Best of 2011: Regan Smith’s Darlington win tops list of best on-track moves

Last-lap passes by veteran drivers and surprising victories by previously winless teams weren’t the exception during the 2011 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season, they were the norm.

Four races saw the lead change hands on the final lap and five first-time winners, the most since 2002, had been crowned by season’s end.

Kevin Harvick’s ability to seemingly come from out of nowhere to pull off the win – feats he accomplished on at least three occasions in the first half of the season – earned the Richard Childress Racing driver the nickname of “the Closer.”

Trevor Bayne, Regan Smith, David Ragan, Paul Menard and Marcos Ambrose were first-time winners, their teams coming together at just the right time to seize the opportunity.

Here’s a look back at some of this year’s most memorable on-track moves: 

1. Regan Smith breaks the ice at Darlington

Sometimes, it’s not what you do on the race track that makes the difference, but what you don’t do.

And what Smith and his Furniture Row Racing team didn’t do was pit late in Showtime Southern 500 at Darlington.

And the decision resulted in Smith’s first career Cup win as well as the first victory for Furniture Row Racing.

Sixth when the caution came out after Jeff Burton’s blown engine, Smith, Brad Keselowski and Tony Stewart chose to remain on the track, while previous race leader Carl Edwards stopped for two tires and restarted fourth.

That set up what would have been a five-lap dash to the checkered flag – if not for an incident just three laps later involving Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer.

As a result, Smith found himself on old tires and hoping to hold off Edwards, who had already led four times for 57 laps, on a green-white-checkered finish.

And although he tagged the wall coming out of Turn 2 on the final lap, Smith was able to hold off Edwards for the impressive victory.

“Pete [Rondeau] and I were talking about it,” Smith said of the conversation with his crew chief about whether to pit or stay out on the track. “The decision is his a hundred percent. The way our stuff works is whatever he tells me to do, I do. I did mention, I said, ‘Man, I think this thing would be good with clean air.’ That's all he needed to hear to make the call to stay out. That won the race for us right there.

“We were fortunate on the last restart. ... The tires hooked up good. When we cleared Carl going into [Turn] 1, I thought, ‘That's good, at least we'll finish second in this thing, I won't have to worry about any of the other guys on fresh tires.’ When he didn't catch me at the white flag and I still had a car length gap at the white flag, I thought, ‘I'm going to run another qualifying lap here; we might have a chance at this thing.’”

Likewise, Edwards said he didn’t second-guess crew chief Bob Osborne’s call to come in for tires.

“I thought about it, but I thought new tires would be such an advantage with 20-25 laps,” Edwards said. “I thought what we did was the right call, and I think if it would have gone green, if we wouldn’t have had that caution, if I would have had more than a lap to work Regan over, I think we would have run right by him, but we didn’t get it.

“It turned into a green-white-checkered and I was surprised. When I drove down into Turn 3 on the last lap, I sincerely planned on driving right by him and his car stuck a lot better than I thought it was going to, so it surprised me.”

2. Hobbled Brad Keselowski wins at Pocono

It was a decision that was made off the track, but it ended up paying major on-track dividends.

Four days after fracturing his ankle when he crashed during testing at Road Atlanta, Brad Keselowski climbed back into his Penske Racing Dodge. His intentions were no different than before the accident.

“I came here to win,” Keselowski said, after doing just that in the Good Sam RV Insurance 500 at Pocono. “When you let the pain get into your head that far that you don’t believe you can win anymore, you’ll never win.”

The injury was far from minor – while Keselowski continued to compete in Cup, team officials held him out of three Nationwide Series events to help speed his recovery.

“He’s a good driver and a great guy,” Dale Earnhardt Jr. said.

Keselowski finished third in points twice, in 2008-09, while driving for Earnhardt Jr.’s JR Motorsports Nationwide Series team.

“He’s not going to let his opportunities pass him by,” Earnhardt Jr. said. “He’s not going to give up the opportunity to anyone else. He wants to drive every lap he can drive.”

3. Marcos Ambrose atones at Watkins Glen

Marcos Ambrose had seen this movie before. A chance at his first Sprint Cup victory gone by the wayside in the closing laps of a race.

But this time the outcome was different, thanks to an incredible driving job in the final laps of the Heulva Good Sour Cream Dips at The Glen.

A little more than one year earlier, Ambrose appeared to be on his way to his first Cup win when he stalled his car while trying to conserve fuel in the closing laps at Infineon Raceway.

At Watkins Glen, Ambrose was faced with two younger, equally aggressive competitors in front of him in the final laps. Kyle Busch, however, went from first to third on a green-white-checkered restart, leaving Keselowski and Ambrose to settle the issue.

Ambrose didn’t wait to pounce, diving underneath the Penske Racing driver to grab the lead with just a little more than two laps remaining.

When David Ragan and David Reutimann were involved in a hard crash on the white-flag lap, Ambrose’ first Cup win was secure.

4. He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother

Keselowski was already assured a starting spot in this year’s Daytona 500 when his 150-mile qualifying race got under way.

The future wasn’t as bright for Brian Keselowski, Brad’s older brother, who was in the same race.

Needing a strong finish to earn a starting position in the 500, Brian got a bit of unsolicited help when Brad hooked onto the back of his unsponsored entry and helped push him to fifth-place in the final laps.

The drafting push put the older Keselowski in his first Cup race, and the series’ biggest of the year.

“Brad’s car was awesome. I’m glad he was behind me and not the other way around, or else this wouldn’t have happened,” Brian Keselowski said. “Because my motor just wasn’t strong enough.”

5. This time, David Ragan doesn’t falter

While Ambrose atoned for his road-course miscue by winning at Watkins Glen, David Ragan settled his own score at Daytona in July.

Penalized for changing lanes on a restart at the conclusion of the Daytona 500, a penalty that cost him a shot at his first Cup win, the Roush Fenway Racing driver made sure he made no mistakes when the series returned to the 2.5-mile track five months later.

This time, he held his position on the second of two green-white-checkered restarts and, with drafting help from teammate Matt Kenseth, sped to his first career win.

“I was hoping to win one a little earlier than the July Fourth race here, but it’s a good feeling to come back here,” Ragan said. “We got one back at Daytona. It would have been tough to lose another one.

“I thought about that under that last caution. I said, ‘Man, if we don’t win this thing, I’m not going to want to talk to anyone afterwards.’ We were able to win. That does ease the pain from February. It’s still nice to think about that Daytona 500 ring, but it’s awesome.” 

6. Clint Bowyer snatches win from teammate at Talladega

Clint Bowyer has quickly become one of the top restrictor-plate racers in the Cup series.

So it wasn’t surprising to see the Richard Childress Racing driver in the thick of the battle in the closing laps at Talladega in October.

It looked like a storybook finish with Bowyer helping push teammate Jeff Burton, riding a 108-race winless streak, into the lead and away from the pack.

But Bowyer was entertaining other ideas. Having already announced his plans to depart RCR for Michael Waltrip Racing at season’s end, Bowyer wanted desperately to go out with a win, and regardless of who was in front of him, he wasn’t about to let the opportunity pass.

Coming out of Turn 4, Bowyer broke low on his teammate, and then won the drag race to the checkered flag.

The timing of his move was unexpected – both drivers said later such a move would have been made closer to the finish line in the trioval on the frontstretch.

“He wasn't expecting it,” Bowyer said of the finish. “I know he was expecting for me to wait for the trioval because we talked about it.

“I felt like it was an opportunity to catch him off guard. It did, but it about bit me in the butt, too.”

“We put ourselves in position to win the race and Clint did a great job,” Burton said. “I thought he made his move a little too early and as it turned out, he did it perfect.”