Ambrose climbs out of car in Victory Lane (via Nationwide Insurance)

In the late stages of the Nationwide Series race on the road course at Watkins Glen, Marcos Ambrose was glued to leader Kyle Busch’s back bumper.  But even though he thought he was a little faster, Ambrose couldn’t make the pass. Until with eight laps to go the Australian made a daring move. Diving inside of Busch just as they were about to make a hard right hand turn at the end of the back straight away, at a place they call the bus stop. Ambrose muscled his way into the top spot then held on to win the Zippo 200 for the second year in a row.

More after the jump.

Marcos Ambrose:
Yeah I didn’t quite have the topping speed to make a classic pass on him. I knew I was going to have to bomb him somewhere to try and get the win. He wasn’t going to make a mistake on his own I was going to have to force one on him. It’s Kyle Busch we’re talking about and he’s going to race you hard and so I just tried to throw the element of surprise in. I came from a fair way back by length and half back on him and just bombed up in there and I knew that it was a high risk move but it was one that was needed to be made to try and win the race. We are not here to come second, we’re here to win. When you are passing Kyle Busch you have to do something special because he doesn’t want you to pass him.

Kyle Busch:
I wouldn’t have made it because I would have wrecked and I think we would have wrecked if one of the cars didn’t give which I was the car that gave so I don’t think it was a fair move. It won him the race. He had to do something, yeah for him, good job, whatever, but I wouldn’t have been able to do it, I would have waded my stuff up.

Ambrose:
Well I never touched him; I’ve seen Kyle knock guys out for the win. You’re racing one of the best in the business and the element of surprise was my attack and he clearly reacted late to me coming down the inside there and I don’t know what he has to complain about. I passed him without touching him and we won the race.

Carl Edwards finished third and also thought Busch should not complain about the way Ambrose made the winning pass.

Carl Edwards:
Marcos knows more about road racing than all of us. I wasn’t happy with the fact that he moved me out of the way into one earlier but he apologized for it and I believe him. I saw the replays of it on the big screen when we were driving around in it. It looked like just a pass, if I could have put my car in that position I sure would have, I think anybody out there would have.

Kevin Harvick came home forth, finishing fifth driving for Dale Jr. and Rick Hendrick was Canadian road racing specialist Ron Fellows. His crew let a tire get away on a pit stop just pass the half way mark, leaving Fellows to drive up through almost the entire pack.

Ron Fellows:
The Fastenal Chevy was fast, we just gave up a lot of track position but that penalty. I don’t know what that penalty was for but whatever, it is what it is. I don’t know if we had any from Marcos but certainly second place was not out of the normal possibilities.

Sixth across the line was Jeff Burton and he was followed in the top 10 by Greg Biffle, David Ragan, Brad Keselowski and Scott Speed. Eleven to 15 it was Boris Said, Steve Wallace, Dave Blaney, Robby Gordon and Jason Leffler. With 22 of 35 races run, Kyle Busch now leads Carl Edwards by 212 points in the Nationwide Series title fight with Keselowski a distant third minus 409.

Now a year ago when Marcos Ambrose won the Zippo 200 at The Glen, he lost the gold lighter he was presented, but it turned up just before he headed back to upstate New York.

Ambrose:
Yes, the other one has been relocated and now I have two. It’s a shame I don’t smoke really.

A full set of the pictures taken at The Glen can be viewed at http://www.flickr.com/photos/nationwide/sets/72157621999144184/

The Nationwide Series will return this week to the Michigan International Speedway.  Look for the audio interview following the Carfax 250.

And don’t forget, Nationwide’s Media Team will be Twittering from the Michigan International Speedway.  

You can follow the Team’s whereabouts on the track at Twitter/Nationwide (http://twitter.com/Nationwide). If there is a picture of someone or something you would like to see trackside, send your request to http://twitter.com/Nationwide. The team will try its best to get the shot. Pictures will be posted at http://www.twitpic.com/photos/nationwide