#88-Dale Jarrett, with help from #20-Tony Stewart, moved from 6th to 1st and won the UAW-Ford 500 at Talladega Superspeedway with a last lap pass on a green-white-checkered finish. It is Jarrett’s 32 career win, first since Feb 2003 at Rockingham, 98 races ago. Jarrett was the last driver to win at Talladega in a Ford in 1998. Jarrett is the 5th oldest driver to win a Cup race, at 48 years, 10 months, 6 days old. Harry Gant, Bobby Allison, Morgan Shepherd and Dale Earnhardt were older. Stewart held on to finish 2nd, retaking the points lead as #48-Johnson was involved in a couple of wrecks and finished 31st, falling to 4th in points. After some checking #17-Matt Kenseth was awarded 3rd, followed by #12-Ryan Newman and #99-Carl Edwards. #6-Mark Martin was involved in the first big wreck and finished 41st, dropping to 9th in points. The other Chase drivers who had trouble were #2-Rusty Wallace [25th] and #16-Greg Biffle [27th]. The race was slowed with 11 cautions for 33 laps. There were 50 lead changes among 20 drivers. Stewart led the most laps with 65. Jarrett led two laps, the 3rd and final lap. Jarrett breaks the Talladega record for fewest laps led by a winner, held by Bobby Hamilton in 2001 and one other driver.
For my race rundown, laps led, DNF’s, caution info, Lucky Dogs and some notes, see my Talladega Race Info/Rundown Page or Race Page.
