![\"brianv\"](\"http:\/\/www.maineracing.com\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/brianv.jpg\")
Vickers wins first Sprint Cup Series race since 2009 health scare<\/p>\nVickers wins first Sprint Cup Series race since 2009 health scare<\/p>\n
LOUDON, N.H. (July 14, 2013) \u2013 Nothing was going to stop Tony Stewart from pulling away from the field on restarts. Nothing, except a dry gas tank. And it was Brian Vickers who took advantage of Stewart\u2019s bad luck, zipping by him on the Magic Mile backstretch with one lap to go and holding on to win the Camping World RV Sales 301 \u2013 Vickers\u2019 third NASCAR Sprint Cup Series victory in 271 career starts.<\/p>\n
\u201cHard to put into words,\u201d said Vickers \u2013 a part-time driver for Michael Waltrip Racing \u2013 who celebrated his moment sharing high-fives to fans along the frontstretch. \u201cThis is one of the most special events of my life. It feels like the first time in my career, the partners and owners and managers and crew chief are as good as it has been in my career.\u201d
\n <\/p>\n
Kyle Busch, Jeff Burton, Brad Keselowski and Aric Almirola round out the top-five.<\/p>\n
Vickers becomes the 11th different winner in the last 11 Sprint Cup races at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, the longest active streak of any track in the circuit. It\u2019s the first victory and fourth top-10 finish in 16 races for Vickers in New Hampshire. It\u2019s the third top-10 finish in eight starts this season for the native of Thomasville, N.C., and the first victory in the Sprint Cup Series since taking the checkers at Michigan International Speedway.<\/p>\n
It was also Vickers\u2019s first win since being diagnosed with blood clots in his legs and lungs.<\/p>\n
\u201cWake up one morning and hope to be around the next. To then I hope to race to now I am racing. To now I don’t have a job then getting a call to see if I’m interested in running races,\u201d said Vickers, who reflected on his return to racing from the health scare. \u201cThe biggest thing is support from my family and friends through the difficult times, a select few folks who still believed in me and supported me along the way.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Busch, the runner-up finish comes a day after winning the CNBC Prime\u2019s \u201cThe Profit\u201d 200 Nationwide Series race at the Magic Mile. Busch led 53 laps on Sunday, but wasn\u2019t able to chase down Stewart.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe car was super-fast, but anytime you got close to someone the aero-effect took over and you couldn\u2019t get any closer than five car-lengths,\u201d said Busch, who now has four top-fives in his last six Cup starts. \u201cYou have to get all you can get on those restarts and we just weren\u2019t able to get a good enough start to pull ahead and get into open air.\u201d<\/p>\n
The third-place finish for Jeff Burton was his highest finish since taking second at Daytona on July 7 of last year. It was also Burton\u2019s best New Hampshire finish since leading all 300 laps in September of 2000.<\/p>\n
\u201cI like the people up here; I\u2019ve been racing here for 25 years,\u201d said Burton, who has four career wins at the Magic Mile. \u201cI just like racing here, it’s a really challenging racetrack. It is fun, it is aggressive, it is hard \u2026 I just love it here.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rounding out the top-10 were Jimmie Johnson, Kevin Harvick, Carl Edwards, Matt Kenseth and Jeff Gordon. The sixth-place finish for Johnson was impressive given he was forced to start at the rear of the field because of a failed inspection following qualifying on Friday. He now sits 56 points ahead of Clint Bowyer (13th) in the Sprint Cup Series standings.<\/p>\n
\u201cOnce you get to the top 10 that\u2019s a different game trying to pass cars and work your way to the front,\u201d said Johnson. \u201cAll in all a great day for the Lowe\u2019s team.\u201d<\/p>\n
Vickers will start four more races this season, including the SYLVANIA 300 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Sept. 22. And given the way Sunday finished, another run-in with Stewart \u2013 a three-time New Hampshire winner \u2013 is not only possible, but very likely.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was not the guy I wanted to be next to on a green-white-checkered finish,\u201d said Vickers. \u201cI knew he wasn’t going to use me up, run me off the racetrack and he wasn’t going to wreck me. I thank him for racing me clean.\u201d<\/p>\n
Clean as an empty tank.<\/p>\n
Notes<\/p>\n
\u00b7 Kurt Busch led a race-high 102 laps before being caught in a three-car accident with Matt Kenseth (33 laps led) and Ryan Newman on lap 226.<\/p>\n
\u00b7 Stewart led 84 laps before running out of gas on lap 300.<\/p>\n
\u00b7 Pole-sitter Brad Keselowski led 14 laps.<\/p>\n
\u00b7 Danica Patrick finished 37th.<\/p>\n
For more details and ticket information on events at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, or to purchase tickets to the SYLVANIA 300 NASCAR weekend in September, please stop by our Ticket Office, visit the speedway website at www.nhms.com, or call our Ticket Hotline at (603) 783-4931.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Vickers wins first Sprint Cup Series race since 2009 health scare LOUDON, N.H. (July 14, 2013) \u2013 Nothing was going to stop Tony Stewart from pulling away from the field on restarts. Nothing, except a dry gas tank. And it was Brian Vickers who took advantage of Stewart\u2019s bad luck, zipping by him on the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[112,16,21,14972],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-new-hampshire","category-nhms","category-sprint-cup","category-touring-series-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13710\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newenglandracingnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}