Dale Earnhardt Jr ended a four-year winless streak in dominant fashion on Sunday by taking victory in the NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Michigan International Speedway.
NASCAR's most popular driver finally got back to victory lane in a points-paying event following a performance worthy of a championship-caliber team. Earnhardt led nearly half the distance and looked untouchable in the closing stages, when reigning champion Tony Stewart was his closest contender.
Following the final stops for fuel, where the front-runners went for two new tires, Earnhardt was in a league of his own as he was able to stretch the gap to Stewart (Stewart-Haas) to almost six seconds, pulling away to see the checkered flag first 1,463 days after he last did so at the same track in what was his first season as a Hendrick driver.
Earnhardt and his team dealt best with an unexpected tire change that threw a curve ball to all teams after Goodyear was forced to switch the left-side tire specification for a harder one for the race to try to avoid blistering. Morning rain, which delayed the race for nearly two hours, made conditions even more treacherous ahead of the 400-mile event.
"That race four years ago was a fuel-milleage race," said Earnhardt. "Today we just whooped them really good. So that feels good."
Ford drivers dominated most of the first half of the race but in the end points leader Matt Kenseth was the best of them, finishing third ahead of his Roush Fenway teammate Greg Biffle and Hendrick's Jimmie Johnson. The five-time Cup champion was strong all day long, recovering from the back of the grid following an unplanned engine change on Sunday morning. Although he had as much speed as Earnhardt in the end, the long green-flag stretch that covered the last 60 laps made it hard for him to really get into contention.
Johnson, who crossed the finish line running out of fuel, was also hampered to some extent by blistering right-side tires, as were Biffle and Hendrick man Jeff Gordon, who came home sixth.
Michael Waltrip Racing's Clint Bowyer was Toyota's leading contender all afternoon and finished seventh, edging Earnhardt Ganassi's Juan Pablo Montoya, who enjoyed his best race of the season thus far, beating early race leader and polesitter Marcos Ambrose (Petty) to eighth.
Joe Gibbs Racing suffered an afternoon to forget. Kyle Busch experienced engine issues for the third consecutive week, Denny Hamlin spun after contact with Stewart-Haas' Ryan Newman and ended up on fire from a suspected broken oil line (RIGHT), while last week's winner Joey Logano lost control of his Toyota on lap 127 and hit the wall.
Results - 200 laps:
Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap
1. Dale Earnhardt Jr Hendrick Chevrolet 2h52m29.000s
2. Tony Stewart Stewart-Haas Chevrolet + 5.393s
3. Matt Kenseth Roush Fenway Ford + 5.891s
4. Greg Biffle Roush Fenway Ford + 7.706s
5. Jimmie Johnson Hendrick Chevrolet + 16.549s
6. Jeff Gordon Hendrick Chevrolet + 17.684s
7. Clint Bowyer Waltrip Toyota + 19.598s
8. Juan Pablo Montoya Earnhardt-Ganassi Chevrolet + 21.725s
9. Marcos Ambrose Petty Ford + 22.872s
10. Kevin Harvick Childress Chevrolet + 23.942s
11. Carl Edwards Roush Fenway Ford + 24.509s
12. Martin Truex Jr Waltrip Toyota + 24.641s
13. Brad Keselowski Penske Dodge + 28.250s
14. Jamie McMurray Earnhardt-Ganassi Chevrolet + 31.109s
15. Ryan Newman Stewart-Haas Chevrolet + 1 lap
16. Bobby Labonte JTG Daugherty Toyota + 1 lap
17. Aric Almirola Petty Ford + 1 lap
18. Landon Cassill BK Toyota + 1 lap
19. AJ Allmendinger Penske Dodge + 1 lap
20. Casey Mears Germain Ford + 1 lap
21. Jeff Burton Childress Chevrolet + 1 lap
22. Paul Menard Childress Chevrolet + 1 lap
23. David Ragan Front Row Ford + 1 lap
24. Austin Dillon Childress Chevrolet + 2 laps
25. Dave Blaney Baldwin Chevrolet + 2 laps
26. Travis Kvapil BK Toyota + 3 laps
27. David Gilliland Front Row Ford + 3 laps
28. Regan Smith Furniture Row Chevrolet + 3 laps
29. Mark Martin Waltrip Toyota + 5 laps
30. Kurt Busch Phoenix Chevrolet + 6 laps
31. Ken Schrader FAS Lane Ford + 7 laps
32. Kyle Busch Wood Brothers Toyota + 43 saps
Retirements:
Kasey Kacne Hendrick Chevrolet 151 laps
Denny Hamlin Gibbs Toyota 132 laps
Joey Logano Gibbs Toyota 125 laps
Tony Raines Baldwin Chevrolet 68 laps
JJ Yeley BK Toyota 67 laps
Michael McDowell Parsons Ford 41 laps
Mike Bliss Humprey-Robinson Toyota 35 laps
Joe Nemechek NEMCO Toyota 32 laps
Scott Riggs R3 Chevrolet 27 laps
Josh Wise Front Row Ford 9 laps
Trevor Bayne Wood Brothers Ford 7 laps