Keselowski sneaks into Eliminator round with Talladega win

Brad Keselowski was the victor in a suspenseful race at Talladega on Sunday. It was the final race of the Contender round of the Chase for the Sprint Cup, meaning that another four drivers were up for elimination coming into the race. One of those drivers was Keselowski, who was coming off a series of incidents following last Saturday evening's race at Charlotte, including getting jumped by Matt Kenseth by his team's hauler. Keselowski's win changed his luck and locked him into the Eliminator round, which starts next Sunday in Martinsville, Virginia. Keselowski's teammate Joey Logano and Kevin Harvick claimed their third-round spots with wins as well. Many fans still angry about last week were even more mad to see Keselowski win.

When all was said and done, three of the four eliminated drivers were from Hendrick Motorsports. The race took two green-white-checkered attempts to finish, and during the first attempt, eliminated Chaser Greg Biffle set off a wreck that collected Dale Earnhardt Jr., Paul Menard and other drivers. Earnhardt, who had restarted the race in 16th place, was already about to be eliminated from the Chase at that point, but the wreck did him in for sure and he ended up finishing 31st. Earnhardt's teammate Jimmie Johnson led the most laps but fell back at the end, ending his chances for a seventh championship. Earnhardt and Johnson were the other two drivers needing a win to advance to the third round. Their teammate Kasey Kahne never contended for the win. Meanwhile, Kyle Busch's fate was determined by a lap 104 crash that also took out Aric Almirola, A.J. Allmendinger, J.J. Yeley, Austin Dillon and polesitter Brian Vickers.

In the last few laps, the battle for the win was down to Keselowski and fellow Chase driver Ryan Newman, who unlike Keselowski was never in danger of elimination from the Chase. Newman went on to finish fifth. Several underdog drivers led throughout the day, including Danica Patrick, Ryan Blaney, David Gilliland and Cole Whitt. There was also a bittersweet touch to the race in the form of veteran and two-time champion Terry Labonte making his final series start. Labonte has only competed at Daytona and Talladega, NASCAR's two restrictor plate tracks, in recent years. Restrictor plate expert Michael Waltrip also made one of his handful of annual starts since going part-time.

The eliminated Chase drivers after Sunday's race:

• 5-Kasey Kahne
• 18-Kyle Busch
• 48-Jimmie Johnson
• 88-Dale Earnhardt Jr.