Ragan surprises all with last-lap pass for 'Dega win (cont'd)

Busch was involved in the Lap 115 wreck that caused the final caution and forced the race to overtime. Contact from Busch's No. 18 Toyota turned Justin Allgaier's Dodge into the Chevrolet of Bobby Gerhart.

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David Ragan gets the push he needs to catch Ryan Newman and win at Talladega. See other race images including more of Matt Kenseth's wreck.

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The crash that dulled some of the luster of Ragan's win came 10 laps earlier, as Kenseth moved up the track on the backstretch to block Busch and then returned to the inside line in front of Ragan, who bumped Kenseth and started his teammate rolling and sliding toward Turn 3. Kenseth's car burst into flames but righted itself, and Kenseth escaped unharmed (watch video).

"Kyle had a run, and I tried to block the top, but I couldn't get up there in time," Kenseth said. "I pulled to the bottom, and I saw David there, but I was well clear, and David hit me as I was turning back down -- to bump-draft me. You just can't hit somebody when they're turning. The cars aren't stable enough for that."

Ragan shared his view of the accident in Victory Lane.

"It looked like Matt was going up the hill," Ragan said. "They had a good run, and I thought that I had a good run on the bottom. He came back down about the time that I was there at his left-rear quarter. Certainly I feel bad for the No. 16 team and for [owner] Jack Roush. It cost them a good finish. We'll chat a little bit, and I'm sure that we'll move on."

The race ran caution-free for the first 54 laps -- a record for a green-flag run in the series at Talladega -- until Logano bumped Michael Waltrip's Toyota and sent it spinning into the Chevrolet of Clint Bowyer. Hard contact with the inside backstretch wall knocked Waltrip out of the race (watch video).

"Same guy -- every damn time," Bowyer radioed, reprising a refrain he had started during the March race at Bristol, where he called Waltrip "the worst driver in all of NASCAR" after an incident there. "How'd I wreck? What happened?" Bowyer continued, mimicking Waltrip.

Replays of the crash, however, showed clearly that Logano had turned Waltrip, who had some choice words for Bowyer after being told of his rival's remarks.

"If he wants to continue to be an idiot, we can play that game," Waltrip said after a visit to the infield care center.

Logano backed up Waltrip's version of events and apologized profusely after the race.

Earnhardt made a big blunder early when he missed his pit box on the first pit stop of the race (watch video). He didn't quite fall a lap down, but dropped a long way back from the leaders.

Earnhardt, who was running his fourth Nationwide race this season, also missed a pit box at the Daytona 500, the first of many pit-road mistakes this year.

"I didn't even know where my pit stall was when I got on pit road," he said. "There were a couple of cars in front of me and I never saw it."

He hit the right stops the rest of the way and nearly came away with the win

Notes: Busch retained the series lead by 62 points over 13th-place finisher Carl Edwards. ... The eighth-place finish was a career-best for Lagasse. ... There were 34 lead changes, two short of the track record for the series.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.