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Tony Stewart won from the pole in the NASCAR Nationwide series Aarons 312 at the Talladega Superspeedway. The win marked the first time in his career that Stewart has won at the Alabama facility.

“I don’t care if it’s a bicycle race — I finally won a race at Talladega.” Said Stewart. “I’m not going to be able to sleep tonight. I really wish I could put into words how excited I am because this is not just like winning any Nationwide race. To me, this is the biggest one I’ve had. To finally win at Talladega is something that I wish I could put into words right now.”

Stewart dominated the race leading five times for a total of eighty one laps. For the most part, Stewarts only challenger was Dale Earnhardt Jr, who spent most of the race drafting with winner. After a late race caution restarted the event with three laps remaining, Jr was unable to hook up with a dance partner as Stewart pulled away to a .302 second lead to claim his second superspeedway win of the year, backing up his Daytona win back in February.

Stewart was followed in by David Stremme, Bobby Hamilton Jr, Jason Leffler and Mark Green to round out the top five. Dale Earnhardt Jr finished sixth. Veteran Morgan Sheppard finished sixteenth, giving him one of the best finishes the team has had in recent memory. Only sixteen of the starting forty three cars finished on the lead lap as the event was marred by eight caution flags, including three multi-car incidents and a red flag.

The first incident occurred early when Dario Franchitti blew a tire on lap twelve collecting several other cars including the championship point’s leader Clint Bowyer. Franchitti blew the tire and climbed up the track and then slid down into oncoming traffic to be T-boned by Larry Gunselman. Both Franchitti and Gunselman had to be transported to a local hospital with Franchitti suffering a fractured ankle.

The biggest incident of the day occurred on lap seventy one. The wreck involved fifteen cars and took out several contenders including Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards. The melee was caused when Kevin LePage jumped the blend line coming off pit road to pull in front of the lead pack causing absolute carnage on the speedway.

The field was red flagged to clean up the racing surface.

LePage was not the only driver who had trouble with the blend line rule. Clint Bowyer was penalized with a drive through penalty earlier in the event for a blending violation.

Gillett/Evernham driver Patrick Carpentier was penalized twice for the same infraction, the second penalty requiring him to turn his engine off on pit road at the direction of a NACAR official.

Initially, Carpentier accused NASCAR of changing the rules from what was described during the drivers meeting. He believed the officials description allowed drivers to move up the track as long as the cars left side tires where on the yellow line through turn two.

After meeting with NASCAR officials, the Canadian driver acknowledged he mis-understood the rule.

The win marked the forth consecutive win for Joe Gibbs Racing. The Previous three Nationwide events have been won by Stewart’s teammate Kyle Busch.

Leaving Alabama, Clint Bowyer remains the point’s leader just thirty nine markers ahead of Carl Edwards. The top five positions in the points are separated by 145 points as the series heads to Richmond International Raceway where Kyle Busch is the defending race winner.

Race Notes

Dale Earnhardt Jr and Jr/Hendrick Motorsports have added the spring race at the Lowes Motor Speedway to his limited Schedule. The event will be run in conjunction with a recruiting drive affiliated with the team Navy Sponsorship.

Kevin Harvick Incorporated announced it has instituted a random drug testing policy for all of there employees. Harvick was openly critical of NASCAR’s drug testing policy following Aaron Fike’s public comments that he drove in the truck series while under the influence of a narcotic.