He held off the rookie in the final 14 laps to win the Alliance Truck Parts 250 at Michigan International Speedway and extend his lead in the series standings. He took the checkered flag minutes before a light rain began to fall on the race track.

Parker Kligerman gambled rain would end the race short of the scheduled 125 laps but lost the lead when he had to pit with 13 to go. That opened the door for Smith, who kept his No. 7 Chevy ahead of a charging Larson in the final 10 laps.

“I felt confident even though he was drafting up to me,” said Smith, who found himself near the front after a Lap 99 stop for fuel.

“It seemed like once we got the car out front it really came to life. (Crew chief) Greg (Ives) made some really good calls to get us the track position.”

Ives said he did all he could to make sure his driver got as close to the front of the pack as he could in the closing laps.

“The strategy was to get him up front and let him get confident and comfortable,” he said.

It made for a pleasant homecoming for Ives, a native of Bark River in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula.

There was no caution flag after Austin Dillon brushed the wall with five laps to go and Larson, who was steadily gaining on Smith in the closing laps, never got a chance to take the lead.

Sprint Cup Series regular Paul Menard gave Chevy a sweep of the top three spots and Kyle Busch and Trevor Bayne rounded out the top-five finishers.

It was the second win of the season and third career series win for Smith, who also was first at Talladega in early May. It’s the 11th straight time he’s finished in the top 10.

Smith, who started 11th, paid tribute to late driver Jason Leffler by displaying a decal over the door pillar of his car and promised a portion of his $45,440 winnings to the trust fund created to assist Leffler’s 5-year-old son.

Leffler, a two-time winner on the Nationwide circuit, died last week after his sprint car crashed at a dirt track in New Jersey. A moment of silence in his honor was held before the start of the race.

Larson, the series’ top rookie, finished in the top five for the fourth time this season and matched his career-best runner-up finish at Bristol.

“It’d be nice to hurry up and get the win,” he said. “I think it’s coming soon. We’re getting better every week. Once we go to the tracks a second time I hopefully should start out the races better and hopefully maintain track position.”

Drivers qualified under warm conditions earlier in the day but took the green flag under overcast, muggy skies that made the track slick. The forecast was threatening, but rain never came.

Pole winner Dillon looked strongest in the first half of the race but opted not to pit with the rest of the lead pack after a lap 64 caution. A flat left-rear tire soon dropped him a lap down and he ended the day 20th after his late-race contact with the wall.

Joey Logano took the lead after a lap 86 restart but gave it to Kligerman when he pitted 13 laps later. Kligerman was 19th in the unofficial standings but was dropped to 25th after speeding onto pit road for his final stop.

Dillon set a new track qualifying record with a lap of 191.882 mph earlier in the day to earn his fourth straight Coors Light Pole Award, a Nationwide Series record.

It was the second straight hard-luck outing for Dillon, who led 207 of 250 laps a week earlier at Iowa but finished second to Bayne.

Sam Hornish Jr., who started the day second in the standings, left the race on lap 81 after a piece of debris broke his oil pump. It dropped him to 32nd and widened his deficit in the standings.

Hornish fell from 23 points behind Smith to 58. Justin Allgaier crept to just a point behind him.

“There is nothing wrong with our Roush Yates engine other than we hit a piece of debris,” Hornish said. “We knew we had a good car that was capable of winning. It just wasn’t our day.”

The race wasn’t quite a lap old before the first caution came out. Alex Bowman and Travis Pastrana spun in turn 4 before Brian Vickers crashed into Jeffrey Earnhardt. The latter two cars sustained significant damage.

Vickers, seventh in the series points standings before the start of the race, got back on the track but finished 33rd, 45 laps off the lead. The lead dropped him back to 10th in the standings.

Dexter Stacey brought out the day’s second yellow flag when he struck the turn 3 wall on lap 7.

With a push from teammate Kasey Kahne, Smith roared out of the pack during the final 400 yards of a green-white-checkered-flag finish and won a race decided when NASCAR called the seventh and final caution an instant before the four cars battling for the win crossed the finish line.

Smith was the leader as the field was frozen when NASCAR called the caution. Kahne was first across the stripe but was scored in third place behind Smith and Joey Logano, who were the two lead drivers when the caution lights came on.

This was the same Regan Smith who was deprived of victory in a race he thought he had won at Talladega in 2008, when NASCAR demoted him to the 18th position for passing Tony Stewart below the yellow boundary line as the cars approached the checkered flag.

“I was having flashbacks, sitting on pit road–I’m not going to lie–when they were making the decision,” Smith said. “I was like ‘Man, I hope we got it–I’m pretty sure we got it when the flag came out and I saw the lights come on… They only thing I didn’t know was if they took it all the way to the stripe.

“I don’t know if it’s vindication or not. I think I’d gotten over that and gotten past that, but I definitely wanted to win here … but you want to win every week, and it definitely helps wipe that bad memory away of sitting on pit road and finding out you’re 18th instead. So, yeah, that was kind of cool.”

Smith took over the series lead, by 27 points over Sam Hornish Jr. in a race whose start was delayed three hours because of rain. It’s the first time JR Motorsports has led the Nationwide Series standings. It was also the first victory as a crew chief for Greg Ives.

Kahne was surprised NASCAR called the final caution instead of letting the race play out to conclusion.

“I think there’s been plenty of times (when) there’ve been wrecks in (Turn) 4 or 3, and we’ve just raced to the line at the end,” Kahne said. “As soon as they started wrecking, I saw the caution. I still raced to the line, and we had a good enough run to get there and be first there, but I was surprised the caution came out.

“I knew I was third when the caution came out, and I knew I was first at the line… My spotter after the race was like, ‘I think we won,’ but I was thinking the whole time, ‘There’s no way. The caution was out.’”

Busch was leading on Lap 93 when contact between Hornish’s Ford and Eric McClure’s Toyota ignited a spectacular 12-car wreck that sidelined the series leader entering the race (Hornish), among others.

NASCAR then opted to shorten the race by 10 laps because of impending darkness, but four laps after a restart on Lap 101, Joey Coulter’s contact with the outside wall caused the sixth caution and set up the two-lap dash to the finish.

On Lap 14, Danica Patrick spun off the bumper of series rookie Kyle Larson, her Turner Scott Motorsports teammate-for-a-day and slid though the waterlogged infield grass, damaging her No. 34 Chevrolet extensively. After losing a lap on pit road, Patrick brought the car to the garage and called it a day.

Patrick, hardly a grizzled veteran herself, attributed the wreck to Larson’s inexperience with the tandem racing that characterizes the Nationwide Series at restrictor-plate tracks. Larson, who was attempting to push Patrick’s car when the wreck occurred, found trouble of his own on Lap 35, when he blew a tire, spun and took Jeffrey Earnhardt’s Ford with him.

The hardest hit of the race, however, came on Lap 71 when pole sitter Travis Pastrana nosed into the outside backstretch wall during a three-car incident that started when Brian Scott turned the Ford of Reed Sorenson.

Sorenson hit the outside wall and spun back across the track into Pastrana’s path. Pastrana blamed himself for being in harm’s way and for not reacting quickly enough when he saw Sorenson spin.

“I just get an award for being stupid,” Pastrana said after leaving the infield care center. “We had the two fastest cars on the track (with Roush Fenway Racing teammate Trevor Bayne). We could have been a half-lap down just pushing each other, not worrying about anything.

“We all said we were going to sit back the whole race, and then, all of sudden, we’re up there racing just like a bunch of fools up front… Everything kind of happened.”

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.

Busch finished .834 seconds ahead of Nationwide Series leader Sam Hornish Jr. to claim his sixth win at the two-mile track and the ninth straight for Joe Gibbs Racing, extending the record for consecutive victories for a Nationwide car owner at a single speedway.

With his third trip to Victory Lane in five starts this season, Busch also extended his own record for career wins in the series, pushing that number to 54. The six wins at a single track ties his personal best; Busch also has six NNS victories at Charlotte.

After the race, Busch seemed just as cognizant of JGR’s failure to win a Sprint Cup event at Fontana as he was elated at keeping the Nationwide streak alive.

“I think it’s pretty cool that you can see a team go to a race track and dominate like that in a series,” Busch said, “although it’s really, really awkward, because we’ve got nine in a row here in the Nationwide Series, and JGR has yet to win a Cup race here.

“That’s quite an odd stat, but I know (polesitter) Denny Hamlin is really good here for (Sunday’s Auto Club 400 Cup race). And I think we’re OK for (Sunday), too, so hopefully we can change that.”

Regan Smith rallied from a lap down — the result of an early flat tire — to claim third, with Parker Kligerman running fourth in a Toyota owned by Busch. Austin Dillon came home fifth, followed by rookie Kyle Larson.

Elliott Sadler, Brian Scott, Trevor Bayne and rookie Kevin Swindell completed the top 10.

Hornish led by more than a half second over Busch when Jason White’s spin through the frontstretch grass caused the fourth caution of the afternoon on Lap 110.

Brad Keselowski stayed on the track under the caution and led Hornish and Busch (who took fuel only under the yellow) to the green flag on Lap 116. Before the cars reached Turn 1, however, Hornish had reclaimed the top spot from his Penske Racing teammate, with Busch in hot pursuit.

Hornish held the point until Busch passed him on Lap 126, and from that point on Busch paced the field. Busch conceded that Hornish may have had the better car, but Busch found a line — or, more accurately, a variety of lines — that worked in the late going.

“I don’t think we were the best car, but I got up on the wheel there at the end and just chased down that 12 (Hornish),” Busch said. “He was really, really good today. I didn’t want to see him win here in front of our home-town crowd of (sponsor) Monster Energy folks that were in the stands and, of course, the Toyota folks that were here today.

“So we got up on the wheel, like I said, and just tried to push hard as far as I could. I ran the top side for a little bit, ran him down, got there and was able to do like a draft move by him.”

Hornish was gaining on Busch in the closing laps until his No. 12 Ford scraped the wall.

“We just didn’t have enough to be able to beat Kyle today,” Hornish said. “I ran hard and got the lead on the restart a couple of times. He’d run real hard throughout the first 50 to 75 percent of a run, slide the car around, wear it out, and then we’d catch him in the last 25 percent.

“We were doing it again on the last run. I got within about 10 car lengths of him and got a little greedy, drove it in a little bit too hard and got into the wall. But we want to win races as bad as we want to lead the points. When there was still smoke inside the car halfway down the back straightaway, I was a little bit worried that we were going to end up with a flat tire, and I was going to look real bad. So I’m just glad that things worked out as well as they did.”

Hornish increased his series lead to 28 points over Smith, who passed 11th-place finisher Justin Allgaier for second in the standings. Scott remained third in points, 31 behind Hornish and one ahead of Allgaier in fourth place.

Notes: Kligerman’s fourth-place finish was a career best in the series… Brian Vickers’ day ended with an engine failure after 53 laps. He finished 34th and dropped six spots to 11th in the standings.

Phoenix Racing owner James Finch said:

Tag Heuer wanted to sponsor a race, and they’ve got some interaction with (Richard) Childress and them. They wanted to put Dillon in my car, and I said that’s fine with me.

Regan Smith finished seventh in the season-opening Daytona 500 for Phoenix Racing, and AJ Allmendinger followed that up with an 11th-place finish in the Subway Fresh Fit 500 at Phoenix International Raceway.

Finch attributed the team’s solid runs to the fact that the playing field is level with the new Generation 6 car. He said:

To everybody it’s all brand new, but the big teams with all the money and technology will start taking over here before long. The car has more downforce to it, and they took some lead out of it. It’s lighter, and there’s more downforce. That makes it a really nice race car. I’ve got my third driver in a third race, and if we have a really good run there that will really speak volumes [about the team].

Finch’s goal for Dillon is to finish the race in the top 15, and finish the race.

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Allmendinger has eight starts at the one-mile oval, with two top 10s and a pole.

Allmendinger said:

This will be good. It’s been a few months since I’ve been in a stock car. I haven’t been in one of the Gen 6 cars yet, so I think it will take a little time to get acclimated to it. Phoenix International Raceway is a great place for me to get back behind the wheel. I’ve always enjoyed the race track. It will definitely feel different, but I’ll be ready to go.

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As Stewart dodged the crash and crossed the finish line, the front clip of Larson’s car sheared off, ripping the engine out of its compartment. The front suspension and engine ended up on the walkway at the bottom of the stands.

A tire from Larson’s car also flew into the grandstands.

Regan Smith led as the cars approached the checkered flag, but Smith tried to block Brad Keselowski, who was running second, and turned across the nose of Keselowski’s car.

Daytona International Speedway president Joie Chitwood III indicated that 14 spectators were transported to medical facilities off-property and 14 others were treated on site.

“First and foremost, our thoughts and prayers are with our race fans,” Chitwood said. “On the incident, we responded appropriately according to our safety protocols and had emergency medical personnel at the incident immediately.

“We transported 14 people off property and treated 14 people at our on-track care center.”

Chitwood referred questions about the conditions of the injured fans to Halifax Medical Center.

“I’d have to refer you to Halifax for any of the conditions of the patients,” Chitwood said.

Byron Cogdell, spokesperson from Halifax Health, said seven spectators had been transported to Halifax Medical with injuries related to the accident, five more spectators for other issues. Two of the injured spectators, one adult and one child, were in critical condition, though all patients were listed as stable.

The adult who was in critical condition was suffering from head trauma, Cogdell said. Halifax has not released the names of the injured pending notification of and consent from their families.

Steve O’Donnell, NASCAR’s senior vice president of racing operations, said all drivers involved in the last-lap crash had been treated and released from the infield care center.

As Chitwood and O’Donnell spoke, and with Sunday’s Daytona 500 17 hours away, track workers continued the process of repairing the fencing in the area of the crossover gate, approximately 75 yards short of the start/finish line at the 2.5-mile superspeedway.

“We’re very confident that we’ll be ready for (Sunday’s) event, with the 55th running of the Daytona 500,” O’Donnell said. “But, as with any of these incidents, we’ll conduct a thorough review. We’ll work closely with the tracks as with all our events, learn what we can and see what we can apply in the future.”

The emergency in the grandstand tempered Stewart’s fifth victory in his last six February races at Daytona and the 11th Nationwide Series win of his career.

“Fortunately, with the way the event’s equipped up, there were plenty of emergency workers ready to go, and they jumped in on it pretty quickly,” NASCAR president Mike Helton told ESPN. “And right now, it’s just a function of trying to determine what all damage is done.

“They’re moving folks, as we’ve seen, to care centers and taking some folks over to Halifax Medical (Center), so we’ll be able to update later on, but right now, all we know is everybody’s working real hard on determining what all happened.”

Larson climbed from his car almost immediately and was evaluated and released from the infield care center.

Drivers, Larson included, were more concerned with the safety of the fans than the outcome of the race.

“The important thing is what’s going on on the frontstretch right now,” Stewart said after climbing from his car. “We’ve always known since racing was started this is a dangerous sport. But it’s hard. We assume that risk. It’s hard when the fans get caught up in it.

“As much as we want to celebrate right now, as much as this is a big deal to us, I’m more worried about the drivers and fans in the stands right now. I could see it all in the mirror and it didn’t look good from where I was either.”

Smith said he wasn’t about to surrender the victory to Keselowski 200 yards from the finish line, but his first thoughts were with the injured spectators.

“Everybody the only thing I’m concerned about right now is the people in the stands,” Smith posted to his Twitter account after the race. “Praying for all who were affected by the accident.”

Keselowski echoed the concern and said he understood Smith’s attempt to block his move.

“We made a move to try and win the race,” Keselowski said. “We were in the catbird seat. Regan was in a good spot. He was first and I was second, and we were pushing. I kind of had the run and the move to win the race, and Regan obviously tried to block it, and that’s understandable.

Sam Hornish Jr. crossed the stripe in second place, followed by rookie Alex Bowman, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Parker Kligerman.

The last-lap wreck wasn’t the only serious incident of the event. A 13-car wreck in Turns 1 and 2, triggered by contact between the No. 43 Ford Mustang of Michael Annett and the No. 3 Chevrolet Camaro of Austin Dillon — both championship hopefuls — stopped the race after 116 laps and set up the finish.

Annett was transported to Halifax Health Medical Center. Richard Petty Motorsports later reported that Annett, whose car slammed the outside wall nose-first, was treated for bruising on his chest and received a CT scan. He remains in the hospital for further observation.

Harvick passed Trevor Bayne on lap 37 to take the lead of Duel 1. He led the remaining 23 laps.

Danica Patrick, who will start the 500 from the pole, played it safe and dropped to the back early on to ensure her car would not sustain damage.

Greg Biffle, Juan Pablo Montoya, Jimmie Johnson, and Kurt Busch rounded out the top 5 of Duel 1.

The first duel was relatively uneventful until lap 52 when Denny Hamlin appeared to get loose and bumped Carl Edwards.  Edwards was turned into the wall triggering a multi-car accident that damaged the cars of Hamlin, Edwards, Trevor Bayne, and Regan Smith.

Kyle Busch used a fuel-only pit stop at lap 41 to take the lead coming off pit road. He ran most of the remaining laps with teammate Matt Kenseth behind him. But, with two laps to go, Kasey Kahne and Austin Dillon were able to pass Kenseth. They couldn’t mount a charge to pass Busch, though.

Busch said after the race that the original plan was to take two tires, but his crew chief made the call to go fuel-only.

Kahne, Dillon, Clint Bowyer, and Kenseth finished second through fifth, respectively.

Jeff Gordon, who will start the 500 on the front row, led the first 40 laps of Duel 2, before a pass-through penalty for speeding on pit road ended his chances of winning the duel.

Martin Truex Jr, who ran in the lead pack for most of Duel 2, was black-flagged for losing a side window. He finished 19th. Mike Bliss also had to make a pit stop to fix his window net, which came down. That cost him a chance at making the Daytona 500. Brian Keselowski was the only other driver who did not qualify for the race.

Kurt Busch will drive the No. 78 in the Sprint Cup Series this season, replacing Regan Smith. Smith will drive for JR Motorsports in the Nationwide Series.

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They will also sponsor the No. 88 Chevy for one race with Dale Earnhardt Jr behind the wheel. Earnhardt Jr is set to drive four N’Wide races this season.

With this news comes a shuffling of numbers, with Regan Smith being assigned the No. 7 Chevy, which he will pilot for the full season with crew chief Greg Ives atop the pit box.

Team general manager Kelley Earnhardt Miller said:

The last three months have been critical for the direction of JR Motorsports and the commitment we’ve made, and this partnership with Great Clips is a major step in the right direction. To sign a 28-race sponsor while adding Kasey Kahne and Brad Sweet to our line-up is quite extraordinary. Our goal is still to run two full-time teams, and this helps us greatly to achieve that.

Update: JR Motorsports has hired Mike Bumgarner to serve as crew chief for the No. 5 Nationwide Series team and drivers Kasey Kahne and Brad Sweet.

Bumgarner has spend the last 18 years with Hendrick Motorsports. In 2007, he served as crew chief for Kyle Busch in the N’wide Series, where they racked up four wins, 14 top 5s, and 16 top 10s.

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