Earlier in the week the car owner switched up the crew chiefs of his NASCAR Nationwide teams and the switch enabled Carl Edwards to pull out his first Nationwide win of the season Saturday night in the Milwaukee 250 at The Milwaukee Mile.
Edwards celebrated with a Polish victory lap after taking the checkered flag, but did not take his regular celebratory back flip out of respect to some peers who endured adverse situations earlier in the day.
The defending series champion had gone 36 races without a victory, and team owner Jack Roush decided that was enough.
Edwards’ last victory was at Nashville in June 2007, and though he won the then-Busch Series title last year, Edwards didn’t win the second half of the season.
“It just feels good to win a race ... for our team, for everybody at the shop and all the guys who have been working hard and sticking with this program even though we haven’t won a race in a long time,” Edwards said. “It means a lot to have all that support. This win is a huge relief.”
Edwards wasn’t the only driver to draw scrutiny for less-than-tactful driving tactics, as Logano’s earlier run-in with Brad Keselowski might have been a sign of things to come from the 18-year-old Joe Gibbs Racing ace.
Logano, who became the youngest winner in series history at Kentucky Speedway last weekend, went fender-to-fender with Keselowski to take the lead with 79 laps to go and appeared to be in position for remarkable back-to-back wins.
But Logano was shuffled back to fourth on the final round of pit stops — rubbing fenders with Bowyer on pit road — setting up a showdown between Bowyer and Edwards.
Bowyer slipped past Edwards to take the lead with 39 laps to go. But Edwards got Bowyer back after a restart, getting underneath him in Turn 2 and knocking him sideways to take the lead with 25 to go. Bowyer recovered, but slipped to third as Logano drove past him.
Logano finished second in Joe Gibbs Racing’s Toyota, with Bowyer hanging on for third in Richard Childress Racing’s Chevrolet”. David Ragan (Roush Fenway) was fourth, with David Reutimann (Michael Waltrip Racing) fifth.
Scott Wimmer, Mike Bliss, Brad Keselowski, Jason Keller and Jason Leffler rounded out the top 10.
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