Kyle Busch had dominated much of 2008 and came into the 2008 Chase for the Cup as the point leader. That was short lived though as he had a suspension failure. Kyle Busch had a very long day.
Qualifying
For the second week in a row qualifying was rained out. As a result the starting lineup was set once again based on car owner points. The top five when they took the green flag were Kyle Busch, Carl Edwards, Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Clint Bowyer.
Drop Of The Green
Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards got free on the start and lead the first lap in single file. Edwards got past Busch and picked up his five bonus points for leading on lap five.
Storylines
Big news early in the race as point leader Kyle Busch had a suspension failure early in the race. His car was well off the pace and he started to fall back through the field.
Busch's JGR team got a chance to work on it during the competition caution on lap 35. When the race went green on lap 41 Kyle's car was still not fixed and he was one lap down.
On lap 83 Kyle finally spun the car. Although he didn't hit anything when he spun David Ragan and Jamie McMurray got together during the incident and McMurray spun into Kyle Busch causing significant damage to the #18.
This is not how Kyle wanted to start his 2008 Chase.
Chasing The Checkers
Jimmie Johnson was out front for most of the last 100 laps. Greg Biffle was running second with Carl Edwards and Jeff Burton in third and fourth. This running order stayed pretty static through a number of cautions and one red flag.
The final green flew with 13 laps to go. Jimmie Johnson got a clean start but Greg Biffle got past with just a dozen laps remaining. Apparently Biffle had been saving something for the end. He was able to hold off Johnson and claim the New Hampshire win.
Top Ten
- Greg Biffle
- Jimmie Johnson
- Carl Edwards
- Jeff Burton
- Dale Earnhardt Jr.
- Kurt Busch
- Martin Truex Jr.
- Tony Stewart
- Denny Hamlin
- Kevin Harvick
The Points
Carl Edwards and Jimmie Johnson are now tied atop the Sprint Cup points. Greg Biffle's win moved him up six places to third. Biffle is now just 30 points behind the two leaders.
Kyle Busch was leading coming into this race. He now finds himself all the way back in eighth 74 points behind the leaders.
- Carl Edwards -0
- Jimmie Johnson -0
- Greg Biffle -30
- Dale Earnhardt Jr. -50
- Jeff Burton -50
- Denny Hamlin -72
- Tony Stewart -73
- Kyle Busch -74
- Clint Bowyer -83
- Kevin Harvick -86
- Jeff Gordon -99
- Matt Kenseth -177
Next Week
Next weekend the Monster Mile in Dover Delaware will host Chase race #2. When we visited Dover in June Kyle Busch made his way to Victory Lane. After his terrible Chase start today a 2008 Dover sweep would help him get back into this battle.
