The Nationwide Race, the Aaron's 312, started off incredibly fast and exciting.  Ryan Newman led them to the green and immediately the drivers started setting records, for the most lead changes, and most laps without cautions.  The racing was close and intense and driver after driver made their way to the front.  Michael Waltrip, in the #99 Aaron's Dream Machine showed he can still drive at Talladega and was up front running strong and seemed to be able to run in the high lane, the low lane and even in between.  He also made some incredible moves from one lane to the other, coming close to crashing on more than one occasion.

around lap 60, Joey Logano makes a bump draft move on Mikey, but unfortunately, his rookie move turned Mikey directly into Clint Bowyer, taking them both out.  Clint was heard on the radio spouting off about Michael's driving, but the replay clearly showed Joey attempting the bump draft, and the announcers stated that Clint would likely have something else to say about it, once he saw the replay.  Unfortunately, ABC's pit reporter, Jamie Little,  obviously want' brought up to speed, because in her interview with Michael moments later, she baited Michael, asking him for his thoughts on Clint's comments.  Michael, not knowing that the replay had been shown, of course retaliated, saying he knew he'd been hit from behind and if Clint wanted to play that way, it was fine, but he just tries to be nice to people.  In my mind, the question asked was a blatant attempt to create some kind of controversy or rivalry and was uncalled for.

Pit stops on the first yellow flag resulted in half a dozen drivers trying to gain positions, and unfortunately, resulted in speeding penalties.  Dale Jr, again, completely missed his pit and had to make another circuit of the track, putting him on the tail end of the lead lap, along with the rest of the pit road speeders.

The second caution came out saving him from going a lap down and only a short time later, he and Brad Keselowski were running second and first respectively.  Of note, Kerry Earnhardt, older brother to Dale Jr, was running in typical Earnhardt fashion, in the top ten.

The third caution flew when Brandon White's right rear tire blew, spinning him into the wall.   With 19 laps to go, the front five included Dale Jr, Brad, Jason Leffler, Kyle Busch and Brian Vickers.  Kyle made a couple of blocking attempts, putting his car and others close to wrecking.  The result of that was for all of the drivers to shove him out of the draft and hang him out to dry, along with Brian Vickers.  With 15 to go, it was Dale Jr, Brad, Justin Algaier, Matt Kenseth and Leffler, but that changed five times in one lap.  Kerry Earnhardt had settled in at 13th and Morgan Shepherd right with him

With 13 laps to go, Matt Kenseth, running right at the front, got out of line slightly and in trying to correct, got tagged and went sliding, then flipping on the concrete apron.  He ended up on his lid, and on fire, but thankfully one last flip to put him right side up enabled him to get out.  Safety crews were immediately on the scene and Matt was fine.  Again, in the post race interview, Jamie Little tried to get Matt to say that David Ragan had gotten into him too aggressively, however, Matt, always the gentleman,  said, no, everyone was just racing hard and fast.

See the video, courtesy of NASCAR.com

With five laps to go, Ryan newman was leading with Dale Jr tucked right under his rear bumper, riding around the bottom.  The high line leader was Kyle Busch, but he was running in 15th, and Kerry Earnhardt was stuck in the middle.  With the dicing around in the middle, however, Justin Allgaier was hit from behind by Kyle Busch when he got a little loose, and he and Bobby Gerhart slammed into the inside retaining wall.  Justin apologized to his crew immediately, but the worry was Bobby Gerhart, injured in the Daytona ARCA race.  He was assisted from his car and taken by ambulance to be checked out.  At 50, Bobby isn't the youngest nor the oldest out there, but he sure has had some rotten luck this year.

The race came down to a Green White Checkers finish.  Ryan Newman was in front, with Dale Jr so close on his bumpter as to seem like an extension of the 33 car.  He stayed right with Newman until the tri-oval, then pulled to the high side to try to make the pass.  He wasn't able to do so, getting loose, and David Ragan pulled a move, reminiscent of Kevin Harvick, to pull around the outside of Ryan, and the inside of Dale Jr., effectively splitting the two of them, to take the Checkered flag.

It was an emotional win, and an emotional race for everyone concerned.  The top ten was Ragan, Ryan Newman, Joey Logano, Tony Raines and Dale Jr, followed by Jason Leffler, Jason Keller, Scott Lagasse Jr., Brad Keselowski and Kyle Busch.  Of note, Kerry Earnhardt finished in 12th and Brian Keselowski ended up 14th.

On a great finishing note, Bobby Gerhart was a little sore, but fine and Matt, too, was able to comfort his very worried and very pregnant wife, Katie.

I listened to some of the post race interviews on SIRIUS and the one thing foremost in everyone's mind was the fact that there was no "Big One".  There were few cautions in the race, and the two really scary ones resulted in no injuries.  NASCAR has done a great job ensuring the safety of the drivers and crews.  For that I am thankful.

The Truck Series race at Kansas Speedway was rained out today, and due to other venues on the track starting first thing tomorrow morning, the race has been postponed to Monday at 10am ET.  Mike Skinner is in the lead with 50 odd laps run so far.