Edwards Wins Wet AAA Texas 500

Originally written for CLNS Radio

Carl Edwards won the AAA Texas 500 from Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday night after rain ended the race with 40 laps to go.

Edwards raced Martin Truex Jr. over the final 100 laps for the lead, but it wasn’t until the final pit stop that Edwards was able to get out front.  Edwards’ team got him the lead, and he ran away from Truex and Joey Logano until the rain came.

 

Sarah Crabill (Getty Images)

Edwards said his team’s fast pit stop got him the victory.

“[Crew chief] Dave Rogers and the guys, they got me off pit road first and that’s what won it for us,” Edwards said.  “I’ve got an amazing group of guys; they work so well together.  My pit crew has worked really hard this year.”

Rain delayed the start of the race by almost five hours, changing it from a day race to a night race that promised to have major Chase implications.  Edwards came into the race needing a victory after finishing 36th at Martinsville one week ago.

“This was a test; we came in and knew what we had to do, and we performed the way we needed to,” Edwards said.  “I really believe we can do that at Homestead.”

“We’ve got a shot at the championship, and that’s all we wanted this year.nnI can’t wait to go to Homestead; it’s going to be a blast.”

Logano finished second after leading 178 of 293 laps.  Logano said the handle on his car went away in the middle of the race, but his team continued to work hard to give him a shot at the victory over the final run.

“We had a good restart there at the end, and started running down the 19 [of Edwards] that last two or three laps, and I thought we could get…back out front,” Logano said.  “It’d have been interesting to see if we’d gotten another 10 to 15 laps...but it is what it is.”

Unofficial results:

1. Carl Edwards

2. Joey Logano

3. Martin Truex Jr.

4. Chase Elliott

5. Kyle Busch

6. Kevin Harvick

7. Matt Kenseth

8. Kasey Kahne

9. Denny Hamlin

10. Ryan Newman

11. Jimmie Johnson

12. Ryan Blaney

13. Alex Bowman

14. Brad Keselowski

15. Kyle Larson

16. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

17. AJ Allmendinger

18. Greg Biffle

19. Jamie McMurray

20. Kurt Busch

21. Chris Buescher

22. Aric Almirola

23. Michael McDowell

24. Danica Patrick

25. Clint Bowyer

26. Regan Smith

27. Brian Scott

28. Paul Menard

29. Landon Cassill

30. Trevor Bayne

31. Tony Stewart

32. Michael Annett

33. David Ragan

34. Jeffrey Earnhardt

35. Reed Sorenson

36. Joey Gase

37. Austin Dillon

38. Ryan Ellis

39. Casey Mears

40. Josh Wise

Jerry Markland (Getty Images)