After pulling away slightly from race winner Brad Keselowski during a dramatic battle over the last 15 of 267 laps, Earnhardt ran out of fuel on the backstretch, a half-lap from the finish, and coasted home in second place, 1.531 seconds behind the driver of the No. 2 Team Penske Ford.

Following a scrape with the outside wall and an off-sequence pit strategy, Keselowski took the checkered flag for the first time this season, the first time at LVMS and the 11th time in his Sprint Cup career.

The winner of Saturday’s NASCAR Nationwide Series race, Keselowski completed the first weekend sweep by a Ford driver since Carl Edwards won both races at Phoenix in 2010.

Earnhardt, the Daytona 500 winner, was runner-up for the second-straight race. Paul Menard ran third, followed by pole winner Joey Logano and Carl Edwards, as Fords grabbed three of the top five positions.

Six-time series champion Jimmie Johnson, Ryan Newman, Kasey Kahne, Jeff Gordon and Matt Kenseth completed the top 10.

With a victory, all but guaranteeing a spot in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, Keselowski wasn’t surprised that Earnhardt and Letarte were willing to gamble. 

“It’s such a (relief) for myself and everyone on the team to get that win in early and being able to enjoy the racing opportunities that we have, rather than being stressed out about it,” Keselowski said. “The chance that Dale and Stevie took with the 88 car was way out there.

“It was a good, risky move on their part, because they had nothing to lose because of this (new Chase) format. I think that shows some of the opportunities that come (from having) stress-free days, and I’m looking forward to being able to take those same opportunities, because I’m not scared to take ‘em, and I know (crew chief) Paul (Wolfe) is not, so look out.” 

Committed to a fuel-mileage gamble, a luxury he earned with the Daytona 500 win, Earnhardt stayed on track during Lap 222 pit stops under the fourth caution of the afternoon for debris on the front stretch. 

It was that same caution that gave Keselowski a welcome opportunity to refuel, a move that put him back on sequence with the rest of the lead-lap drivers other than Earnhardt, Edwards and 12th-place finisher Denny Hamlin.

Keselowski restarted seventh but quickly rocketed past all but Earnhardt and Carl Edwards, who also stayed out under the yellow. More than two seconds behind Earnhardt, Keselowski slipped past Edwards on Lap 245 and drew a bead on the leader.

With three laps left, Keselowski had narrowed the interval to .296 seconds, the closest he would get before Earnhardt’s car slowed on the backstretch halfway through the final lap. 

“I ran two real hard laps right after that restart (on Lap 226), and we got about a 20-car-length lead, and I started lifting real early into both corners and seeing whether they were going to catch me,” Earnhardt said. “So I was being pretty cautious and lifting pretty early, and when I saw Brad pass the 99 (Edwards), I knew Brad in clean air would be quicker than us, potentially — he had been all day — and I just continued to save fuel and hope that once he got behind me and got into dirty air I could keep him there. 

“I continued to save until he got within about eight car lengths, and then I started running hard, and we were fast enough to keep him behind us. As soon as I got to the top of Turns 1 and 2 the last several laps, I was real comfortable that he wasn’t going to get to me, felt fine about, if we had enough gas, we weren’t going to have a problem, but we didn’t have enough gas.”

Using a contrarian fuel-mileage strategy, Keselowski stayed on track when the rest of the lead-lap cars came to pit road on Lap 156, under the third caution of the race for debris on the backstretch.

Keselowski’s No. 2 Team Penske Ford took off on old tires and built a lead of more than 2.5 seconds over Kevin Harvick, whose strong run was spoiled by a brake failure as he chased Keselowski.

Harvick, last week’s winner at Phoenix, brought his car to pit road on Lap 194 and ultimately lost 30 laps as his team went about repairs in the garage.

Keselowski gave up the lead when he came to pit road on Lap 196 and regained it briefly during the subsequent green-flag pit stop cycle. But Earnhardt took the point by staying out for a Lap 226 restart and held the top spot until Keselowski passed him on the final lap.

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"We were supposed to be fine [on fuel] until the end of the race, and then we ran out with like two laps to go and I came in, took my helmet off and bashed a fender on the car and just made a real ass of myself and learned a lot from that experience," Earnhardt said of the Pocono incident. "My team was disappointed in my actions, and my cousin was disappointed in my actions and the way I was. So when we run out of gas now, you know, you’ve got to try to be positive, because those kind of things — when you crash, wreck, blow up — those kind of things, there’s an opportunity there for it to be worse, and you make it worse than it is, or for you to try to clean up the mess and carry on.

"Throwing a tantrum and getting upset and mad about it don’t do any good for your team. They don’t feed off of that. If anything, it brings your team down."

And this season, no team is more "up" than Earnhardt’s. After winning the sport’s biggest race in the season opener at Daytona, he’s finished runner-up in both races since and holds the Sprint Cup Series championship lead by a point over Sunday’s race winner, Brad Keselowski, who has three top-three finishes as well.

That place atop the standings, and Earnhardt’s victory already almost guaranteeing him a spot in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup, plus the fact crew chief Steve Letarte is in his final year with the team before moving to the NBC Sports television booth all created a fitting Las Vegas-style setting for a strategy of doubling down and taking gambles. Earnhardt knew he was probably a lap shy on fuel while leading the field in the closing laps, but he was more willing to roll the dice.

"I think everybody has seen that over the last couple of weeks, that this (Chase) format has definitely allowed teams to gamble like we have,’’ Earnhardt said. "You know, it did pay off. Not the ultimate prize, but we did run second.

"I felt good about the car and proud of Steve and the strategy that he used to give us a chance to win. We’re going to dearly miss that next year and hopefully we are learning what we need to learn in these last couple of years so (the team) can continue calling races as well as he does.

"It’s disappointing, but at the same time the good Lord has blessed me with a good team and good fortune and a great opportunity."

As for Letarte, Earnhardt said the team has not made any decisions about a new crew chief for 2015. In fact, Earnhardt said, it hasn’t even been discussed.

"There has been none about it," Earnhardt said. "We’ve got a lot of time and I think it’s best not to jump to a conclusion early. Steve’s a great part of that process, let him sort of watch the year unfold and see how the team is and understand what his opinion is on who would be best for that role.

"Unless you’re really ready to make the decision, it’s almost best not to even discuss it because you don’t want rumors to start floating around in the shop and people start getting the wrong messages and stuff like that.

"When we’re ready to make the decision, we’ll sit down and we’ll make it. And it’ll be clear."

In the meantime, Earnhardt is enjoying the best start to a season in his 15 years at the Cup level.

"When we first got together we’d run our guts out to run in the top 15," Earnhardt said smiling. "Then the next year, we’d run our guts out to run in the top 10 and you wondered when you’d get up to fifth and start running in the top five regularly.

"We started doing that that finally last year and so our team just keeps stepping up this ladder. It just makes total sense to me how that process has went, having lived it and having seen the progression.

"So the sky’s the limit for us, and if we are smart and keep our composure and don’t get foolish and don’t get too proud of ourselves … just keep it in perspective, we’ve got a great opportunity this year to be this competitive every week."

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