BUSCH

• Keselowski outruns Bowyer for Bristol Nationwide win

  
  

  Bristol, TN (Sports Network) - Brad Keselowski took the lead from Clint Bowyer with 24 laps to go at Bristol Motor Speedway, claiming a victory in Friday's Food City 250 for his second Nationwide victory. Keselowski finished 1.025 seconds ahead of Bowyer, who won the spring event at Bristol earlier this year.

  Keselowski's first Nationwide win came in June at Nashville.

  He is in his first full season driving the No.88 Chevrolet for Dale Earnhardt, Jr.'s J.R. Motorsports.

  He also moved to within 122 points of Bowyer in the championship standings with nine races remaining in the season.

  "We know to win the championship, we got to win races, and that's what we did today," Keselowski said. "That's what we got to do every week. We got to run up front to get a shot at winning races." Cale Gale captured his first Nationwide pole earlier in the day and led the first l7 laps, but Dario Franchitti moved underneath Gale and grabbed the top spot just before the first caution flag waved on Lap 18 for an incident involving Marcos Ambrose.

  Franchitti led 87 circuits before Bowyer jumped out in front on Lap 105.

  Carl Edwards, meanwhile, took a major hit in the points chase on Lap 87 when he made contact with Elliott Sadler and slapped the outside wall, causing severe damage to his No.60 Ford. Edwards was running fifth at the time. He returned 83 laps behind and ended up finishing 37th. The defending series champion is now 241 points behind Bowyer.

  "Definitely very frustrating in the points right now," Edwards said. "My hats off to Brad for winning the race. He did a great job. Clint also did a great job. But that's not what we need them to be doing for us to win championships. We have to be up there racing with them." Despite leading a race-high 121 laps, Bowyer was frustrated with his second- place run.

  "It's been a frustrating the last two months for me," Bowyer said. "We've been struggling over here. Bottom line is we finished second, and it was a good points night for us. They expect me to win races when they put me in cars like that. It's not fair to those guys. I messed up down there." Bowyer got loose on a restart on Lap 226, allowing Keselowski to move underneath him and grab the top spot.

  Greg Biffle, Gale and David Stremme completed the top-five.

  The next race is set for Saturday, August 30th, at Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, CA.

  08/22 23:20:49 ET