Keselowski had no plans of dipping below the yellow

TALLADEGA, Ala. -- While pushing Carl Edwards to the lead on the final lap of Sunday's Aaron's 499, Brad Keselowski's mind was not only on racing to the line, but also racing back to the last time the Cup Series visited Talladega Superspeedway.

Wild win No. 1

Brad Keselowski took the part-time No. 9 Chevrolet owned by James Finch and surprised many with his last-lap win at Talladega.

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In October, Regan Smith ducked below Tony Stewart coming through the tri-oval for the victory in the Amp Energy 500, only to have the win taken away when NASCAR officials ruled Smith used the area below the yellow line to advance his position.

Instead of possibly wrecking Stewart and himself, Smith made a clean pass -- but all he had to show for it at the end of the day was an 18th-place finish.

Not only did Keselowski take note, but he knew he'd do things differently if he got in the same position.

"Regan last year did the right thing," Keselowski said. "He did the smart thing. He did the cool thing. And he did something that I would be proud of if I was him. You know, he took the bullet.

"To be honest, I didn't. I wasn't going to take the bullet. I'm not in a situation in my career where I can afford to take the bullet and I had nothing to lose."

Keselowski deked Edwards to the high side, and when the leader slid up the track to block, Keselowski went down low and got the fender of his No. 09 Chevrolet up to the left-rear quarterpanel of Edwards' No. 99 Ford. And by the time Edwards realized his error and tried to correct it, the two touched, sending Edwards on a scary ride, first off Ryan Newman's hood and then into the catch fence.

And Keselowski's first lap led in Cup Series competition resulted in his first Cup victory. Not bad for a kid with a total of five Cup races under his belt.

"I thought I knew Carl well enough to know that he wouldn't go all the way down [to block]," Keselowski said. "Apparently I did not. But I knew I had to hold the spot.

"You know, certainly I was thinking of Regan Smith more than just when the moment came, but I was thinking of him the whole weekend. Not necessarily specific to winning the race, but running anywhere in the field, whether that's for 12th on the last lap or not."

Too Dangerous

Carl Edwards' spectacular crash in the final lap of the Aaron's 499 reminded Joe Menzer of Bobby Allison's 20 years earlier. Before they race at 'Dega again, he says something needs to be done before tragedy strikes.

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Edwards, who climbed out of his destroyed car and ran across the finish line to complete the race, had no problems with what he felt was good, hard racing.

"Brad was doing everything right," Edwards said. "He was pushing and that's what you have to do to win. I knew he was going to try to get around me, I just didn't realize how much better his car would be when he broke the plane of my rear bumper. So when I saw him turn down, I immediately started to turn down, but he had already come up along my left side a couple of inches, a foot maybe, so it turned me when I turned down."

The yellow line rule is there to provide a boundary and whether the drivers like it or not, they have to play by that rule.

"The yellow line is there to prevent us from running underneath each other and prevent us from being crazy," Keselowski said. "But the bottom line is, that's who we are. We are all crazy race car drivers and we are going to run into each other.

"The yellow line could be six feet high or six feet low and we would still run into each other. That's what we do. It's a give-and-take sport and as races go on, it's a challenge of who is going to lift and who is not, and it's testing each other every moment."

Keselowski said knowing the rules, and being willing to race aggressively under those circumstances, was the reason why he was willing to take the chance that there would be contact coming to the line. And Edwards was perfectly fine with that.

"I mean, he did everything right," Edwards said. "NASCAR puts us in a box. If he drives below the line, he loses the race, so what's a guy supposed to do? So you end up having to wreck people or having to get second, and none of us wants to do that."

Keselowski agreed.

"We all know the rules, and we know how to take advantage of them, and I guess we have to look in the mirror and decide what we are going to do when we are faced with those decisions," Keselowski said. "I've said right along that I am not in a position to lift. I was not going to lose. I was not going to lift, hold my ground and consequences be damned."