Busch dominates Richmond Busch race

Busch led an impressive 227 of the race's 252 laps, only losing control twice. He was first overtaken by Matt Kenseth on lap 27 but pitstops put him ahead again, and then on lap 141 the Roush Fenway driver passed him again, but spun 18 laps later while trying to avoid a spinning Paul Menard.

The Hendrick Motorsports driver went through to retake the lead and never surrender it for the rest of the distance. Despite a green-white-chequer finish, Busch's strength on the restarts all night allowed him to pull away in the last mile and a half of racing to score a much-deserved victory.

"It was a great battle there with Matt and a lot of fun," said Busch after scoring his ninth Busch Series career victory. "But we had a really great race car and I'm just proud to have been able to drive it tonight.

"Matt got away from me a little bit there and had a pretty good car on that run. He got up to those guys and they were running side by side and I guess they ran into each other, started spinning and then Matt tried checking up and just couldn't get woahed up without spinning."

The last few laps of the race were a bit tense for Busch and his team after he radioed his crew chief to say that he felt like the right rear tyre on his car was going down.

"Everytime I'm going to win one of these things and had a dominant performance something feels like it's going wrong. I was just getting into the corner it was feeling like the sidewall was a little soft and then on the exit I was getting loose too," Busch added.

Points leader Carl Edwards finished second after fending off the late attacks from Ryan Newman. Both of them, as well as Busch, stayed on the track while some of their rivals pitted during the penultimate caution with 14 laps to go.

"I wish I could've put on a better show in the end and try to get Kyle but he had a great car," Edwards said. "But this is what we need to do for the championship, this is great. It's been pretty miserable for us in the last few races but tonight I had a good time."

The gamble of taking on new tyres in the last few laps didn't pay off for Denny Hamlin and Matt Kenseth, who were among the top runners all night but could not contend for victory in the end. Kenseth however recovered from his spin and his late stop to finish fourth.

"A couple of lapped cars got together and slowed down," Kenseth said about the incident. "I got on the brakes and the No 15 (Paul Menard) was so close to me I just couldn't stop to keep from hitting him.

"I turned the wheel a little bit but my car was so loose that I just spun out. I wish we hadn't spun there and had a shot at the fight. I was having a lot of fun racing tonight."

Mike Bliss and Brian Vickers completed solid runs to finish fifth and sixth respectively ahead of Denny Hamlin, while Scott Wimmer delivered another consistent run to cross the finish line eighth ahead of Kasey Kahne and Jason Keller.

AJ Allmendinger had a good race although he was a bit edgy at times. He ran comfortably in the top ten for nearly half of the race but twice had contact while passing other cars and then spun through his own fault with 14 laps to go while running 13th. He eventually came home in 14th.

Last year's race winner Kevin Harvick had a difficult race and was never in contention for victory driving his team's No. 33 entry. His rival for second place in the standings David Reutimann finished just one place ahead of him in 23rd and now the pair are tied in the points behind Carl Edwards.

Pos  Driver                  Make        Laps
 1.  Kyle Busch              Chevrolet    252
 2.  Carl Edwards            Ford         252
 3.  Ryan Newman             Dodge        252
 4.  Matt Kenseth            Ford         252
 5.  Mike Bliss              Dodge        252
 6.  Brian Vickers           Toyota       252
 7.  Denny Hamlin            Chevrolet    252
 8.  Scott Wimmer            Chevrolet    252
 9.  Kasey Kahne             Dodge        252
10.  Jason Keller            Chevrolet    252
11.  Jason Leffler           Toyota       252
12.  Jamie McMurray          Ford         252
13.  Greg Biffle             Ford         252
14.  A.J. Allmendinger       Dodge        252
15.  Marcos Ambrose          Ford         252
16.  Bobby Hamilton Jr       Ford         252
17.  Bobby Labonte           Chevrolet    252
18.  Steve Wallace           Dodge        252
19.  J.J. Yeley              Chevrolet    251
20.  Todd Bodine             Toyota       251
21.  Stephen Leicht          Ford         251
22.  Landon Cassill          Chevrolet    251
23.  David Reutimann         Toyota       250
24.  Kevin Harvick           Chevrolet    250
25.  Bobby East              Ford         250
26.  Kelly Bires             Ford         250
27.  Danny O'Quinn Jr        Chevrolet    250
28.  Mark Green              Chevrolet    250
29.  Kyle Krisiloff          Ford         250
30.  Richard Johns           Ford         249
31.  Mike Wallace            Chevrolet    249
32.  Tim McCreadie           Chevrolet    249
33.  Clint Bowyer            Chevrolet    248
34.  Brent Sherman           Chevrolet    248
35.  Bryan Clauson           Dodge        248
36.  D.J. Kennington         Dodge        247
37.  Derrike Cope            Chevrolet    240
38.  Brad Keselowski         Chevrolet    221
39.  David Ragan             Ford         211
40.  Paul Menard             Chevrolet    158
41.  John Graham             Ford         113
42.  Eric McClure            Chevrolet     45
43.  Kevin Conway            Chevrolet     36