Busch beats Johnson to Chicago win

Kyle Busch beat reigning champion Jimmie Johnson in a spectacular green-white-chequered finish to score his seventh Sprint Cup victory of the season in the LifeLock.com 400 at Chicagoland Speedway.

he current points leader had started from pole position and battled at the front with Roush Fenway drivers Carl Edwards and Greg Biffle in the first part of the race. Come the second half of the 400-miler he was the dominant force, although he didn't seem to be the fastest over the long runs.

Following his last pitstop and with seventeen laps remaining, Johnson came out of turn four on the inside of Busch after a long battle in which he had done his best to keep his car on the bottom lane of the track, where Johnson's Chevrolet was working better that his Toyota.

Busch finally had to concede the lead to the Hendrick driver, who pulled away by two and even three tenths of a second a lap. That was until David Gilliland's Ford engine blew up, forcing the caution to come out with only four laps remaining.

That evaporated Johnson's lead, but at the same time allowed him to get some debris off from the grille of his car, as water temperatures started to raise worringly. But given Busch's speed on cold tyres on restarts, the reigning champion knew the race was anything but won for him.

On the green flag for the final two-lap sprint, Johnson spun his tyres too much when he got on the throttle, giving Busch a run on him. Probably thinking that he would be better off running on the bottom again, he forced Busch to go on the outside into turns one and two.

Busch was able to ride side-by-side with Johnson and then going into turns three and four the Californian got loose as 'Rowdy' drove by on the outside of him to take the lead and hold him off in the last lap, with Kevin Harvick finishing a close third in the best seat of the house to watch the spectacular finish.

"I really don't believe how good things are going," Busch said after winning his fourteenth NASCAR race of the season. "This has been a phenomenal year, just something so special. I don't know where this is coming from but they're blessing us all here at Joe Gibbs Racing this year.

"I good a good restart on Jimmie and was able to push him a little bit on that start, got him going and then had to go to the outside because I knew he was going to go to the bottom there through [turns] one and two and we were able to get by him there."

Johnson lamented losing a victory in that way and admitted he probably made a mistake on the last restart giving Busch the outside when he saw he was under attack.

"He got the outside of me there, you know and got a good run on me," Johnson said. "Deep down inside I knew better to give him the outside but he had a run coming on the inside on the restart and I just thought that was the best tonight, but I should know better I pass guys on the last lap on the outside.

"I should've given him the bottom and been a little smarter with that."

Harvick ran strong all race long and scored his first top-five for a while, capitalizing on his strong finish by moving up four spots in the drivers' standing to ninth place. Biffle finished fourth behind him and similarly moved up four places in the points to seventh.

Tony Stewart ran a strong race and led for a few laps but didn't have enough handling in the end to contend for victory, finishing in fifth place.

Carl Edwards looked a threat for victory when he overtook Busch in the early stages of the race but a damaged splitter right after his penultimate stop forced him to make an unscheduled pitstop under green. As a consequence he fell a lap down that he never got back, finishing 32nd.

His teammate Matt Kenseth also had to make an unscheduled stop earlier due to an apparent puncture, which also put him off the lead lap. However he managed to recover it to finish seventh behind Red Bull's Brian Vickers.

Canadian Patrick Carpentier was the highest-finishing rookie in 30th place despite an early clash with the wall at turn four.

"I think we learned a lot," the Canadian said. "We lost a lap early on and I touched the wall there and got behind and could never get it back. Could have got the lucky dog there at the end but the car was fast, it was fun to drive this weekend."

Following back-to-back wins, Kyle Busch has extended his lead in the championship and gets another 10-points bonus towards his Chase seeding. He currently enjoys a 50-point lead over Edwards and Kasey Kahne in the bonus that will come into play when the 'playoff' starts in September.

Pos Driver Make Laps
1. Kyle Busch Toyota 267
2. Jimmie Johnson Chevrolet 267
3. Kevin Harvick Chevrolet 267
4. Greg Biffle Ford 267
5. Tony Stewart Toyota 267
6. Brian Vickers Toyota 267
7. Matt Kenseth Ford 267
8. David Ragan Ford 267
9. Martin Truex Jr Chevrolet 267
10. Ryan Newman Dodge 267
11. Jeff Gordon Chevrolet 267
12. Elliott Sadler Dodge 267
13. A.J. Allmendinger Toyota 267
14. David Reutimann Toyota 267
15. Kasey Kahne Dodge 267
16. Dale Earnhardt Jr Chevrolet 267
17. Mark Martin Chevrolet 267
18. Juan Montoya Dodge 267
19. Jeff Burton Chevrolet 267
20. Scott Riggs Chevrolet 267
21. Jamie McMurray Ford 267
22. Clint Bowyer Chevrolet 267
23. Dave Blaney Toyota 267
24. J.J. Yeley Toyota 267
25. Robby Gordon Dodge 267
26. Paul Menard Chevrolet 267
27. Jason Leffler Chevrolet 267
28. Kurt Busch Dodge 267
29. Bobby Labonte Dodge 267
30. Patrick Carpentier Dodge 265
31. Reed Sorenson Dodge 265
32. Carl Edwards Ford 265
33. Casey Mears Chevrolet 265
34. Regan Smith Chevrolet 265
35. Bill Elliott Ford 265
36. Michael Waltrip Toyota 264
37. Sam Hornish Jr Dodge 263
38. Terry Labonte Dodge 263
39. Joe Nemechek Chevrolet 263
40. Denny Hamlin Toyota 262
41. Travis Kvapil Ford 260
42. David Gilliland Ford 259
43. Michael McDowell Toyota 258