NASCAR Track Talk

I’m so glade to see Joey 2nd

Yeah, some controversy with not only the final restart in overtime, but also a caution going out in stage 2 for nothing more than Kyle Busch just lightly scraping the wall, thus ruining pit strategy for guys like Alex Bowman (a real pity, considering pit strategy is one of the few things Richmond has going for it). On a more positive note, the weather conditions provided an excellent opportunity to test the wet tires at the start of the race, and while officials mandated when they had to stop being used, the race on those wet tires did prove exciting enough that it seems we can expect any potential weather delays in future races (at least on short tracks) to spend much less time drying the track than what we’ve seen in previous years.

Another highlight this past weekend at Richmond that gave me a good laugh was during the Xfinity series race, when one driver got wrecked out and took out his frustration on the other guy who made contact with him by ripping off the rear bumper of his destroyed car and then throwing it at that other guy’s car, right at the windshield.

Next week will be Martinsville, another short track, so we’ll see if things get any better, though I don’t exactly have high hopes.

This particular race at Martinsville was special because it was at this track 40 years ago that Hendrick Motorsports got their very first win in what would’ve otherwise been their final race (always amazing to think that the most successful NASCAR team of all time could’ve ended almost as soon as it began if not for that Martinsville win back in 1984). Interestingly, today’s Martinsville race results were almost ideal of Hendrick Motorsports, with William Byron getting the win, while teammates Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott finished right behind, making this the first time that any team has ever gotten a 1-2-3 finish at Martinsville (the fourth driver, Alex Bowmen, finished not much further behind in 8th).

As for the race itself, it had some moments, such as Christopher Bell spinning out in stage 2, green flag pit stops in stage 3 began with William Byron to gain the track position he needed to win, and John Hunter Nemecheck having brake failure and hitting the wall with just three laps to go to result in an overtime finish. Remarkably few cautions, with apparently the vast majority of stage 3 supposedly being the longest continuous green flag laps at Martinsville since 1996. Overall, this race was not bad by Martinsville standards.

Next week will be at Texas Motor Speedway, now moved to a spring date in the regular season rather than in the fall during the playoffs, presumably to ensure its lone date on the schedule would be at a time with cooler temperatures.

Texas was a pretty wild race. Several cautions, many of which were caused by someone spinning out in the turns (it was even specified that four times in this race we saw the driver in second place spin out and hit the wall). With so many cautions, there was a wide variety of pit strategy, some worked out well and got drivers from further back up to the front (such as Chase Elliott and Brad Keselowski), while others had poor stops and quickly fell way behind. Kyle Larson led early, but was given a major penalty after a wheel fell off. After that, it was amazing to see how many different drivers kept moving up to the front as others fell back from either crashes or bad pit stops (usual suspects like Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex, but also a few surprises like Michael McDowell and even Harrison Burton). In the end, Chase Elliott was able to win the race, his first win since late 2022, so after how poor his performance was last year, it’s good to see him back in contention for wins.

If you thought Texas was crazy, next week will potentially be even wilder as the next track will be Talladega.

Would it be safe to call Denny Hamelin nascars posey?

And yes I’m a fan of his have been since he first showed up as a rookie

Not much happened for much of the race (though a lot of drivers who have never won a cup series race were able to run up front and lead laps for much of the first stage). In the final stage, the Toyotas tried working together on a pit strategy, but that quickly failed when half of them suddenly wrecked out. With that final caution taking away everyone’s concern of running out of fuel before the end of the race, everyone remarkably kept it together up until literally the end of the final lap, when leader Michael McDowell made one too many blocks on Brad Keselowski and started the big wreck (Corey LaJoie crossed the finish line while sliding sideways against the wall), allowing Tyler Reddick to slip by to take the win.

Next week will be Dover. I honestly don’t know what to expect after what happened at Bristol about a month ago.

Before I get to the race itself, a couple things worth noting. Eric Jones had apparently suffered a back injury from that severe crash at Talladega last week, so until he fully recovers, Corey Heim (who races full time in the Truck series and happens to be a championship contender there) will be driving his number 43 car, starting this week at Dover, and it just so happens that car would have a special paint scheme similar to what Richard Petty had used near the end of his racing career.

Also, with Dover having a concrete racing surface like Bristol, it seems the excessive tire wear we saw at Bristol was similar to what we saw at Dover during practice on Saturday when it was cooler weather, but when it significantly warmed up the following day for the race, the tire rubber actually managed to lay down onto the track, providing much better grip and durability, so I guess it can now be reasonable argued that colder temperatures played a significant factor in the crazy tire wear we had seen at Bristol earlier this year.

Anyway, as for the actual race, there were a few spins and crashes to keep things interesting, but also plenty of long green flag runs as well. There were some lead changes throughout the early stages, but after the final round of pit stops, Denny Hamlin was easily able to use “aero-blocking” to defend his lead against the notably faster Kyle Larson, so Hamlin wins the race (extending his all-time record to 54 wins, which now ties him for 12th most wins with Lee Petty).

Next week is Kansas, an intermediate track where these next-gen Cup Series cars seem to perform at their best, so this could be exciting to watch.

Hello chris buescher I have a question for you can or will you sponsor me for a wild water derby raft or fastenal can you let me know either way OK thanks jim

I’m gonna say it first, HELL OF A FINISH! CAN’T ASK FOR MORE! A RECORD BREAKING CLOSEST FINISH IN NASCAR HISTORY, ALL THE TOP 4 WITHIN A BLANKET AND IN STRIKING DISTANCE, A GREAT BATTLE, A GREAT RACE, BEST OF 2024 NO DOUBT

At this point, I think we can fairly say that Kansas is one of the must-see racetracks on the NASCAR schedule. Sure, the race didn’t see much action in both of the first two stages with full green flag runs. As soon as stage three started, there were four cautions one right after another, allowing alternate pit strategies to mix up the field. Then one more caution set up an overtime finish, resulting in Kyle Larson winning over Chris Buescher by only 0.001 seconds, the closest finish ever in the NASCAR Cup Series! It was so close, everyone initially thought Chris Buescher had won, but unfortunately it seems we have gone yet another week with Fords not winning any races at all in NASCAR this season.

Next week is throwback weekend at Darlington, so there should be plenty of interesting paint schemes to see. (I’ve heard that the Hendrick cars will have some really good ones, especially the Terry Labonte throwback being run with Kyle Larson.)

That race at Darlington sure was interesting. With this being throwback weekend, there were definitely some interesting paint schemes on the cars. Among them was Kyle Larson’s throwback to Terry Labonte’s Kellogg’s Corn Flakes cars from the late 90’s, a design so widely publicized that not only was Terry Labonte there at the track for the race, he even joined the broadcast booth for the entire second stage of the race. (In a rather cruel twist of fate, just after Terry left and the third stage had gotten started, Kyle Larson, who had led many laps, had a tire blowout and crashed out of the race.)

This race certainly got very interesting in the closing laps between Tyler Reddick, Brad Keselowski, and Chris Buescher. On the final restart, Reddick and Keselowski raced side by side for the lead, and despite help from his teammate, Keselowski couldn’t quite complete the pass, so Buescher eventually just went down low to pass both of them at once. Soon after, Reddick made a dive bomb attempt in the turns for the lead, but slid up and put himself and Buescher into the wall, not hard enough to put out a caution, but both cars were damaged enough that they had to pit, allowing Keselowski to take the lead and ultimately win the race. (Keleowski’s previous win was three years ago back when he raced Penski’s 2 car, so it’s great to see him finally get his first win in the 6 car, and as a driver-owner for the first time since Tony Stewart) While Keselowski celebrated his win, Buescher furiously confronted Reddick for taking away the chance for the win (and I’m pretty sure one of the things said that was caught on microphone was Buescher saying “This means war!” so this might be the beginning of a new rivalry).

Next week, it’s the All-Star race at the newly repaved North Wilkesboro Speedway. This particular race has in the past been used for experimental things to see if they might improve the racing, and in this year’s running, they will be using multiple types of tires (regular tires and softer alternate tires that should be faster but less durable, and teams will be requited to use both types of tires at least once throughout the race). This should be a very interesting experiment, as the short tracks have not been racing well with these new cars, and after the accidentally exciting race at Bristol, it seems we will see if this effort at a new kind of tire strategy could improve the quality of racing on short tracks.

@Background Pony #F579
FINELLY I’ve been a fan of brad since he drove for dale jr in the nationwide series(as it was called back then)back in like 2008

The big story going into the All-Star race was the use of the softer “optional” tires. While they did show some good wear-out during practice in daylight, once night fell during the race, they turned out to be just as durable as the standard tires, so a step in the right direction, but not as much as we had hoped for. As a result, Joey Logano led all but one lap from pole position to win the race, but despite that dominance, there were moments that showed some real signs of competitiveness. And with more than one lane of the track being raceable, that’s especially impressive for a recently repaved track, so as dull as this year’s All-Star race was, it was at least a modest improvement over last year.

Of course, the big thing everyone is talking about after the race is the fight between Kyle Busch and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Right on the first lap of the race, Stenhouse went three-wide and caused Busch to hit wall, so Busch immediately responded by punting Stenhouse into the wall and taking him out of the race. After the race ended, the two drivers confronted each other and a full-on brawl broke out between them and their crews. That sure was some unexpected excitement, and Something tells me we have not seen the last of this conflict between those two drivers.

Next week, we have not only the Coca Cola 600 at Charlotte, but also the Indianapolis 500 where Kyle Larson will be competing as well to attempt “the double”. He just recently managed to qualify 5th for the Indy 500, so there’s a real possibility he could not only complete both races, but also be a serious contender to win both of those races on the same day.

@Background Pony #551D
If he wins both races I will literally die, that’s insane that he has race winning equipment both ways

Well, thanks to some impeccable timing of rain in both Indianapolis and Charlotte, the most hyped day in auto racing for this year had turned into a major let-down. Brief rain at Indy postponed the start of the Indy 500 by a few hours, forcing Kyle Larson to make a choice, so he ultimately decided to stay and run the Indy 500, leaving Justin Allgaier to start the Coke 600 in the #5 car as a relief driver for him. Larson had some good speed in that indycar, but a couple of rookie mistakes caused him to lose position and struggle to regain much, ultimately finishing 18th. He then quickly got on the plane to Charlotte, arrived at the racetrack, and even got as far as putting on his helmet ready to jump in, but it was right at that moment when rain halted the race just past the halfway point, so Kyle Larson unfortunately never got a chance to run even a single lap in the Coke 600 this year.

Christopher Bell got the win with this rain-shortened race, though it seems there might be quite some controversy over whether or not the race could’ve been resumed. I’m not going to speculate on that (though it should be noted this year marks the last time the Coca Cola 600 will be broadcasted by FOX, as next year it will be the first of five NASCAR Cup Series races that will be streaming on Amazon Prime), but I will highlight a couple of positive moments we got that day. In the Indy 500, Kyle Larson actually led a few laps, albeit thanks to some pit strategy, but at least that’s one good stat to his name. In the Coke 600, while it took Justin Allgaier a while to get used to Larson’s #5 car, he did eventually figure it out and was running 13th when the race was halted, so one can only imagine just how much better Larson could’ve been if only he had a chance to actually race it. Also, I really liked William Byron’s “pass through the grass” move to advance up to 3rd just a few laps before the rain arrived.

With that big day in auto racing now behind us, time to look forward to the next NASCAR Cup Series race, which will be at Gateway.

BIG NEWS!!!

Stewart-Haas Racing has officially announced their entire NASCAR team (both Cup Series and Xfinity Series) will be completely shutting down after the end of this season.

It’s obviously sad to see a once powerhouse team come to a point where it closes its doors for good. I don’t think we’ve such a collapse of a once-powerful team since the likes of Robert Yates Racing or Dale Earnhardt Incorporated approximately fifteen years ago. In this era of charters, I never imagined we would see a four-car team just suddenly fail so spectacularly, but here we are.

Of course, now there are big questions to ask. Where will those drivers and crew members go next season? Who will those four charters in the Cup Series end up being sold to? Who will ultimately benefit by filling the huge void that will be left by the end of this team? This season is not yet even halfway over and already it’s clear there’s going to be some big changes in NASCAR going into the 2025 season.

Now that was a crazy way to end a race. Christopher Bell had dominated much of the race, winning the first two stages, was just about to retake the lead from Ryan Blaney after alternate pit strategies, but then suddenly has engine issues (not enough to take him out, but enough that he no longer had any chance at winning). Then, just as Ryan Blaney takes the white flag to start the final lap, he suddenly runs out of fuel, allowing Austin Cindric to pass by and take the win (his second career win, his previous being the 2022 Daytona 500). Considering how Cindric did not have enough points to reach the playoffs, this win locks him in and other drivers without any wins must now really step it up (especially Kyle Busch, who essentially wrecked himself out of this race while battling for position with Kyle Larson).

Next week will be at Sonoma, a road course that was just recently repaved, so it’ll be interesting to see how that race will go.

And the madness just keeps on coming. First half of the race, there were several cautions which not only took out quite a few good cars, but also allowed everyone else to try a wide variety of pit strategies. Second half of the race ended up staying green all the way to the finish, and amidst the different strategies that were applied, Kyle Larson ended up taking the win. And for the second time in a row, one driver unexpectedly ran out of gas on the final lap, this time it was Martin Truex who was running second, only to stop just feet away from the finish line and had to barely creep his car forward the rest of the way just to finish in last of the lead lap cars.

Next week’s race will be at Iowa Speedway, a short track that the Truck series and Xfinity series have raced at several times before, but this will be the first the Cup Series has ever raced there, so this should be interesting to watch.

Despite some initial apprehension due to the partial repave at the bottom of the turns and numerous tire failures in practice, the first ever Cup Series race at Iowa turned out to be rather good. Some drivers did surprisingly well, while others did surprisingly poorly. Kyle Larson did great in the first two stages, only to wreck out at the start of the third stage. There were a few cautions scattered around, and it was during pit stops on the final caution that some drivers gambled on changing just two tires instead of four, among them was Ryan Blaney who got the track position he needed to be able to win the race. Definitely a fun track that I really hope gets to stay on the Cup Series schedule for years to come. (I only question why it took so long to make it happen, considering the track first opened in 2005 and the Xfinity and Truck series have raced there several times over the years.)

Next week’s race will be at New Hampshire. Not sure what to expect, is all I can really say for now.

The race at New Hampshire started out fairly typical, but after a red flag period for rain, the last 82 laps became an excellent opportunity to see how well these Cup Series cars could race on the wet tires on one of the biggest and fastest oval tracks where they’re provided, and boy did we see some amazing racing (aside from a few cautions for wrecks and spin-outs). A lot of drivers had some rather interesting runs in this race, but I’ll limit myself here to perhaps the two most extreme results: Christopher Bell dominates and wins yet again at New Hampshire, while Kyle Busch just suffered through several incidents in what could arguably be the worst race he has ever had in his Cup Series career.

Next week’s race is Nashville. Let’s see how that one will go.

For much of this race, I had assumed the brief rain delay at around halfway would end up being the most significant part of it, but then someone spins out with only two laps to go. That leads to an overtime finish… followed by a wreck and another overtime attempt… then another one… and another one… and another one before they finally finished the race. To make things even more crazy, earlier cautions meant that most of the drivers leading were cutting it very close on fuel to reach the end of the scheduled race, but all those attempts at green-white-checkered forced many of them to either give up their position to pit for fuel or simply keep going until they finally ran out (and potentially causing another crash). When it was all finally over, the results were so mixed up that you’d think these results came from a track like Daytona or Talladega rather than Nashville. Ultimately, it was Joey Logano who not only finally got his first win of the season, but managed to do it with barely one more lap of fuel left in his car.

Next weekend, it’s the street course in downtown Chicago! I really hope we don’t see any rain this time like we did last year. I would very much like to see how a NASCAR race on a track like this would really be like under ideal conditions.

While the rest of the weekend saw good weather, it was literally as soon as the Cup Series race was about to begin that it suddenly started raining. Thankfully, past experiences made it possible to get the race going, not only by letting the teams decide for themselves when to put on wet tires or slick tires, but also setting an absolute latest time to end the race due to evening darkness. There was a red flag period during stage two for a couple hours to clear away all the large puddles to improve visibility, but otherwise were able to get the race going. Shane van Gisbergen (winner of not only last year’s Cup Series race on this track, by also won this year’s Xifinity Series race the previous day) was the heavy favorite to win, and was so dominant in the first stage that one could argue the only way he could lose would be if he was taken out in a wreck… which is exactly what happened when Chase Briscoe spun out. After that, the next heavy favorite to win became Kyle Larson… until he locked his brakes and smashed the front of his car against a wall with hardly any tire barrier to soften the impact.

So with both of the heavy favorites finishing in last and second-to-last, now the race became a lot more interesting to see who would actually win. While many teams would later choose to pit to replace the wet tires with slicks for better speed, Alex Bowman was among the few who chose to not pit, forcing him to hold the lead on older wet tires. Once the timed deadline arrived, Tyler Reddick came very close, but Alex Bowman managed to stay up front to win the race, his first win in over two years (and his first win following his back injury last year and the concussion he got late in the previous season). And with that, all four Hendrick drivers and teams are now locked into the playoffs.

Next week’s race will be a Pocono. With twelve winners so far this season, it’ll be interesting to see if any of the other winless drivers can pull off an upset before the end of the regular season.

Okay, now that my internet access has been restored, I can finally talk about the most recent race at Pocono.

A lot of teams used a wide variety of strategies, so you saw many different drivers end up in the lead at several points throughout the race, not to mention all the fuel saving by many of them that has apparently become typical of Pocono. Some cars were taken out by hitting the wall on their own, others were taken out by mechanical failures, and Kyle Busch once again just can’t catch a break as he is wrecked by Corey LaJoie and results in a big crash that takes out several other cars. In the end, it was Ryan Blaney who was able to hold the lead after the final restart to win the race, first time in several years that a Penske car was able to get a decent finish at Pocono, let alone actually win the race.

Next, NASCAR will be on the oval track of Indianapolis for the return of the Brickyard 400. It’ll be interesting to see how these next-gen cars can handle such a unique racetrack.

Indianapolis races similar to Pococo, so it shouldn’t be too much of a surprise that just like last week, what made Indy interesting to watch was the wide variety of pit and fuel strategies. A few occasional wrecks, the first stage won by Denny Hamlin, the second stage won by Bubba Wallace, and in the later part of the race, while some cars took it easy to save fuel, others pitted later and began charging towards the front. Things began to get crazy with just a few laps to go when Kyle Busch once again wrecks out, Brad Keselowski tried to stay out on the lead, but a fuel shortage forced him to pit immediately before the restart, leading to some confusion (mostly by Ryan Blaney who was in second) and another wreck. Kyle Larson was able to take the lead, and after running out the overtime restart as long as possible after another spinout, he ultimately gets the win. It’s worth noting that Kyle Larson has previously won the Coca Cola 600 and the Southern 500, so now that he has also won the Brickyard 400, the only big race he has yet win is the Daytona 500, so I’m sure people will be talking about that once the next season begins.

The next two weeks are off due to the Olympic Games, but after that, the next race will be at Richmond, where it’s already been confirmed that teams will be given “option tires” in addition to the regular tires, much like what we saw in the All-Star at North Wilksboro a few months ago, so hopefully that will add a degree of strategy to make the race at a short track a bit more interesting.

The two week break is over, NASCAR is back, and boy did we see something at Richmond.

The softer so-called “option tires” with better speed and grip with less durability did proved to be effective for some (but not all) drivers, especially Daniel Suarez who put on the option tires while most of the others were on the prime tires, and as a result he just flew to the front and actually won the second stage, before everyone swapped to whatever tire they were not on and we saw the opposite happen, sending Suarez plummeting back to around where he started the race. We also saw yet another Toyota engine failure, this time taking out Martin Truex, so now he and teammate Ty Gibbs (who had an engine failure in the previous race) might not be confidently making it on points. Meanwhile, Bubba Wallace needed a strong run and finish, and he got exactly that, so now he has made up enough points to make it back into the playoffs, but only by a few points, so he’ll need to keep up this good momentum for the last few races of the regular season.

But by far the biggest story of this race was Austin Dillon, who’s been having one of the worst seasons of any full-time driver this year, somehow actually had a pretty fast car at this race, and even managed to legitimately pass Denny Hamlin for the lead. He would’ve won the race with a significant lead, but then who else but Ricky Stenhouse and Ryan Preece wreck each other with just two laps to go, so it’s on to an overtime restart. Dillon doesn’t get a good launch and Joey Logano easily passes him for the lead, but through the final turn on the final lap, Dillon just punts Logano around, and when Hamlin tried passing both of them for the win, Dillion punts him into the wall as well, and it’s Austin Dillon who gets the win and is now locked into the playoffs.

It really was a good race at Richmond (certainly much better than many of the more recent races there) thanks to the tire strategies, but unfortunately that finish alone is unquestionably one of the most controversial of this season. No word yet on possible penalties, but it’s definitely got a lot of people talking. Personally, I can see why some fans are comparing this to the driving style of the guy who made that #3 car famous, the late Dale Earnhardt, and if that guy had to race under today’s championship format, I could totally see him doing something like this.

Only three races left to go in the regular season, and next week’s race will be at Michigan.