Upon his return to pit road, McDowell also spoke with Welch, stating that "it seems like when I do it they are usually fairly big", referring to a previous crash that he had suffered at the 2008 Samsung 500, at Texas Motor Speedway. He also stated that he "didn't really have time to adjust or move, I just tried not to hit Ryan in the door there. I was along for the ride". The race was red flagged for 81 minutes while the Armco barriers were repaired, and as the cars started running again, Carl Edwards stayed out when the leaders came in to pit. The race restarted with 31 laps to go, and A. J. Allmendinger took the lead from Edwards with 30 laps to go. Casey Mears got turned in the inner loop with 18 laps to go, before the caution flew for the fourth time with 13 laps to go, after Josh Wise stalled in the inner loop. Allmendinger led the way on the restart with nine laps to go, but the fifth caution came out very quickly when Jimmie Johnson got turned in turn 1 and made contact with Regan Smith, while Justin Allgaier was also collected. The race restarted with five laps to go. Ambrose took the lead immediately thereafter, following a side-by-side battle with Allmendinger. The sixth caution period came out the following lap, when Denny Hamlin spun and crashed into the gravel-filled barrels at the entrance to pit road. In a non-connected incident, Alex Kennedy hit the wall on the exit of turn one, to bring out the sixth caution, the race was red flagged for a second time. Following a delay of around 20 minutes, the race restarted, and Allmendinger held off a hard charging Ambrose with two laps to go to score his first career Sprint Cup Series victory. Upon exiting his car, Allmendinger expressed his delight at the result, stating he could not "believe we've won a NASCAR Sprint Cup race", before congratulating his entire JTG Daugherty Racing team, expressing "with this whole 47 team, [team owners] Tad Geschickter, Jody Geschickter, Brad Daugherty, all the great sponsors we have, our first Cup victory together, my first victory...I love these guys. I just wanted it so bad for them and this team. They work so hard. I wasn't gonna let Marcos take that from me". Ambrose recorded his sixth top-three finish in Sprint Cup races at Watkins Glen, but praised the performance of his late-race rival, Allmendinger.