After a winning at Pocono with a broken ankle in a stunning upset, Brad Keselowski paraded the American flag around Bristol Motor Speedway after winning his third race of the season. Early on it looked as if either Jeff Gordon or Matt Kenseth would be in victory lane, but the "Blue Deuce" emerged as a strong contender and proved to be the car to beat late.
Keselowski started off the night in a special way as well. During driver intros, "Bad" Brad walked out to a chorus of cheers. Not because he's as popular as Dale, Jr, but because he walked out with an Iraq war veteran who was just back from his second tour of duty. Most fans find Keselowski to be arrogant, but like him or not, Brad and his Checkered Flag Foundation do some great things for the men and women who defend this great nation. Other drivers could definitely learn something from Keselowski.
Ryan Newman led the field to green, but it didn't take long for Jeff Gordon to grab the lead. It looked like Gordon and Kenseth would be battling for the win amongst themselves, but Paul Wolfe used some pit strategy to get the Miller Lite Dodge up front. Because of that, the Miller Lite Dodge took the lead by lap thirty-four. All totaled, Keselowski led eighty-nine laps on the night.
This was a very tame race as Bristol night races go. There were only two wrecks the whole night. The first one occurred when David Stremme wrecked David Reutimann for no apparent reason. I guess while running four laps down to the leaders, Stremme (quite possibly the biggest never-was in Nascar history) must have just gotten bored and decided to wreck a car fighting to get in the top twenty in points. The other wreck occurred when Mark Martin tried to get in between Bobby Labonte and another car and wrecked himself.
But the action picked up when Martin Truex, Jr took two tires on his final pit stop and grabbed the lead back from Keselowski. But on the restart, Truex didn't have the same grip with two fresh right side tires while Keselowski had four fresh Goodyears. Brad grabbed the lead and never looked back as Truex and Gordon battled for second.
As the field came off the final corner, Brad Keselowski grabbed his second win in four weeks and his fourth top three finish in a row. Truex grabbed second by just a fender over Gordon, Jimmie Johnson finished fourth and Jamie McMurray crossed the line in fifth. In victory lane, Keselowski said "an awesome car" and "an awesome team" were the reasons why he won the race. "The night race at Bristol! This is the race that Tony Stewart, Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt win this race," Keselowski told ESPN. "This is a race of champions. There's races that pay more, there's races that might have a little but more prestige, but this is the coolest damn one of them all." That is absolutely right. The races every driver would kill to win are the Daytona 500, the Brickyard 400 and the night race at Bristol.
The other big thing that happened because of the No. 2 teams win Saturday night is that they are legitimate Chase contenders. Many people speculated that this team would finish top twenty and grab a wildcard spot. But now, he is eleventh in points, just 21 markers out of tenth. This team may just make the Chase the hard way and race into the top ten. I'll admit that I was in the group of fans that doubted Keselowski's ability. But now that he's won Bristol and is closing in on a Chase birth, it is pretty obvious to me that, like him or not, Brad Keselowski is the real deal. They may not win the championship, but they will definitely contend for it over the final ten races. Brad and the "Blue Deuce" team are here to stay.
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