Penske Racing's Justin Allgaier captures first career victory by holding off teammate Brad Keselowski
Justin Allgaier celebrates his first career NASCAR Nationwide Series victory. // Sam Cranston, NASCAR Illustrated
BRISTOL, Tenn. – It wasn't a hauler chat with NASCAR that kept Brad Keselowski from knocking Justin Allgaier out of the way in the closing laps of Saturday's Scotts Turf Builder 300 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Instead, Keselowski, the polesitter, couldn't hold off and then couldn't catch Justin Allgaier, his Penske Racing teammate, who led all 27 laps of the final green-flag run to notch his first Nationwide Series victory.
Allgaier grabbed the lead from Keselowski with an exceptional restart from the inside lane on lap 274. Though Keselowski harried Allgaier through lapped traffic during the run to the finish – and on several occasions pulled alongside Allgaier's No. 12 Dodge – Allgaier ran mistake-free for the final laps and finished .178 seconds ahead of Keselowski.
Joe Gibbs Racing's Kyle Busch led 59 laps – second most to Keselowski's 72 – and finished third. Carl Edwards came home fourth and retained the series points lead by 26 points over Keselowski. Allgaier is third in the standings, 31 points behind Edwards.
Allgaier started 30th after a lackluster qualifying effort but quickly worked his way through the field. Staying out on old tires under caution on lap 147, while many of the other lead-lap cars came to pit road for service, catapulted him to third for a restart on lap 151, and Allgaier spent the rest of the afternoon in the top 10, finally taking the lead on lap 274 of the 300-lap event.
"It was pretty unbelievable," Allgaier said. "We had a great car in practice, and I screwed up qualifying and didn't get the run we really needed and had to start 30th. But [crew chief] Chad [Walter] told me, 'You'll be there all day long, and if you push it really hard, you'll be in victory lane.'
"I wasn't sure we were going to be able to hold off Brad there for the last couple of laps, but Brad drove a heck of a race and ran us really clean. I'm just excited to get a 1-2 for Penske Racing."
The win came approximately eight hours after Keselowski, team owner Roger Penske, Roush Fenway Racing's Carl Edwards and his team co-owner, Jack Roush, met with NASCAR about Edwards' retaliation against Keselowski on March 7 at Atlanta.
Keselowski, who drove for JR Motorsports last year and wrecked Allgaier at Bristol, cut his teammate some slack on the final restart.
"On the restart there, he ran me up pretty high, but I really had no room to be angry with him, because last year I wrecked him in a really similar instance," Keselowski said. "I lifted and let him in and lost the lead there. I thought I had a shot at getting it back, but I just didn't catch the right breaks, as far as boxing him out in lapped traffic.
"This [Penske] Nationwide program is really in its infancy stages. It has limitless potential, and it's important that – in order for that potential to grow – that we don't self-destruct."
Edwards finished fourth while Kevin Harvick spun Joey Logano on the final lap to capture fifth.
