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Kyle Busch beat Carl Edwards out of the pits on their final stop, then held off the defending NASCAR Nationwide Series champion in overtime for his second straight victory Friday night at Phoenix International Raceway.
A series of late-race caution flags on the mile oval hampered Edwards, who appeared to have a faster car at the end and remained winless in 2008 in the series formerly known as Busch.
Busch led 133 of the 202 laps, the most of any driver.
This was the first time in the history of the spring race that the pole sitter wound up in victory lane.
“It was a good race,” Busch said. “In the beginning, we felt like we had the car to beat. It was the class of the field.”
Edwards had seized the lead on lap 160, when he slipped by Busch and opened a 1.5-second lead in just five laps. His advantage grew to 2.16 seconds on lap 169, but a caution flag on lap 178 erased his edge, which had swelled to three seconds just before the yellow came out and changed the race.
“That caution was really bad for us. We were extremely fast and superior there,” Edwards said.
“It would be a better deal if it was 210 or 200 laps,” Edwards joked. “It was a fun race, too bad somebody’s gotta finish second. Second is no fun. These cars aren’t as much fun to drive on 1 1/2-mile tracks . .. but fun at these short tracks.”
“You’re able to race side by side, and to go down to the wire with Kyle was really cool. He earned it.”
On the flip side, the flag came out at just the right time for Busch.
“There was still going to be a round of green-flag pit stops,” Busch said. “We were going to be two laps short and I backed off to save some fuel. I was going to try and stretch it and see if we could make it the whole way.”
The lead went back and forth, changing hands a track-record 14 times between five drivers. Denny Hamlin led 18 laps, Brad Keselowski led nine and Jeff Burton led four. The nine cautions slowed the field down for 36 laps.
Quality work by Busch’s pit crew over the course of nine caution flags played a key role.
“Those boys won the race for us tonight,” said Busch, who prevailed a week ago in Texas and made it two straight in the series at PIR.
“He had a great, great car and it was just a great night for us,” Busch said. “Luckily, we kept getting those cautions and we kept getting a little two-lap jump on him. He had a better car on longer runs. We got good restarts and it was good he gave me a lot of room to race him.”
Busch, who moved from fifth to third in the season points, said the other key to this victory was getting out of the pits first on the last stop.
“It was much easier trying to race up front than having to pass him,” Busch noted.
Edwards agreed, saying, “He got us off pit road and that hurt us a little bit.”
Before leaving the postrace press conference, Edwards, who has three victories in seven Sprint Cup events heading into Saturday night’s Phoenix race, said, “Tell (Busch) I’m coming for him tomorrow. “
Denny Hamlin finished third, followed by former series champion Kevin Harvick, David Ragan, Mike Bliss and Stephen Leicht. Series leader Clint Bowyer, who fell from fifth to 13th when he was penalized late in the race for speeding on pit road, wound up eighth and now leads Edwards by just 24 points.
