Nemechek caps winning weekend at Banquet 400

KANSAS CITY, Kan. -- Joe Nemechek completed a weekend sweep Sunday, holding off a charging Ricky Rudd to win the NASCAR Nextel Cup Banquet 400 at Kansas Speedway.

This one was almost as close as his half car-length victory over Greg Biffle in the Busch Series event Saturday, with Nemechek and Rudd racing side-by-side and bumping once with a lap to go before Nemechek took control again and beat Rudd to the finish by 0.081 seconds -- about 1 1/4 car-lengths.

"There at the end I was trying to save gas and here come Ricky Rudd out of nowhere," Nemechek said. "I was like, 'Holy Moley.' I had to get back on it. He got beside me one time, but I wasn't going to let it happen."

Nemechek was among a group of 10 drivers who stayed on track when cars ahead of them pitted during a caution period late in the race, moving from 14th to fourth.

Another yellow flag on the ensuing restart left him in the same spot, but the veteran racer, who started from the pole for the second straight race, charged to the front once the green flag waved for lap 218 of the 267-lap event.

He passed Rudd and Jamie McMurray and dueled with championship contender Elliott Sadler before grabbing the lead on lap 231, staying out front the rest of the way for his fourth career victory and first since May 2003 at Richmond.

Biffle finished third, followed by Sadler, Jeremy Mayfield and Kurt Busch, who came into the race with a 12-point lead over Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the Nextel Cup standings and finished Sunday leading Earnhardt, who finished ninth, by 29 points.

Jeff Gordon, who finished 13th, is third, 79 points behind after four of 10 races in NASCAR's new 10-man championship format.

Neither television broadcaster NBC nor radio's Motor Racing Network needed to use delays they announced earlier in the week in the aftermath of Earnhardt using a vulgarity during a victory interview on live TV last weekend. NASCAR fined Earnhardt $10,000 and docked him 25 points, knocking him out of first place in the standings.