NASCAR at Talladega 2015: Winners, Losers from the CampingWorld.com 500

Oh, boy—where to start with the CampingWorld.com 500 at Talladega Superspeedway? Where, indeed!

You could start with Joey Logano sweeping the entire Contender Round, making him, well, the contender for the Sprint Cup.

“I think they’ve shown they can win at any race track,” NBC Sports NASCAR analyst Dale Jarrett said during the broadcast. “You couldn’t have any more momentum than what they have.”

You could start, and probably should start, with the green-white-checkered embarrassment at the end of this race.

The first “attempt” at the GWC actually wasn’t an attempt after the yellow came out before the start-finish line. The second GWC start resulted in a far greater wreck, yet the green flag stayed out.

This race, incredibly clean and devoid of big wrecks, ended in a murky, unsatisfying way, cutting four drivers—Ryan Newman, Denny Hamlin, Matt Kenseth and Dale Earnhardt Jr.—from the Chase for the Sprint Cup.

Read on as we try to make sense of this cut race at Talladega.

Loser: NASCAR's Mulligan

Mark Almond/Associated Press

So NASCAR instituted a new rule for Talladega that put into place one green-white-checkered finish instead of three.

After an entire day of clean racing, it did come down to a final restart. Funny how that happens.

With Logano and Earnhardt on the front row, the green flag dropped, but before Logano and Earnhardt hit the start-finish line, NASCAR threw the yellow flag for a benign crash behind them.

NASCAR ruled that the attempt lacked attempt-iness. They would do it again. Call it a mulligan, I guess?

Kyle Petty, a NASCAR analyst, said on the NBC Sports broadcast:

"

We have a green-white-checkered. You see the restart and you see where they start to spin. Boom, the caution comes back out. NASCAR waves this off and says they did not start. I’m going to be honest. I’ve never heard that rule. I thought the green flag came out, they started in the box, the green lights were on. NASCAR deemed this was not a restart.

"

The next restart blew up the field at about the same spot on the track of the first “attempt.” Yet the flag stayed green, just long enough to lock the order of the field.

Petty continued:

"

This is the second restart. Look at the start-finish line. The green flag is out. Look where these cars are wrecking, just about 100 feet from where [the previous crash happened]. Where was the caution flag? That’s my concern. I understand that was their attempt at a green-white-checkered. For me they threw [the caution] incredibly early on the first restart and incredibly slow on that second.

"

The point? Be consistent. This can’t be arbitrary. This, to put it mildly, was an embarrassment.

As a result, the end of this race was unsatisfying for everyone except Logano and, to some extent, the seven other who advanced: Kurt Busch, Jeff Gordon, Carl Edwards, Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Busch, Kevin Harvick and Brad Keselowski.

Winner: Jeff Gordon

Mark Almond/Associated Press

With the unofficial elimination of Newman, the resident winless Chase driver becomes Jeff Gordon.

Gordon won the pole at Talladega and drove near the front for the entire race. He took third and was all smiles at the end.

“Talladega can surprise you at any time,” he said during the NBC Sports broadcast. “I actually had a lot of fun out there. I was really looking forward to driving with Dale Jr. at the end.”

Gordon now becomes the only representative of Hendrick Motorsports in the Chase. Jimmie Johnson fell off in the first round. Junior failed this round. Now, in his final season, Gordon’s still alive heading to the Eliminator Round.

He said, "Crazy, crazy, what a relief. We’re in. That was awesome. I cannot believe it. This has been a crazy season for us. Since the Chase started the attitude of this team, the momentum, the things we weren’t doing early in the year, we’re doing them now at the right time."

Watch out: We’ve got something for them in the next three…or four.

Why not, right?

Loser: Roof Hatches

Butch Dill/Associated Press

It was something so simple, a precautionary measure to ensure Denny Hamlin’s safety should he need a better way to escape his car.

On Lap 86, Hamlin’s roof hatch—an optional piece of equipment—jarred loose in the turbulent wind of the race. He was forced to pit. His crew adhered an inadequate amount of tape in the first pit stop as Hamlin charged back out onto the track.

“We had a self-inflicted day,” Hamlin said during the NBC Sports broadcast. “It took us four times to fix our roof. It’s unfortunate. I feel like I’ve done everything we could possibly do to advance. It’s just one bad race in a three-race season takes you out. I really can’t spin anything positive about it.”

Five laps later, Hamlin’s roof hatch again came loose, and he pitted. This killed his season.

A roof hatch took him from second place in the Chase standings, 18 points from the cut line, and vaulted him out of the top eight and ended his run for the Sprint Cup.

During the final restart, Hamlin wrecked and ripped off his helmet in disgust. His season, for all intents and purposes, ended because of small piece of equipment.

“We’ll just move on to next year,” he said.

Winner: Martin Truex Jr., Who Overcame a Bad Start

Butch Dill/Associated Press

It’s amazing that Martin Truex Jr. is still alive in this competition. It didn’t look like that would happen at Talladega as he teetered on the edge of the cut line.

After committing an infraction during qualifying (driving over the yellow line), he was forced to start 43rd. In a plate race, that’s actually a good thing. Newman had qualified 18th and elected to start at the back of the field to keep all the presumed carnage in front of him.

Truex kept plugging. He had to be surprised by his finish, no?

“Not surprised,” he said during the NBC Sports broadcast. “At Talladega you never know what can happen. You have to fight to the end. Starting in the back wasn’t a big deal. We wanted to stay out of an early wreck; once that was clear, we’d race our way back through there.”

After a terrible pit stop, he found himself alone and out of the draft, soon falling a lap down. A timely caution as the Lucky Dog put him back on the lead lap and in control of his destiny.

But, as he said, anything can happen at this track, and finishing seventh advanced him into the next round, something no one could have imagined at the beginning of the season.

Why can’t this Cinderella story continue? His journey will probably end in this round, but he’s made it this far, an incredible accomplishment in itself.

Loser: Over the Wall Too Soon

John Bazemore/Associated Press

For Earnhardt, the win was oh so close. After driving over 500 miles, Earnhardt lost by the length of a penny and saw his chase for the Sprint Cup end in Alabama.

It stung all the more because his tire man went over the wall too soon. It took Junior from P1 to P27 after the penalty.

“We could pout about this day, but we didn’t do well enough in the first two races of this round,” Earnhardt said during the NBC Sports broadcast. “We would not be worrying by losing by a splitter.”

Earnhardt was the favorite to win this race, and certainly the fan favorite. Anytime he struck the lead, the Talladega faithful let loose their Dale calls. Unfortunately for Earnhardt, he needed the win to advance.

The race finished under caution, and the replay officials deemed that Logano nosed ahead when the yellow came out.

“I couldn’t believe he gave me the bottom [on the restart],” Junior said. “That was a gift. I was going to win the race. That caution came out, I’m fine with the new rule. We ran second. I can live with that. We fell about the width of a splitter short, and you know how much I hate that splitter.”

Nobody owned the plate tracks like Earnhardt this year, with two wins and four top-threes, but ultimately he leaves Talladega on the outside looking in.

Winner: Kevin Harvick's Hitting Trevor Bayne

Butch Dill/Associated Press

Where was Kevin Harvick after the race? Gone. He was gone.

Harvick’s car was in serious danger of costing him a chance at advancing. He had no power and could drive no faster than caution speed.

He couldn’t keep pace on restarts. He gave up the outside lane, but as Trevor Bayne came up to Harvick’s outside, Harvick nudged him just enough to cause a wreck and freeze the order of finish.

“The No. 4 could only run about 30 miles per hour,” Hamlin said after the race on NBC Sports. “He saw people coming. He knew he was going to be 30th, the last car on the lead lap, so he caused the wreck.”

Matt Kenseth added, "You can’t hardly blame the guy for doing it. He’s either going to make it if it does it or not and wreck some people going slow. Or if it stays green, he won’t make it two laps. The Ford car knew [Harvick] was blowing up. [Harvick] told everybody he was going to stay in his lane, and he only did that so when somebody got outside him, he could cause the wreck to finish the race."

If that’s true, which it may be, it was conniving to bait cars around him so that he could wreck them. As Kenseth said, it was Harvick’s only chance. Otherwise, he'd have fallen out of the top eight by the end of the restart.

Backed into a corner, Harvick did what he had to do. Once the dust settles, he’ll answer for this crash, and he’ll likely have a neatly crafted answer, but his wreck caused a chain reaction that certainly cost Hamlin a chance at advancing.

Harvick wasn’t going to let his mechanical issues end his season. He proved he’d do anything to stay alive.

Loser: Matt Kenseth

Butch Dill/Associated Press

Matt Kenseth was all set to advance to the Eliminator Round at Kansas. He had led 153 laps, and the guy trailing him on the final lap had already advanced, so what could go wrong?

That’s when Logano spun him out and made sure that Kenseth’s only chance of a future in the Chase came via winning at Talladega. It didn’t happen. Kenseth was involved in the final wreck on the final restart and had no chance.

“It’s disappointing. It wasn’t really racing,” he said during the broadcast. “There were a lot of games going on. Hopefully we can get back to racing next week, driving fast.”

Kenseth sits in the position of playing spoiler. When Logano cut him off heading to pit road at Talladega, you could almost feel the rage pouring out of the No. 20 car.

Now that Kenseth is racing for pride, you better believe he’ll be looking for any opportunity—subtle or otherwise—at ruining Logano’s chances for a Sprint Cup. The gloves will come off at some point over the next four races.

Winner: The Contender-Round Sweep

Russell Norris/Associated Press

The Talladega faithful booed Logano and threw beer cans at his burning out the No. 22 Ford. Not only did Logano win his third race in a row, something that hadn’t been done since Jimmie Johnson did it in 2007, but he kept Earnhardt from advancing in the Chase.

Hence the beer cans.

“Three in a row, can you believe that? How does that even happen?” Logano said during the NBC Sports broadcast.

When you’re hot, you’re hot, and the final restart granted Logano the win by the shortest of margins.

“I was confused after the first [restart],” he said. “I saw the green flag fly. I thought that was an attempt. We did it one more time. We play by NASCAR’s rules. It’s their sandbox. Thankfully it worked out for us.”

Logano can’t be driving any better, which may not be the best thing right now. Everything resets come Martinsville, and peaking too early is a reality in this playoff format. These points don’t carry over.

To boot, he now has a recently eliminated, vengeful Matt Kenseth (thwarted by Logano at Kansas) who will no doubt make Logano’s trip around Martinsville, Texas and Phoenix miserable.