Hampton, GA (Best E Casino)- Youngster Carl Edwards captured Sunday's Bass Pro Shops MBNA 500 for a season sweep at the Atlanta Motor Speedway. The No.99 Ford crossed the finish line 2.712 seconds ahead of Jeff Gordon and then finished the day off with his patented winning backflip.
The victory was Edwards' third of the season.
"This is unbelievable," said Edwards, who moved to within 107 points of the lead. "We need to do this for three more weeks and we'll be all right. I just want to thank everyone in the engine department, theses motors are unbelievable."
Pole winner Ryan Newman brought the field to the green flag for the first of 325 laps, but he didn't even lead the first lap, Elliott Sadler did.
On lap six, Mike Skinner blew a tire and spun out Kevin Lepage. In the aftermath, "Chase" driver Rusty Wallace suffered front-end damage - a devastating blow to his championship hopes.
"This pretty much knocks us out (of the title race), three races in a row we had bad luck," said Wallace.
Edwards and Mark Martin also led laps and collected bonus points.
On the move, however, was Dale Earnhardt Jr. who started 17th on the grid and pulled in behind Martin for second place on lap 25. But "Junior" couldn't get past him.
Martin, though, had his own problems when he was caught speeding on pit road. That left the No.6 Ford at the end of the longest line, in 26th place and gave the lead to "Junior."
Meanwhile, two other "Chase" drivers were having problems. Jeremy Mayfield was in the garage with engine problems and Greg Biffle had a tire run flat.
Tony Stewart took his first lead of the day on lap 59. But he only held in for one lap before Earnhardt Jr. gathered his No.8 Chevrolet and retook the top spot.
Martin was still the fastest car on the track and by lap 65 was already up to 14th place. He re-joined the top-10 on lap 71. While the Martin was working his way through the field, Earnhardt Jr. was expanding his lead to three seconds after 100 laps.
Earnhardt Jr. had a lead of almost six second when defending series champion Kurt Busch had a right-front tire blow and he slammed into the outside wall on lap 122.
The damage was extensive and effectively ended the No.97 Roush Racing Ford driver's chances at repeating as champion.
By lap 125 Martin was up to fifth place, but it was getting much tougher to pass the faster cars.
Kyle Busch put it together after the next caution and passed "Junior" for the lead on lap 131. Biffle followed Busch at the bottom of the track for second place just before Reed Sorenson and Kasey Kahne crashed in turn three of lap 133.
Earnhardt Jr. grabbed the lead just after the green flag came out to restart the race. Gordon and Martin followed "Junior" in second and third, respectively.
While Gordon and Martin battled each other for second, Earnhardt Jr. built his lead to almost six second again. Then Earnhardt's teammate, Martin Truex Jr. scraped the wall bringing out a caution flag and erasing "Junior's" big lead. After the restart he re-established his dominance moving out to a 1.091-second lead on lap 176.
Two drivers whose cars were improving over the afternoon were Jimmie Johnson and Jamie McMurray. Johnson moved into seventh place on lap 175 and McMurray also joined the top-10.
As the field approached the 190-lap mark it appeared that while Earnhardt Jr., was leading, the Roush Racing were beginning to establish themselves as the main threat to win the race.
Earnhardt still led by one second, but behind him was Martin, Edwards, Matt Kenseth and Biffle - all Roush Racing employees.
This time on the restart, Edwards stayed with "Junior" and would be denied. On lap 207, Edwards was credited with the lead as the two battled side-by-side. Edwards took the lead for good on the next lap and even opened up a working margin on Earnhardt Jr. with 115 laps to go.
Martin moved past "Junior" into second place as Edwards expanded his lead to 1.198 seconds over his teammate.
Following caution No.8, Martin took the lead over Edwards, but Edwards had gotten off to slow starts after every pit stop. On lap 243, Edwards re-took the lead and off he went. His margin was half-a-second two laps later and 2.124 with 75 laps to go. In fact, Gordon was catching Martin for second place.
Gordon passed Martin on lap 250 and took dead aim on Edwards. But the No.24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet couldn't make a dent on Edwards' lead either. The margin kept getting bigger, 3.222 seconds on lap 260.
In the "race within the race," points leader Stewart was solidly in the top-10 at seventh, but Jimmie Johnson's car was suddenly not working very well and the No.48 Chevrolet had fallen to 17th with 50 laps to go.
Edwards continued to put the "pedal to the metal" and his lead ballooned to 5.948 seconds on lap 280.
A debris caution on lap 284 cost Edwards his big margin but after everyone pitted Edwards was still the leader. Behind him was Kenseth, Earnhardt Jr., Martin and Gordon.
On the restart, Kenseth jumped Edwards and led a lap for the first time on the afternoon, but Edwards took it right back on the backstretch. "Junior" passed Kenseth for second place with 29 laps to go, but he was more than half-a- second behind Edwards.
Edwards was in clean air while Earnhardt Jr. and Gordon fought over second place and he expanded his margin to 1.472 second with 25 laps remaining. Gordon passed the No.8 Chevrolet, but it seemed that without a caution flag to close the gap, he had no shot at the No.99 Roush Ford.
There was no caution and Gordon didn't get a look at Edwards. Edwards took the checkered flag comfortably ahead of the four-time series champion to complete a sweep of both Atlanta Nextel Cup races.
"I'm so proud of this team, we're coming," said Gordon after a win and a second place the last two weeks. "Carl drove a great race, he's a heck of a race car driver."
Martin, Earnhardt Jr. and Kenseth completed the top-five.
After seven of 10 events in NASCAR's "Chase for the Nextel Cup" Tony Stewart holds a 43-point lead over Jimmie Johnson.
The next race is scheduled for Sunday, November 6th at the Texas Motor Speedway.
