Royal Purple 200

The famed Darlington Raceway held true to form this week with challenges abounding for new father Carl Edwards and his #60 Roush Fenway Racing team.  Rainstorms washed out qualifying, so the lineup was set according to practice speeds.  Kyle Busch sat on the pole, with Clint Bowyer, Carl Edwards, Kasey Kahne and Reed Sorenson earning the top five spots.  By lap 2, Edwards made a power pass on the #18 car to take the lead.  That was when the first hint troubles and oddities would strike the #60 Mustang.  Carl reported his rear window braces had broken off at the top of the window.  At lap 16, both Kahne and Busch passed Edwards. Edwards then reported a very stiff throttle pedal.  He was able to move back up to P2 before the competition caution was called on lap 36.

Edwards continued a strong run until just past the halfway point, when he pitted under caution to take four tires and fuel.  The plan was to race to the finish without further stops.  The strategies were as varied as the teams in the race — four tires, two tires, no tires and several teams stayed out.  Edwards found himself in the sixteenth spot.  This put the 60 car in the midst of the big wreck involving Edwards, Brad Keselowski, Aric Almirola, Brian Scott, Mike Bliss, Ryan Truex and Kasey Kahne.  The RFR team managed to stay on the lead lap while making repairs during the extended caution period.  Even with a heavily damaged racecar,  Carl fought his way back to the tenth spot but the hopes of salvaging a top ten finish faded until Carl hit the wall on lap 128.

The second half of the race was dominated by Kyle Busch who drove his #18 Toyota to his first Darlington victory.  Busch was followed by Denny Hamlin, Elliott Sadler, Justin Allgaier and Steve Wallace.  Edwards finished three laps down in 20th place.  Teammates Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. finished in 10th place, and Chris Buescher (subbing for Trevor Bayne in the 16 car) survived a lap 45 crash to finish a respectable 17th place.  Allgaier now holds a slim 5 point lead over Sadler in the points standings.

After the race, Edwards said, “We had a really fast race car, but they were all wrecking. I thought I had it missed and I just got caught in the right-rear. I tried my hardest to miss that, but there was nothing we could do. We got lucky it wasn’t torn up worse, and I thought we were still gonna end up with a top 10, but there was just nothing I could do about it. I blew the right-front or something and hit the fence again, but the guys did a good job.”

The team heads to Dover next Saturday for the 5-Hour Energy 200.