SPORTS6B Monday, May 23, 2011 Brainerd Dispatch | www.brainerddispatch.com

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Laura Ellingson • 218-855-5823

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CONCORD, N.C. (AP) — The race wasbilled as a throwback to the Wild West,and track officials practically promisedscores would be settled in the $1 millionSprint All-Star Race.

Only the knock ’em down action nevercame, and the only fireworks were thosein Saturday night’s post-race show atCharlotte Motor Speedway. The onlydrama came after Carl Edwards took thecheckered flag during his celebratory slidethrough the grass.

Although he appeared to hit either amanhole cover or a drainage device, hiscar instead seemed only to dip hard intothe grass — contact that crumpled thefront of his No. 99 Roush Fenway RacingFord.

After his trademark celebratory back-flip, Edwards needed a tow truck to takehim to Victory Lane. He left behind a deeprut in Charlotte’s infield grass.

“You never know what comes from mis-fortunes and it was definitely unfortu-nate,” Edwards said. “Pretty wild twist offate that we tore it up, but I’m going tohave faith something good will come fromit.”

Edwards had a sheepish grin as heclimbed out his window for his customarycelebratory backflip, and he apologized tocrew chief Bob Osborne for wrecking thecar.

“That’s a million dollars. We just won amillion dollars,” Edwards said fromVictory Lane. “I feel so bad about tearingup the car. But I’m sure Bob’s got a betterone.”

Edwards won three of the four seg-ments in the 100-lap race, but still hadone last pit stop and a 10-lap sprint to thefinish before he could claim his first All-Star victory. NASCAR brought the field infor a 10-minute break following the thirdsegment, then sent the cars back to thetrack for parade laps before they wererequired to return to pit road for a four-tire stop.

The stop is where the pit crews havetheir chance to shine in this event, andEdwards’ team delivered. He came in asthe leader and left as the leader, beatingBusch back onto the track.

Edwards then got a terrific jump on therestart and easily pulled away.

“As far as he jumped out on me reallysurprised me,” Busch said. “He took off sofar, I was like ‘Damn, there ain’t no way Iam going to be able to run him down inthis short period of time.”’

Edwards praised his Roush-Yatesengine for the speed he had throughoutthe race, and for the restart that helpedhim pull away from Busch.

“The restart was good, and man, thatthing, it really runs,” Edwards said.

Busch, who has a history of wreckingcars capable of winning the All-Star race,settled for second in a Toyota and willbring the car back next week as his back-up for the Coca-Cola 600.

“Considering our fleet has been gettinga little bit low, this is pretty good,” Buschsaid of his second-place finish. “I didn’tput a scratch on it. It was a good one.”

Edwards had little time to celebrate.He was off after the race to catch a flightto Iowa to run the Nationwide Series raceon Sunday.

“I really can’t wait to go,” he said. “Themost enjoyable thing I can do is go raceanother car.”

Most everyone else will have to wait fornext week’s Coca-Cola 600, the longestrace of the NASCAR season. The All-Starrace is usually the warm-up act for the600, and the final 10 laps of Saturdaynight have always been billed as a wild,dash for the cash.

But the excitement never came, as thedrivers raced clean and caution free.

“This was a pretty tame night, at leastfrom the All-Star perspective,” TonyStewart said.

David Reutimann was third in a Toyotaand followed by Stewart, who celebratedhis 40th birthday a day earlier.

Greg Biffle was fifth, Matt Kensethwas sixth and RFR teammate DavidRagan was eighth to put all four of theteam’s car inside the top eight. Ragan wonthe Sprint Showdown qualifier earlierSaturday to earn his spot in the field.

Denny Hamlin was seventh. KevinHarvick was ninth and Ryan Newmanrounded out the top 10.

Kurt Busch’s struggles continuedSaturday night and he sounded despon-dent over his team’s performance formuch of the event. He finished 13th. Histeammate, Brad Keselowski, finished18th after moving into the All-Star racewith a second-place finish in the qualifier.

Dale Earnhardt Jr., made his way intothe race by winning the fan vote that putsa third driver from the Sprint Showdowninto the main event. But he had nothingfor the contenders in the All-Star race andfinished 14th.

Edwards rolls to easy win in All-Star Race

NEWTON, Iowa (AP) — With most ofthe Sprint Cup stars busy with the All-Star Race at Charlotte, the NASCARNationwide race at Iowa Speedway wasthe perfect opportunity for one of theregulars in that series to to win for thefirst time this season.

The breakthrough was provided byRicky Stenhouse Jr. — and it wasn’t afluke either.

Stenhouse held off the only Cuppoints contenders in the field, CarlEdwards and Brad Keselowski, andbecame the first Nationwide regular topick up a victory since Justin Allgaierwon at Bristol in March of 2010.

“I think it feels good for theNationwide guys. I don’t think we’re theonly Nationwide regular that’s going towin a race this year,” Stenhouse said.“To be that first one it feels good. I feellike since we got that first one out of theway, hopefully the next few will be a lit-tle easier.”

Edwards, who won the Sprint All-Star Race at Charlotte on Saturdaynight, fell behind his Roush-Fenwayteammate with 18 laps to go and fin-ished second.

Keselowski, who captured the inau-gural Nationwide event at Iowa in 2009,was third, followed by Reed Sorensonand Elliott Sadler.

Kenny Wallace, whose brother Rustydesigned Iowa’s 7/8th-mile oval, joinedJason Keller as the only drivers to run500 Nationwide races. He finished aseason-best sixth.

Roush-Fenway teammates Stenhouseand Edwards swapped the lead a num-ber of times down the stretch, butStenhouse slipped free late and beatEdwards by over four seconds.

Stenhouse came out on top after the17th and final lead change of the raceand earned his first victory in 51 starts,giving the entire Nationwide series aboost in the process.

“I’m very happy for Ricky,”Keselowski said. “It’s good to see aNationwide regular come out there andwin a race. It’s been a little while.”

Allgaier, who started in the backafter wrecking his main car in practice,stayed out while others were pitting

and took a brief lead about 40 laps fromthe finish. Brian Scott then spun out infront of the leaders, drawing out a cau-tion flag that put Edwards back in frontwith Stenhouse.

Given recent history, it seemedinevitable that Edwards would eventu-ally grab the lead and pull off the week-end sweep. But it was Stenhouse’s No. 6car that proved to be the strongest.

“The Mustang was just so fast allday. I was babying there for a littlewhile and riding around with Carl, but Ithink when I drove it hard, it wouldtake it,” Stenhouse said.

Edwards didn’t crumple the No. 60car like he did to the No. 99 after win-ning the All-Star Race Saturday night,but in hindsight he might have tweakedit a bit too much during a late pit stop.

“I asked for some adjustments that Iprobably should have not asked for andRicky was able to hold on for the win. Ithink our cars were about the samespeed. He was just out front, and manhe was wheeling it,” Edwards said.

The field was set on owner’s pointswith qualifying rained out. That putDrew Herring of Joe Gibbs Racing onthe pole, even though Herring hadn’trun a Nationwide race all year until hegot to Iowa.

Herring started strong, leading forthe first 38 laps before being passedMichael McDowell in Kyle Busch’s No.18 Toyota. McDowell led for 19 laps,more than double the total he had in 72previous series starts.

Predictably, both faded. They finishedwell, though, with McDowell taking sev-enth and Herring clearing in 12th.

Sunday also marked the first timethree women ran the same Nationwiderace. Veteran Jennifer Jo Cobb startedalong with the Cope twins, Angela andAmber, who were making their seriesdebuts.

Both Copes ran into trouble midwaythrough the race, spinning out in simi-lar fashion. Cobb was 26th, Angela fin-ished 28th and Amber was 32nd.

This was the first of two Nationwideevents at Iowa this season after the rel-atively new track drew strong crowdsfor solo races in 2009 and 2010.

Stenhouse wins Nationwide race in Iowa