Weekend That Was: Lowe's (cont'd)

After too much predictability over the season's first 11 races, this was something different. This was just what NASCAR needed. And it wouldn't have been nearly as challenging for the competitors, or as exciting and as interesting for the fans, if it had been a 500-mile event instead of a 600-mile one.

"I think that's what's so special about the Coca-Cola 600," said Kyle Petty, who registered his best finish in nearly a decade by overcoming some early damage to the front end of his No. 45 Dodge, caused when Johnson had a tire literally come apart. "That last 100 miles, if you go back and look at the history -- and let's go back 20 years because it's been 20 years since I won this race [in 1987] -- but even the year that I won it, it was like nobody wanted to lead it. Everybody that led the race blew up, or hit the wall, or something happened. All of sudden with eight or 10 laps left to go, I get the lead and there wasn't enough time for me to screw it up -- and I ended up winning the race. That's kind of the way it worked.

Back on top

With a solid run, the No. 45 team looks to use Lowe's as a stepping stone for the future.

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"I think it's that last 100 miles that make it so good. ... You don't know what's going to happen."

Petty added that it's refreshing to see some new folks at the top of the leaderboard at the end of a day, and that a long race like the 600 helps make that possible because it's an event like no other.

"Do I think it's good for the sport? Yeah. I think it's good that Casey Mears wins the race and J.J. Yeley runs second. It shows that the sport is healthy," Petty said. "I think sometimes we get stagnant. But look, we've gone through this 10 million times. We went through it when Tony [Stewart] won all the races; we went through it when Dale [Earnhardt] Sr. won all the races; or when Jeff [Gordon] or Jimmie [Johnson] wins all the races.

"You need that variety. The sport needs that mixup. We need those new guys to come in and win races and run good, to show people that we're not just all lap cars out here and that we can compete to win races out here."

Not back yet
Robbie Loomis, vice president of operations at Petty Enterprises, cautioned that while everyone in the Petty organization is jacked up about Kyle's strong finish in the 600, it's not like Petty Enterprises has suddenly jettisoned back to its glorious past.

"We've still got a long, long way to go," Loomis said. "It really comes down to money and time. We need a lot of money. If you lined 'em up by points finishes, a lot of them would be ahead of us as far as money coming in. It's a step in the right direction, but we've just got to keep growing our performance so we can go to our sponsors and ask for more -- so we can ultimately give them more.

"Right now you're just trying to work together. ... Everyone is working like crazy around Petty Enterprises, and we're getting there."

Petty added: "We didn't change the world [Sunday night]. It's just a race. I guess I'm at that stage in my life where I can feel that way. Don't get me wrong, it feels darn good. ... To race competitively with some of these guys who are 20 years younger than me, it feels good. The third-place [finish], I guess that's just cherry on the sundae right now.

"If I was 21 or 22 and that's the best finish I'd ever had, maybe I'd be making a wet spot on my seat right now. But it's just a race. It's good for Petty Enterprises, it's good for those guys at the shop who have worked so hard every day for the last five or six years. ... But now we need to try to build on it."

Generally speaking
Of all the places Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, could have gone to make a public appearance on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend, he chose Lowe's Motor Speedway and the Coca-Cola 600.

He explained way before Sunday's race began, expressing how much he appreciated NASCAR's "Salute to American Heroes" theme that included having the Nextel Cup cars of Greg Biffle, Denny Hamlin, Mark Martin, Gordon, Earnhardt, Johnson and even eventual 600 winner Mears drive cars with special paint schemes honoring different branches of the military. Mears' No. 25 Chevrolet featured the National Guard -- but then the National Guard usually is his main sponsor. (Continued)