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As his days at Richard Childress Racing wind to a close, Kansas native Clint Bowyer won for the second straight fall at Talladega. It's Childress' 100th win in NASCAR and comes as Bowyer will leave RCR at the end of the season for Michael Waltrip racing.
"It means a lot for me to get my team back to victory lane before we cap this thing off," said Bowyer. "I wanted to stay up front. On the restart we got bunched up. I was really worried about the 14 car and the Red Bull cars were hooked up. I didn't think it would end up like that."
Bowyer and his drafting partner Jeff Burton had been running near the front all day long, but most of the time with Burton in front and Bowyer pushing the two car tandem.
After a scary accident that sent Regan Smith into the wall hard with seven laps to go, Burton and Bowyer found themselves side by side for the restart. The green flag dropped with two to go and Burton again went to the point. The two were able to jump out to a big enough lead, that Bowyer was got a chance to pull out from behind his teammate and race him to the checkered flag.
"I thought he made his move to soon, I really did. But he timed it just right," said Burton who finished second. "Part of me wants to cheer, part of me wants to cry."
Dave Blaney got a career best finish of third, with Brad Keslowski and Brian Vickers rounding out the top 5.
Points leader Carl Edwards decided to take the safe route, hanging out in the back most of the day. He made a late race push to finish 11th.
"This race is insane," said Edwards. "It really is."
Edwards' lead over second place Matt Kenseth is 14 points, with Keselowski back 18 points, Tony Stewart 19 markers back and Kevin Harvick tumbling to 5th in the points, after being caught in an early incident on the track.
