LOUDON, N.H. – Brad Keselowski slipped in front when Kevin Harvick got into a traffic jam. Then Harvick got mad.

Keselowski took the checkered flag in Saturday’s Nationwide race at New Hampshire Motor Speedway while Harvick fumed about the inexperienced driver who got in his way even though she had been lapped.

“It’s somebody who shouldn’t be on the racetrack, who has no clue what they’re doing in the race car,” Harvick said, directing his anger at Amber Cope.

“She wants to be Danica Patrick, but she can’t hold her helmet.”

Keselowski capitalized when Harvick was forced to slow down with about 21 laps left in the 200-mile race at the 1-mile oval, pulling ahead and winning by about six car lengths.

“I caught a little bit of a break in traffic,” Keselowski said, “but that’s the way it goes.”

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The pole-sitter lost the lead to Harvick at about the 150th lap when Patrick’s Chevrolet bumped Jason Bowles’ Toyota, bringing out the yellow flag. When the race restarted, Harvick shot in front.

Would Keselowski have won if Harvick and Cope hadn’t slowed down like a pair of rush-hour commuters?

“There’s no way of really knowing that. The odds were probably not in my favor,” Keselowski said.

“You catch good breaks and bad breaks. It was a bad break for us when the yellow came out to begin with.”

The 28-year-old Cope is one of the twin nieces of Derrike Cope, who won the Daytona 500 in 1990.

Her only other race in the Nationwide series was in May at Iowa Speedway, where she was sent off the track on the 203rd lap of the 250-lap race for driving too slowly.

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On Saturday, Harvick couldn’t figure out where she was going as he tried to get by her while she was far out of contention.

“You’ve got to make a decision off of what direction the car was going and (her car) was going up (the high side of) the racetrack and I committed to the bottom and (then she) committed to the bottom, too,” he said.

Said Keselowski: “You’re always going to have some traffic. You’re always going to have those that don’t know where you’re at. That’s part of the series, different drivers learning and trying to pick up their awareness on the racetrack.”

Austin Dillon finished third, followed by Sam Hornish Jr. and Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

Rounding out the top 10 were Kasey Kahne, Elliott Sadler, Justin Allgaier, Jamie McMurray and Ryan Truex.

TRUCKS: Timothy Peters won notched his first victory of the season at Newton, Iowa.

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It’s the fourth career win for Peters, who overtook Ron Hornaday Jr. with 10 laps left at Iowa Speedway to become the third pole-sitter to win a trucks race in four events in Iowa.

Hornaday was second, followed by Matt Crafton, Johnny Sauter and Justin Lofton.

OXFORD PLAINS: Billy Childs Jr. of Leeds took the Late Model feature ahead of Dave Farrington Jr. of Jay in the final tuneup for the TD Bank 250.

Other feature winners were Brady Romano, Runnin’ Rebel; Rob Greenleaf, Mini Stock; and Ryan Robbins, Strictly Stock.


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