Brad Keselowski made good on a confident Babe Ruth-like prediction earlier this week when he said he expected to dominate and win Saturday night‘s Federated Auto Parts 400 Playoff race at Richmond (Va.) Raceway.

Dominate, he did. After leading a race-best 192 of the 400 laps at the three-quarter mile track, Keselowski scored an impressive 2.568-second victory over Martin Truex Jr. to guarantee his position in the next round of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs. It‘s Keselowski‘s fourth win of the season in the No. 2 Team Penske Ford and 34th career victory.

Keselowski‘s Team Penske teammate Joey Logano was third, followed by Austin Dillon and Chase Elliott. Kyle Busch finished sixth, followed by championship points leader Kevin Harvick. Aric Almirola, Alex Bowman and Clint Bowyer rounded out a top 10 sweep of current playoff-eligible drivers. Although not a victory for the reigning series champion Busch, his top-10 finish was an achievement considering he started last in the field after failing pre-race inspection twice.

Denny Hamlin, who finished 12th, still earned enough points to secure a spot in the next round of the playoffs. He led 45 laps and won Stage 1, but he was called for speeding on pit road and had to play catch up the rest of the night after serving the penalty. He had another faster car than the finish gave way last Sunday at Darlington with a 13th place effort. The finishes haven’t been there as they’ve been fast but sloppy. Good thing for the playoff points because once they turn it on again, watch out.

The only caution flags Saturday were for scheduled slowdowns — a competition caution and two stage breaks. And there were 20 lead changes among nine drivers.

“It was a great race for us and the 2-team,” the 2012 series champion Keselowski said, noting he drove the same car Saturday as he used to win at New Hampshire earlier this summer. “I wanted to do a really cool burnout with it, but I want this car for (the championship race at) Phoenix.

“I‘m really pumped. I don‘t want to look too far ahead. The next round is going to be really difficult, but still, I‘m really pumped about this performance and the way we‘ve run on short tracks.

“If we can get to Phoenix, we‘re going to be really good,” Keselowski promised, not wanting to look too far ahead despite his impressive performance Saturday.

Three of Keselowski’s four wins have come on 750 (hp) tracks. No one else has more than once. Phoenix, is a 750 track too.

While Keselowski, 36, was clearly the class of the field, leading nearly four times as many laps as any other driver, Logano, Truex and Dillon did their best to keep him honest.

Dillon‘s 55 laps led was the most he has ever led in a single race in his seven-year full-time NASCAR Cup Series career. He missed pit road while coming to the pits for service late in the race — the only hiccup on his night. But his team recovered and it turned out to be of minimal consequence for an organization that has mightily impressed the first two weeks of the playoffs.

Dillon finished runner-up to Harvick in last week‘s Playoff opener at Darlington and now has a second top five heading to Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway next week for the final race in this opening stage of the Playoffs. He’s also scored four top 10s over his last six starts on the season too.

“To come from the back (after the speeding penalty) and finish second in Stage 2 was just so awesome,” said Dillon, driver of the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet.

“This race team is on fire right now and showing up when it matters.”

Dillon, who won at Texas Motor Speedway this summer, has positioned himself to a much better playoff run than many may have anticipated heading to the Bristol cutoff race next week. He is a sleeper right now as he was sixth at Bristol earlier this season.

On the other side, Truex kept up his consistent pace. His second place run was his ninth top-five finish in the last 10 races, eight of which coming in the top three. In fact, he’s had three runner-ups in his last five starts in 2020 and four since July. He’s also had five third place finishes during this span too.

Truex, needed this result tonight because 12 of his last 14 Bristol starts he’s finished 20th or worse. Now, he has some cushion.

Logano was third for the second straight week and has eight top 10s over the last nine starts of the season.

Chase Elliott rounded out the top five for his fourth in the last six races and seventh top 10 in the last nine.

Some drivers were critical of the racing. Out of the four races, three of them went caution free in the final stage.

“I think something is not meshing with the track. You look out there on the race track and all night long it’s had a lot of racing on it this weekend and it looks like a highway out there,” 10th place finisher Clint Bowyer said.

“It wasn’t putting any rubber down on the track and they’ve got to do a better job of that. That’s unacceptable as far as I’m concerned. I’m a fan of this sport and we’re going to ask fans to come back one of these days and we’ve got to put a better show on than that.

“We can’t have it run lap after lap after lap with no cautions. Something’s got to change there and the first thing I’d change if I owned it would be the tire.”

Truex agreed.

“It didn’t lay really any rubber down on the race track like we’ve seen here in the past, and I think that changed things up quite a bit, especially for us, obviously,” Truex said.

“I was surprised with how bad my car felt that I was still able to run second. I don’t know, I liked the old (tire) better, but I guess it depends on who you ask.”

Only the top 12 drivers among the 16 playoff eligible will continue to contend for the season title following that Bristol race.

Kyle Busch is still winless but in a good spot. He didn’t have his crew chief on Saturday night, started last after failing pre race inspection and still finished in the top 10. He’s had three top seven results in his last five starts overall.

After Richmond, the four drivers below that top-12 line include William Byron (-3 points), Cole Custer (-8 points), Matt DiBenedetto (-25 points) and Keselowski‘s Penske teammate Ryan Blaney (-27 points).

Blaney and DiBenedetto are in trouble. They likely have to win Bristol and they’ve never won there either. DiBenedetto did finish second last year though. Blaney has led a lot of laps there but has just one top five too. He’s only had one top 10 in his last seven starts in 2020 as well.

Byron showed how one bad run can take you out. He entered this weekend on the heels of three straight top five finishes but a 21st place result, worst among all playoff drivers, put him on the outside looking in.

The series moves to Bristol for the Bass Pro Shops Night Race next Saturday (7:30 p.m. ET on NBCSN, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

They said it

“I think the strengths of Team Penske right now are the restrictor-plate tracks (of Daytona and Talladega) and the short tracks,” Keselowski said. “Road courses are pretty weak right now. I think we are 10th-15th as a company with what we have. I think the 1.5-mile tracks we are 5th-10th but we are in the top-5 for the others.”