The first race of the penultimate round of the playoffs did not disappoint. With chaos and calamity abound for several playoff drivers, some before the race even started.
Ryan Blaney would start shotgun on the field after blowing a tire in the first lap of practice, putting him and his team behind the proverbial eight ball early. Christopher Bell would lead fellow Toyota driver Tyler Reddick to the green flag. By 15 laps in Bell would check out to a lead of over a second. However, Chase Elliott, who started worse of the playoff drivers who actually qualified, would break into the top 10. As the aforementioned, Blaney would crack the top 20 within the first 30 laps. Pit stops would start on lap 32. Chase Briscoe would receive a penalty for a safety violation. Denny Hamlin’s playoff woes would continue with a slow stop during the cycle. After pit stops, Bell would cycle back to the lead until an incident involving Austin Dillon and Daniel Hemric would bring out the first caution of the day on lap 64. The resulting contact with the wall would end Dillon’s race. This would bring everyone down pit road with some drivers, including Martin Truex Jr. and Hamlin would move to the front with two tire calls. Tyler Reddick would be the first car on four fresh tires, and it would pay off as he was able to get past Truex and Hamlin and win stage one.
Stage One Results:
- Tyler Reddick
- Christopher Bell
- Martin Truex Jr.
- William Byron
- Brad Keselowski
- Ty Gibbs
- Chris Buescher
- Joey Logano
- Austin Cindric
- Kyle Larson
During the stage break, Hamlin would inherit the lead by staying out on the same left side tires he started the race on. Kyle Larson would have to come back down pit road to fix damage on his nose from debris. Ty Gibbs would be the first car on two tires, and Bell would be the first with four tires. Gibbs would easily take the lead to start the second stage as Hamlin quickly fell from the top five. Mere laps into the stage calamity would strike as Truex would check up in front of Chase Elliott, Brad Keselowski, and Reddick. Which would cause a stack up three wide out of turn four with simply nowhere to go. The resulting crash would see Reddick flip in the infield and drive his car back to his pit stall. However, his day was over. Ryan Blaney also clipped the wall and effectively ended any chance he had of competing. That combined with Chase Elliott’s crash damage would result in the dynamics of the playoffs being changed for almost half of the remaining competitors in a single corner.
Gibbs would lead the field back to green over Logano on lap 97, Larson would find himself quickly in the top 15 after his mishap during the stage break. Conversely, Hamlin would find himself in 20th after what turned out to be a bad strategy call to stay out during the stage break. However, Hamlin would be able to pit early and manage to keep the lead lap after pit cycles. As for green flag cycles for the leaders, we would have more calamity strike. Larson would have issues on the right rear, resulting in not only a slow stop to fix it, but a second pit stop to get the left rear tire put on. This would put him multiple laps down. The rest of the green flag cycles went smoothly. However, a few cars, including the likes of Daniel Suarez, would stay out to try to gain track position by stretching their fuel tanks. Bell, however, was able to get by Suarez with Truex in tow and win stage number two.
Stage Two Results:
- Christopher Bell
- Martin Truex Jr.
- William Byron
- Chris Buescher
- Joey Logano
- Alex Bowman
- Justin Haley
- Daniel Suarez
- Bubba Wallace
- Ryan Preece
Stage break cautions would bring even more frustration to the #11 team as Hamlin would have to come down pit road and second time to fix a loose wheel. Bell would lead the field to green for the final stage and pull away easily. Gibbs and Larson would find themselves in an intense battle for the free pass position that would go on for laps on end before Gibbs would overstep and spin out, bringing out the caution and giving Larson the free pass. All lead lap cars would pit, and again, Bell would come off pit road first and easily lead off the ensuing restart. However, this is where things would get interesting. As strategy would split with the front running cars such as Bell, Alex Bowman, and William Byron would pit for fresh rubber and others such as Suarez, Logano, and Hamlin would stay out and try to stretch fuel to get a good finish. As the laps started to tick down, Logano would begin to push from second into the lead Suarez had, using an assist in the form of some pushes from his out of contention teammate in Ryan Blaney, as they pushed past Suarez to get Logano the lead, Bell was charging them down at a rate of almost a second a lap. However, traffic would play a factor, and Bell would wind up about a second short of challenging Logano for the win as the #22 Shell Penzoil Dark Horse Mustang would cross the stripe first and lock himself into the Championship race at Phoenix.
Results:
- Joey Logano
- Christopher Bell
- Daniel Suarez
- William Byron
- Alex Bowman
- Martin Truex Jr.
- Ross Chastain
- Denny Hamlin
- John Hunter Nemecheck
- Chris Buescher
The playoff picture seems pretty set unless we see some winners below the cutline. However, with the way this season has gone, I wouldn’t count out the chances of anything happening just yet.
Current Standings
- Joey Logano – Win
- Christopher Bell – +42
- Kyle Larson – +35
- William Byron – +27
- Denny Hamlin – -27
- Tyler Reddick – -30
- Ryan Blaney – -47
- Chase Elliott- -53
Photo Credit: @puffadda
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