Joey Logano impressively held off his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch on old tires after a late-race restart to win Friday’s Dollar General 300 Nationwide Series race at Chicagoland Speedway.
Logano passed Busch for the lead just before a caution for debris came with less than 20 laps to go. While Busch and the other leaders pitted for new tires, Logano’s crew chief, Dave Rogers, elected to keep his driver on the track. Jason Leffler also did not pit. Kansas City Star
“I can’t believe it, dude—he’s driving away from me!” Busch radioed after the final restart.
In fact, Logano pulled away to win by 2.619 seconds over Busch, who nevertheless extended his lead in the Nationwide standings to 192 points over sixth-place finisher Carl Edwards. Brian Vickers ran third, followed by Leffler and Kevin Harvick.
“We thought we got beat there at the end,” said Logano, who won his third race of the season and his first at Chicagoland. “Everybody else took tires except for the 38 [Leffler] ... But the clean air was big.” NASCAR.com
Crew chief Dave Rogers said he made the call to keep Logano on the track because the No. 20 Toyota turned its fastest laps during practice on old tires.
“I knew old tires had them in it,” Rogers said.
NASCAR Nationwide Series: Chicagoland Speedway - Race Results
Busch was second. Brian Vickers, Jason Leffler and Kevin Harvick rounded out the top five.
“Joey had a better car than us tonight,” Busch said.
Busch kept his overall points lead over pole winner Carl Edwards. It was the fourth 1-2 Logano-Busch combination finish this year. The Associated Press
Brad Keselowski’s championship hopes suffered a severe blow when he ran out of fuel before pitting on Lap 57 during the first green-flag run of the race. Keselowski lost two laps before his crew could get the stalled No. 88 Chevrolet refired. Though he rallied for an 18th-place finish and held third in the Nationwide standings, Keselowski fell 334 points behind Busch. NASCAR.com
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