Something happened at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway on Sunday that we weren’t expecting, Jimmie Johnson wasn’t in Victory Lane.
Instead, Jeff Gordon, whose had a tumultuous NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season made a late race pass on Matt Kenseth and scored his eighth career win at the 0.526-mile oval in the 65th annual Goody’s Headache Relief Shot 500 Powered by Kroger.
“It’s hard to top what it feels like to win; especially when you’ve been through all of what this Drive to End Hunger Chevrolet team has been through,” said Gordon, who with his triumph earned a bid into the 2014 All-Star race at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway.
“I’m just so proud of them for never giving up. We’ve shown it all year long. We’ve been through a lot, but boy this is making it all worth it.”
Gordon wasn’t the only topic of conversation Sunday. The race for the Chase intensified as Matt Kenseth and Jimmie Johnson will now head to Texas Motor Speedway, site of next Sunday’s AAA 500 tied for the championship lead with three races to go. Johnson, third on the all-time win list at the historic oval failed to dominate at his most successful track and finished fifth, allowing Kenseth to erase his four-point margin.
It appeared heading into the race that Johnson would have a huge advantage over Kenseth at Martinsville. While Johnson entered with eight career wins, 16 top-five and 20 top-10 finishes in 23 career starts at the track, Kenseth had never won and had registered only three top-five and eight top-10 finishes in 27 career starts. To put it in even better perspective, Johnson entered the day having led a total of 2,327 laps in his career at Martinsville; Kenseth had led a total of 169 out of more than 13,000 laps he had run there.
Realistically, those numbers meant nothing when it came right down to the only short track in the Chase.
Kenseth was unable to withstand a late race charge from Gordon, another Chase driver entering the final 25 laps and Gordon in his No. 24 Drive to End Hunger Chevrolet SS utilized lap-traffic including his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Kasey Kahne to catch Kenseth, who led the most laps in the 3 hour 44 minutes and 21 seconds event with 202.
Sunday’s race was filled with a little bit of everything. There was contact, there was drama and there were cautions. 17 cautions in all for 111 laps. Surprisingly though, the last 77 laps of the event went caution-free and without any major serious tension. Oddly enough.
Denny Hamlin, the hometown favorite scored his season-high fifth pole of the year on Friday and led the first two laps, before Johnson took command on Lap 3 and held it for 22 laps, before another Chase contender Kyle Busch sporting the Halloween look in his No. 18 M&Ms Toyota Camry led for 12 laps, before Kenseth, who started fourth mounted his charge to the front.
Kenseth would lead a whopping 74 laps, until Johnson reassumed the point on Lap 111. Johnson seemed to be settling into his dominate ways until the caution flag flew for an expired motor for Ganassi development driver Kyle Larson, in his second career NCSCS start. Jeff Burton, who brought out the first caution flag of the day for a spin on Lap 8 utilized strategy to put him in the lead for five laps.
From there, Johnson and Kenseth would exchange the top spot for a course of 58 circuits, before Clint Bowyer also utilizing a varying strategy darted his No. 15 5-hour Energy Toyota Camry out front. Bowyer, another championship hopeful would guide the field for 44 laps until 42-year old Jeff Gordon extended his Hendrick Motorsports machine to the front for the first time of the afternoon.
Denny Hamlin, who found himself involved in a five-car incident in Turn 1 with Aric Almirola, Kasey Kahne, Ken Schrader and Martin Truex Jr. on Lap 183 fought through the pack to put himself back into contention on Lap 339 for 12 laps.
Bowyer would again put himself back in front trading the lead with Kenseth, but when Cole Whitt crashed in Turn 4 on Lap 366, pit road would open up and become a busy place. Elliott Sadler in place of Brian Vickers, who’s sidelined with blood clots stayed out and inherited the lead, but his time at the front was short lived with Kenseth resuming sole control on Lap 374.
After the 17th caution flag flew on Lap 417 for debris in Turn 1, many didn’t expect that to the final caution of the event. But, it was and the pressure built on the competitors behind the Joe Gibbs Racing driver to catch him.
The opportunity to pounce came on Lap 479 as Gordon utilized momentum to make a clever pass on Kenseth entering Turn 1. From there, it was game over for Kenseth and the rest of the field as the four-time champion soared to his 88th career victory in 722 starts.
“To be able to get a huge win here at Martinsville for points for the Manufacturers’’ Championship, for all the Hendrick family and for all those that were lost several years ago; seeing Rick Hendrick) here means a lot to all of us. I thought we’d given it (the win) away a couple of times there, and I’m so just proud of how we fought.”
Kenseth reflected on an exceptional day by saying, I have nothing to complain about, just you always feel bad when you’re leading at the end and your crew puts you out front and you can’t hold on to win. So, I’m disappointed about that. But, just Jeff’s (Gordon) experience here got me. I’m just not that experienced running upfront here and I had something that was working, but I was kind of hurting the rear tires and I hurt the front tires too. But, overall, what a great day. Just thanks to Dollar General and JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing), it was a good day for us.”
Kenseth, who tallied his 10th top-five of the season finished ahead of Clint Bowyer. Reining Sprint Cup champion Brad Keselowski was fourth and Johnson fifth.
Kevin Harvick, who endured an up and down day took sixth, while pole sitter Denny Hamlin settled for seventh, Dale Earnhardt Jr. eighth, Greg Biffle ninth and Jamie McMurray comprised the remainder of the top-10.
Danica Patrick earned a solid 17th place finish after starting 41st. It was her eighth top-20 finish of the year driving the No. 10 GoDaddy Breast Cancer Awareness Chevrolet SS. At one point, Patrick raced her way into the top-10 before being shuffled back in the final 100 laps.
Other Chase drivers in the field: Carl Edwards (12th); Joey Logano (14th); Kyle Busch (15th); Kurt Busch (18th); Kasey Kahne (27th) and Ryan Newman (38th).
As they leave Martinsville, Kenseth and Johnson are tied for the points with Jeff Gordon in third (-27), Harvick fourth (-28), Kyle Busch fifth (–36). Clint Bowyer sixth (-55), Dale Earnhardt Jr. seventh (-56), Greg Biffle eighth (-58), Kurt Busch ninth (-75), Carl Edwards 10th (-76), Joey Logano 11th (-85), Ryan Newman 12th (-106) and Kasey Kahne 13th (-124).
The homestretch is here for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. The series’ heads for the Lone Star State to the “Wild Circuit Asphalt” at Texas Motor Speedway for the running of the AAA 500 on Sunday, November 3. The event will be broadcasted live on ESPN, the Performance Racing Network and SiriusXM Satellite Radio (channel 90).
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
