Right call: Labonte stays out, wins Virginia 500

MARTINSVILLE, Va. -- Bobby Labonte held on for a late-race restart to win the Virginia 500 at Martinsville Speedway on Sunday.

Bobby Labonte jumped five spots in the Winston Cup standings.

After starting 15th, Labonte had the No. 18 Interstate Batteries Pontiac ahead of Dale Jarrett, Matt Kenseth and Tony Stewart for a caution restart with seven laps to go. While Jarrett and Kenseth battled side-by-side, Labonte used that to his advantage and pulled away and into Victory Lane.

With two laps left, the caution flag came out again as Bobby Hamilton got spun in Turns 3 and 4 giving Labonte the win. It was Labonte's first victory here and 19th of his career. His previous best finish here was a fourth-place effort last fall.

Labonte said the car came around in the latter part of the race, even as his tires wore down.

Matt Kenseth scored his fifth straight top-10 finish.

“We had a good car in practice yesterday, we just didn’t qualify very well,” Labonte said. “These guys did a great job in the pits today and we made some adjustments.

“We kept working on it a little bit in the race and got track position. We went with two tires twice and then none at the end there.

“Car was good on the forward bite coming off the turns for the last two-thirds of the day. Luckily, we weren’t one of the cautions today. I don’t like to bump guys out of the way like I’ve seen other guys do.

“I figured if I was up front I had a better shot than being behind somebody.”

Tony Stewart led the most laps.

While Labonte was driving away for the victory, Jarrett and Kenseth were waging a war for second.

Kenseth got the better of the deal in the No. 17 DeWalt Tools Ford as Jarrett ending up losing a position to Stewart, who finished third. Jarrett ended up fourth, his first top-five of the year.

“You hate getting run into and you hate running into people,” Kenseth said. “It was just hard racing. Right before the caution came out I was getting away from the No. 88 a little bit.

“He got into me getting into Turn 1 and got me sideways and got by. He didn’t do it on purpose, it was just close quarters racing. At the end of the race, we got into each other again and we were just battling for position.

	This early accident sent Elliott Sadler into a spin. Sadler ended up 28th.

Kenseth, who has two wins already this year, was just happy how the race ended up for him. “To be honest, I didn’t even think we had a second-place car,” said Kenseth, who is now only 27 points behind Winston Cup points leader Sterling Marlin. “We had a real solid car, it wasn’t superfast, but it was real solid.

“We kind of just aimed for a top-10 today and came out of here second.”

“That’s as hard and close of racing I’ve seen here,” said Jarrett. “It was fun racing. Everyone was beating and banging and after our air wrench broke and got us a lap down, I didn’t have any idea we could be racing for the win.

“The guys did a great job and made up some time for me in the pits with great stops. The car just worked well when we got two tires, we just didn’t have enough there at the end.”

Finishing fifth was Earnhardt Jr. with Terry Labonte in sixth. It was Terry Labonte's second straight top 10 finish.

Ricky Rudd was seventh with Roush Racing teammates Mark Martin, Jeff Burton and Kurt Busch rounding out the top 10.