Logano Gets Nashville Confidence Boost

On the Nationwide Series' first venture of 2009 away from the shadow of the Sprint Cup Series, Joey Logano spoiled the show.

Logano, a full-time driver in both the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and the Nationwide Series, won Saturday's Nashville 300 at Gladeville, Tenn.'s 1.5-mile Nashville Superspeedway after passing teammate Kyle Busch with just 8 laps to go.

While the Joe Gibbs Racing teammates dominated much of the day, the biggest story might be a restoration of Logano's confidence in a race car.

The 18-year-old Logano moved up to a full-time role in the Sprint Cup Series in 2009 to fill in a seat at JGR vacated by the departing Tony Stewart. Seven races into that campaign, it's quite easy to see that his venture to the top ranks of NASCAR has been a bumpy ride -- including a hard head-on crash in the season-opening Daytona 500 after a frustrating speedweeks.

Since then, Logano has nearly fallen from the Top-35 automatic start line with his best finish in the Sprint Cup Series a 13th-place result at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in March.

His Nationwide campaign, however, has been much more successful. Logano has completed every lap in 2009 with a worst finish of 20th at Daytona. Saturday afternoon, Logano led a race-high 95 laps of the 225 lap event (teammate Kyle Busch led 77) and made the winning move on his teammate as the checkered flag neared.

"It's been way too long since we've been here," said Logano after the race, referring to victory lane.

But the drive to that checkered flag stopped momentarily after a scary crash on the frontstretch saw Joe Nemechek's No. 87 get clipped in the right rear, spin sideways, and flip on his roof before bouncing arond to land back on all four wheels. Nemechek actually kept driving the car as the caution came out. However, Nemechek brought the car to pit road under the ensuing red flag and NASCAR wouldn't let him return to the track in fear that the car couldn't adequately protect Nemechek in another crash.

Oddly enough, Nemechek wasn't required to report to the infield hospital after flipping his car because he didn't stop on the track and actually drove it back to the pit area. NASCAR rules mandate any car that stops on track after an incident see the driver report to the infield care center.

The wreck didn't stop Logano, though, and the No. 20 jumped quickly out to a multiple car length lead over Busch to cruise to his first win of 2009. Logano's first career win in the Nationwide Series came last year at Kentucky Speedway.

Brad Keselowski (third) and Kelly Bires (fourth) led the brigade of Nationwide Series regulars, while Carl Edwards finished 5th. After the race, Edwards was very high on the work put in by Bires after the Kevin Harvick Inc. driver passed him in the final laps. Bires doesn't have a full-time ride in the Nationwide Series.

Jason Leffler, David Ragan, Mike Bliss, Steve Wallace and Scott Lagasse Jr. rounded out the Top-10.