Carl Edwards won the Pocono 500 at Pocono Raceway, scoring his second NASCAR NEXTEL Cup victory in his 27th career start.
Edwards is the second driver to win in his first race at Pocono Raceway. Richard Petty won the first race here in 1974.
Edwards led four times for 46 laps, including the final 15.
Edwards has scored six top-10 finishes in 14 races this season
Edwards climbed from ninth to fourth in the NASCAR NEXTEL CUP point standings, 303 behind first-place Jimmie Johnson
Edwards scored the first victory at Pocono Raceway for car owner Jack Roush. Roush finished second 11 times with four different drivers before scoring his first Pocono victory. This is Roushs 81st victory as a car owner and seventh in 14 races this season.
This is the seventh victory for Ford in 2005. Chevrolet has six and Dodge has one.
Notebook Items
Brian Vickers (second) posted his career-best finish in 55 NASCAR NEXTEL Cup races. It is his first top-10 finish in his third race at Pocono Raceway.
Joe Nemechek (third) posted his fourth top-10 finish in his 22 races at Pocono. He scored his third top-10 finish in 14 races in 2005, and his best since his victory last October at Kansas City.
Kyle Busch (fourth) posted a top-10 finish in his first race at Pocono Raceway. Busch scored his fifth top-10 finish in 2005. The Raybestos Rookie-of-the-Year contender Busch has had a notable run in his last seven races, scoring five top-five finishes. He won the Truck and Busch race at Lowes. He finished 25th in the Cup race at Lowes. He won the Truck race at Dover, finished 36th in the Busch race, second in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup race at Dover and fourth at Pocono today. He has climbed from 26th to 18th in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup point standings in the last five races.
Mark Martin (seventh) scored his 26th top-10 finish in 37 races at Pocono Raceway. Martin has scored seven top-10 finishes in 2005. He climbed from sixth to fifth in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup point standings.
Rusty Wallace (11th) extended a 27-race streak of running at the finish that began at Bristol last August.
Six of the top-10 positions in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup point standings changed at Pocono Raceway.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. (33rd) dropped from 15th to 16th in the point standings, 504 points behind point leader Jimmie Johnson.
Kurt Busch (22nd) ended a 48-race streak of ranking among the top 10. He dropped from eighth to 11th in the point standings. The streak began at Rockingham in February 2004.
Jeff Gordon (ninth) posted his posted his 18th top-10 finish in his 25th race at Pocono Raceway. He returned to the top 10 climbing from 11th to ninth in the NASCAR NEXTEL Cup point standings. He is now 362 points behind point leader Johnson.
Brian Vickers led 121 of the 200 laps in todays race. This is the most laps that he has led in a single race in his NASCAR NEXTEL Cup career.
Mike Garvey became the 41st different driver to lead in 2005. This was the first time that Garvey has led in a NASCAR NEXTEL Cup race.(NASCAR Statistical Services)(6-12-2005)
