Logano Wins Nationwide Race At Kansas
KANSAS CITY, Kan.(Oct. 2, 2010) — Polesitter Joey Logano was tired of finishing second — and on Saturday at Kansas Speedway, he did something about it.
With a push from NASCAR Nationwide Series points leader Brad Keselowski, Logano pulled away from Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch after a restart on Lap 199 of 200 and held on to win the Kansas Lottery 300.
“It definitely gets frustrating, when you feel like you should have won a lot more races than what you have this season,” said Logano, who has finished second six times this year and four times since his last victory in the series, which came at Kentucky in June. “But it also makes you want it a little bit more and makes it a little bit sweeter when you do win.”
Logano took the lead from Busch on a restart on Lap 194, when he ran Busch up the track and forced his teammate to back out of the gas. One lap later, Aric Almirola spun into the wall to cause the eighth and final caution and set up the two-lap sprint to the finish.
Right after caution flag waved, Busch gave Logano’s car a bump to express his displeasure.
“We’ll talk about it and get over it,” Logano said.
The victory was Logano’s second of the season, the eighth of his career and his second at the 1.5-mile track, making him Kansas’ first repeat winner in the Nationwide Series.
Keselowski passed Busch off the final corner to secure the runner-up position, as Busch crossed the stripe in third. Kevin Harvick and Martin Truex Jr. finished fourth and fifth, respectively.
“We’re just a little bit off the Gibbs cars speed-wise,” said Keselowski, who extended his lead in the Nationwide standings to 374 points over second place Carl Edwards, who finished 14th despite spinning into the Turn 2 wall on Lap 67. “We had some good strategy there, and we got in front of them, but we just didn’t have quite enough to keep in front of them.
“I’m proud of our effort, and we’ll just keep digging.”
Notes: In his first trip in the No. 99 Michael Waltrip Racing Toyota, Ryan Truex finished 15th. … Trevor Bayne, whom Truex replaced, didn’t fare as well in his debut in Roush Fenway Racing’s No. 17 Ford. Bayne’s spin on Lap 189 caused the seventh caution of the race. He finished 30th. … The win clinched the series manufacturers’ championship for Toyota.
