RELATED: Full race results from Dover

Just after escaping an 18-car wreck, Carl Edwards spun and slammed hard into the inside SAFER barrier on the backstretch with 40 laps remaining in the AAA 400 Drive for Autism on Sunday at Dover International Speedway.

Edwards was running in second place at the time of the accident. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver said he tried to give room to Kurt Busch as they came out of Turn 2, with Edwards’ No. 19 Toyota pitching sideways off the corner. From there, the No. 42 Chevrolet of Kyle Larson made contact with the No. 19’s rear bumper, sending Edwards’ ride careening toward the inside wall.

Edwards was critical over the JGR team radio, saying, “Yeah, that one hurt. Damn, man. Give me a break. Who was that?” Edwards’ crew implicated Larson, and the No. 19 radio crackled again: “What an idiot.”

Edwards was more reserved after being evaluated and released from Dover’s infield care center.

“I didn’t see much,” said Edwards, who finished 28th, 41 laps short of the 400-lap distance. “I was trying to give Kurt a little room, it looked like he got choked up and as I looked at the replay it looked like I moved down a little and Larson got underneath me. I don’t think he meant to do it, but it surprised me. I didn’t know he was that close.”

Larson continued on, equaling his career-best effort in the Sprint Cup Series with a second-place finish. In post-race interviews, he echoed the apology that he issued over his team radio after Edwards’ late-race crash.

“Not sure if Carl got loose, went to block me, or if I came up or what,” Larson said. “I got into him, turned him into the inside wall. So I feel bad about that, if it was my fault. Even if it’s not my fault, I feel bad about that.”

Edwards’ finish marked his third straight finish outside the top 10 since back-to-back wins at Bristol and Richmond last month.

RELATED: Full race results from Dover

The AAA 400 Drive for Autism was red-flagged on Lap 354 of 400 when Jimmie Johnson‘s No. 48 Chevrolet failed to accelerate on a restart and caused a wreck that collected 18 cars at Dover International Speedway.

Starting from the outside lane on the front row, Johnson’s race-leading car was slow to come up to speed, causing Martin Truex Jr. to rear-end the No. 48, and Kevin Harvick to plow into Truex. That collision clogged the 1-mile track’s frontstretch, triggering a melee that involved nearly half the 40-car field.

“I got a great start in second gear,” said Johnson, who led four laps but finished 25th. “As I went to put it in third (gear) and came across the shifting gate it never went into third. It actually got locked in the neutral area of the transmission. I had plenty of time. Martin was plenty patient with me and I was trying to get third and I couldn’t. I tried for fourth and third and fourth and I finally got hit. Just a freak deal with something with the transmission. I’ve never had that happen to me in my career.”

Johnson spun into traffic behind him, damaging a list of cars that included: No. 18 Kyle Busch, No. 1 Jamie McMurray, No. 43. Aric Almirola, No. 17 Ricky Stenhouse Jr., No. 22 Joey Logano, No. 16 Greg Biffle, No. 88 Dale Earnhardt Jr., No. 47 AJ Allmendinger, No. 15 Clint Bowyer, No. 31 Ryan Newman, No. 95 Michael McDowell, No. 6 Trevor Bayne, No. 13 Casey Mears, No. 27 Paul Menard and No. 11 Denny Hamlin.

Truex was lined up fourth for the restart, taking instructions from his crew to let Carl Edwards pass him for third leaving pit road so that he would have the outside lane at the drop of the green. That placed him right behind Johnson’s lagging car, causing significant front-end damage.

Remarkably, Truex’s Furniture Row Racing crew repaired his No. 78 Toyota enough to salvage a ninth-place finish.

“Just one of those deals: wrong place, wrong time,” said Truex, who led twice for 47 laps. “Frustrating, but we got a top 10 out of it, so not too bad. The guys on pit road did a great job fixing it. Just hate that it happened. I wanted to be fourth on that restart, but I didn’t want to be fourth that bad. I should have been third so maybe I should have not let (Edwards) beat us off pit road. I don’t know how you can see those things coming. All in all good day, just bad finish.”

All drivers were either evaluated or treated and released from the infield care center after the stack-up, but Almirola emerged holding an ice pack on his left hand.

“It just stinks we all got stacked up like that,” said Almirola, who finished 31st. “I banged up my hand. I think I may have a broken finger, it is pretty sore and swollen. We worked really hard to get back on the lead lap and we were actually making a lot of progress it just took us all race to get back up on that lead lap. I hate that our day is going to turn out like that. That is a shame. Then to make matters worse I think I have a broken pinky finger. That isn’t very manly, is it?”

Harvick, who prevailed at the 1-mile track last fall, had led three times for a race-high 117 laps. The pole-starter finished 15th, the first driver one lap down.