Roush Fenway Racing's Jamie McMurray wins wild Talladega Cup race
Roush Fenway Racing's Jamie McMurray celebrates his win in Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup Amp Energy 500 at Talladega Superspeedway. // David Griffin, NASCAR Scene
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TALLADEGA, Ala. - Jamie McMurray won Sunday's running of the NASCAR Sprint Cup Amp Energy 500, but his victory will be an afterthought in the wake of one of the strangest Talladega Superspeedway races in recent memory.
McMurray's third career win - and first since July 2007 at Daytona - came after two vicious wrecks in the final five laps of the 191-lap event.
McMurray, who has yet to secure a ride for the 2010 season, snapped an 85-race winless streak.
"I saw the guys wreck behind me and I didn't know if I had to take the white [flag]," said McMurray, who nursed his fuel to get to the checkered flag.
The decision to utilize smaller restrictor plates in an attempt to ensure drivers' safety after Carl Edwards' spectacular wreck here in the spring - and raise the catch fences for the added protection of fans - were major storylines heading into the race. But it was NASCAR President Mike Helton's pronouncement in the prerace drivers meeting that bump-drafting would be prohibited in any of the turns at the behemoth 2.66-mile track that led to some sedate racing for much of the day.
That all came to an end with five laps remaining when Stewart-Haas Racing's Ryan Newman went for a horrific ride. The incident began along the backstretch and after contact between Marcos Ambrose, Newman and his teammate, Tony Stewart.
Newman's car somersaulted end over end, then landed on the hood of Kevin Harvick's car. The No. 39 Chevrolet subsequently slid up the track and into the wall and then down the banking before flipping once again and coming to rest on its roof in the grass.
After being checked and cleared at the infield care center, Newman found some irony in his finish this time around.
"Ironically, I'm the guy that got upside down," he said, referencing his previous comments about something needing to be done after he was on the receiving end of Edwards' Ford in April.
Once the racing resumed, with a green-white-checkered finish, contact between Phoenix Racing's Brad Keselowski and Penske Racing's Kurt Busch triggered a 13-car pileup that collected Hendrick Motorsports' Mark Martin, whose car also flipped. Points leader Jimmie Johnson had restarted ninth and narrowly escaped the final accident. His sixth-place finish left him leading the points by 184 over Martin with three races remaining in the season.
Tedium isn't a word normally mentioned in the same breath as Talladega, but NASCAR's bump-drafting decree clearly affected the competition. Single-file racing prevailed as drivers bided their time until the money laps. Then, the carnage came.
"It's no surprise to me," said Jeff Gordon, who finished 22nd after running out of fuel before the final accident.
Johnson said there is a solution to solving the problems that persist at Talladega, and that involves removing the need for restrictor plates.
"Get some tractors out and knock down the banking," he said.
Denny Hamlin, who looked to be the class of the field in his No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, saw his day come to a sudden end on lap 137 due to engine failure. Hamlin had been warned by NASCAR about contact in the turns before his engine expired.
