All day long at New Hampshire Motor Speedway it was a battle between Brad Keselowski and Denny Hamlin.
If the No. 2 held the lead, the No. 11 was going to come down low to pass, and the No. 2 was going to take it right back as soon as possible.
On the final run of the race – that stretched over 85 laps – Keselowski earned that lead over Hamlin, gradually pulling away from the FedEx car and stretching it to multiple seconds.
While teams were potentially stressing a shortage of fuel, Keselowski stayed poised and calm to capture his third victory of the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season.
The win elevates Keselowski to third on the playoff grid, just one playoff point short of where Kevin Harvick sits in second. Denny Hamlin, who’s ahead of both of them, picked up another stage win on Sunday, too, to extend his lead.
Early on in the race, Kyle Busch was forced to retire due to a flat tire that sent his car into the wall.
Kyle Busch, after this accident puts him OUT of the race at New Hampshire: “Let's find somebody from Goodyear, send ‘em to my fucking garage."#NASCAR pic.twitter.com/NUGvrW0gRW
— Connor Ferguson (@cfchangs9) August 2, 2020
Goodyear has not yet addressed what Busch said, however a poor season for the 18 team just continues to get worse as he moves closer to the playoff cutoff every week.
With six races to go, we still haven’t seen the defending champs win a race.
The NASCAR Cup Series will return to the track on Saturday during the first of two races for the tour at Michigan International Speedway. The event will be televised on NBCSN and is scheduled to start at 3:00 p.m. CT.
NASCAR Cup Series New Hampshire Results
1. Brad Keselowski
2. Denny Hamlin
3. Martin Truex Jr.
4. Joey Logano
5. Kevin Harvick
6. Matt DiBenedetto
7. Aric Almirola
8. Cole Custer
9. Chase Elliott
10. Tyler Reddick
11. William Byron
12. Jimmie Johnson
13. Austin Dillon
14. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
15. Alex Bowman
16. Ryan Preece
17. Kurt Busch
18. Clint Bowyer
19. Michael McDowell
20. Ryan Blaney
21. Ryan Newman
22. Ty Dillon
23. Bubba Wallace
24. Erik Jones
25. Chris Buescher
26. Daniel Suarez
27. Brennan Poole
28. Christopher Bell
29. J.J. Yeley
30. James Davison
31. Garrett Smithley
32. Quin Houff
33. Timmy Hill
34. Joey Gase
35. Corey Lajoie
36. John Hunter Nemechek
37. Matt Kenseth
38. Kyle Busch
| 2020 NASCAR Cup Series Playoff Grid | ||||||
| After 20 of 26 Regular Season Races – Next Race Sat. @ Michigan | ||||||
| Position | Driver | Wins | Points | Cutoff | Playoff Points | |
| 1 | Denny Hamlin | 5 | x | x | 29 | |
| 2 | Kevin Harvick | 4 | x | x | 22 | |
| 3 | Brad Keselowski | 3 | x | x | 21 | |
| 4 | Joey Logano | 2 | x | x | 14 | |
| 5 | Chase Elliott | 1 | x | x | 10 | |
| 6 | Alex Bowman | 1 | x | x | 9 | |
| 7 | Ryan Blaney | 1 | x | x | 8 | |
| 8 | Martin Truex Jr. | 1 | x | x | 7 | |
| 9 | Cole Custer ® | 1 | x | x | 5 | |
| 10 | Austin Dillon | 1 | x | x | 5 | |
| 11 | Aric Almirola | 0 | +145 | 1 | ||
| 12 | Kurt Busch | 0 | +112 | 1 | ||
| 13 | Kyle Busch | 0 | +94 | 2 | ||
| 14 | Clint Bowyer | 0 | +43 | 0 | ||
| 15 | Matt DiBenedetto | 0 | +40 | 1 | ||
| 16 | William Byron | 0 | +15 | 0 | ||
| Playoff Cutoff | ||||||
| 17 | Tyler Reddick ® | 0 | -15 | 0 | ||
| 18 | Jimmie Johnson | 0 | -25 | 0 | ||
| 19 | Erik Jones | 0 | -31 | 0 | ||
| 20 | Bubba Wallace | 0 | -118 | 0 | ||