by Lee Spencer

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Carl Edwards, who entered Lowe's Motor Speedway second in the standings, saw his Saturday night go from bad to worse on pit road with every lap completed by the competition around Lowe's Motor Speedway.

While running second, Edwards felt a wicked vibration on Lap 51 following pit stops and returned to the pits to change right side tires. As the No. 99 was pulling down pit road, the yellow flag flew as AJ Allmendinger hit the wall in Turn 3. Officials argued that the leaders had passed Edwards before the flag flew and scored the No. 99 Ford one lap down.

Edwards restarted 40th and radioed that his ride was "smooth now" after getting up to speed, but the action slowed again as Mike Skinner and Ken Schrader collided in Turn 2 on Lap 64. Edwards returned to pit road and slid out of the box. He backed up and the crew changed four tires and discovered that an issue with the right front was causing the vibration.

"We never give up," Edwards told the crew. "That's what we do."

But before the race could go back to green, gremlins invaded Edwards' electrical system and the driver radioed, "The car has no power. It won't start." As a tow truck pushed the No. 99 Ford to his stall, the leaders passed and Edwards fell two laps off the pace.

Crew chief Bob Osborne told his driver to check the gauges. Edwards replied, "They're dead." The pit crew and engine tuner Mike Messick worked feverishly on the car solve the problem, but by the time Edwards returned to the track on Lap 83, he was 16 laps behind the leaders.

Even before the disappointment on the track, Edwards was experiencing a rough weekend. Things got off on the wrong foot Thursday when he and Kevin Harvick got into an altercation in the Nationwide Series garage. The situation was exacerbated by photos that were leaked to the press on Saturday. Following the drivers' meeting, both racers were called to the NASCAR hauler to diffuse any lingering animosity before the competition began.

"There's only one thing to do and that's to learn from everything this week, that's for sure," said a dejected Edwards after the race. "I can guarantee you that if I had the week to do over again, the last seven days would be a lot different. But you just have to do what you think is right at the time and move on after that. Today's race didn't help at all. That car right there is a great race car. I don't know if we've ever had the problem that we had there. It was something with the ignition system, so it's very frustrating. But nobody got hurt at least, I guess."

Edwards was scored 33rd and dropped to fourth in the point standings, 168 points behind championship leader Jimmie Johnson.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. was the next Chase casualty. Some claim it was the curse of Jessica Simpson, who wore a Junior/AMP jacket while singing the National Anthem before the race. Regardless, the No. 88 entered the race 10th in points and was running sixth on Lap 103 when he cut a tire and crashed into Turn 2.

"No warning, it just popped," Earnhardt said. "We might have run over something. I was running about 90 percent really, not running hard at all. The car was handling pretty good. Just popped a tire there. Might have run over something.

"It's pretty disappointing because I was just taking it pretty easy. We ran real, real hard here in the spring and worked our car too hard, I was just going to take care of the race car, that's what I was trying to do. We just got some bad luck there."

Earnhardt's crew was able to repair the car and he returned to action on Lap 148, 45 laps down. He finished the race 36th.

Matt Kenseth was the third victim — and an innocent one at that. The No. 17 was caught in an aftershock with Travis Kvapil after Chad McCumbee and Tony Raines tangled at the end of the frontstretch on Lap 195.

"I slowed down and just got ran over from behind," Kenseth said. "We struggled tonight, but Chip (crew chief Bolin) made a lot of really good adjustments. We actually had it better there. I think we were close to a top 10 car."

Kenseth was scored 41st and fell from ninth to 11th in the standings.

"It's been borderline miserable for sure," Kenseth added. "There have been a couple of bright spots, but even when things go right they go wrong. Hopefully, it will get better."