By Staff
Kasey Kahne continues to impress everyone in the NEXTEL Cup Series.
On Sunday he came inches from recording his first Cup victory.
But as much as I would love to see Kahne, who has three second place finishes this season, win a race, I was happy that he didn't.
Because Elliott Sadler, who I have always liked, won his first race in more than 100 starts.
Everything they say is bigger and better in Texas. Well, I'm here to tell you bigger wasn't better when it came to the finish of the Samsung/Radio Shack 500.
In fact, smaller was better.
Sadler edged Kahne by less than half a car length. The official time was two-hundredths of a second.
Sadler was able to pick up his second career Cup victory when Jeff Gordon, who was making a bid for his first win at Texas Motor Speedway, ran into electrical problems in the closing laps.
Although Gordon recovered to finish third, he was not a factor at the end -- much to the delight of a lot of the fans in the stands.
Kahne had the best car all day long and led the most laps, but unfortunately for him, had trouble in the pits which left him at the tail end of the lead lap in the final laps.
He roared to the front and if he had another 100-feet of track to work with would have had his first Cup victory.
Sadler's victory also snapped the winning streak of the Gillette "Young Guns", who was six-for-six entering Texas.
Defending champion Ryan Newman cut a tire and crashed ending his day early and dropping him from fifth in the points to 10th.
Points leader Matt Kenseth also ran into trouble on Sunday, but recovered to finish a respectable 16th, but he lost the lead to Kurt Busch.
Now with a week off, teams can regroup, design some new strategies and then head to Martinsville where tempers will flare once again.