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AVONDALE, Ariz. -- Dale Earnhardt Jr. won the Quicken Loans Race for Heroes 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series event Sunday at Phoenix International Raceway when the red flag was displayed early because of rain. The race was called official after the completion of 219 laps of the 312-lap scheduled distance.
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Kevin Harvick finished second, Joey Logano third, Kyle Busch fourth and Jimmie Johnson fifth.
Harvick, Busch and Martin Truex Jr. (who finished 14th on Sunday) will join the previously qualified Jeff Gordon as the four drivers competing for the Sprint Cup in the 2015 season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Nov. 22.
The race was already under a caution that came out on lap 195 for a wreck involving Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Joey Gase. The start of the race was delayed over 6 1/2 hours for rain earlier in the day.
The yellow flag for Stenhouse and Gase was the second caution of the race, and it came after about half of the race field pitted under green, as a cycle of green-flag pit stops began just a lap earlier.
Earnhardt, Harvick, Logano and Busch pitted under green just before the yellow flag but remained on the lead lap and moved into the top four positions when others pitted under yellow. Johnson was the first driver off pit road during the caution.
Harvick dominated the race after getting off pit road first courtesy of a two-tire stop during a competition caution on lap 40. He led most of the remaining laps.
Earnhardt and Logano, like Harvick, were among five drivers who took two tires during the yellow-flag pit stops. As Harvick pulled away when the race returned to green, Earnhardt and Logano traded the second position back-and forth. By the time the race field began cycling through green-flag pit stops on lap 118, Harvick had a cushion of more than five seconds over Logano.
When the cycle of stops completed, Harvick was back up front with Logano in second. Logano made his green-flag stop two laps before Harvick, and after the cycle was completed, his deficit to Harvick was down to two seconds.
Johnson started the race on the pole, with Kurt Busch alongside on the front row following the rain delay. Busch looked to take the lead in turn three on the first lap, but NASCAR penalized him for jumping the start and handed the lead back over to Johnson. As a result of the penalty, Busch was not credited for the laps he ran up front before serving his pass-through penalty.
Johnson continued to lead until the lap-40 yellow flag, but he was forced to join Kurt Busch in the back for the restart after serving a pit-road speeding penalty. By the halfway point of the race, though, both Johnson and Kurt Busch were inside the top 10 of the running order.
The race, originally scheduled for a 12:45 p.m. start, was delayed by rain throughout the afternoon and evening.
NASCAR and track personnel got the racing surface nearly dry multiple times between showers. After hours of battling moisture from the sky, water that collected in the track's SAFER barrier system began seeping onto the race track.
Of the 43 drivers who started the race, seven were vying for three remaining slots in the one-race Championship round of the Chase for the Sprint Cup. They were Busch, Harvick, Brad Keselowski, Logano, Truex Jr., Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards.
Phoenix International Raceway is temporarily renamed Jeff Gordon Raceway to honor the retiring driver. Gordon clinched his advancement to the final round of the Chase with a win at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway on Nov. 1.
NOTES: Kevin Harvick came into Sunday's race as the winner of the four most recent races at Phoenix International Raceway. ... Joey Logano's only shot at advancement in the Chase for the Sprint Cup was to win at Phoenix. ... Erik Jones substituted for the suspended Matt Kenseth in the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota for the second week, and he came in 19th. It also was Jones' second consecutive week of NASCAR triple duty. Kenseth will return next week. ... Kyle Busch led all but 10 laps en route to the win in the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Phoenix on Saturday. Brad Keselowski and Jones finished second and third, respectively.
