Hamlin, who practiced for 16 laps at Talladega, said afterwards that he was happy to be back in the car, and he thanked Brian Vickers and Mark Martin who filled in for him.

Hamlin said he didn’t experience discomfort once he was in the car, but it did hurt getting into and out of the car through the window. So, he will be entering and exiting the car through the roof.

The plan seems to be for Hamlin to start the race, and climb out of the car at the first caution. He said that he will keep himself out of harms way to ensure that he makes it to the first caution without causing one himself.

Hamlin and his team have practiced the driver swap with Brian Vickers several times. He says that they have it down to about a minute, which should be enough to keep them on the lead lap.

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Keselowski passed Kyle Busch to the lead with nine laps left, with Harvick following into second place a lap later. Keselowski crossed the finish line .718 seconds ahead of Harvick with Busch rolling home in third.

The victory was Keselowski’s first of the season in the Nationwide Series and the 21st of his career. Brian Vickers finished fourth, followed by Regan Smith.

The victory was a breakthrough of sorts for Keselowski, who won for the first time this year in either the Nationwide or Sprint Cup Series, after Penske Racing switched from Dodge to Ford during the offseason.

“It’s very gratifying,” Keselowski said. “We’ve had a lot of seconds this year (two in the Nationwide Series), and we’ve been really close on the Cup side. We just haven’t been able to get that win. We’ve struggled here at Richmond, too, both in the Cup and the Nationwide cars, so it’s great to get that turned around and finally get to Victory Lane in a Ford.

“This is a Mustang (in NNS). Now we’ve got to win a Fusion (in Cup). The Fords have been really fast, and new finally closed one out today.”

Harvick’s car was superior over long runs, but he didn’t have time to Keselowski over the final run.

“Our car was pretty good on the longer runs,” Harvick said. “The 22 (Keselowski) was really good for the short runs, and I had to try to fend him off as good as I could… All in all, it was a fun night. He just had a better car for the short runs. I enjoyed the race, back and forth. I always want to win, but it was still enjoyable.”

Harvick dominated a long green-flag run from Lap 107 until NASCAR called the third caution for Juan Carlos Blum’s contact with the Turn 2 wall on Lap 151. After pit stops under the yellow, however, Keselowski wrested the lead from Harvick on Lap 158 powering his No, 22 Ford to the inside of the No. 33 Chevrolet.

Keselowski’s lead was short-lived. On lap 170, Harvick regained the top spot near the start/finish line. After two laps of intense racing, Busch took over the second spot from Keselowski on Lap 177 but trailed Harvick by 1.763 seconds.

Busch was closing the gap when Tanner Berryhill’s spin in Turn 2 brought out the fourth caution on Lap 190. Harvick was off pit road first for a restart on Lap 197, and he, Keselowski and Busch were running 1-2-3 when Kevin Swindell spun in Turn 2 to cause the fifth yellow on Lap 201.

Keselowski grabbed the lead after the subsequent restart on Lap 210, but one lap later, a hard wreck in Turn 3 involving series championship hopefuls Austin Dillon, Brian Scott and Justin Allgaier slowed the field once again and set up a Lap 221 restart with Keselowski at the point.

Harvick passed Keselowski to the outside off the restart, but on Lap 225, as Harvick went to the inside to block Keselowski, Busch powered around both cars to the outside to take the lead before the seventh caution slowed the race on Lap 228.

Note: Seventh-place finisher Sam Hornish Jr. retained the series lead by one point over Smith… Scott and Nelson Piquet Jr.—and their crews—skirmished after the race after repeated contact between their cars in the closing laps.  Scott accused Piquet of kicking him below the belt. Both drivers were called to the NASCAR hauler for further discussion.

Unfortunately I won’t be racing this weekend at Richmond. It kills me to not be in the car for my team and… twitpl.us/t/9JT

— Denny Hamlin (@dennyhamlin) April 24, 2013

Hamlin had hoped to be back in the car at Richmond.

Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano got together while racing for the win in the Auto Club 400 at Auto Club Speedway. Hamlin’s car made hard contact with the inside wall.

Tests revelealed a fractured L1 vertebra that could sideline Hamlin for up to six weeks. Mark Martin and Brian Vickers have filled in for Hamlin in Joe Gibbs Racing’s No. 11 Toyota.

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JGR President JD Gibbs said:

We’ve been real fortunate to have never been in this situation with the need to find someone to fill in for an injured driver. A lot goes into a decision like this but we are really pleased to have someone of the character and caliber of Mark Martin to fill in while Denny is out. Obviously we’re not exactly sure how long that is going to take, but Mark’s career speaks for itself and our team knows it will have the opportunity to compete for a win every week.

Martin, who currently shares the No. 55 Michael Waltrip Racing Toyota with Brian Vickers, will take over driving duties in the STP Gas Booster 400 at Martinsville Speedway.

Martin said:

I’m happy to have this opportunity to help out JGR, FedEx and Denny. Hopefully I can keep those guys up front and compete for wins while Denny heals up.

Vickers is expected to drive the No. 55 while Martin fills in for Hamlin.

Update: Martin will only fill in for Hamlin at Martinsville. He will return to the No. 55 in the NRA 500 at Texas Motor Speedway. Vickers will then drive the No. 11.

J D Gibbs said:

Obviously having to find someone to fill in for Denny is not an ideal situation to have to be in and when you start a process like this you obviously begin to look at the drivers that are not only available but also able to drive for your race team and manufacturer. We were a bit premature in determining Mark’s status past Martinsville however. We’re real happy to have the opportunity to get Brian in our Cup cars and with him driving Nationwide for us we think we have some continuity there that is beneficial.

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“I’m 27 and I’m getting old,” said Busch, after holding off 20-year-old Nationwide Series rookie Kyle Larson in a finish that no doubt aged him slightly.

Larson, making his fourth Nationwide start, trailed Busch by five car lengths with 10 laps to go but went high around lap traffic and traded paint with Busch as the two crossed the finish line .023 seconds apart, making it the second-closest finish ever at Bristol.

“I did everything I could to try to protect the momentum,” Busch said. “A young kid like that, he’s got a lot of talent. He’s obviously made a name for himself. He was running hard, that’s for sure. He brought a lot to the table today and brought his show to the fans. ”

Coming to the finish line, Busch had a decision to make: Maintain the high line or go low around the lap car of Brad Teague.

“There were two thoughts,” Busch said. “You don’t ever want to give anyone the bottom for a cheap shot. Two, I ran the top in (Turns) 1 and 2 and gained so much ground on (Teague), I was afraid I was going to run into the back of him coming off Turn 4 — or I slow down any little bit and it hurts my run. Then Larson might have enough speed on the bottom to beat me back to the line. Knowing that the start-finish line is only halfway down the straightaway, I just needed to lunge off the corner to make it.”

Larson, from Elk Grove, Calif., was happy to see Busch go low.

“I tried a couple of moves on Kyle around the bottle and (my car) was just a little too tight off (the corner) to get back to the throttle,” he said. “The last lap, I was pretty happy he went to the bottom to block a slide-job or whatever. It gave me one more shot to try to get around him and he left me just enough room to squeeze the outside. I just missed it by a couple of feet, but it was a lot of fun.”
Driving the Cottonelle Chevrolet for Turner Scott Motorsports, Larson entered the race simply seeking a solid result after finishing no better than 13th in any of his first three starts.

“We’d kind of been digging ourselves a hole,” he said.

Busch, who started 13th, noted that although Larson didn’t win the race, he won a measure of respect.

“You certainly want to win races the right way,” he said. “Coming up, running races in the Nationwide Series, Cup Series, I didn’t win a lot, but the ones that I did — there’s a way of going about things. There’s the way I did it and the way (Brad) Keselowski did it — ruffling a lot of feathers.

“(Larson) played it smart today. That was good on his end. I think a lot of people have been looking at him to try to see whether he was going to be a wrecker or a checker. Today he didn’t get the checker. That will come. If you’re driving into the corner and driving into the back of me — I’m going to be here for a while. … He’s not going to have fun dealing with me every week. Right now, I’m going to race him as hard as he raced me but just as clean as he raced me.”

Busch, who made NASCAR history at Bristol in 2010 when he became the first driver to win all three national touring events in the same weekend, appears to be in the midst of another potentially dominant weekend. He will sit on the pole for Sunday’s Food City 500 and also turned the fastest laps in both Sprint Cup practice sessions on Saturday.

But Larson turned what looked like a battle between Busch and veteran Kevin Harvick into a three-dog fight.

“I was catching them. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do when I got to them,” said Larson, who stayed on the gas as the two leaders battled their way through lap traffic.

Busch led 92 of the first 225 laps, however the run for the money began about Lap 230 when Busch and Harvick approached a five-car group of slower cars. It took nearly 10 laps for the lead duo to clear the pack and, by the time they did, Larson was applying pressure.

Harvick, who led 43 laps, elected to pit under caution with 32 laps remaining. Unable to match Busch’s speed while running low on the track and slated to restart on the inside lane, Harvick elected to take four fresh tires. He restarted eighth and finished fifth.

Brian Vickers and Sam Hornish Jr. finished third and fourth. Hornish extended his series lead to 22 points over Justin Allgaier, the pole-sitter who led the first 62 laps but settled for eighth.

Sam Hornish Jr. drove an absolutely dominant car to victory Saturday afternoon, streaking away from Kyle Busch during a seven-lap dash to the finish in the Sam’s Town 300 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

The win was Hornish’s second in NASCAR’s Nationwide Series and his first since Nov. 12, 2011 at Phoenix. It was the first Las Vegas victory for Penske Racing in any NASCAR series and the first Nationwide triumph for crew chief Greg Erwin, a winning Sprint Cup crew chief who signed on with Penske during the offseason.

The Penske organization also collected its first victory after switching from Dodge to Ford between seasons.

Busch rolled across the finish line in second, 1.1 seconds behind Hornish. Brian Vickers ran third, followed by Trevor Bayne and Elliott Sadler. Bayne recovered from an early brush with the wall to post the fourth-place result.

Hornish, who led 114 of the 200 laps, leads the series by 19 points over Sadler, Justin Allgaier (15th Saturday) and Brian Scott (ninth).

It wasn’t until race day that Hornish learned of the similarity between his name and that of the title sponsorship.

“I didn’t know until this morning that this was the Sam’s Town 300,” Hornish said. “It’s kind of cool that I was able to win it… It’s great to get Penske Racing’s first win back in a Ford.

“Man, the car was awesome today. It was a real joy to drive. I’ve got to thank all the guys on the Penske team for giving me an awesome car to race with. When you have a car that good, you’re always worried something bad is going to happen or you’ll get caught in somebody else’s problem. I’m glad that didn’t happen today.”

Busch, who had dominated at Phoenix a week earlier, had an excellent car on Saturday—but not quite strong enough.

“It was a tough race out there today all around,” Busch said. “Cars were really getting loose out there in the early stages of the race through the middle part of the race… The second-to-last run and the last run, I felt like our car was really good. There wasn’t much else that we could do to make it better.

“Sam was just that much faster than us. He was beating us a little bit everywhere, all the way around the race track. Certainly, when he stepped on the gas, that thing would go forward in a hurry. Us two were kind of the class of the field, but he was the class of everybody.”

Hornish dropped from the lead to third during pit stops on Lap 139, after NASCAR called a debris caution one lap earlier. Eight circuits after a restart on lap 145, Hornish regained the top spot, sailing past Busch and driving away.

Hornish led Busch by almost three seconds when Scott Lagasse Jr.’s spin in Turn 1 on Lap 182 caused the seventh caution of the race. The top seven cars stayed on track under the yellow while those behind them came to pit road for fresh rubber on Lap 184.

Four laps later, moments after Hornish led the field to the green flag, a hard wreck in Turn 2 involving rookie Kyle Larson, Joey Gase and Ryan Sieg slowed the race for the eighth time and left Larson’s No. 32 Chevrolet Camaro a smoking ruin.

Larson, whose car flew into the catch fence on the final lap of the NNS season opener at Daytona, hastily climbed from his car as safety workers arrived with fire extinguishers.

Bayne and Larson made track-position plays on Lap 83, taking fuel only under caution for Robert Richardson Jr.’s spin in Turn 2. Though they started at the front of the field, the strategy backfired, as both Bayne and Larson hit the outside wall battling for the lead on Lap 87.

Larson, in the outside lane, crowded Bayne on the bottom as the drivers raced side by side. Bayne’s No. 6 Ford broke loose, carrying both cars into the wall. Bayne remained on the lead lap, but Larson’s No. 32 Chevrolet was damaged more extensively, and the rookie lost two laps during repairs.

Martin said:

My goal is to make this car one of the most wanted rides in NASCAR for 2014. I want to help [crew chief] Rodney Childers get there and see him race for a championship.

When asked whether or not he would drive in 2014, he said:

It’s way too early to speculate on that. I really enjoy working at Michael Waltrip Racing. I’ll be around no matter what. But I want to do everything I can to get this team in position to race for a [driver's] championship in 2014.

Martin and Brian Vickers will split time in the car this season. Vickers could be a candidate for the No. 55 in 2014.

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Scott drove for JGR last season, finishing ninth in points, with two top 5s, and 11 top 10s. Scott lost his ride when JGR signed Elliott Sadler and Brian Vickers to drive in the Nationwide Series full time in 2013.

Update: Brian Scott will drive  the #2 Shore Lodge Chevy Camaro for the RCR in the 2013 NASCAR Nationwide Series season. Phil Gould, car chief for the No. 2 team in 2012, has been promoted to crew chief for the team.

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Logano, the polesitter, dominated Saturday’s Great Clips 200 Nationwide Series race at Phoenix International Raceway, beating new Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Brian Vickers to the finish line to win for the ninth time in 21 starts this season, the first time at PIR and the 18th time in his career.

Sadler’s wreck forced the race to a green-white-checkered-flag finish and extended the length of the race from the scheduled 200 laps to 204.

Defending NNS champion Ricky Stenhouse Jr. ran third and opened his lead in the series standings to 20 points over Sadler, whose late crash led to a 22nd-place finish.

For the second straight year at Phoenix, Elliott Sadler’s championship hopes took a severe blow. Coming to the white flag in 12th position, Sadler tangled with the Chevrolet of Cole Whitt, backed into the outside wall and turned sideways into the path of Richard Childress Racing teammate Brendan Gaughan.

The blow from Gaughan’s Chevy tore the nose off Sadler’s car. NASCAR red-flagged the race, and Sadler sat in his crippled car, after driving away from the accident scene. Sadler lost a lap in the pits while his car was repaired and rolled across the finish line at half speed.

“I did it to myself,” said Sadler, who started from the rear after slapping the wall during time trials and going to a backup car. “I put my team in a hole, qualifying like I did. We tried to work on this car as much as we could, and I just got a little loose there, getting under the 88 (Whitt).

“I just wanted to say, ‘My fault.’ I should have done a better job for these guys. I just apologized to them for putting them in this position heading to Homestead (site of next Saturday’s season finale). We’re going to go there and fight, but I definitely dug ourselves a hole.”

The caution for Sadler’s wreck interrupted a fierce battle between Logano and Vickers, both of whom thought they would have won had the race continued to green to the checkered flag. Logano pulled ahead after the drivers swapped the lead following a restart on Lap 196.

“He got underneath me, and then I crossed him over off of (Turn) 4,” said Logano, who led 168 laps. “And then I was able to clear in the middle of 3 and 4, and it was like, ‘OK, I’ve got him now.’ I think my car was good enough to take off…

“I got pretty nervous when he passed me (after the restart). It was like, ‘Uh, oh. This is not good. I’m about to give this thing away.’ Brian did an awesome job. It was a heck of a race.”

Sadler started from the rear in a backup car after slapping the wall during qualifying. From the drop of the green flag, he worked his way toward the front, climbing to the 18th position before John Blankenship’s spin on Lap 32 brought out the second caution.

After a two-tire call on Lap 71, under the third yellow for Blankenship’s second spin, Sadler restarted eighth. When Paulie Harraka looped his car in Turn 4 on Lap 89, NASCAR called the fifth caution. Sadler stayed out and restarted fourth — and quickly gave back almost everything he had gained to that point.

Sadler went wide into the marbles on the restart on Lap 95 and nearly lost control of the No. 2 Chevrolet. By the time he had regained his momentum, Sadler was 15th and running behind Stenhouse, who had pitted for fuel and tires.

Running 11th on Lap 148 when Mike Wallace tapped Timmy Hill’s Chevrolet and sent it spinning, Sadler chose to pit for four tires under caution on Lap 149, leaving him 14 spots behind Stenhouse in fourth for a restart on Lap 154.

Sadler, however, gained five positions to 13th before contact from Kyle Busch’s Toyota turned Sam Hornish Jr. on Lap 155. By then, Stenhouse was running second to Logano.

Stenhouse can lock up his second straight title with a finish of 16th or better at Homestead, 17th if he leads a lap and 18th if he leads the most laps.

“We’ve got to keep doing what we’re doing,” Stenhouse said. “We’ve given up 20 points in one race, so it’s not even close to over… It’s going to be tough, because obviously I’m going to have to not push the limits as much as I like. I like going for race wins, too, so it’s going to be a fine balance there.”

Logano extended the lead of the No. 18 JGR car to 33 points in the owners’ standings over the No. 6 Ford driven by Stenhouse. JGR will win the owners’ title if the 18 finishes 28th or better at Homestead, 29th if it leads a lap or 30th if it leads the most laps.

Vickers will also compete for the Nationwide Series championship.

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