Keselowski took his Ford to the garage and lost 31 laps while his crew made repairs. He finished 38th.

After the race, Keselowski questioned Busch’s judgment in driving aggressively on Lap 42 of 500.

"If you’re going to be aggressive, wreck yourself, don’t wreck me," Keselowski said. "I’ll remember that when it’s Lap 50 and he needs a break, and he’ll find his ass turned around in the wall. Just like he tore my car up.

"Once or twice when it happens, you start to go, ‘Hey, it happens,’ but when it happens repeatedly, you just realize who the person is who’s at fault, and you just got to make sure you show them you’re not going to take that, and I’m not going to take it, and I know the 2 team’s not going to take it."

Busch was surprised at the vehemence of Keselowski’s reaction to the incident, especially after Keselowski tried to exact payback on the track.

"Yeah, I can’t believe he overreacted and he’s as upset as he is," Busch said. "The 5 car (Kasey Kahne) was trying to pull into his box. Brad ran into the back of him. I steered right to go around Brad and then he clobbers our left-side door, and it’s like, OK, accidents happen on pit road. It’s congested.

"It’s not a place to race, because of all the pit crew guys down there and I didn’t think much of it, and then once we were back out running, he targeted us. He was aiming for us. He tried to flatten all four of my tires. That’s a no-fly zone. That’s a punk-ass move and he will get what he gets back when I decide to give it back."

UPDATE: Keselowski later said on Twitter that there would be no carryover at Texas and that he didn’t blame Kurt Busch for the pit road accident. He blamed him for not lifting and making it worse.

No Sorry to burst @eddiegossage bubble. @racrboi90 @keselowski Will the rivalry with @KurtBusch carry forward to @TXMotorSpeedway next week?

— Brad Keselowski (@keselowski) March 31, 2014

Not that it matters to the media, but I never blamed Kurt for the accident. I blamed him for not lifting and making it worse @timpowell8

— Brad Keselowski (@keselowski) March 31, 2014

SOLID RUN FOR EARNHARDT

In all honesty, Dale Earnhardt Jr. finished as high as he could have hoped in Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Martinsville — third.

Earnhardt had the best seat in the house for the decisive battle between race winner Kurt Busch and runner-up Jimmie Johnson, but he didn’t have enough left to mount a challenge at the end of the race.

The key to Earnhardt’s success was self-restraint.

"You had to just discipline yourself to not use the throttle," said Earnhardt, who regained the series lead by nine points over second-place Matt Kenseth. "I think we’ll have a lot of fun looking at the throttle trace on some of the runs, because I was quarter-throttle at the max. …

"I was real patient all day, saving the left rear and just waiting till the end to see where we’d be. Inside 38 laps to go, I thought everybody was going to go like hell, and we all did and ended up running third."

As the laps wound down, Earnhardt’s car began to fade.

"I was losing my car pretty fast the last five laps, so I didn’t have anything else to get there (to Busch and Johnson)," he said. "I got a couple of lapped guys give the outside instead of the inside. That’s their right, but that cost me a little time and maybe some wear on my tires.

"I thought when we passed the 22 (Joey Logano, for third) we might be able to roll up there and get in the middle of the race for the win, but, no, those guys’ cars, they were pretty good."

MORE FRUSTRATION FOR BOWYER

With 50 laps left in Sunday’s STP 500, Clint Bowyer grabbed the lead, but a subsequent caution and a mistake on pit road proved his undoing.

After Carl Edwards spun on Lap 459 to bring out the 14th caution of the afternoon, Bowyer led the field to pit road. But a problem with the right rear tire led to a slow stop that mired the driver of the No. 15 Michael Waltrip Racing Toyota in 10th place for a restart on Lap 466.

“Disappointed,” Bowyer said. "We had the lead there at the end and had trouble in the pits and came out 10th. We just didn’t have enough laps to make it up.

"Just really disappointed. Felt we could have had the win there."

Last week at Auto Club Speedway, Bowyer was running second when he blew a left-rear tire with less than three laps left in the Auto Club 400. Bowyer is 17th in the series standings, with just one top 10 in six starts.

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The contact spun the No. 1 car into the wall, ending a run that saw the car in the top 10 for most of the race after starting ninth. McMurray was able to get back on track, but the damage left him with a 42nd-place finish.
 
"There was a lap car holding up our pack," McMurray said. "I thought the No. 88 would be a little more patient with me. I had gotten by him in lap traffic. Then he got on my inside. 

"When he got into me, it was like it couldn’t get off and spun me around and just got into the wall there."

McMurray had a season-best sixth-place finish last Sunday at Auto Club Speedway. It was his second top-10 finish of the season after notching a 10th-place result at Phoenix International Raceway in the second race of the year.

"Really unfortunate, had a good car, every race we’ve had good cars," McMurray said. "You just wish you weren’t racing for points because that is the hardest part to swallow is the points loss. It’s fun to run well, but that is what you will think about for the next five days."

McMurray has only led a lap in one race this season at Bristol Motor Speedway, where he had a 38th-place finish. That result was his previous worst finish of the season before finishing next-to-last on Sunday at Martinsville.

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"He does awesome things for charity, and he’s probably the most talented race car driver, but he’s also one of the dumbest," Keselowski said, "so you can put those three together."
 
Told that Busch had radioed his crew during the race to say that he planned to rearrange his face, Keselowski seemed willing to let him try.
 
"Tell him come here. I’m right here," Keselowski said as he stood behind his damaged No. 2 Team Penske Ford. "He knows where I’m at. Leave Victory Lane. We’ll go."
 
Keselowski’s woes began during the second caution period of the race, a competition yellow that NASCAR scheduled on Lap 40 in the 500-lap event. When the field came in for wholesale pit stops, Keseloswski drove into the back of Kasey Kahne‘s No. 5 Chevrolet, slamming the front of the No. 2 Ford on the congested pit lane. Shortly thereafter, Busch’s No. 41 Chevy plowed into Keselowski, leaving all three cars with damage.
 
Keselowski limped back to the garage for repairs and returned to the track after his crew removed much of the front sheet metal from the No. 2 car. More than 30 laps down, Keselowski engaged his rival on the track, hooking a hard left into the side of Busch’s car down the straightaway and making an obscene gesture toward Busch outside the driver’s-side window — both moves that left Busch surprised by the reaction.
 
"I can’t believe he overreacted and he’s as upset as he is," Busch said. "The 5 car was trying to pull into his box, Brad ran into the back of him, I steered right to go around Brad and then he clobbers our left‑side door, and it’s like, ‘OK, accidents happen on pit road.’ It’s congested. It’s not a place to race, because of all the pit-crew guys down there and I didn’t think much of it, and then once we were back out running, he targeted us, he was aiming for us. He tried to flatten all four of my tires. That’s a no‑fly zone. That’s a punk‑ass move and he will get what he gets back when I decide to give it back."
 
Though Keselowski laid blame on Busch during a TV interview while his car was being mended, Busch was predicting doom as he pointed fingers in a radio message to his crew.
 
"We just got destroyed by the 2 car," Busch said. "The left rear just got hammered. Probably ruined for the rest of the day."
 
But Busch’s prediction didn’t come true in the best possible way as he notched his first victory of the season, and all but clinched a spot in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup postseason. Keselowski said the turn of fortune didn’t make him feel any more or less sour about the outcome.
 
"That’s just racing. You can’t get caught up in that stuff," said Keselowski, who fell three spots to seventh place in the Sprint Cup standings. "Doesn’t make you happy, but it’s just racing."
 
Keselowski indicated that the two have had occasional run-ins in the past, mentioning an early crash that sidelined him last year at Kentucky Speedway. While Keselowski backed off his initial statements on Monday and expressed that he continued to have respect for his former Penske teammate’s talent, he said at the time of Sunday’s run-in that the pattern of racing incidents had grown tiresome.
 
"Same thing. He wrecked me for no reason 50, 30 laps in, whatever … early in the race, just being overaggressive," Keselowski said of the Kentucky altercation. "Aggressive is good, but Lap 50 wrecking somebody — if you’re going to be aggressive, wreck yourself, don’t wreck me. I’ll remember that when it’s Lap 50 and he needs a break and he’ll find his ass turned around in the wall, just like he tore my car up.

"That (expletive) will come around. Once or twice when it happens, you go, ‘eh, you know. it happens,’ but when it happens repeatedly, you just realize this person is at fault and you make sure you show ’em you’re not going to take that. And I’m not going to take it, and I know this 2 team’s not going to take it.
 
"We had a race-winning car today and instead, we finished 30-whatever with the whole front end tore off it. It’s inexcusable for my team, and I’m not going to put up with that."

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