BRISTOL, Tenn. -- As he stood along pit road following Saturday's Irwin Tools Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway, driver Clint Bowyer wiped sweat from his brow with the back of his hand and took a gulp from a bottle of water.

He deserved it. Earlier he took a big bite out of his closest competition for a spot in the Chase.

“

I can't paint you a pretty picture. There's not much good here right now. ... We're just not running good.

”

-- ALAN GUSTAFSON

By virtue of his hard-earned, fourth-place finish in the grueling 500-lap race at the .533-mile short track, Bowyer solidified his hold on the 12th and final spot in the Chase. With only races at Atlanta and Richmond remaining before the 26-race cutoff, Bowyer increased his lead over his closest pursuer to 100 points.

Bowyer had entered the evening with a mere 35-point advantage over Mark Martin. And while Bowyer celebrated the fourth-place finish in his No. 33 Chevrolet, Martin was left to ponder what went wrong as he struggled to a finish of 23rd that dropped him to 14th in the standings -- 101 points behind Bowyer and one behind Jamie McMurray, who finished third in the race and moved into 13th in the standings.

"We all talked before the race," Bowyer said. "This was a team effort and it's going to take a team effort going forward to get ourselves in the Chase. The [pit crew] guys did their job on pit road. ... I promised them I would do my job."

He did, but only after overcoming an early penalty for exiting pit road too fast after a stop. He started 24th and had moved up to 11th before the penalty -- but then fell back to 20th and had to work his way back to the front.

"I messed up in the pits and got us the penalty. But the guys responded," Bowyer said.

Martin's woes

While Bowyer was happy with his end result, Martin and his crew chief, Alan Gustafson, were left to ponder what went wrong again in what rapidly is becoming a lost season. Martin started 13th and struggled most of the night before eventually getting as high as eighth by Lap 400 -- only to fall back again.

"We weren't any good. We sucked," Gustafson said by way of explanation.

The obviously frustrated crew chief said he realizes his team is not yet mathematically eliminated from Chase contention. But he's also enough of a realist to understand the odds are now stacked against the No. 5 Chevrolet. (Continued)