Biffle about his race. "It certainly was an eventful day. I was feeling a little bit under the weather for starters and then we got caught speeding on pitroad.
"But the car was just so fast. We were able to drive right through the field and worked our way back to the front. I had a little hiccup on a pitstop and lost one spot but then ran out of gas there. It was kind of unexpected.
"There at the end we ran out of gas going into turn one and that's what gave Carl a chance to get under me going into the backstretch but the car ran so well that I was able to get back by him."
Edwards finished second but he had an equally eventful race. He too had to serve not one but two penalties on pit road, one for speeding and another for entering the pits when they were closed. He also recovered well from being a lap down at one point due to a tyre issue.
The former Nationwide Series champion caused the eighth of a total of twelve caution periods when he spun on the backstretch.
"Man, it was a wild day from the beginning," said Edwards. "We had a great race car. There were a lot of wrecks. We had that tyre go down and we had a speeding penalty, all sorts of things happened and luck was on our side and we had a chance to race up there for the win."
Brian Vickers finished the race third driving for Braun Racing, recovering well from a pitroad penalty for a missing lug nut on his last stop. Jason Leffler finished fourth, also battling fuel pressure issues on the last restart, while Dale Earnhardt Jr rounded out the top-five.
Many of the fastest cars of the day were involved in incidents. Kevin Harvick led 41 laps - second to Biffle who led 86 - but was involved in a multi-car crash halfway through the race.
Denny Hamlin also led laps but finished his race hard against the wall due to a cut tyre and contact with Mike Bliss. Kyle Busch also hit the wall as soon as lap 23 while battling for the lead with Harvick, taking polesitter Scott Speed with him.
"It was just 100 percent my fault for racing for the lead that early in the race," said Busch about his crash.
"You have a clean shot off of turn two and go in the inside of somebody and race off into turn three and I felt like all of the air was taken off my side, but I guess that's just a part of hard racing. I shouldn't have been doing that that early in the race - I shouldn't have."
The race had to be red-flagged for ten minutes to clean up Busch's wreck, and then later again for another multi-car incident, taking the event close to the three-hour mark.
Edwards now leads the championship ahead of Vickers, Biffle and rookie Brendan Gaughan, who impressed again with another top-ten finish.
Pos Driver Make Laps 1. Greg Biffle Ford 209 2. Carl Edwards Ford 209 3. Brian Vickers Toyota 209 4. Jason Leffler Toyota 209 5. Dale Earnhardt Jr Chevrolet 209 6. Michael McDowell Toyota 209 7. Brendan Gaughan Chevrolet 209 8. Justin Allgaier Dodge 209 9. Scott Lagasse Jr Toyota 209 10. Jeff Burton Chevrolet 209 11. Scott Wimmer Chevrolet 208 12. Kenny Hendrick Dodge 208 13. Morgan Shepherd Chevrolet 207 14. Kenny Wallace Chevrolet 207 15. Tony Raines Chevrolet 207 16. Eric McClure Ford 207 17. Ken Butler III Chevrolet 207 18. Danny O'Quinn Jr Chevrolet 206 19. Brian Keselowski Dodge 205 20. Joe Nemechek Chevrolet 205 21. Denny Hamlin Toyota 196 22. Mike Bliss Chevrolet 194 23. Andy Ponstein Chevrolet 189 24. Brandon Whitt Ford 182 25. Jason Keller Ford 177 26. David Ragan Ford 169 27. Brad Keselowski Chevrolet 165 28. Stanton Barrett Chevrolet 151 29. Kevin Harvick Chevrolet 146 30. Steve Wallace Chevrolet 144 31. David Green Toyota 104 32. Michael Annett Toyota 90 33. D.J. Kennington Dodge 89 34. Robert Richardson Chevroletr 89 35. Casey Atwood Ford 76 36. Scott Gaylord Chevrolet 65 37. Kelly Bires Toyota 32 38. John Wes Townley Ford 26 39. Kyle Busch Toyota 21 40. Scott Speed Toyota 21 41. Terry Cook Chevrolet 20 42. Johnny Chapman Chevrolet 12 43. Dennis Setzer Dodge 3
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