BUSCH SERIES Hamilton dominant in victory

The 25-year-old led 186 of 200 laps in the Tropicana Twister 300.
JOLIET, Ill. (AP) -- Bobby Hamilton Jr. overpowered the field, leading all but a handful of laps Saturday in winning the Tropicana Twister 300 Busch Series race.
Hamilton Jr., the son of former Winston Cup star and current NASCAR Craftsman Truck competitor Bobby Hamilton, took the lead from pole-starter Casey Mears on the third lap and led 186 of 200 trips around the 11/2-mile Chicagoland Speedway oval, including the last 53.
The diminutive 25-year-old Hamilton came up with his third Busch Series win and second in four races. This one was nearly as dominant as the wire-to-wire win by Dale Earnhardt Jr. last week at Daytona.
Hamilton built a lead of almost 16 seconds -- about a half-lap -- before one of six caution flags in the race gave Winston Cup series leader Matt Kenseth one last shot at catching the leader.
Pulling away
But Hamilton's Team Rensi Motorsports Ford pulled away with ease on the restart on lap 166 and beat Kenseth's Taurus to the finish line by 4.503-seconds, about 20 car-lengths.
"I know you've got to try to make it sound interesting, but it just wasn't," Kenseth said. "It was like an old-fashion whipping we took today. He had the whole field covered."
The first words out of Hamilton's mouth after climbing out of his cockpit with a huge smile on his face were: "Holy cow, can you believe that?"
Hamilton has finished in the top 10 in eight of the last 10 races, but the youngster gave much of the credit for Saturday's showing to veteran crew chief Harold Holly.
Holly didn't join the team until June. Since then, Hamilton has five top-10s in six races, including both of his 2003 wins.
"You can see the difference," Hamilton said. "Who ... has race cars like that every week? I have them like that every week."
Only 26 of the 43 starters were running at the end of the attrition-filled race.
There were several multicar crashes, but no injuries reported. Kerry Earnhardt, son of the late seven-time Winston Cup champion Dale Earnhardt, was taken to a nearby hospital but was later released after being examined.
Scott Riggs finished a lap down in seventh and extended his lead over David Green in the championship race from 2 to 23 points as Green finished 11th.