1. Kyle Busch: Busch won Stage 2 at Sonoma but couldn’t catch Martin Truex Jr. late and settled for the runner-up spot.
“I thought I could catch Martin,” Busch said. “I gave it my best shot. There’s nothing like a charge in ‘Wine Country,’ except for maybe a ‘charge’ in ‘Tequila Country.’”
2. Martin Truex Jr.: Truex held off former teammate Kyle Busch to win the Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma.
“Nothing beats sipping wine in Victory Circle at Sonoma,” Truex said. “Except shotgunning a beer anywhere but Victory Circle at Sonoma.”
3. William Byron: Byron started 26th and finished 14th in the Toyota/Save Mart 350.
“My Hendrick teammate Chase Elliott chatted with Denny Hamlin about their incident at WWT Raceway,” Byron said. “I don’t know the details of their talk, but I’m pretty sure they put the ‘cuss’ in ‘discussion.’”
4. Kevin Harvick: Harvick finished 11th at Sonoma.
“That was my 806th Cup series start,” Harvick said. “That put me ahead of Jeff Gordon for the most all-time. I may have more starts than Jeff, but I’ll never have more championships or marriages.”
5. Joey Logano: Logano finished third at Sonoma, his second consecutive third-place finish.
“Good things come in threes,” Logano said, “unless you’re Austin Dillon.”
6. Ryan Blaney: Blaney struggled at Sonoma and finished 31st.
“Road course racing is not my cup of tea,” Blaney said, “and here in Sonoma, it’s not my glass of wine.”
7. Christopher Bell: Bell finished ninth at Sonoma, his first top-10 finish since Dover in April.
“This race was a typical Sonoma race,” Bell said. “Long, boring, and lacking entertainment. Here in Wine Country, the race packed all the drama of a wine tasting.”
8. Denny Hamlin: Hamlin started on the pole, but wrecked with under 20 laps to go and finished last at Sonoma.
“I’ve got no one to blame but myself,” Hamlin said. “But by the time my latest podcast goes live, I’ll have someone else to blame.”
9. Ross Chastain: Chastain finished 10th at Sonoma, posting his seventh top 10 of the year.
“It’s always fun to see Denny Hamlin wreck,” Chastain said. “And it’s about time he did something without my help.”
10. Kyle Larson: Larson came home eighth in the Toyota/Save Mart 350.
“It was a good day for Hendrick Motorsports,” Larson said. “But only because all four regular drivers participated.”
More than a month after snapping his one-year winless streak at the Monster Mile, Martin Truex Jr. doubled down on a sunny afternoon in Northern California and capped off a dominant run with a victory in the Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway on Sunday, June 11.
The 2017 NASCAR Cup Series champion from Mayetta, New Jersey, led four times for a race-high 51 of 110-scheduled laps, including the final 13 after overtaking Chase Elliott while on four fresh tires for the lead compared to Elliott’s worn tires during a 15-lap dash to the finish. Once he acquired the lead, Truex then fended off a late charge from ex-teammate Kyle Busch to claim his second checkered flag of the 2023 Cup season and fourth overall at Sonoma.
With on-track qualifying that determined the starting lineup occurring on Saturday, Denny Hamlin notched his second Cup Series pole of the 2023 season after posting a pole-winning lap at 92.178 mph in 77.719 seconds. Joining him on the front row was Tyler Reddick, who posted the second-best qualifying lap at 92.068 mph in 77.812 seconds.
When the green flag waved and the race commenced, Hamlin jumped ahead with an early advantage entering the first two turns. As the field navigated its way through Turns 3 and 4 before proceeding through the Chute corner, Hamlin maintained the lead ahead of teammate Christopher Bell while Reddick slipped to third. In addition, teammate/rookie Ty Gibbs challenged teammate Martin Truex Jr. for fourth while Michael McDowell and AJ Allmendinger were dueling for sixth. With the field navigating its way through the 12-turn circuit, Hamlin proceeded to lead the first lap ahead of Toyota teammates Bell, Reddick, Truex and Ty Gibbs.
During the second lap, Hamlin was leading by eight-tenths of a second over teammate Bell while Toyota teammates Reddick, Truex and Ty Gibbs remained in the top five. Behind, Allmendinger was in sixth followed by McDowell, Chris Buescher, Chase Elliott and Kyle Busch while Austin Dillon, Alex Bowman, Kyle Larson, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Bubba Wallace, Aric Almirola, Joey Logano, Corey LaJoie, Ross Chastain and Ryan Preece occupied the top 20.
Through the first five scheduled laps, Hamlin’s No. 11 Sport Clips Toyota TRD Camry continued to lead by eight-tenths of a second over teammate Bell’s No. 20 Rheem Toyota TRD Camry while Reddick’s No. 45 Unleashed the Beast Toyota TRD Camry trailed in third place by more than a second. Truex and Ty Gibbs remained in the top five while Allmendinger, McDowell, Buescher, Elliott and Kyle Busch retained their spots in the top 10. Meanwhile, William Byron trailed in 21st place ahead of Chase Briscoe, Justin Haley, Kevin Harvick, Erik Jones and Brad Keselowski while Daniel Suarez, who over-revved his engine at the start of the race and lost a bevy of spots from starting 10th, was mired in 28th. In addition, Ryan Blaney was mired back in 32nd in front of teammate Austin Cindric, Harrison Burton, Andy Lally and Grant Enfinger.
At the Lap 10 mark, Hamlin, who was leading by more than a second two laps earlier, had his lead shrink to four-tenths of a second over teammate Bell, who was slowly catching teammate Hamlin for the lead while teammate Truex moved his No. 19 Bass Pro Shops Toyota TRD Camry into third. Reddick and Ty Gibbs continued to trail in the top five followed by Allmendinger, McDowell, Buescher, Elliott and Kyle Busch. Behind, Larson was in 12th after starting 16th, Logano was mired in 15th ahead of Aric Almirola and Ross Chastain, Byron worked his way up to 20th, Bubba Wallace slipped back to 21st and Harvick was mired in 23rd behind teammate Chase Briscoe.
Two laps later, Truex overtook teammate Bell for the runner-up spot in Turn 7 as Hamlin retained the lead by nearly two seconds. Soon after, Allmendinger overtook Ty Gibbs for fifth while Reddick retained fourth. By the time the event reached its Lap 15 mark, the top-eight nine competitors were separated by more than nine seconds as McDowell, Buescher and Elliott tried to close in on the top-six competitors led by race leader Hamlin.
A lap later, Keselowski pitted his No. 6 King’s Hawaiian Ford Mustang under green. Blaney would then pit his No. 12 Menards Ford Mustang under green during the proceeding lap while Hamlin continued to lead by more than three seconds over teammate Truex and more than four over teammate Bell. Blaney, however, would be penalized for speeding while exiting pit road.
By Lap 20, Hamlin stabilized his advantage to more than three seconds over teammate Truex as Bell remained in third. Behind, Allmendinger overtook Reddick for fourth place in Turn 11 as McDowell followed suit. With Reddick back in sixth, Ty Gibbs trailed in seventh in his No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota TRD Camry followed by Buescher, Elliott and Larson. Meanwhile, Zane Smith, Suarez, and Harrison Burton, among others, made pit stops under green.
A lap later, Kyle Busch pitted his No. 8 McLaren Custom Grills Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 from 11th place. A host of names that included Larson, Elliott, Logano, Austin Dillon, Chastain, Byron, Harvick, Briscoe and Cindric would pit during the following lap as Hamlin remained on the racetrack with the lead.
At the conclusion of the first stage on Lap 25, Hamlin captured his third stage victory of the 2023 season. Teammate Truex followed suit by more than two seconds in the runner-up spot while Bell, Allmendinger, McDowell, Reddick, Buescher, Ty Gibbs, Bowman and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. were scored in the top 10. By then, a trio of Ford competitors that included Harrison Burton, Blaney and Cindric were mired towards the rear of the field as Almirola pitted under green. Ty Dillon, Erik Jones, Haley and a host of other names also pitted under green with Almirola.
A lap later and as the event proceeded under green to start the second stage, Hamlin steered his No. 11 Toyota to pit road to pit under green followed by teammate Truex, McDowell, Allmendinger, Bell, Reddick, Buescher, Ty Gibbs, Bowman, Corey LaJoie and others. By the time the leaders completed their pit stops, Hamlin retained the lead by more than two seconds over teammate Truex while Elliott and Larson, both of whom pitted earlier than Hamlin, cycled their way into third and fourth. Bell, meanwhile, slipped back to fifth while Kyle Busch, Allmendinger, McDowell, Reddick and Buescher were running in the top 10.
Thirty laps into the event, Hamlin retained the lead by eight-tenths of a second over teammate Truex while Elliott trailed in third place in his No. 9 NAPA Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 by more than six seconds. Bell was in fourth as he also trailed by more than six seconds while Larson settled in fifth. Meanwhile, Reddick and Ty Gibbs were strapped in eighth and 11th, respectively, while Byron navigated his way up to 15th.
Then on Lap 32, Truex drew himself alongside teammate Hamlin in Turn 12 in a bid for the lead. After dueling for the lead through the first two turns, Truex made the pass stick through Turns 3 and 4 as he emerged as the second different leader of the afternoon.
At the Lap 40 mark, Joe Gibbs Racing’s Truex was leading by a full second over teammate Hamlin while teammate Bell trailed by less than eight seconds in third place. Hendrick Motorsports’ Elliott and Larson trailed in the top five while Allmendinger, McDowell, Buescher, Reddick and Ty Gibbs were in the top 10 ahead of Kyle Busch, Bowman, Logano, Austin Dillon, Byron, Chastain, Stenhouse, Harvick, Almirola and Ryan Preece.
Nearly five laps later, a second wave of green flag pit stops slowly commenced as Kyle Busch pitted along with names that included Suarez, Logano, Austin Dillon and Byron while Truex retained the lead by more than a second over teammate Hamlin. By then, Keselowski, Harrison Burton and Cindric pitted under green a few laps earlier as Harvick pitted under green on Lap 46.
Nearing the Lap 50 mark, Truex continued to lead by more than a second over teammate Hamlin while third-place Bell, another teammate, trailed by more than 13 seconds. Behind, McDowell was in fourth ahead of Elliott and Allmendinger while Larson was scored in seventh ahead of Buescher, Reddick and Ty Gibbs. Just then, the first caution of the event flew on Lap 49 when a right-front wheel rolled out of Zane Smith’s No. 38 pit box just as his pit service was complete, with the wheel rolling into the center of pit road. The caution period occurred just as Ross Chastain had pitted in his No. 1 Kubota Chevrolet Camaro ZL1.
During the event’s first caution period, nine competitors that included Kyle Busch, Joey Logano, Byron, Austin Dillon, Stenhouse, Chastain, Brad Keselowski, Harvick and Suarez remained on the track while the rest led by the race leader Truex pitted. Following the pit stops, Truex exited pit road first followed by teammate Bell, McDowell, Hamlin, Buescher and Elliott.
When the race restarted under green on Lap 52, where Kyle Busch and Logano occupied the front row, Busch launched ahead with the lead on the inside lane and entering Turns 1 and 2. He then cleared the field through Turn 2 while Logano and Byron battled for second. Behind, Chastain and Stenhouse battled for fourth while Austin Dillon was in sixth ahead of Harvick, Keselowski and Truex. With the field scrambling, fanning out and jostling for positions through the Chute corner before entering a series of right- and left-hand turns through Turns 7 to 10 before entering a steep right-hand, braking turn in Turn 11, Busch remained as the leader ahead of Logano while Chastain muscled his way into third ahead of Byron and Stenhouse.
At the conclusion of the second stage on Lap 55, which marked the halfway point of the event, Kyle Busch claimed his second stage victory of the 2023 season. Logano followed suit in second while Chastain, Byron, Stenhouse, Austin Dillon, Truex, McDowell, Bell and Harvick were scored in the top 10.
With the event proceeding under green with 54 laps remaining, Kyle Busch stretched his advantage to a second-and-a-half over Logano followed by Chastain, Byron and Stenhouse while Truex, McDowell, Bell, Austin Dillon and Buescher were scored in the top 10. Behind, Harvick was in 11th ahead of Allmendinger, Keselowski, Hamlin and Elliott while Suarez, Larson, Bowman, Ty Gibbs and Preece were running in the top 20. Meanwhile, Wallace was in mired in 21st ahead of teammate Reddick, LaJoie, Almirola and Briscoe while Josh Bilicki, Erik Jones, Blaney, Haley and Todd Gilliland were strapped in the top 30. Ty Dillon, Cindric, Harrison Burton, Enfinger, Andy Lally and Zane Smith rounded out the 36-car field, with all running on the circuit.
With 50 laps remaining, Busch stabilized his advantage to more than a second over Logano while third-place Chastain also trailed by more than a second as he tried to catch Logano for the runner-up spot. Meanwhile, Truex carved his way up to fourth over Byron. McDowell would then overtake Byron for fifth during the following lap as Bell, Stenhouse, Buescher and Harvick were battling within the top 10. Soon after, Chastain overtook Logano for second entering the first two turns, but he went wide in Turn 2, which allowed Logano to reclaim the spot as Truex joined the battle. Truex would overtake Chastain during the proceeding lap before overtaking Logano for the runner-up spot with 47 laps remaining. All in the process, Kyle Busch increased his advantage to more than two seconds.
Then with 46 laps remaining, Austin Dillon ran into late trouble after receiving a bump from Ty Gibbs that sent him spinning in Turn 11 while battling for 17th. Despite stalling his car while off the racing course, he managed to continue without drawing a caution.
During the proceeding lap, Kyle Busch, who nearly got loose in Turn 10, was leading by a second over a hard-charging Truex while Logano trailed in third place by more than three seconds. Behind, McDowell carved his way up to fourth while Chastain settled in fifth. After cutting Busch’s advantage during the following three laps, Truex executed his move beneath Busch in Turn 7 as he reassumed the lead with 42 laps remaining. Truex would proceed to stretch the advantage to more than a second over Busch as McDowell started to intimidate Logano for third.
With 38 laps remaining, names that included Bell, Bowman, Ty Dillon and Harrison Burton pitted under green. Byron would pit during the following lap along with Hamlin, Larson and Cindric. Another lap later, the pit strategy games ensued as more drivers including Logano, Chastain, Stenhouse, Preece, Almirola, Briscoe and Corey LaJoie pitted.
Then with 36 laps remaining, the leader Truex pitted along with Kyle Busch and Allmendinger while McDowell inherited the lead after remaining on the track. Buescher moved up to second after he also remained on the track while Elliott, Harvick and Ty Gibbs moved up into the top five.
With 35 laps remaining, McDowell surrendered the lead to pit under green followed by Buescher as Elliott, who last pitted on Lap 51, assumed the lead. By then, Keselowski and Justin Haley also pitted. Once McDowell and Buescher exited pit road together and in close-quarters racing, McDowell managed to cycle past Erik Jones, Chastain and Byron on the track while Buescher was trapped behind Chastain and Erik Jones.
Down to the final 30 laps of the event, Truex, who last pitted on Lap 75, reassumed the lead as both Elliott and Harvick pitted under green. By then, Reddick cycled back into second as he trailed Truex by nine-tenths of a second while Suarez, Kyle Busch and Logano were in the top five. Behind, Bell was in sixth ahead of McDowell, Wallace, Chastain and Buescher. During the following lap, Reddick, along with his teammate Wallace, and Suarez pitted under green as Busch, Logano, Bell and McDowell were scored in the top five.
With 25 laps remaining, Truex extended his advantage to more than four seconds over Kyle Busch while third-place McDowell trailed by more than six seconds. Logano and Buescher were mired in the top five while Bell, Chastain, Byron, Hamlin and Larson were scored in the top 10 ahead of Stenhouse, Allmendinger, Bowman, Preece, Elliott and Harvick.
Down to the final 20 laps of the event, Truex continued to lead by more than four seconds over Kyle Busch as McDowell retained third place despite trailing by nearly seven seconds. Meanwhile, Buescher overtook Logano for fourth place two laps earlier while Chastain was up in sixth ahead of Bell, Larson, Byron and Hamlin.
A lap later, the caution flew when Hamlin, who was running in 10th, scrubbed the inside wall entering the frontstretch. The incident caused him to get loose and spin in the middle of the frontstretch as he smacked the frontstretch’s wall and damaged his pole-winning Toyota TRD Camry along with his toe link and right-rear suspension. The damage to Hamlin’s car was enough to terminate his strong run in the garage.
During the caution period, nearly the entire lead lap field led by Truex pitted while Elliott, Reddick and Blaney remained on the track as Elliott cycled into the lead. Following the pit stops, Truex exited first followed by Kyle Busch, Buescher, Logano, Chastain and Larson. In the midst of the pit stops, McDowell exited pit road 11th after enduring a slow pit service from his No. 34 Front Row Motorsports pit crew.
With the race restarting under green with 15 laps remaining, Elliott took off with the lead entering the first two turns. With Elliott maintaining the lead through Turns 3 and 4 before entering the Chute corner, Truex quickly charged his way into second as Kyle Busch challenged Reddick for third. Logano would then challenge Reddick for fourth after overtaking teammate Blaney through Turns 7 and 8. As the field jostled for late positions throughout the 12-turn circuit, Elliott maintained the lead by four-tenths of a second over Truex while Kyle Busch trailed in third place by more than a second.
Then during the following lap, Truex rocketed past Elliott’s No. 9 NAPA Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 for the lead entering Turn 7. With Truex back out in front, Kyle Busch then closed up on Elliott’s rear bumper through Turns 8 to 10. Busch then moved up to second after overtaking Elliott, who was losing ground on worn tires, through Turn 11 as he set his sights on Truex for the lead. Way behind the leaders, Reddick fell off the pace after cutting a left-front tire after through Turn 11, but he proceeded to cut the Turn 11 corner and limp his No. 45 Toyota TRD Camry to pit road without drawing a caution, though NASCAR assessed Reddick a pass-through penalty for cutting the course. The race remained under green flag conditions during the following lap despite Almirola spinning but continuing in Turn 7.
Down to the final 10 laps of the event, Truex was leading by nine-tenths of a second over Kyle Busch while third-place Elliott trailed by more than three seconds. By then, Erik Jones, who spun in Turn 3A and briefly stalled his No. 43 Allegiant Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 between Turns 3 and 4, proceeded without drawing a caution.
Truex would continue to lead by more than a second-and-a-half over Busch with five laps remaining and as Logano, Buescher and Elliott occupied the top five. By then, Blaney, who was running in the top 10 two laps earlier, had plummeted to 31st after getting hit by McDowell and spinning in Turn 7, as his roller-coaster day went from bad to worse after he spun again in Turn 2 when he got hit by Chase Briscoe.
When the white flag waved and the final lap started, Truex remained as the leader by more than three seconds over Kyle Busch. After smoothly navigating his way through the 12-turn circuit for a final time and with Busch unable to close the gap, Truex was able to the frontstretch victorious as he streaked across the finish line in first place and with his second checkered flag of the 2023 season.
With the victory, Truex, who endured a dismal run at Sonoma along with his Toyota teammates a year ago, became the fourth Cup Series competitor to win multiple races this season as he notched his 33rd career victory in NASCAR’s premier series. He also notched his first Cup victory since winning at Dover Motor Speedway this past April and his fourth at Sonoma, with his last at the circuit occurring in 2019. In addition, Truex recorded his 14th victory driving for Joe Gibbs Racing and the 175th Cup career win for the Toyota nameplate.
Ironically, this marked the fifth 1-2 finish in a Cup Series race overall for Truex and Kyle Busch where Truex ended up victorious.
“[It took] A lot of hard work by everybody,” Truex said on FOX. “Everybody at Toyota, [Toyota Racing Development], everybody at [Joe Gibbs Racing] in the off-season to redesign. We got to do some work with NASCAR to pre-design some stuff. Everybody did and they did a good job there. Just hats off to my team. To be so bad here last year and to come back and do that with the same car, basically, is really unbelievable. Just proud of [my team]. We’re having a great year. I feel really good about our team. We couldn’t do it without all our partners, all of our fans. Man, it just feels so incredible to have a day like that and a run like that, and a team like I have. They’re doing everything right right now and it’s a lot of fun to drive these cars.”
Kyle Busch, winner of last weekend’s Cup Series event at World Wide Technology Raceway, settled in second place for the second time this season and his fourth top-two result at Sonoma while Logano came home in third place for his fifth top-five result of the season.
“Yeah, not too bad,” Busch said. “[I] Wished we had a little bit more. I tried there really hard at the end to, at least, try to keep Martin honest and felt like I could beat him a little bit on a lap and then, I would mess up and he’d beat me by a little bit more on the next lap. We were just trading a little bit there, but then, he was able to pull away there late. Great job by all the guys on this McLaren Grills Camaro. Proud of the effort. We gave it everything that we had. We made a lot of changes. We got a lucky break there with the yellow [flag on Lap 49], with only three laps on tires, so we were able to cycle to the front. Once we got up there, we could maintain pace with some of the good cars and have a good top-three speed race car and just flip-flop the race a little bit. Good fortunes for us. Nice to come out of here with a [runner-up result] after a win last week.”
“Overall, the team did an amazing job,” Logano added. “Great execution. We got the car a lot better last night and to where I could, at least, hang in the top five. I wasn’t good enough to win at all means, but to get the AutoTrader Mustang up towards the front, get some momentum, we got lucky a few times today. We got pretty lucky today to get through it and get some points and get some momentum back going.”
Meanwhile, Buescher, who finished second to Daniel Suarez at Sonoma a year ago, posted another strong result in Northern California by finishing fourth while Elliott capitalized in his return to racing following his one-week suspension along with his late strategic call to remain on the track on old tires to bid for a win by finishing fifth. Elliott, however, is currently situated in 31st place in the driver’s standings and trails the top-16 cutline to make the 2023 Cup Series Playoffs by 148 points.
“[It was] Nice to get a top five,” Elliott said. “[I] Just felt like our only play was to stay out. I was really hoping that more people would [stay out] with us, where you had three or four rows and probably, still wouldn’t have been enough, but I do think it would’ve been nicer to have a couple more rows of a buffer before the [competitors on] tires got to us. Good fight. Certainly have one of our better runs there the last couple, so always good to finish strong. To kind of fight through there and get a top-five is a good thing. Looking forward to trying to build on that and hopefully, contend for a win here before long. Definitely closer today.”
AJ Allmendinger settled in sixth while McDowell, Larson, Bell and Chastain finished in the top 10.
Notably, Kevin Harvick finished 11th in his 23rd and final run at Sonoma, William Byron settled in 14th, rookie Ty Gibbs posted a 16th-place result in his first run at Sonoma, Suarez ended up 22nd and Blaney fell back to 31st following his two late-race spins. In addition, Grant Enfinger, who filled in for rookie Noah Gragson as Gragson continues to recover from concussion-like symptoms, finished 26th in his Cup Series debut while Andy Lally ended up 35th.
There were 10 lead changes for six different leaders. The race featured two cautions for six laps. In total, 31 of 36 starters finished on the lead lap.
With 10 Cup regular-season events remaining on the schedule, Martin Truex Jr. leads the regular-season standings by 13 points over William Byron, 24 over both Ryan Blaney and Ross Chastain, 25 over Kevin Harvick and 29 over Kyle Busch.
William Byron, Kyle Busch, Martin Truex Jr., Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell, Denny Hamlin, Joey Logano, Tyler Reddick and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. are currently guaranteed spots for the 2023 Cup Series Playoffs based on winning at least once throughout the regular-season stretch. Ross Chastain, Kevin Harvick, Chris Buescher, Brad Keselowski, Bubba Wallace and Alex Bowman occupy the remaining vacant spots in the Playoffs based on points, with Bowman occupying the 16th and final vacant spot by three points over Daniel Suarez, 11 over rookie Ty Gibbs, 14 over Michael McDowell, 33 over AJ Allmendinger, 39 over Austin Cindric and 40 over Corey LaJoie.
The NASCAR Cup Series teams and competitors enter a one-week break period before returning to action at Nashville Superspeedway on June 25. The event’s air coverage is scheduled to occur at 7 p.m. ET on NBC, which will launch NBC’s and USA Network’s coverage for the remainder of this year’s Cup season.
1. William Byron: Byron started from the pole at Charlotte and was strong throughout, but was one-upped by Ryan Blaney for the win and settled for the runner-up spot.
“Congratulations to Blaney,” Byron said. “He deserved this win, not only because he broke a long winless streak, but also because he clearly had the best car, as you can see by the fact that he led 163 laps. Ryan towered over the competition, just like Fox’s Jamie Little towers over any driver she interviews.”
2. Ryan Blaney: Blaney outdueled pole sitter William Byron late and pulled away to win the Coca-Cola 600, snapping a 59-race winless streak.
“What’s the best thing about ending a winless streak?” Blaney said. “Starting another one.”
3. Kyle Busch: Busch finished sixth at Charlotte, posting his seventh top 10 of the season.
“I spun on Lap 176 and dropped way down the order,” Busch said. “But I made my way back to the front. If you saw the aftermath of my spin, you could say I ‘reversed’ my fortunes.”
4. Martin Truex Jr.: Truex came home third in the Coca-Cola 600.
“It was great to see Jimmie Johnson race in the 600 for his team, Legacy Motor Club,” Truex said. “Unfortunately, Jimmie finished dead last. This is a prime example of Jimmie destroying his legacy.”
5. Tyler Reddick: Reddick led 28 laps and finished fifth in the Coca-Cola 600.
“My 23XI Toyota sported the Air Jordan logo,” Reddick said, “and Carolina blue. We could have made it completely a Michael Jordan look had we added a golf club and an image of MJ paying his bookie.”
6. Kevin Harvick: Harvick started second at Charlotte and fell back to last early, but took the lead early in Stage 3. But Harvick went high into Tyler Reddick on Lap 358 and spun, sending him back in the field. He finished 11th.
“My car featured the Hunt Brothers Pizza cam,” Harvick said. “Usually, when you hear ‘Hunt Brothers Pizza’ and ‘camera’ mentioned in the same sentence, it’s often a doctor discussing your colonoscopy.”
7. Denny Hamlin: Hamlin crashed out of the Coca-Cola 600 on Lap 186 when it appeared Elliott retaliated for contact moments earlier that caused Elliott to brush the wall. Hamlin finished 35th.
“As I said after the incident,” Hamlin said, “Chase threw a ‘tantrum’ and wrecked me intentionally. He should be suspended. I’m sure he’ll profess his innocence, but, much like after his idiotic snowboarding accident, he won’t have a leg to stand on.”
8. Ross Chastain: Chastain finished 22nd at Charlotte.
“There was a shoving match,” Chastain said, “an incident with Denny Hamlin, and many other spins. None of that is unusual. What’s unusual was I wasn’t involved in any of it.”
9. Kyle Larson: Larson struggled early but came on strong midway through Stage 3 with a charge to the front. But Larson’s No. 5 Chevy got loose on a restart with 25 laps to go and suffered extensive damage. Larson’s day was done and he finished 30th.
“I’m planning on doing the Indianapolis 500-Coke 600 double next year,” Larson said. “I think I can do that in less time than it took to complete Stage 4 in Charlotte on Monday.”
10. Christopher Bell: Bell got loose and spun into the infield on Lap 236 but luckily suffered little damage. He wasn’t so lucky on a restart with 25 laps to go when he was collected in a pileup triggered by Kyle Larson’s spin. Bell finished 24th.
“The Coca-Cola 600 is a grueling, time-consuming, and energy-sapping race,” Bell said. “And that’s just for the fans.”
Ryan Blaney erased his winless drought spanning more than a season by emerging victorious in a wild, rain-postponed Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Monday, May 29.
The 29-year-old Blaney, a third-generation racer from High Point, North Carolina, led seven times for a race-high 163 of 400-scheduled laps, including the final 26. The event was originally scheduled to occur on Sunday, May 28, before being postponed to Monday amid ongoing precipitation and an increase of steady rain. Even when the race was delayed again for half an hour in the early stages due to light precipitation, Blaney prevailed through 6 cautions, on-track chaos and seven side-by-side restart battles against pole-sitter William Byron, including the final one with 20 laps remaining, to fend off the competition and claim his first NASCAR Cup Series checkered flag in 59 races.
With on-track qualifying that was scheduled to occur on Saturday, May 27, being canceled due to inclement weather, the starting lineup for the main event was determined through a metric formula per the NASCAR Rule Book. As a result, William Byron, winner of the previous Cup event at Darlington Raceway, was awarded pole position and was joined on the front row by Kevin Harvick.
When the green flag waved and the race commenced, William Byron managed to pull ahead of Kevin Harvick and clear him to assume an early lead through the first two turns. As the field fanned out through the backstretch, Byron managed to retain the lead through Turns 3 and 4 and back to the frontstretch as he led the first lap while Brad Keselowski challenged Harvick for second place.
During the second lap and with Byron leading, Harvick managed to pull ahead of Keselowski exiting the backstretch to retain the runner-up spot as Keselowski was then overtaken by Denny Hamlin and Ryan Blaney for top-five spots. Kyle Busch would then overtake Keselowski and drop him out of the top five on the track while Byron continued to lead.
Then on Lap 13, Byron, who led the first 13 laps, was overtaken by the No. 11 Sport Clips Toyota TRD Camry piloted by reigning Coke 600 winner Hamlin. Hamlin would proceed to lead at the Laps 20 and 25 mark. By then, teammates Christopher Bell and Martin Truex Jr., who started 10th and 18th, respectively, carved their way into the top five while Harvick, who started on the front row, was clinging a spot within the top 20 as he continued to slip backward.
When the scheduled competition caution flew on Lap 35, Christopher Bell, who assumed the lead from teammate Hamlin a lap earlier, was scored the leader in his No. 20 Interstate Batteries Toyota TRD Camry by nearly a second over Blaney, who just managed to overtake Hamlin for the runner-up spot. By then, Truex overtook Byron for fourth and Keselowski overtook Kyle Busch for sixth place while Tyler Reddick, Kyle Larson and Chris Buescher were running in the top 10.
During the competition caution, the field led by Byron pitted. Following the pit stops, Byron reassumed the lead after exiting first followed by Blaney, Bell, Keselowski, Hamlin and Reddick while Truex dropped to seventh. Amid the pit stops, Joey Logano plummeted within the leaderboard after he slid through his pit box while running in the top 15.
When the race resumed under green on Lap 41, Byron retained a narrow advantage until Blaney managed to muscle ahead on the outside lane in his No. 12 BodyArmor Cherry Lime Ford Mustang and assume the lead during the following lap. With Blaney leading Byron, Keselowski battled Bell for third while Hamlin and Buescher battled for fifth.
Just past the Lap 50 mark and amid a series of early on-track battles, Blaney was leading by nearly a second over Byron followed by Bell, Keselowski and Hamlin while Kyle Busch, Truex, Reddick, Buescher and Larson were scored in the top 10. Behind, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. was in 11th ahead of Chase Elliott, rookie Ty Gibbs, Daniel Suarez and Erik Jones while Ross Chastain, Alex Bowman, Austin Cindric, Michael McDowell and Justin Haley were running in the top 20. Meanwhile, AJ Allmendinger was running in 21st ahead of Corey LaJoie, Bubba Wallace, Logano and Harrison Burton while Jimmie Johnson, Zane Smith, Austin Dillon, Ryan Preece and Harvick rounded out the top 30, with names that included Aric Almirola, rookie Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe mired outside top 30.
Thirteen laps later, Bell, who methodically carved his way back to the front, reassumed the lead from Blaney. By then, Byron was in third ahead of Keselowski and Hamlin while Reddick overtook Kyle Busch for sixth. Behind, Truex was mired in eighth ahead of Larson and Stenhouse while Bowman, who made his return from a four-race absence amid a fractured vertebra from a sprint car accident at Iowa in late April, was scored in 16th.
On Lap 74, the second caution of the event flew when Jimmie Johnson spun his No. 84 Club Wyndham Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 off of Turn 2 and the outside wall. By then, Bell was scored the leader by more than a second over Blaney followed by Byron, Keselowski and Hamlin. During the caution period, the field led by Bell returned to pit road amid a stack-up. Following the pit stops, Byron reassumed the top spot after exiting pit road first from his first pit stall ahead of Blaney, Bell, Hamlin, Reddick and Kyle Busch while Keselowski, who pitted from fourth place, dropped to 10th due to a slow pit stop and hesitancy from the jackman. Amid the pit stops, Michael McDowell, who hit Bubba Wallace on pit road, was penalized for an equipment interference along with AJ Allmendinger. Austin Dillon would then pit for a second time for repairs to his front nose.
When the race restarted on Lap 79, Byron and Blaney dueled for the lead through the first two turns until Byron managed to pull ahead on the outside lane through the backstretch. Bell would then follow suit in second over Blaney, where both would battle for the runner-up spot, while Reddick marched his way up to fourth ahead of Larson, Truex and Hamlin.
At the Lap 90 mark, Byron retained the lead by two-tenths of a second over a hard-charging Blaney while third-place Bell trailed by nearly a second. Amid a series of on-track battles within the middle of the pack, Reddick retained fourth while Truex moved up to fifth ahead of teammate Hamlin. In addition, Kyle Busch was in seventh, Larson fell back to eighth and Keselowski was back in ninth over Stenhouse, Erik Jones, Suarez, Ty Gibbs, Chase Elliott and Buescher.
When the first stage concluded on Lap 100, Byron fended off late charges from Bell and Blaney to claim his seventh stage victory of the 2023 season. Bell settled in second as Blaney dropped to third while Reddick, Truex, Hamlin, Kyle Busch, Keselowski, Larson and Stenhouse were scored in the top 10. By then, 33 of 37 starters were scored on the lead lap.
Under the stage break, nearly the entire lead lap field led by Byron returned to pit road for service, except for McDowell as he assumed the lead. Following the pit stops, Byron exited pit road first for a third consecutive time following a fast pit service from the No. 24 pit crew ahead of Bell, Blaney, Reddick, Truex and Keselowski. Amid the pit stops, Austin Cindric was assessed a vehicle interference penalty while Legacy Motor Club’s Erik Jones and Noah Gragson took their respective cars to the garage due to mechanical issues as a result of running over the same debris on the track.
The second stage started on Lap 107 as McDowell and Byron occupied the front row. At the start, Byron and McDowell dueled for the lead until Byron pulled ahead through the backstretch. With Byron back in the lead, Bell, Reddick and Blaney would overtake McDowell for positions as the field fanned out and jostled for positions. McDowell then began to fade and lose the track positions he gained while Byron was leading by a steady margin over Bell and Blaney.
On Lap 117, Bell tracked down and overtook Byron for the lead. Reddick would soon follow suit in second while piloting the No. 45 Carolina Blue Jordan Brand Toyota TRD Camry along with Blaney and Keselowski while Byron dropped to fifth at the Lap 120 mark. Through the Lap 125 mark, Kyle Busch was in sixth followed by Hamlin, Truex, Suarez and Stenhouse while Buescher, Elliott, Harvick, Gibbs and Larson occupied the top 15. Behind, Logano was mired in 16th ahead of Wallace, Haley, Almirola and Preece while McDowell had fallen back to 25th behind Cindric, Bowman, Austin Dillon and Allmendinger. In addition, Chastain was mired in 26th, LaJoie was in 29th and Briscoe, who received the free pass to cycle back on the lead lap during the first stage break, was back in 32nd.
By Lap 135, Bell continued to lead by a tenth of a second over Reddick while third-place Blaney trailed by more than a second. Bell would then manage to stretch his advantage to four-tenths of a second over Reddick at the Laps 140 and 145 mark. Meanwhile, Cindric made an unscheduled pit stop under green after scraping his No. 2 Menards Ford Mustang into the outside wall entering the backstretch. McDowell had also pitted under green, with both competitors falling out of the lead lap category.
Within the Lap 145 mark, green flag pit stops slowly commenced as Hamlin pitted, though he stalled his car upon his service’s completion. Kyle Busch would then pit his No. 8 Alsco Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 under green followed by Keselowski, Truex, Reddick, Blaney, Chastain, Byron and a host of other competitors. Bell would then surrender the lead to pit by Lap 148 as Elliott, who had yet to pit, was leading. Upon his completed pit stop, which was slow, Bell was overtaken by Reddick, Keselowski and Blaney while trying to blend back onto the track. Amid the pit stops, Wallace was penalized for an equipment interference violation.
Once the remaining competitors led by Elliott pitted, the No. 45 Carolina Blue scheme piloted by Reddick assumed command of the field on Lap 154 followed by Keselowski, Blaney, Truex and Bell. A lap later, however, the caution flew due to precipitation reported in Turns 3 and 4 as the field was brought down to pit road and placed in a red flag period on Lap 158.
Half an hour later, the red flag lifted once the precipitation cleared and the track was dried as the field returned to the track under a cautious pace. During the caution period, some led by Byron and Keselowski pitted while the rest led by Reddick remained on the track. Following the pit stops, Larson had the hood of his No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 raised up while Logano was penalized for an equipment interference.
When the race resumed under green flag conditions on Lap 163, Reddick and Blaney dueled for the lead until Reddick pulled ahead through the backstretch as Truex made his move for second. Shortly after, the caution quickly returned when Johnson, who was multiple laps down, made contact with his driver Gragson against the Turn 2 outside wall, which resulted in Gragson scrubbing the wall and debris being scattered while Johnson spun.
During the following restart on Lap 169, Reddick and Blaney dueled for the lead for a second time. They remained dead even during the following two laps until Reddick managed to muscle ahead of Blaney on the outside lane. With Reddick leading, Truex was in third followed by Elliott while Daniel Suarez battled Buescher, Keselowski and Byron for fifth.
Then on Lap 175, the caution returned when Kyle Busch, who was battling within the top six, got loose entering Turns 1 and 2 and made contact with Keselowski, sending Keselowski scraping into the outside wall, before Busch spun from the top to the bottom lane of the backstretch while being barely hit by Suarez as the field scattered to avoid Busch. Following his spin, Busch reversed his car below the apron towards Turn 4 before spinning his car the right direction and pitting for repairs. During the caution period, names that included Keselowski, Ty Gibbs, Larson, Logano, Haley, Allmendinger, Bell, Cindric, Preece and Suarez pitted while the rest led by Reddick remained on the track. During the pit stops, Larson’s No. 5 pit crew popped the hood up on the car for a second time for adjustments.
At the start of the following restart on Lap 181, Reddick and Blaney battled dead even for the lead entering Turn 1 until Blaney managed to pull ahead and assume the lead from the inside lane. As the field fanned out through the backstretch, Almirola, who had a brief shoving match with Wallace during the red flag period, got loose and hit the backstretch’s outside wall while running within the top 10 and began to plummet below the leaderboard while the race remained under green flag conditions.
Then on Lap 185 and amid the on-track battles, the caution returned when Hamlin, who was battling Elliott within the top 10, slipped up and squeezed Elliott into the outside wall entering the frontstretch. With both managing to continue straight, Elliott then seemingly retaliated by darting back to the left and sending Hamlin’s No. 11 Toyota straight into the outside wall head-on, thus collecting Elliott in the process with both sustaining significant damage to their respective entries as Keselowski barely dodged the incident. Despite sustaining heavy front nose damage to his car, Hamlin emerged uninjured as Elliott nursed his damaged No. 9 NAPA Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 to the garage. The incident was one that prompted Hamlin to voice his displeasure towards Elliott while suggesting NASCAR to suspend Elliott for next weekend’s event at Gateway.
During the caution period, some that included Byron and Chastain pitted while the rest led by Blaney remained on the track.
When the race restarted on Lap 191, Buescher made his presence at the front known as he battled Blaney for the lead, which he succeeded during the following lap, while Reddick trailed in third. Behind, Harvick carved his way up to fourth followed by Logano and Keselowski while Truex was in seventh.
A few laps later, Harvick moved his No. 4 Mobil 1 Ford Mustang up into second place as he battled Blaney and Keselowski to defend the spots while Reddick slipped to seventh behind Keselowski, Logano and Ty Gibbs. In the process, Buescher maintained the lead in his No. 17 Fastenal Ford Mustang.
Then on the final lap of the second stage, the caution flew due to BJ McLeod spinning and stalling his car in Turn 4. The caution was enough for the second stage’s conclusion scheduled for Lap 200 to conclude under caution as Buescher captured his first stage victory of the 2023 season. Harvick settled in second while Keselowski, Logano, Blaney, Bell, Ty Gibbs, Byron, Chastain and Wallace were scored in the top 10. By then, 25 of 37 starters were scored on the lead lap.
Under the stage break, nearly the entire lead lap field led by Buescher pitted while Stenhouse and Kyle Busch remained on the track. Following the pit stops, Harvick beat Buescher off of pit road first followed by Logano, Gibbs, Blaney, Byron and Keselowski, whose pit stall erupted in flames upon exiting his stall.
The third stage started on Lap 207 as Stenhouse and Busch occupied the front row. At the start, Stenhouse peeked ahead with the lead on the outside lane while Harvick battled Busch for second. Harvick then made his move on the frontstretch during the following lap as he assumed the lead while Logano challenged Stenhouse for second. As Logano assumed second in his No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang, Blaney battled Busch and Stenhouse for third while Buescher was back to sixth in front of Keselowski.
At the Lap 220 mark, Harvick was leading by eight-tenths of a second over Blaney followed by Logano, Busch and Byron while Bell, Truex, Buescher, Gibbs and Chastain were scored in the top 10. By then, Keselowski dropped out of the lead lap category after pitting a lap earlier under green amid concerns of a loose wheel to his No. 6 Castrol Edge Ford Mustang.
Ten laps later, Blaney, who assumed the lead from Harvick four laps earlier, was leading by more than a second over Harvick while Busch maintained third ahead of Byron and Bell, who rallied from starting at the rear of the field during the race’s resumption after his No. 20 pit crew made an unapproved adjustment to his car during the red flag period. A lap later, however, Bell drew the caution after getting loose underneath Byron entering the frontstretch and spinning through the front-stretch’s grass. Bell, however, was able to prevent his car from hitting the wall as he slid through pit road before proceeding.
During the caution period, the lead lap field led by Harvick pitted. Following the pit stops, Byron reassumed the lead after exiting pit road first from his first pit stall followed by Harvick, Blaney, Gibbs, Logano and Buescher. Amid the pit stops, Kyle Busch, Truex, Buescher and Chastain made contact on pit road after getting squeezed into one another, with Truex later being assessed an equipment interference penalty.
With the race restarting on Lap 236, Byron and Blaney battled for the lead through the first two turns and the backstretch until Blaney peeked ahead and assumed command during the following lap. Behind, Harvick and Logano jostled for third as Larson drew himself into the picture. Reddick also carved his way up to sixth in front of Ty Gibbs while Kyle Busch was back in eighth ahead of Stenhouse and Chastain.
By Lap 240, Larson carved his way into third followed by Reddick while Logano and Harvick dropped to fifth and sixth. Meanwhile, Blaney maintained the lead by half a second over Byron as Wallace cracked the top 10 by moving into 10th.
Ten laps later, Blaney extended his advantage to more than a second over Byron as Reddick was in third followed by Larson and Harvick. By then, Busch was in sixth ahead of Gibbs, Logano, Stenhouse and Wallace while Bowman, Cindric, McDowell, Chastain, Truex, Preece, Haley, Bell, Zane Smith and Austin Dillon were scored in the top 20.
Another 10 laps later, Blaney continued to lead by four-tenths of a second over Reddick while Larson, Byron and Harvick trailed in the top five.
On Lap 274, the 10th caution of the event flew when Keselowski got loose and clipped the right rear of the No. 51 Rick Ware Racing Ford Mustang piloted by Todd Gilliland as both spun through the backstretch. During the caution period, the lead lap field led by Blaney pitted, but Byron reassumed the lead with the benefit of his first pit stall and another stellar pit stop from his No. 24 pit crew. With Byron exiting pit road first, Blaney followed suit along with Reddick, Harvick, Gibbs and Larson.
During the following restart on Lap 280, Byron retained the lead as the field fanned out through the first two turns. Behind Byron, Blaney retained second while Reddick used the outside lane to battle and overtake Harvick for third. Two laps later, Blaney reassumed the lead after gaining a strong run beneath Byron’s No. 24 Liberty University Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 through Turns 2 and 3. Meanwhile, Harvick fell back to seventh as Larson, Truex and Gibbs occupied spots in front of him.
By Lap 290, Blaney maintained the lead by three-tenths of a second over Reddick while Truex carved his way up to third while trailing by more than a second, all while Byron slipped to fourth in front of teammate Larson.
When the third stage concluded on Lap 300, Blaney fended off a late charge from both Reddick and Truex to capture his first stage victory of the 2023 season. Reddick settled in second followed by Truex while Byron, Gibbs, Larson, Kyle Busch, Harvick, Stenhouse and Alex Bowman were scored in the top 10. By then, 27 of 37 starters were scored on the lead lap.
During the stage break, the lead lap field led by Blaney pitted. Following the pit stops, Byron retained the lead after exiting pit road first followed by Blaney, Larson, Ty Gibbs, Reddick, Kyle Busch and Harvick.
With 93 laps remaining, the final stage started as Byron and Blaney occupied the front row. At the start, Byron and Blaney engaged in another tight battle for the lead before Blaney pulled ahead and motored away with the lead.
Eighteen laps later, Blaney was leading by more than two seconds over Reddick followed by Kyle Busch, Byron and Larson while Gibbs, Stenhouse, Bowman, Wallace and Harvick were scored in the top 10. Behind, Truex was mired in 11th ahead of Haley, Zane Smith, Austin Dillon and Logano while Cindric, McDowell, Allmendinger, Chase Briscoe and Preece rounded out the top 20. Meanwhile, Buescher was mired back in 21st while Bell, Harrison Burton, Almirola, LaJoie, JJ Yeley and Chastain rounded out the 27-car field of competitors scored on the lead lap.
With 60 laps remaining, Blaney maintained the lead by more than three seconds over Kyle Busch while Reddick was back in third ahead of Larson and Byron.
Then with laps remaining, the caution flew when a right-front tire came off of the No. 34 Chicago Pneumatic Compressors Ford Mustang piloted by McDowell in Turn 2. During the caution period, the field led by Blaney peeled to pit road for service. Following the pit stops, Byron’s pit crew continued to deliver after enabling their driver to exit first and reassume the lead ahead of Reddick, Busch, Blaney, Larson, Harvick and Truex. During the pit stops, Wallace, who pitted within the top 10, dropped to 19th after getting blocked by Bowman while trying to exit his pit stall.
With 51 laps remaining, the race proceeded under green. At the start, Byron and Reddick battled for the lead but Byron quickly retained the lead. Meanwhile, Reddick slipped up the track as Busch, Larson and Blaney overtook him. Truex also made his move into the top five during the following lap as Reddick fell back to sixth in front of Ty Gibbs and Harvick. Not long after, Larson battled Kyle Busch for second as Truex joined the battle with less than 50 laps remaining.
With 43 laps remaining, however, the caution flew when Harvick, who was battling Gibbs and Reddick for spots in the top 10, made contact against Reddick’s Toyota entering the front stretch and sent spinning through the frontstretch grass, though he continued and directed himself to pit road. During the caution period, all but Zane Smith pitted as Byron was the first competitor to exit pit road first.
Down to the final 38 laps of the event, the race proceeded under green. At the start, Byron assumed the lead from Zane Smith as the field fanned out, with Larson challenging Blaney for second. Nearly a lap later, however, the caution returned when Allmendinger received a nudge from Stenhouse, slipped sideways and spun towards the Turns 3 and 4 outside wall, barely clipping Logano in the process as Harrison Burton was also involved.
With the race restarting with 31 laps remaining, Byron received a strong push from teammate Larson to retain the lead over Blaney. As the field made its way through the backstretch, trouble struck again as Cindric, who was running within the middle of the pack, got sideways and slapped the inside wall head-on as his long event came to a late end.
During the following restart with 26 laps remaining, the calamity continued as Larson, who was running fourth, slipped sideways and ignited a multi-car wreck in Turn 2 that involved Gibbs, Bell, Logano and Almirola. At the moment of this recent caution, Blaney had managed to reassume the lead over Byron.
With the race restarting with 20 laps remaining, Blaney used the outside lane to retain the lead over Truex and Byron. Through Turns 3 and 4, however, Blaney briefly lost his momentum, which allowed Byron to fight back on the inside lane while Truex had to also step out of the gas to avoid hitting Blaney. Byron, however, was unable to mount his charge as Blaney retained the lead while Byron and Truex battled for second. Shortly after, Reddick made his charge to the front as he overtook Truex for third. Behind, Wallace carved his way to fifth while Kyle Busch, who nearly got turned by Stenhouse, was mired in sixth.
With less than 15 laps remaining, Blaney was leading by half a second over Byron and more than a second over Truex. Blaney continued to lead by six-tenths of a second with 10 laps remaining as 23XI Racing’s Wallace and Reddick were scored in fourth and fifth.
Down to the final five laps of the event, Blaney retained the lead by more than a second over Byron and Truex while Wallace and Reddick trailed by more than two seconds.
When the white flag waved and the final lap started, Blaney remained as the leader by nine-tenths of a second over Byron. Despite Byron mounting a final lap charge as he cut the deficit down to six-tenths of a second, he ran out of time as Blaney, who had a clear vision in front of him, was able to cycle his way back to the frontstretch and claim his first checkered flag in 59 races.
With the victory, Blaney, who also achieved his first Coke 600 victory, notched his first Cup Series victory since winning at Daytona International Speedway in August 2021. He became the 10th different winner of the 2023 Cup season and the second Team Penske competitor alongside Joey Logano to win this season as he notched his eighth career win in NASCAR’s premier series.
As an added bonus, Blaney’s Coke 600 victory capped off a memorable weekend for his team owner Roger Penske, who notched his 19th Indianapolis 500 victory a day ago with the help of two-time NTT IndyCar Series champion Josef Newgarden. Blaney also recorded the first Cup points-paying victory for crew chief Jonathan Hassler.
Photo by John Knittel for SpeedwayMedia.com.
“I might shed a tear,” Blaney said on FOX. “Man, this has been a cool weekend. Obviously, Memorial Day weekend, it means a lot. I’ve been growing up here, watching dad [Dave Blaney] run this race for a long time. It’s just so cool to be a part of it, let alone win it. I was able to get the lead on the restart. Our car was so good that I could kind of bide my time a little bit and we were able to drive off. I was hoping no caution just because you never know. I knew we had the car to do it, but restarts can be crazy. You start to get to feel like you can’t win anymore and when you don’t win [a race] in a while, it kind of gets hard. Just super thankful to the No. 12 guys for believing in me and thank you [fans] for sticking around.”
Byron, the pole-sitter who led 91 laps and received superior service from his pit crew amid the long event and delay, settled in second place for his best result at his home track.
“We just needed a little bit,” Byron said. “Just really happy for Ryan. He really deserves it. He’s a good dude. Cool to see him get a win. I felt like there were enough restarts for him to get back towards the front. I knew [Blaney] and [Reddick] were a little bit stronger than us, but just thanks to this Liberty University Chevrolet team. The car was great tonight. Just not quite good enough, but really proud of the effort. Pit crew was phenomenal on pit road. Those guys are just high energy and that [number one] pit stall helps, so just a credit to the few weeks before Darlington. Just proud of where our team is at. Just needed a little bit more.”
Truex, a two-time Coke 600 winner, came home in third while Bubba Wallace and Tyler Reddick finished in the top five. Kyle Busch, Stenhouse, Buescher, Austin Dillon and Zane Smith completed the top 10 in the final running order. Notably, Harvick finished 11th in his final Coke 600 event while Alex Bowman finished 12th in his first event since returning from his fractured vertebrae injury.
There were 31 lead changes for 13 different leaders. The race featured 16 cautions for 83 laps. In total, 25 of 37 starters finished on the lead lap.
With 12 regular-season events remaining of this year’s Cup Series schedule, Ross Chastain leads the regular-season standings by a single point over Ryan Blaney, four over William Byron, eight over Kevin Harvick and 13 over Martin Truex Jr.
William Byron, Kyle Busch, Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, Martin Truex Jr., Christopher Bell, Tyler Reddick, Denny Hamlin, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Joey Logano are currently guaranteed spots for the 2023 Cup Series Playoffs based on winning at least once throughout the regular-season stretch. Ross Chastain, Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski, Chris Buescher, Bubba Wallace and Alex Bowman occupy the remaining vacant spots to the Playoffs based on points, with Bowman occupying the 16th and final vacant spot by four points over Chase Briscoe, 15 over rookie Ty Gibbs, 20 over Daniel Suarez, 38 over Corey LaJoie and 42 over Austin Cindric.
Results.
1. Ryan Blaney, 163 laps led, Stage 3 winner
2. William Byron, 91 laps led, Stage 1 winner
3. Martin Truex Jr.
4. Bubba Wallace
5. Tyler Reddick, 28 laps led
6. Kyle Busch, one lap led
7. Ricky Stenhouse Jr., four laps led
8. Chris Buescher, 12 laps led, Stage 2 winner
9. Austin Dillon
10. Zane Smith, three laps led
11. Kevin Harvick, 19 laps led
12. Alex Bowman
13. Ryan Preece
14. AJ Allmendinger
15. Justin Haley
16. JJ Yeley
17. Corey LaJoie
18. Harrison Burton
19. Brad Keselowski
20. Chase Briscoe
21. Joey Logano
22. Ross Chastain
23. Daniel Suarez
24. Christopher Bell, 48 laps led
25. Aric Almirola
26. Ty Gibbs, two laps down
27. Ty Dillon, three laps down
28. Michael McDowell, four laps down, four laps led
29. BJ McLeod, eight laps down
30. Kyle Larson – OUT, one lap led
31. Austin Cindric – OUT, Accident
32. Erik Jones, 59 laps down
33. Todd Gilliland – OUT, Accident
34. Chase Elliott – OUT, Accident, six laps led
35. Denny Hamlin – OUT, Accident, 20 laps led
36. Noah Gragson – OUT, Engine
37. Jimmie Johnson – OUT, Accident
Next on the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the series’ second annual event at Gateway’s World Wide Technology Raceway in Madison, Illinois. The event is scheduled to occur next Sunday, June 4, at 3:30 p.m. ET on FS1.
In a similar scenario to the Bristol Motor Speedway Dirt Course a year ago, Kyle Busch found himself situated at the right place to strike at the right time as he dodged a final lap carnage involving race leaders Bubba Wallace and Ryan Blaney to net a big victory in the GEICO 500 at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday, April 23, amid two overtime attempts.
The two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion from Las Vegas, Nevada, led three of 196 over-scheduled laps as he placed himself in contention to win while starting on the front row during the second of two overtime attempts. Despite being overtaken by Wallace and a hard-charging Blaney on the frontstretch and as the final lap started, the seas parted ways for Busch as Wallace, who went from the bottom to the top lane to block Blaney, got bumped and turned sideways in front of Blaney on the outside lane.
The result triggered a multi-car pileup between Turns 1 and 2 as Busch dodged the carnage to reassume the lead before the caution flag waved to officially conclude the event on the final lap. Amid fuel concerns, Busch had enough fuel to coast his No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 across the finish line first and claim his second checkered flag of the 2023 season and his first at Talladega in 15 years.
With on-track qualifying that determined the starting lineup occurring on Saturday, Denny Hamlin started in pole position for the first time in 2023 after posting a pole-winning lap at 180.751 mph in 52.979 seconds. Joining him on the front row was Aric Almirola, who posted the second-best qualifying lap at 180.642 mph in 53.011 seconds.
Prior to the event, Austin Cindric, AJ Allmendinger and Todd Gilliland dropped to the rear of the field due to unapproved adjustments made to their respective entries.
When the green flag waved and the race commenced, Hamlin and Almirola dueled for the lead amid two tight-packed lanes entering the first turn until Almirola received a strong push from teammate Chase Briscoe to launch ahead and assume control of both lanes through the backstretch. With the field fanning out to two tight-packed lanes, Almirola proceeded to lead the first lap ahead of Briscoe, Christopher Bell, Joey Logano, Hamlin and Chris Buescher.
Then prior to the second lap and as Logano challenged Almirola for the lead, the first caution flew when Michael McDowell, who was running within the top 20, spun in the middle of the pack through Turns 3 and 4 after losing a right-rear tire. Amid the spin, the field scattered to avoid hitting McDowell as he pitted his No. 34 Love’s Travel Stop Ford Mustang for repairs.
During the first caution period, a host of names that included Ross Chastain, Erik Jones, Alex Bowman, Chase Elliott, Justin Haley, Ty Dillon, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Riley Herbst, Corey LaJoie, JJ Yeley, Ryan Preece, Austin Cindric, Todd Gilliland, Zane Smith, BJ McLeod and Austin Hill pitted while the rest led by Almirola remained on the track.
When the event restarted on the sixth lap, Almirola maintained the lead on the outside lane followed by Logano while Briscoe challenged Buescher for third. As the field returned to the frontstretch, Briscoe drew himself into a side-by-side battle with teammate Almirola for the lead as the former led a lap for himself. Then on the eighth lap, Bubba Wallace was drafted into the lead on the outside lane as he had rookie Ty Gibbs and Ryan Blaney drafting him. As Wallace fought for the lead on the outside lead, Briscoe also fought back on the inside lane with drafting help from teammate Almirola and Logano.
At the Lap 10 mark, Wallace was leading ahead of Gibbs, Briscoe, Blaney and Almirola as the field battled amid two tight-packed lanes. Despite being pressured by Briscoe on the inside lane, Wallace maintained the lead on the outside lane through the Lap 20 mark.
By Lap 25, Wallace continued to lead as Blaney moved up to second. Martin Truex Jr. also moved up to third followed by Gibbs and Daniel Suarez while Briscoe fell back to sixth ahead of Kyle Busch, Almirola, Harrison Burton and Ross Chastain. By then, all but one of 38 starters were separated within two seconds amid a tight pack and two lanes.
Then as the first wave of green flag pit stops commenced approaching Lap 35 with Wallace leading his Toyota teammates to pit road, early trouble struck for teammate Tyler Reddick, who made a late dart to the left and locked up his front tires while trying to slow his car prior to entering pit road. After getting loose, Reddick then spun and hit the inside wall as he was dodged by Wallace and all four Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota competitors. Despite the incident, the race proceeded under green as Reddick navigated his No. 45 MoneyLion Toyota TRD Camry back to pit road for repairs.
On Lap 39, another wave of competitors, mainly Chevrolet competitors, led by Chastain, who passed Kyle Busch for the lead on Lap 36, pitted as Preece cycled to the lead. Then as another wave of competitors, mainly Ford competitors, led by Preece pitted by Lap 41, trouble struck for Briscoe, who spun after locking up his tires and trying to slow his No. 14 Mahindra Tractors YOG Ford Mustang while trying to enter pit road.
While the rest of his Ford competitors proceeded to pit, Briscoe’s event then went from bad to worse when he flattened his tires and was left stranded on pit road while the rest of his fellow competitors pitted. As a result of his mishap, the caution returned on Lap 42. By then, Erik Jones was leading ahead of Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Ty Dillon, Haley, Corey LaJoie and AJ Allmendinger. During the caution period, some led by Erik Jones, who had yet to pit, pitted while the rest led by Elliott remained on the track.
When the event restarted under green on Lap 47, teammates Elliott and Bowman dueled for the lead in front of the pack. They continued to duel for the lead through the backstretch and entering Turns 3 and 4 until Bowman peeked ahead in his No. 48 Ally Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 and led the following lap. While Bowman had drafting help from teammate Kyle Larson, Elliott had drafting help from Chastain as both Hendrick Motorsports teammates continued to swap back and forth for the lead.
Nearing the Lap 55 mark, the battle for the lead continued to intensify as Elliott reassumed the top spot with drafting help from Chastain on the inside lane while Bowman fought back on the outside lane with drafting help from teammate Larson. As the field remained dead even in a tight pack, Almirola tried to start a third lane towards the outside lane entering the frontstretch. Kyle Busch would then move up in front of Almirola along with Blaney and Zane Smith towards the outside lane as Elliott retained the lead.
When the first stage concluded on Lap 60, Elliott, who swapped the lead with teammate Bowman since the previous restart amid the draft, claimed his first Cup stage victory of the 2023 season. Bowman, Chastain, Byron, Larson, Cindric, Gragson, Logano, Preece and Suarez were scored in the top 10. By then, the event featured 15 lead changes for 10 different leaders while 36 of 38 starters were scored on the lead lap.
Under the second stage, the field led by Elliott returned to pit road for service. Following the pit stops and amid mixed strategies, Hamlin exited first after only opting for fuel. Harvick, who pitted for two fresh tires, exited second followed by Haley, Chastain on four tires, Truex and Cindric. Amid the pit stops, Todd Gilliland was penalized for having his crew members jump over the pit wall too soon. Buescher was also penalized for running over equipment along with Herbst, who was nabbed for pitting outside his pit box. JJ Yeley was also assessed a penalty for vehicle interference.
Prior to the start of the second stage, the following names that included Buescher, Kyle Busch, Zane Smith, Erik Jones, Keselowski, Stenhouse, Austin Hill and Herbst pitted to top off on fuel.
The second stage started on Lap 67 as Hamlin and Justin Haley occupied the front row. At the start, Hamlin pulled ahead on the outside lane in his No. 11 FedEx Toyota TRD Camry through the first two turns as Haley tried to fight back on the inside lane with drafting help from Chastain. Hamlin, however, had drafting help from Harvick as he maintained the lead in front of the field battling in tight formation through two lanes.
Four laps later, Harvick, who drew himself in a side-by-side battle with Hamlin for the lead, led a lap for himself as he tried to receive drafting assistance from Truex while Hamlin moved in front of Haley on the inside lane. With Harvick in the lead, Logano then drew himself behind Harvick’s No. 4 Mobil 1 Ford Mustang in the draft while Truex drew himself in a side-by-side battle with Harvick for the lead.
At the Lap 75 mark, Harvick was leading ahead of Logano, Preece, Truex and Hamlin while Larson, Haley, Wallace, Chastain and Ty Dillon were scored in the top 10. By then, the top-36 competitors were separated by two seconds, with the first 21 separated by under a second.
Two laps later, Logano was drafted into the lead as he led a lap for himself. Another lap later, however, Truex made his move to the front after receiving a draft from teammate Hamlin and Harvick on the outside lane while Logano remained on the inside lane.
Through the first 90 scheduled laps, Truex, who had been swapping the lead with Logano since Lap 77, was out in front ahead of Logano while Hamlin, Haley and Harvick were in the top five. By then, Chastain was in sixth followed by Preece, Cindric, Wallace and Bell while Ty Dillon, Larson, Austin Dillon, Byron and LaJoie were scored in the top 15 ahead of Elliott, Almirola, Harrison Burton, Bowman and Blaney. In addition, 36 of 38 starters scored on the lead lap were separated within two seconds.
At the halfway mark on Lap 94, Truex continued to lead ahead of teammate Hamlin while Harvick, Logano, Preece, Haley, Wallace, Chastain, Ty Dillon and Cindric were battling within the top 10. By then, the top-26 competitors were separated by less than a second while a total of 36 lead lap competitors were separated by over a second and a half.
Three laps later, the field fanned out to three tight-packed lanes as Wallace mounted a charge on the outside lane with drafting help from Erik Jones. Another lap later, Wallace was drafted into the lead as he moved in front of Truex and Hamlin while Harvick and Logano occupied the top five. By Lap 100, Harvick moved back into the lead as he battled Truex to maintain the spot while Preece and Ty Dillon moved up into the top five.
Three laps later, the second wave of green flag pit stops commenced as a host of competitors, mainly Chevrolet competitors, led by Chastain pitted. Another lap later, a mix of Toyota and Chevrolet competitors led by Truex and Hamlin pitted under green for service. Another wave of competitors, mainly Ford competitors, led by Harvick would then pit under green by Lap 105, mainly for fuel. Amid the pit stops, Logano was penalized for speeding on pit road.
Nearing the Lap 106 mark, the top-four competitors led by Keselowski and followed by teammate Buescher, Yeley and Riley Herbst pitted. Once the second cycle of green flag pit stops concluded, Truex cycled his No. 19 Bas Pro Shops Toyota TRD Camry into the lead followed by Austin Dillon and Byron while Kyle Busch, Bowman and Elliott were scored in the top six. By Lap 110, however, Wallace navigated his way back into the lead over Elliott, who led the previous lap.
Then on Lap 115, the field split Logano in the middle as Logano, who was left out of the draft prior to the field catching him, was mired a lap down following his pit road penalty. As Logano received drafting help from teammate Cindric to battle Briscoe for the free pass spot, Elliott, who spent the previous several laps battling Wallace for the lead, was out in front. By then, Almirola moved up to second followed by Harvick, Burton and Preece while Wallace was left battling Truex for sixth.
When the second stage concluded on Lap 120, Almirola executed a move on Elliott with drafting help from teammate Harvick on the outside lane to claim his first Cup stage victory since 2020. Elliott settled in second followed by Harvick, Wallace and Burton while Truex, Preece, Hamlin, Stenhouse and Gragson were scored in the top 10. By then, the event featured 33 lead changes for 16 different leaders. In addition, Logano was the beneficiary of the free pass and cycled back to the lead lap after managing to remain ahead of Briscoe and BJ McLeod, both of whom were a lap down, on the track.
Under the stage break, nearly the entire field led by Almirola returned to pit road for service. Following the pit stops, Almirola exited first to retain the lead followed by Hamlin, Wallace, Elliott, Burton and Harvick.
With 62 laps remaining, the final stage started as Almirola and Wallace occupied the front row. At the start, Wallace peeked ahead with the lead on the inside lane with drafting help from Burton as he then darted up the track to block Almirola. This enabled Burton to be drafted into the lead on the inside lane followed by Gragson as Wallace battled Truex for third. Burton would then maintain the lead in front of Gragson, Wallace, Truex, Blaney and Almirola as the event reached its final 60-lap mark.
With 50 laps remaining, Blaney was leading NY a hair over Burton and followed by Wallace, Gragson and Almirola while Hamlin, Truex, Reddick, Elliott and Harvick were running in the top 10. By then, the top-22 competitors were separated by under a second while 35 lead lap competitors were separated by less than two seconds amid the tight two-lane packed racing.
Then with 47 laps remaining, the caution flew when Burton, who was being drafted by Gragson while battling for the lead, spun off the front nose of Gragson as he spun his No. 21 Motorcraft/Quick Lane Ford Mustang below the Turn 3 apron, though he managed to sustain no significant damage. As the field checked up to avoid Burton’s spin, however, Logano got into the rear of Zane Smith, who then collected Austin Dillon as Dillon spun his No. 3 Bass Pro Shops Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 below the apron and the grass while Smith made more contact with Austin Hill.
During the caution period, the field led by Blaney pitted, mainly for fuel, and Blaney retained the lead after exiting first followed by Almirola, Wallace, Hamlin, Truex and Gragson. Prior to the restart, names that included Keselowski, Buescher, Erik Jones, Logano and Hill pitted to top off with enough fuel for the finish.
With the event restarting with 41 laps remaining, Blaney and Wallace dueled for the lead before Wallace received a draft from his owner Hamlin to move into the lead on the outside lane. With Blaney remaining on the inside lane and in front of Almirola, Wallace maintained his momentum and lead on the outside lane in front of Hamlin and Truex as the field fanned out to three tight-packed lanes.
With 38 laps remaining, the outside lane led by Wallace briefly stacked up, which enabled Preece to try to ignite a drafting charge on the outside lane as Blaney was pushed clear to the lead followed by Almirola, Gragson and Harvick. As the field continued to fan out through three tight-packed lanes, Gibbs charged his way into third in front of Gragson, Wallace, Hamlin and Harvick as Blaney retained the lead. Gibbs then started to challenge Blaney for the lead with 35 laps remaining while running in the middle lane while Preece launched another bid for the front on the outside lane.
A lap later, the battle for the lead fanned out to three tight-packed lanes amid the draft as Blaney, Gibbs and Preece, all of whom were the front-runners of each of the three lanes, dueled for the lead. As Gibbs managed to peek ahead to lead a lap for himself, Blaney and Preece fought back from their respective lanes, with Blaney receiving a strong push from Almirola on the inside lane to move ahead. With Preece slowly falling back on the outside lane, Gibbs received drafting help from Wallace and his Toyota teammates to keep Blaney within his sights under the final 30-lap mark.
Down to the final 25 laps of the event, Blaney was leading ahead of Almirola, Gragson, Gibbs and Harvick while Wallace, Chastain, Hamlin, Truex and Larson were scored in the top 10. By then, the top 20 competitors were separated by less than a second, with the top 33 separated by one-and-a-half seconds amid the tight-packed draft racing fanning out to three lanes.
Five laps later and with the field still fanned out to three lanes, Blaney and Gibbs continued to duel for the lead ahead of Almirola, Wallace and Gragson while Stenhouse tried to form a third drafting lane to the front. Another two laps later, the inside lane gained momentum as Blaney started to pull ahead followed by Almirola, Gragson, Harvick, Chastain, Larson, Kyle Busch and Allmendinger while Gibbs, Wallace and Hamlin were losing touch with the leaders while running on the outside lane. With 15 laps remaining, however, the outside lane led by Gibbs and followed by Wallace, Hamlin and Truex regained their momentum as Gibbs started to challenge Blaney for the lead.
Down to the final 10 laps of the event and with fuel becoming questionable for the front-runners, the top-33 competitors were separated within a second and in tight formation amid the draft as both Blaney and Gibbs continued to fight for the lead followed by Wallace, Hamlin, Almirola, Gragson, Truex, Harvick, Haley and Chastain.
With seven laps remaining, the top-four competitors that included Blaney, Almirola, Gragson and Harvick broke away from the tight pack while Gibbs was trying to maintain momentum as the lead competitor on the outside lane. Then as the intensity toward the front continued, the caution flew with five laps remaining when Logano, who darted to the outside lane to ignite a charge to the front while running in the middle of the pack, got bumped and loose by LaJoie as he briefly bounced off of Suarez before making contact with the backstretch’s outside wall and spinning below the track. Stenhouse and Herbst also sustained damage along with Byron, who made contact with Burton as Burton spun and slapped the inside wall, as the event was sent into overtime.
During the caution period, select names that included Byron, Bell, Stenhouse and Ty Dillon pitted for fuel while the rest led by Blaney remained on the track.
At the start of the first overtime attempt, where Blaney and Gragson occupied the front row, Gragson received a push from Chastain to peek ahead of Blaney entering the first turn. Then through Turns 1 and 2, Chastain tried to make a move between Blaney and Gragson for the lead. Amid the tight racing, Chastain and Gragson ended up making contact as Gragson’s No. 42 Wendy’s Beef is in the Bag Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 ended up shooting back across the track and hitting the outside wall. In the ensuing process, Larson got turned by Harvick as he spun below the apron. Larson then came back across the track and despite being dodged by most of the oncoming field, he was T-boned by Preece’s No. 41 Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford Mustang as both of their events came to an end.
Under the caution period, Harvick, Hamlin, Chastain and Haley pitted for fuel while the rest led by Blaney remained on the track.
During the start of the second overtime attempt, where Blaney and Kyle Busch occupied the front row, the momentum occurred on the outside lane as Busch was drafted into the lead followed by Wallace and Keselowski while Blaney was left to battle Truex for fourth. By then, Gibbs pulled his No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota TRD Camry below the track after running out of fuel. Through the backstretch, the inside lane led by Busch continued to gain more momentum while Truex was mired back in sixth despite remaining on the outside lane.
Then through the frontstretch, Wallace made his move on Busch and assumed the lead on the outside lane in his No. 23 Columbia Toyota TRD Camry with drafting help from Blaney’s No. 12 Wurth Ford Mustang as he started the final lap of the event. Through Turn 1, however, Blaney tried to make a move beneath Wallace for the lead but was blocked. He then moved up the track along with Wallace and the two made contact, which resulted in Wallace getting loose and spinning sideways as he came down the track and clipped Keselowski before spinning within the middle of the pack and towards oncoming competitors. Among those involved on the final lap included Keselowski, Truex, Allmendinger, Cindric, Gilliland and Byron while the rest of the field scattered to avoid the carnage.
With the caution waving and the race deemed official, Kyle Busch was back in front ahead of Blaney. Amid concerns of not having enough fuel to finish, Busch was able to have enough to remain ahead of Blaney and navigate his No. 8 McLaren Custom Grills Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 through the frontstretch before claiming the checkered flag and the official victory.
With the victory, Busch, who won earlier at Auto Club Speedway in late February, notched his second NASCAR Cup Series victory of the 2023 season, which makes him the third multi-time winner of this season. He also notched his 62nd career win in NASCAR’s premier series, which makes the 2023 season Busch’s 13th of 19 full-time seasons with multiple Cup victories. The Talladega victory was also Busch’s second of his Cup career, with his first dating back to April 2008, and the 13th overall for Richard Childress Racing. Ironically, Busch’s Talladega victory marked his first restrictor-plate victory since winning at Daytona International Speedway in July 2008.
“Sometimes, you got to be lucky,” Busch said on FOX. “Some of these races come down to that. You gotta take’em when they come your way. The seas kind of parted there when [Wallace and Blaney] went up the racetrack. They were trying to push draft. These cars are just not stable enough to do that. Seeing [Wallace] just turn a little bit sideways, I was like get out of the way, just miss it and try to see if I was ahead of [Blaney] by the time [the race] was called. Just a great day for another new sponsor at [Richard Childress Racing] with McLaren Custom Grills. We have a great time being able to come out here and race and be a part of Team Chevy and get this Camaro in Victory Lane.”
“We were sweating it being close [on fuel],” Busch added. “I thought back to California, Fontana, earlier this year where we have a win. I’m like we gotta gamble. We’re up here, you gotta take the track position when you have it and go give it what you can on the restarts and see what happens. Low and behold, it worked out. Knock on wood for this one.”
Following an extensive review of the finishing order amid the final lap chaos, Blaney settled in second place after leading a race-high 47 laps. Buescher made his way to third followed by Briscoe, who rallied from losing a lap to the leaders, while Keselowski ended up fifth.
“You get big runs and you take’em when you can,” Blaney said. “I’m glad everyone’s OK, but on my mind, you kind of triple move like that, triple block and you can’t block three times. Just the runs are so big and as the leader, with Bubba, he’s trying to block, which is the right thing to do, but I think he kind of moved three times. You don’t really get a lot of those. I gotta go somewhere, so I hate that good cars got torn up. I hate for us being so close for the win. I’m not blaming anybody. It’s just hard racing at the end of this thing. Unfortunate [that] cars got tore up and we just missed out on another win.”
Erik Jones, Byron, Bell, Suarez and Todd Gilliland finished in the top 10. Notably, Elliott finished 12th in front of Bowman, Ty Dillon and Stenhouse while Hamlin ended up 17th behind Reddick. Almirola fell back to 22nd behind teammate Harvick, who made his 800th Cup career start, while Truex ended up 27th. Meanwhile, Wallace, who led 35 laps, was left in 28th place while Ty Gibbs ended up 31st after not having enough fuel to finish.
There were 57 lead changes for 21 different leaders. The race featured eight cautions for 34 laps. In addition, 27 of 38 starters finished on the lead lap.
Following the 10th event of the 2023 Cup Series season, Christopher Bell leads the regular-season standings by 12 points over Ross Chastain, 20 over Kevin Harvick, 36 over Kyle Larson, 41 over Kyle Busch and 45 over Tyler Reddick.
Results.
1. Kyle Busch, three laps led
2. Ryan Blaney, 47 laps led
3. Chris Buescher
4. Chase Briscoe, one lap led
5. Brad Keselowski, two laps led
6. Erik Jones, three laps led
7. William Byron, one lap led
8. Christopher Bell
9. Daniel Suarez, five laps led
10. Todd Gilliland
11. JJ Yeley
12. Chase Elliott, 18 laps led, Stage 1 winner
13. Alex Bowman, eight laps led
14. Ty Dillon
15. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
16. Tyler Reddick
17. Denny Hamlin, seven laps led
18. BJ McLeod
19. Justin Haley
20. Riley Herbst
21. Kevin Harvick, 11 laps led
22. Aric Almirola, 11 laps led, Stage 2 winner
23. Ross Chastain
24. Austin Hill
25. Corey LaJoie
26. Austin Cindric
27. Martin Truex Jr., 19 laps led
28. Bubba Wallace – OUT, Accident, 35 laps led
29. AJ Allmendinger – OUT, Accident
30. Joey Logano, one lap down, three laps led
31. Ty Gibbs – OUT, Fuel, four laps led
32. Noah Gragson – OUT, Accident, one lap led
33. Kyle Larson – OUT, Accident
34. Ryan Preece – OUT, Accident, two laps led
35. Michael McDowell, 13 laps down
36. Harrison Burton – OUT, Accident, 11 laps led
37. Zane Smith – OUT, Accident
38. Austin Dillon – OUT, Accident
Next on the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the series’ lone visit of this season to Dover Motor Speedway in Dover, Delaware. The event is scheduled to occur next Sunday, April 30, at 2 p.m. ET on FS1.
1. Kyle Larson: Larson charged early at Martinsville, and was into the top 10 by lap 20 after starting 19th. Larson surged again in the latter part of the race, holding off Joey Logano while leading.
“I was just in a hurry to get to Ryan Preece,” Larson said, “to see if he was for real after winning the pole and to get some payback for his treatment of me at Bristol. But as soon as I got near the front, he started dropping like a fly, proving that instead of running with the big dogs, he runs from them.”
2. Joey Logano: Logano started at the back of the field
“I have mostly fond memories of Martinsville,” Logano said, “and one not-so-fond memory. That’s thanks to Matt Kenseth. But I’ve mostly gotten over that situation, through therapy and positive imagery, in which I picture Matt Kenseth as himself, and I picture myself as Carl Edwards bullying him.”
3. Christopher Bell: Bell started 22nd and finished 16th in the NOCO 400.
“Every driver dreams of raising the grandfather clock trophy at Martinsville,” Bell said. “Now, Kyle Larson has his, and he’s won two of the last three races. He looks like the favorite to win the championship. Larson may have the clock, but everybody knows what time it is.”
4. William Byron: Byron finished 23rd in the NOCO 400 at Martinsville.
“Chase Elliott returned after missing the last six weeks recovering from a broken leg suffered while snowboarding,” Byron said. “Now, every time Chase vows to do something, he’ll hear the same three words from everyone at Hendrick: no, not ‘Break a leg.’ I’m talking about ‘Don’t go snowboarding.’”
5. Martin Truex Jr.: Truex finished third in the NOCO 400 at Martinsville.
“That’s my first top-five of the season,” Truex said. “Except for Christopher Bell, it’s been a pretty slow start for everybody at Joe Gibbs Racing. With Kyle Busch gone, I’d say Christopher is JGR’s top driver. The rest of us, we’re the B-team. In short, with Kyle gone, Christopher’s taken over the job of ‘A’-hole.”
6. Ross Chastain: Chastain led 31 laps and finished 13th at Martinville, and is second in the points standings, 13 behind Christopher Bell.
“I feel pretty good about finishing 13th,” Chastain said, “especially since I started the race 34th. So, much like Denny Hamlin’s championship-less career, I feel like I won the battle, even though I didn’t win the war.”
7. Ryan Blaney: Blaney finished seventh at Martinsville.
“It’s amazing that Chase Elliott was able to return so quickly after breaking his leg,” Blaney said. “Kudos to the doctors who performed the surgery. Heck, there’s no telling what kind of hardware Chase has in his leg. It’s the same thing NASCAR inspectors say about Hendrick cars.”
8. Kevin Harvick: Harvick won Stage 2 at Martinsville but faded late and came home 20th.
“We were in contention,” Harvick said, “but we blew that when I had to return to the pits to tighten a lug nut. Seeing your chances evaporate like that is tough to swallow and hard to digest, much like a famous Martinsville hot dog.”
9. Kyle Busch: Busch finished a disappointing 21st at Martinsville.
“To make things even more frustrating,” Busch said, “I had to deal with Corey LaJoie. Corey’s earned a reputation as a real douchebag in this sport. So, he’s like a less-talented, less-successful version of me.”
10. Denny Hamlin: Hamlin led 36 laps and finished 4th at Martinsville, posting his first top-five result of the season.
“I’m pleased,” Hamlin said, “but the real story here for me is Bubba Wallace bumping me during the race. Did he forget that I’m his team owner? Ironically, it was a totally ‘boss’ move by Bubba.”
Kyle Larson struck gold following a late strategic call to pit for two fresh tires and place himself in race-winning contention, where he then navigated his way to the front during a late-race restart and proceeded to win the NOCO 400 at Martinsville Speedway on Sunday, April 16.
The 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion from Elk Grove, California, led the final 30 of 400 scheduled laps in an event that was dominated by all four Stewart-Haas Racing competitors. During a caution period with less than 60 laps remaining amid JJ Yeley’s wreck, Larson pitted with a host of lead lap competitors and opted for two fresh tires to restart towards the front. During the final restart with 46 laps remaining, Larson tracked and overtook Joey Logano, who was running on worn tires, with 30 laps remaining and never looked back as he proceeded to claim his first victory at the Paperclip-shaped short track and his second of the 2023 Cup campaign.
With on-track qualifying that determined the starting lineup occurring on Saturday, Ryan Preece notched his first Cup career pole after posting a pole-winning lap at 84.780 mph in 19.979 seconds. Joining him on the front row was Daniel Suarez, who posted the second-best qualifying lap at 94.298 mph in 20.081 seconds.
Prior to the event, Joey Logano dropped to the rear of the field due to unapproved adjustments made to his car.
When the green flag waved and the race commenced amid an early start due to weather concerns, Preece and Suarez dueled for the lead amid a side-by-side battle through the first two turns until Preece managed to peek ahead and clear Suarez through Turns 3 and 4 as he proceeded to lead the first lap. With Preece out in front of Suarez, Aric Almirola trailed in third followed by Martin Truex Jr. and Chase Briscoe while the rest of the field behind jostled for early positions through two tight-packed lanes.
Through the first 10 scheduled laps, Preece was leading by a second over Suarez followed by Almirola, Truex and Tyler Reddick while Briscoe, Kevin Harvick, Bubba Wallace, Denny Hamlin and William Byron were in the top 10. Behind, Todd Gilliland was in 11th followed by Kyle Larson, Kyle Busch, Chris Buescher and AJ Allmendinger while rookie Ty Gibbs, Austin Dillon, Brad Keselowski, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Christopher Bell occupied the top 20. By then, Chase Elliott, who returned to competition after recovering from his leg injury from a snowboarding accident in Colorado in early March, was back in 22nd in his No. 9 NAPA Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 behind teammate Alex Bowman. In addition, Ryan Blaney was in 24th, Erik Jones was back in 28th behind teammate Noah Gragson and Ross Chastain was mired back in 31st while battling Harrison Burton.
Fifteen laps later, Preece maintained his advantage to more than a second over Suarez’s No. 99 Worldwide Express Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 while third-place Almirola also trailed by more than a second. Truex and Reddick continued to run in the top five while Larson cracked the top 10 in 10th behind Hamlin as Byron dropped to 11th. Meanwhile, Elliott was mired back in 23rd, Logano was in 32nd and Austin Cindric was all the way back in 34th.
Another 10 laps later, Preece continued to lead by nearly a second over Suarez, who was slowly starting to close in on Suarez while Almirola trailed by a second in third place. The remainder of the top 10 spots that included Briscoe, Harvick, Wallace, Hamlin and Larson remained unchanged as the leaders started to approach lapped traffic.
At the Lap 50 mark, Preece, who continued to navigate his way through lapped traffic, retained the lead ahead of Suarez and Almirola as Suarez continued to close in for the lead. Behind, Reddick was in fourth and trailing by nearly four seconds while Briscoe was in fifth ahead of a battle between Truex and Harvick. Wallace, Hamlin and Larson occupied the remaining spots in the top 10 while Byron trailed in 11th. By then, Cindric was lapped by the field.
By Lap 65, Preece maintained the lead by a second over both Suarez and Almirola while Reddick and Briscoe remained in the top five. Meanwhile, Logano, who was still mired in 32nd, was lapped by the field while Elliott was in 23rd behind Bell and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. In addition, teammates Byron and Bowman along with Truex battled for 10th while Blaney was up in 14th in front of Kyle Busch.
When the first stage concluded on Lap 80, Preece steered his No. 41 Haas Ford Mustang to his first Cup career stage victory after leading every lap thus far. Teammate Almirola navigated his way into second followed by Reddick, Suarez and Briscoe while Harvick, Wallace, Hamlin, Larson and Byron were scored in the top 10. By then, 31 of 36 starters were scored on the lead lap.
Under the stage break, the lead lap field led by Preece pitted. Following the pit stops, Preece, who received a stellar pit stop from his pit crew, edged Suarez and Almirola off of pit road first to retain the lead while Redick, Harvick and Hamlin exited fourth through sixth, respectively. Following the pit stops, Zane Smith, who was filling in for the suspended Cody Ware, was penalized for speeding on pit road. Kyle Busch and Buescher were also penalized for equipment interference.
The second stage started on Lap 91 as Preece and Suarez occupied the front row. At the start, Preece battled and pulled ahead of Suarez through the backstretch and entering Turns 3 and 4 to maintain the lead while the field behind battled through two tight-packed lanes for positions. Soon after, teammate Almirola made his way up to second while Harvick and Hamlin were in the top five ahead of 23XI Racing’s Wallace and Reddick.
At the Lap 100 mark, Preece was leading just ahead of teammate Almirola, Suarez, Harvick and Hamlin while Wallace, Reddick, Larson, Bowman and Truex were in the top 10. Behind, Briscoe was in 11th ahead of Brad Keselowski, Byron, Todd Gilliland and Blaney while Austin Dillon, Bell, Ty Gibbs, AJ Allmendinger and Stenhouse rounded out the top 20.
Ten laps later, Preece maintained the lead by seven-tenths of a second over teammate Almirola, who continued to close in on his Stewart-Haas Racing teammate for the lead despite reporting early concerns of a loose lug nut and wheel to his No. 10 Smithfield Ford Mustang.
Just past the Lap 125 mark, Preece stabilized his advantage to four-tenths of a second over teammate Almirola while third-place Suarez trailed by more than a second. Meanwhile, fourth-place Harvick trailed by more than two seconds while Bowman cracked the top five in fifth. Hamlin, Wallace, Reddick, Larson and Briscoe were scored in the top 10 while Truex was mired back in 11th ahead of Keselowski, Byron, Gilliland and Blaney. Meanwhile, Bell was in 18th, Chastain was back in 25th, Elliott was mired in 28th and Logano was stuck back in 29th in front of Kyle Busch.
On Lap 132, the event’s second caution of the event flew when Harrison Burton spun through Turns 1 and 2 amid contact with Erik Jones while Elliott was able to carve his way through without sustaining damage. During the pit stops, nearly the entire field led by Preece returned to pit road for service. Following the pit stops, Preece barely edged Suarez and Almirola in a three-wide photo finish off of pit road first to maintain the lead while Todd Gilliland, Harvick and Bowman followed through from fourth to sixth, respectively. Following the pit stops, however, Preece was penalized and sent to the rear of the field for speeding on pit road. Wallace and Truex were also sent to the rear of the field for speeding on pit road. Back on the track, however, Chastain, who nearly lost a lap to the leaders during the first stage, remained on the track as he inherited the lead.
During the following restart on Lap 142, teammates Chastain and Suarez led the field to the start as Chastain rocketed with the lead on the inside lane. Behind, Almirola and Suarez battled for second in front of Gilliland while Harvick and Larson engaged in a fierce battle for fifth. Not long after, Suarez and Almirola engaged in a fierce battle for second, where Suarez bumped Almirola and both battled dead even through the backstretch and the frontstretch. This allowed Gilliland, who opted for two fresh tires during the previous caution period, to join the battle while Chastain pulled away by more than a second.
By Lap 160 and amid a series of on-track battles, Chastain was leading by a second over Gilliland while Stewart-Haas Racing’s Harvick and Briscoe moved up to third and fourth in front of Hamlin. Behind, Reddick was in sixth ahead of Suarez, Almirola, Keselowski and Larson while Bowman, Ty Gibbs, Bell, Stenhouse and Allmendinger were in the top 15. Byron, Blaney, Justin Haley, Gragson and Corey LaJoie occupied the top 20 while Preece was mired back in 26th, two spots behind Elliott.
Seven laps later, Harvick carved his No. 4 Realtree/Hunt Brothers Pizza Ford Mustang into the lead after overtaking Chastain. Teammate Briscoe would follow suit another lap later in second followed by a hard-charging Hamlin in his No. 11 Sport Clips Toyota TRD Camry. With Gilliland dropping to seventh behind Keselowski, Reddick would then navigate his No. 45 Monster Energy Toyota TRD Camry into fourth over Chastain just past the Lap 170 mark while Suarez and Almirola, both of whom ran upfront in the early stages, were back in eighth and ninth.
When the second stage concluded on Lap 180, Harvick, who was making his penultimate Cup start at Martinsville, captured his first stage victory of the 2023 Cup season and his first since 2020. Teammate Briscoe followed suit in second followed by Hamlin, Reddick and Keselowski while Chastain, Gilliland, Suarez, Almirola and Larson were scored in the top 10. By then, 31 of 36 starters were scored on the lead lap while names that included Byron, Blaney, Preece, Kyle Busch, Elliott, Logano, Wallace and Truex were mired back in 16th, 17th, 23rd, 24th, 25th, 26th, 28th and 31st. In addition, the sun overshadowed the track.
Under the stage break, the lead lap field led by Harvick pitted. Following the pit stops, Briscoe exited with the lead followed by teammate Harvick, Keselowski, Hamlin, Almirola and Larson.
With 208 laps remaining, the final stage started as Briscoe and Keselowski occupied the front row followed by Harvick and Almirola. At the start, Briscoe maintained the lead as he jumped away from the field followed by teammate Harvick while Keselowski and Hamlin battled for third in front of Almirola, Larson and Suarez. By then, the field engaged in two tight-packed racing through the corners and straightaways while the cloud cover returned above the Paperclip-shaped track.
At the race’s halfway mark with 200 laps remaining, Briscoe was leading by three-tenths of a second over teammate Harvick followed by Hamlin, Keselowski and Almirola while Larson, Reddick, Gilliland, Suarez and Chastain were scored in the top 10. Meanwhile, Bell was in 11th in front of Bowman, Blaney, LaJoie and Gibbs while Allmendinger, Stenhouse, Byron, Haley and Elliott were in the top 20. By then, Preece was in 21st ahead of Kyle Busch, Wallace, Logano and Erik Jones while McDowell, Buescher, Austin Dillon, Truex and Gragson rounded out the top 30.
With 175 laps remaining, Briscoe continued to lead by two-tenths of a second over teammate Harvick while also approaching lapped traffic while third-place Hamlin trailed by four-tenths of a second. As Almirola and Keselowski trailed in the top five, Larson was in sixth ahead of Reddick, Gilliland, Suarez and Chastain.
With less than 150 laps remaining, Briscoe maintained the lead by two-tenths of a second over Hamlin while Harvick fell back to third in front of teammate Almirola and Keselowski. Then with 143 laps remaining, Hamlin made his move beneath Briscoe’s No. 14 HighPoint.com Ford Mustang and captured the lead while Harvick kept the two leaders within his sights. Harvick would then move into second place after overtaking teammate Briscoe with 137 laps remaining while teammate Almirola followed suit during the following lap, thus placing three of four Stewart-Haas Racing competitors in the top four.
With 120 laps remaining, Hamlin was leading by two seconds over Harvick followed by Harvick’s teammates Almirola and Briscoe while Keselowski occupied fifth in front of Larson, Reddick, Gilliland, Suarez and Bell. By then, Preece, the fourth Stewart-Haas Racing competitor, was mired in 21st, the final competitor on the lead lap, behind Elliott while names that included Wallace, Logano, Austin Dillon, Michael McDowell, Truex, Erik Jones, Kyle Busch, Gragson, LaJoie, Harrison Burton and Cindric were lapped by the field.
Seven laps later, Blaney pitted his No. 12 Advance Auto Parts Ford Mustang under green as Hamlin lapped Preece while trying to lap Elliott. By then, Wallace was trying to keep pace with his owner Hamlin to cycle back on the lead lap as Bowman, Reddick, Kyle Busch and Bell pitted. This commenced a cycle of green flag pit stops as Harvick pitted along with Haley, Almirola, Briscoe and others. Not long after, the leader Hamlin pitted under green followed by Larson, Byron, Gilliland and Elliott. Amid the pit stops, AJ Allmendinger was penalized for speeding on pit road. Erik Jones would also be penalized for improper fueling.
Back on the track and with 107 laps remaining, Keselowski was leading followed by Suarez, Wallace, Logano, Austin Dillon and McDowell and Truex, all of whom had yet to make a pit stop. Meanwhile, Harvick, the first competitor who pitted, was up in eighth as he cycled ahead of Hamlin, Almirola and Briscoe. Suarez would then assume the lead with 100 laps remaining followed by Wallace as Keselowski pitted.
With 98 laps remaining, however, the caution flew after the right-rear wheel from Anthony Alfredo’s No. 78 BJ McLeod Motorsports entry came off on the frontstretch as the wheel came to rest against the outside wall while Alfredo limped his car back to pit road. During the caution period, a host of lead lap competitors led by Suarez pitted while the rest led by Briscoe, Reddick and Larson remained on the track.
Down to the final 88 laps of the event, the race restarted under green as Briscoe and Larson occupied the front row. At the start, Briscoe fended off Larson to retain the lead as the field stacked up and battled amid two lanes. With Larson maintaining second ahead of Harvick, Reddick and Suarez were in the top five while Logano and Wallace battled for sixth in front of Almirola, Hamlin and Truex.
With 75 laps remaining, Briscoe was leading by a second over Larson and Reddick in third place, while Harvick and Suarez were in fourth and fifth. By then, 24 of 36 starters were scored on the lead lap as the field continued to bump and jostle for late positions.
Then with 58 laps remaining, the caution returned when JJ Yeley went dead straight into the Turn 3 outside wall while locking up the brakes. By then, Briscoe was leading ahead of Larson, Reddick, Harvick and Suarez. During the caution period, a majority of the field led by Briscoe pitted while the rest that included Logano, Almirola and Hamlin remained on the track. Following the pit stops, late disaster struck for Harvick, who returned to pit road with a flat right-front tire as a result of a wheel nut coming loose.
With 46 laps remaining, the race restarted under green as Logano and Almirola occupied the front row. At the start, Logano, who rallied from being mired a lap down during the first stage, gained the advantage on the inside lane as he took off from Almirola and assumed the lead while Hamlin battled and overtook Almirola for second place during the following lap. Larson and Briscoe would then challenge Almirola for third while Logano checked out with the lead by half a second.
With 35 laps remaining, Logano was leading by two-tenths of a second over a hard-charging Larson and over a second over third-place Hamlin while Briscoe and Almirola were in the top five. Behind, Stenhouse was up in sixth ahead of Blaney, Truex, Wallace and Suarez while Austin Dillon, Bowman, Chastain, Reddick and Buescher. Meanwhile, Preece was in 17th, Byron was back in 20th after reporting a potential vibration to his car and Harvick was mired back in 24th behind Kyle Busch.
Then with 30 laps remaining, Larson, who tracked Logano on two fresh tires since the start of the latest restart, overtook and fended off Logano to assume the lead in his No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 while third-place Hamlin kept the two leaders within his sights. By then, teammates Briscoe and Almirola remained in the top five while Truex challenged Stenhouse for sixth.
Down to the final 20 laps of the event, Larson was leading by more than two seconds over Logano and more than three seconds over Hamlin. Larson then extended his advantage to more than three seconds with 10 laps remaining and with five laps remaining. By then, Logano retained second over a hard-charging Truex while Hamlin, Briscoe and Almirola fell back to fourth, fifth and sixth, respectively. Meanwhile, Elliott cracked the top 10 in 10th place after overtaking Austin Dillon as he had Wallace within his sights.
When the white flag waved and the final lap started, Larson remained as the leader by nearly four seconds over Logano. With a clear view in front of him and no challengers lurking behind, Larson was able to cycle his way around the Paperclip-shaped short track for a final time as he returned to the frontstretch and claimed his first checkered flag at the track.
With his first victory at Martinsville, Larson notched his 21st NASCAR Cup Series career victory and his second of the season after winning two weeks ago at Richmond Raceway. As a result, he joined teammate William Byron as the only other multi-race Cup winner of this season and delivered the all-time leading 28th Martinsville victory for Hendrick Motorsports. Larson’s victory occurred as crew chief Cliff Daniels returned atop the No. 5 pit box following a four-week suspension amid the hood louver penalties that affected all of Hendrick Motorsports’ entries from Phoenix Raceway in March.
“Huge congratulations to this whole No. 5 team and Hendrick Motorsports,” Larson, who had two top-three finishes at Martinsville prior to his victory, said on FS1. “I feel like [crew chief] Cliff [Daniels] and everybody did a great job all day on pit road. Making the right calls, having great pit stops and then, it all kind of worked out for me there at the end. We had a great car. That was the best my car had been in being able to get out front and manage. I never ever would have thought that I would won here at Martinsville. This place has been so tough on me. [The track] Just does not suit my driving style at all. I like to charge the center. I like to roll momentum. That’s just not what this place is like, but thanks to Cliff Daniels and everybody for making me feel like I know what I’m doing sometimes around here. Just can’t believe it.”
Logano fended off Truex to finish second while Hamlin and Briscoe finished in the top five.
“It’s a solid recovery for what the start of the race looked like,” Logano said. “We went down a lap twice, two times. At one point in the race, I would have been just happy to finish on the lead lap. [Crew chief] Paul [Wolfe] did a good job of getting some good changes to the Verizon Mustang to where I got competitive. We just needed track position. [I] Was able to stay out, get a lucky caution there during a green flag cycle. Stayed out again when everyone pitted. It put ourselves on the front row and a shot to win the race. I tried holding off Larson as long as I could, but overall, there’s days when you’re mad about second. Today’s not one of those days when you’re pretty stoked that you finished a little better than I thought we were going to.”
“We had kind of a crazy day with our Bass Pro Shops Toyota Camry TRD,” Truex said. “Really just got a little bit lucky there, getting back to the lead lap midrace and just kept working on our car. We were just loose all day long and then finally at the end, we got it a whole lot better. It was fun at the end, passing a lot of cars and getting up there. Still needed to be a little bit better, but overall, proud of everybody sticking with it and just grinding one out today.”
Almirola navigated his way to a sixth-place result followed by Blaney, Stenhouse and Wallace while Chase Elliott earned a 10th-place result in his return to competition following a six-race absence.
“[Today] was pretty good,” Elliott said. “It was about what I expected, so it was a good thing. It was warm and I’ve been sitting on the couch for six weeks, so I think that probably hurt me more than anything. Our NAPA Chevy, we struggled really bad, honestly, for every run but the last. We finally got it going there at the end and I was able to make some passes and do things that I didn’t really think I was capable of doing early. I was pleasantly surprised by that and got us a top 10 out of our first day back, so that was definitely nothing to be too bummed out about.”
Notably, Preece ended up 15th after leading a race-high 136 laps, Suarez finished 17th, Harvick settled in 20th and Byron fell back to 23rd behind Reddick.
There were 10 lead changes for nine different leaders. The race featured five cautions for 50 laps. In addition, 24 of 36 starters finished on the lead lap.
Following the ninth event of the 2023 Cup Series season, Christopher Bell leads the regular-season standings by five points over Ross Chastain, 15 over Kevin Harvick, 17 over Kyle Larson, 36 over Martin Truex Jr. and 37 over Tyler Reddick.
Results.
1. Kyle Larson, 30 laps led
2. Joey Logano, 25 laps led
3. Martin Truex Jr.
4. Denny Hamlin, 36 laps led
5. Chase Briscoe, 109 laps led
6. Aric Almirola
7. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
8. Ryan Blaney
9. Bubba Wallace
10. Chase Elliott
11. Alex Bowman
12. Austin Dillon
13. Ross Chastain, 31 laps led
14. Chris Buescher
15. Ryan Preece, 135 laps led, Stage 1 winner
16. Christopher Bell
17. Daniel Suarez, seven laps led
18. Ty Gibbs
19. Michael McDowell
20. Kevin Harvick, 20 laps led, Stage 2 winner
21. Kyle Busch
22. Tyler Reddick
23. William Byron
24. Brad Keselowski, seven laps led
25. Todd Gilliland, one lap down
26. Corey LaJoie, one lap down
27. AJ Allmendinger, one lap down
28. Justin Haley, two laps down
29. Harrison Burton, two laps down
30. Noah Gragson, two laps down
31. Erik Jones, two laps down
32. Ty Dillon, three laps down
33. Austin Cindric, three laps down
34. Zane Smith, five laps down
35. Anthony Alfredo, 10 laps down
36. JJ Yeley – OUT
Next on the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the series’ first of two visits to Talladega Superspeedway in Talladega, Alabama, for the GEICO 500. The event is scheduled to occur next Sunday, April 23, at 3 p.m. ET on FOX.
1. Christopher Bell: Bell led 100 laps and held off Tyler Reddick to win the Food City Dirt Race at Bristol.
“I’m thrilled to get this win,” Bell said. “Not only is it big for the Playoffs, but I also got that big trophy plus a sweet gladiator sword. There are two things I can’t wait to do with that sword: 1, Show it off to my friends, and 2, ship it to Mexico and ask Kyle Busch to bring it back the next time he’s there.”
2. Tyler Reddick: Reddick was on the charge late, attempting to catch Christopher Bell, but ran out of time and had to settle for his second consecutive runner-up finish in the Bristol Dirt Race.
“If you saw my post-race interview with Fox’s Jamie Little,” Reddick said, “then you’re well aware that I’m used to coming up a little short.”
3. William Byron: Byron finished 13th at Bristol.
“My team was penalized again after failing inspection at Richmond,” Byron said. “But let’s be honest, we’re just trying to make our car faster; NASCAR keeps catching us. They’re preventing us from making a ‘fast getaway (with it).’”
4. Martin Truex Jr.: Truex finished seventh at Bristol, as Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Christopher Bell captured the win.
“Bell’s one of the best drivers on tracks like this,” Truex said. “His name has become synonymous with ‘dirt.’ The name ‘Denny Hamlin’ brings up similar associations, because his name is ‘Mud’ when it comes to retaliatory maneuvers on the track.”
5. Ross Chastain: Chastain finished a disappointing 28th at Bristol, one lap down.
“Dirt track racing is not my cup of tea,” Chastain said. “If I did have a cup of tea, I’m sure someone would have a problem with it. And with it being Easter, I’m sure I’d get crucified for it.”
6. Kevin Harvick: Harvick finished ninth at Bristol.
“Michael Waltrip was joined on his Bristol ‘Grid Walk’ by the Easter Bunny,” Harvick said. “From what I understand, the Easter Bunny doesn’t speak, yet he’s still a better interviewer than Waltrip.”
7. Kyle Larson: Larson started on the pole at Bristol and won Stage 1, but was knocked out of the race by Ryan Preece on Lap 177. He finished 35th.
“I think Preece was retaliating for earlier contact between us,” Larson said. “Does he know who I am? Heck. Does he know who he is? Obviously not, because he’s out there trying to make a name for himself.”
8. Joey Logano: Logano had an eventful day, full of spins and contact with other cars, and was finally knocked out of the race on Lap 96. He finished 37th.
“My car was all over the place,” Logano said. “That place was ‘last.’”
9. Kyle Busch: A broken shock with 13 laps to go ended Busch’s night in the Food City Dirt Race. He finished 32nd.
“It wasn’t the finish I was looking for,” Busch said. “On the bright side, though, I got to shake hands with Tim Tebow. That’s probably as close as I’m gonna get to feeling the hand of God. That is, a God-awful NFL quarterback.”
10. Ryan Blaney: Blaney ran near the front for the majority of the night at Bristol, but a spin on a restart with eight laps to go cost him a top-five finish. He finished 23rd.
“The track conditions changed quite a bit over the duration of the race,” Blaney said. “If you took a look at the stands, you noticed that the track was the only thing ‘packed.’”
Nearly a month after having a pair of victories within the West Coast region slip out of his grasp, Kyle Larson gained a needed late break to exit pit road ahead of the field and fend off the competition through two late-race restarts to win the Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond Raceway on Sunday, April 2, for his first elusive NASCAR Cup Series victory of the 2023 season.
The 2021 Cup Series champion from Elk Grove, California, led four times for 93 of 400 scheduled laps in an event that was dominated by drivers between Hendrick Motorsports and Joe Gibbs Racing. After enduring an up-and-down day, where he led in certain portions of the event before trailing the front-runners and slightly damaging his car amid contact with Daniel Suarez on pit road during the second stage, Larson capitalized on a pit stop under caution due to Tyler Reddick’s spin to beat the field off of pit road and cycle back to the lead. From there, he fended off substitute teammate Josh Berry and the competition through two restarts under the final 21 laps to grab his first victory of the season.
With on-track qualifying that was scheduled to occur on Saturday canceled due to inclement weather, the starting lineup for the main event was determined through a qualifying metric system from NASCAR’s rulebook qualifying procedure. Based on the metric system, Alex Bowman, the series points leader, was awarded the pole position and was joined on the front row by Kyle Busch.
When the green flag waved and the race commenced, Bowman and Busch engaged in a side-by-side battle for the lead for a full lap before Busch was able to lead the first lap by a hair on the outside lane as the entire field battled in close-quarters racing through two lanes. Bowman, however, was able to clear Busch and the field during the following lap as he assumed the clean air with the lead. Behind, teammate William Byron battled and overtook Busch for second as Ross Chastain and Tyler Reddick proceeded to battle Busch for third.
By Lap 10 and with a series of on-track battles continuing around the short circuit, Byron, who had been closing in on teammate Bowman for the lead, made a strong move to Bowman’s outside entering the frontstretch to assume the lead in his No. 24 Raptor Chevrolet Camaro ZL1. He continued to lead the field through the Lap 20 mark while Bowman fell back to fourth as Chastain and Reddick overtook him. Soon after, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. muscled his way into the top five after overtaking Kyle Busch while Kevin Harvick and Denny Hamlin cracked the top 10 behind Kyle Larson and Austin Cindric.
When the competition caution flew on Lap 30, Byron retained the lead by more than two seconds over Chastain and more than three seconds over third-place Reddick while Bowman, Stenhouse, Larson, Kyle Busch, Harvick, Cindric and Hamlin were in the top 10. By then, all 37 starters were scored on the lead lap, with names like Martin Truex Jr., Christopher Bell, Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney, Daniel Suarez, Brad Keselowski, rookie Ty Gibbs, Chase Briscoe, Bubba Wallace, Aric Almirola, Austin Dillon, Josh Berry, AJ Allmendinger and Erik Jones were in 11th, 13th, 14th, 15th, 17th, 19th, 20th, 21st, 22nd, 23rd, 25th, 26th, 27th and 29th. In addition, Chandler Smith, winner of Saturday’s Xfinity event at Richmond and who was making his Cup Series debut for Kaulig Racing, was back in 34th.
During the competition caution, the entire field led by Byron pitted, and amid a jammed-packed exit off of pit lane, Chastain exited with the lead followed by Byron, Bowman, Reddick, Busch and Larson. During the pit stops, Hamlin was sent to the rear of the field for speeding on pit road along with Todd Gilliland, who was penalized for equipment interference. In addition, Stenhouse, who was running in the top five prior to the competition caution, endured a long pit stop due to a mechanical issue as he took his No. 47 Kroger Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 to the garage.
During the following restart on Lap 38, the field fanned out to four lanes as Chastain rocketed his No. 1 Jockey Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 with the lead followed by Byron and Reddick while teammates Larson and Bowman battle for fourth. With Larson eventually overtaking Bowman for position, Logano followed suit to move his No. 22 Shell/Pennzoil Ford Mustang into the top five while Bowman was being pressured by Kevin Harvick for more. As Ryan Blaney moved up the leaderboard to eighth in front of Daniel Suarez and Keselowski, Kyle Busch slipped out of the top 10.
Then on Lap 44, the caution flew when Hamlin, who was running just outside of the top 30 and was trying to rally from the rear of the field from his pit road speeding penalty, bumped and sent JJ Yeley sideways as Yeley backed his car into the Turn 1 outside wall with significant rear end damage. During the caution period, some like Suarez, Martin Truex Jr., Ryan Preece, Aric Almirola, Erik Jones, Corey LaJoie, Allmendinger, Justin Haley, Ty Dillon and Chandler Smith pitted while the rest led by Chastain remained on the track.
When the event restarted under green on Lap 50, Chastain struggled to launch on the gas, which allowed Byron and Larson to trap Chastain with a three-wide move as both Hendrick Motorsports competitors muscled away with the top-two spots. With Chastain falling back to third, teammates Byron and Larson engaged in a side-by-side duel for the lead for the following two laps until Byron managed to clear Larson and retain the lead. Behind, Harvick started to close in on his bid for the lead in fourth behind Chastain while a series of battles ensued within the middle of the pack.
Just past the Lap 60 mark, Byron was leading by eight-tenths of a second over teammate Larson followed by Chastain and Harvick while Reddick was in fifth. By then, Logano was in sixth in front of Bowman, Keselowski, Bell and Briscoe while Kyle Busch was back in 12th. Meanwhile, Truex, who was the first competitor with four fresh tires after pitting during the previous caution period, carved his No. 19 Auto-Owners Insurance Toyota TRD Camry up to 16th.
When the first stage concluded on Lap 70, Byron captured his fifth stage victory of the 2023 Cup season. Teammate Larson settled in second followed by Chastain, Harvick and Logano while Reddick, Bowman, Bell, Keselowski and Briscoe were scored in the top 10.
Under the stage break, the entire field led by Byron returned to pit road for service. Following the pit stops, Byron retained the lead after exiting pit road first followed by teammate Larson, then Chastain, Harvick, Logano and Bowman. During the pit stops, Blaney and Allmendinger were penalized for speeding on pit road.
The second stage started on Lap 79 as teammates Byron and Larson occupied the front row. At the start, Byron rocketed with the lead ahead of Larson, Chastain, Harvick and Logano while Bowman, who struggled with launch pace in his No. 48 Ally Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 on restarts, was being challenged by Chase Briscoe for sixth. As the field behind fanned out to three lanes, Byron maintained his advantage to six-tenths of a second over Larson. By Lap 82, however, Chastain navigated his way around Larson for second. Meanwhile, Kyle Busch was mired back in 10th behind Bell and Keselowski while Hamlin was battling Ryan Preece for 14th.
On Lap 94, the caution returned when Blaney, who was running within the top 30 and trying to rally from his pit road speeding penalty during the first stage’s conclusion, bumped and sent Josh Berry’s No. 9 NAPA Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 spinning in Turn 4, with Berry managing to keep his car off the wall with no damage. During the caution period, the entire field led by Byron returned to pit road for service and Byron retained the lead after exiting pit road first followed by Larson, Chastain, Bowman, Logano and Bell. During the pit stops, Harvick, who pitted from fifth place, endured a slow pit stop and fell back to 16th. In addition, Team Penske’s Logano and Cindric pitted for a second time, with Logano addressing a loose right rear wheel while Cindric addressed power issues to his No. 2 Discount Tire Ford Mustang.
With the event restarting under green on Lap 101, the field fanned out to three lanes through the first two turns as Byron retained the lead over Larson and Chastain. Behind, Bowman slotted himself into fourth while Bell, the highest-running Joe Gibbs Racing competitor on the track, was in fifth. By then, Truex was up in eighth behind Suarez and Keselowski while Briscoe and Kyle Busch battled for ninth.
Through the first 125 laps of the event, Larson, who assumed the lead over Byron in his No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 a lap earlier, was leading by half a second over teammate Byron followed by Chastain, Bell and Bowman while Keselowski, Truex, Suarez, Hamlin and Briscoe were in the top 10. By then, Ty Gibbs was in 11th ahead of Kyle Busch Harvick, Preece and Bubba Wallace while Blaney, Reddick, Almirola, Michael McDowell and Todd Gilliland occupied the top 20. Behind, Austin Dillon was in 21st followed by Harrison Burton, Logano, Berry and Corey LaJoie while Chris Buescher, rookie Noah Gragson, Haley, Ty Dillon and Cindric were in the top 30 as 35 of 37 starters were scored on the lead lap.
Twenty-five laps later, Larson extended his advantage to more than two seconds over teammate Byron while Chastain and Bell battled for third in front of Bowman. By then, Buescher and Berry made pit stops under green while Ty Gibbs carved his No. 54 Monster Energy Toyota TRD Camry into ninth place behind teammates Truex and Hamlin along with Keselowski. Meanwhile, Harvick had fallen back to 11th behind Suarez.
Nearing the Lap 155 mark, green flag pit stops started to slowly commence as Reddick pitted his No. 45 SiriusXM Toyota TRD Camry. Truex, Kyle Busch, Gilliland and Logano would also pit nearing the Lap 160 mark followed by Byron. The leader Larson would then pit along with Bell, Burton, Chastain, Suarez, Harvick, Briscoe, Erik Jones and others. During the pit stops, Larson and Suarez made contact on pit road as Larson was trying to exit his pit stall while Suarez was trying to enter his. Amid the pit stops, Hamlin assumed the lead followed by teammate Gibbs, Blaney and Austin Dillon, all of whom had yet to make a pit stop. Once Hamlin pitted on Lap 166 along with Gibbs, Blaney and Dillon, Larson cycled his way back into the lead followed by Byron, Bell, Bowman, Chastain and Truex. Following the pit stops, Blaney was penalized for removing a wrench out of his pit box, an issue that would cost him a lap behind the leaders.
By Lap 175, Larson was leading by half a second over teammate Byron while Bell, Bowman and Chastain were running in the top five. Truex was in sixth ahead of Keselowski while Berry navigated his way to eighth followed by Hamlin and Reddick as Harvick trailed behind in 11th.
At the halfway mark on Lap 200, Byron, who assumed the lead from teammate Larson three laps earlier, was leading by eight-tenths of a second over Bell while Larson, who fell back to third, was battling tight conditions to his No. 5 entry as a result of the right-front fender damage from hitting Suarez’s No. 99 Quaker State Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 on pit road. Truex and Bowman were in the top five followed by Chastain, Hamlin, Keselowski, Harvick and Ty Gibbs while 21 of 37 starters were scored on the lead lap.
Seven laps later, Bell overtook Byron, who was stuck behind lapped traffic, particularly Harrison Burton, to move his No. 20 Rheem Toyota TRD Camry into the lead as he became the seventh different leader of the event. By then, teammate Truex overtook Larson for fourth while Hamlin was in fifth after claiming the spot over Bowman.
When the second stage concluded on Lap 230, Hamlin, who cycled his way around teammate Bell for the lead two laps earlier and rallied from his early pit road speeding penalty, claimed his first stage victory of the 2023 Cup season. Bell settled in second by Byron, Truex and Chastain while Keselowski, Bowman, Larson, Harvick and Ty Gibbs were scored in the top 10. By then, 19 of 38 starters were scored on the lead lap.
Under the stage break, the lead lap field led by Hamlin pitted and Hamlin retained the lead after exiting pit road first followed by Byron, Truex, Bell, Bowman and Keselowski.
With 160 laps remaining, the final stage started as Hamlin and Byron occupied the front row. At the start, Hamlin rocketed out his No. 11 SHINGRIX Toyota TRD Camry in front to retain the lead followed by Byron and Truex as the field behind jostled and fanned out for positions, among which included Logano as he tried to carve his way into the top 15. As the laps proceeded, Keselowski, who was in eighth in front of Chastain and Larson, radioed gearing issues to his No. 6 Solomon Plumbing Ford Mustang as his car kept coming out of fourth gear, though he continued under race pace.
With 125 laps remaining, Hamlin was leading by half a second over teammate Truex while third-place Byron trailed by more than three seconds. Harvick and Bell were running in the top five followed by Larson, Bowman, Keselowski, Chastain and Preece while Wallace, Logano, Briscoe, Gibbs and Almirola were in the top 15.
Then with nearly 110 laps remaining, another cycle of green flag pit stops commenced as Truex, who was closing in on teammate Hamlin for the lead, pitted along with Suarez, Josh Berry and Kyle Busch. By then, Allmendinger, who was not on the lead lap, had made a pit stop. Soon after, a multitude of names that included Larson, Bowman, Chastain, Gibbs, Briscoe, McDowell, Burton, Austin Dillon, Reddick, Byron, Cindric, Keselowski and Preece pitted as Hamlin continued to lead. With 107 laps remaining, however, Hamlin surrendered the lead to pit along with Bell and Harvick. During his pit stop, Hamlin endured a slow service for his pit crew to change the right-front tire. Once the last set of names that included Bubba Wallace, Logano and Blaney pitted, with Wallace being penalized for a safety violation after a crew member fell over the wall, Truex cycled his way into the lead with 105 laps remaining.
With less than 100 laps remaining, Truex was leading by more than two seconds over Larson followed by Byron, Bowman and Bell while Chastain, Harvick, Almirola, Keselowski and Preece were in the top 10. By then, Hamlin was mired back in 12th following his slow pit service.
Down to the final 95 laps of the event, however, the caution flew when rookie Noah Gragson got loose entering Turn 2 at full speed and slapped the outside wall with smoke billowing out of his No. 42 Sunseeker Resort Chevrolet Camaro ZL1. During the caution period, the leaders led by Truex returned to pit road for service. Following the pit stops, Truex retained the lead followed by Byron, Larson, Bowman, Harvick and Chastain.
With 88 laps remaining, the event restarted under green as Truex and Byron occupied the front row. At the start, Truex launched ahead with the lead followed by Byron, Larson and Bowman as the field behind jostled for late positions, among which included Hamlin as he tried to make his way through the top 10.
Down to the final 75 laps of the event, Truex was leading by four-tenths of a second over Byron followed by Larson, Bowman and Chastain while Harvick was in sixth ahead of Bell and Keselowski. By then, Hamlin carved his way only up to ninth while Logano was in 10th ahead of Almirola, Gibbs, Briscoe, Preece and Berry.
Fifteen laps later, Truex continued to lead by eight-tenths of a second over Byron while Larson, Bowman and Bell remained in the top five. By then, Hamlin was back in 10th behind Logano, Kyle Busch was back in 17th behind Briscoe, Reddick was mired back in 20th and Wallace was in 22nd, a lap down.
Another 10 laps later, Truex extended his advantage to more than a second over Byron as Larson, Bowman and Chastain remained in the top five followed by Harvick, Keselowski and Hamlin, who could not gain the lost ground on the leaders. By then, Briscoe pitted along with Austin Dillon, Kyle Busch, Preece, Harrison Burton and Ty Gibbs.
Shortly after, Byron pitted as he was soon followed by Larson, Bowman, Chastain, Almirola, Harvick, Suarez and the leader Suarez. While most of the leaders had already made a pit stop, Bell was leading a group of seven competitors who had yet to pit. Bell would pit with 45 laps remaining along with teammate Hamlin as Keselowski cycled to the lead for a lap before he pitted and handed the lead to Berry. By then, Berry, McDowell and Gilliland had yet to pit while Byron, the first competitor who recently pitted, was in fourth ahead of Truex and Larson.
Then with 33 laps remaining, Byron tracked and overtook teammate Berry for the lead. Truex would follow suit in second as Larson would eventually make his way into third. By then, Berry and McDowell remained on the track and in the top five.
With 29 laps remaining, however, the caution flew when Reddick spun in Turn 2. By then, Byron, who was locked in a side-by-side battle for the lead with Truex, was deemed the leader over Truex. During the caution period, the leaders led by Byron returned to pit road and Larson emerged with the lead after exiting first amid a tight-packed field followed by teammate Berry, Truex, Byron, Harvick and Bell. During the pit stops, Hamlin was busted for speeding on pit road for a second time.
During the following restart with 21 laps remaining, Larson peeked ahead of teammate Berry as the field started to fan out to multiple lanes entering the first turn. Through the first turn, however, Bell made contact with Byron and sent Byron spinning sideways into the outside wall as he plummeted below the leaderboard.
The next restart with 14 laps remaining saw teammates Larson and Berry duke for the lead until Larson managed to clear Berry for the lead through the first two turns. As the field fanned out behind, Chastain and Truex battled for third behind Berry while Larson pulled away by half a second.
Down to the final 10 laps of the event, Larson was leading by eight-tenths of a second over teammate, Berry, while Chastain and Bell were in the top five. Truex fell back to sixth in front of McDowell, Bowman, Logano and Gibbs. Larson would retain the lead by nearly a second with five laps remaining while Truex slipped back to eighth.
When the white flag waved and the final lap started, Larson remained as the leader by more than a second over teammate Berry. With the clean air to his advantage and no late challenges lurking behind, Larson was able to cycle his No. 5 entry around the short track circuit for a final time and back to the frontstretch to claim his first checkered flag of the 2023 Cup Series season.
With the victory, Larson notched his 20th career victory in NASCAR’s premier series and his second at Richmond as he became the sixth different winner through the first seven events on the schedule. The 2023 season also marked Larson’s sixth season with at least one Cup victory and his 14th driving the No. 5 car for Hendrick Motorsports.
The victory was also the first for veteran Kevin Meendering, who served his third race as an interim Cup crew chief for Cliff Daniels as Daniels is currently serving his third of a four-race suspension stemming from NASCAR confiscating the louvers from all four Hendrick Motorsports’ entries and the team being penalized for modifying pieces of the car pertaining to the air direction over the hoods. All four HMS entries were reinstated their points earlier in the week while the crew chief suspensions and $400,000 fine from each entry remained in place.
“It’s really cool,” Larson said on FS1. “We’ve been close to winning a couple [races]. William’s [Byron] been extremely good this year. It was probably gonna be between him, [Truex] and us. [Bell] was really good, so just things worked out. My pit crew had a great stop, so shoutout to Brandon Johnson. He’s out jackman, he just turned 30 today. Our spotter, Tyler Monn, he turned 30 today, so great day for them guys. What an awesome HendrickCars.com Chevy. I got into [Suarez] there on pit road sometime in the second stage. We were awful after that and I was hoping the damage was the reason why. [The pit crew] had to calm me down a little bit and get refocused, and I was able to get it done. Thanks to everyone on this team. [Crew chief] Cliff Daniels for everything he does to prepare the team to be as strong as we are without him on the box. Good to get a win and hopefully, many more.”
Teammate Josh Berry, making his fourth Cup start as an interim competitor for the injured Chase Elliott, made his late pit strategy pay off to perfection as he notched a career-best second place while Chastain, Bell and Harvick finished in the top five.
“Man, this is really cool,” Berry said. “I gotta give all the credit to this NAPA team, [interim crew chief] Tom [Gray], [regular crew chief] Alan [Gustafson],…everybody at Hendrick Motorsports. Man, they made some great calls. When we got some clean track, we weren’t running bad lap times. I’m so glad they tried something different there at the end to just get us up front because I felt like we were decent the whole time. Just getting in clear air there. Really a little too free to run with Kyle [Larson], but man, what a huge day. To come here and start at the back, no practice, qualifying, get spun out, worked through the field like that to a second place, it’s pretty cool.”
McDowell, who also benefitted through a late pit strategy as Berry, came home in sixth place while Logano, Bowman, rookie Ty Gibbs and Keselowski completed the top 10 on the track.
Notably, Truex fell back to 11th in front of Briscoe, Almirola, Kyle Busch and Todd Gilliland while Hamlin settled in 20th following his share of pit road speeding penalties. In addition, Chandler Smith finished 17th in his Cup Series debut behind Reddick, Wallace ended up 22nd in front of Suarez, Byron fell back to 24th after leading a race-high 117 laps and Blaney ended up in 26th, a lap down.
There were 22 lead changes for 11 different leaders. The race featured eight cautions for 54 laps.
Following the seventh event of the 2023 Cup Series season, Alex Bowman leads the regular-season standings by four points over Ross Chastain, 34 over Christopher Bell, 35 over William Byron, 36 over Kevin Harvick and 41 over both Joey Logano and Kyle Larson.
Results.
1. Kyle Larson, 93 laps led
2. Josh Berry, 10 laps led
3. Ross Chastain, 16 laps led
4. Christopher Bell, 26 laps led
5. Kevin Harvick
6. Michael McDowell
7. Joey Logano
8. Alex Bowman, eight laps led
9. Ty Gibbs
10. Brad Keselowski, one lap led
11. Martin Truex Jr., 56 laps led
12. Chase Briscoe
13. Aric Almirola
14. Kyle Busch, one lap led
15. Todd Gilliland
16. Tyler Reddick
17. Chandler Smith
18. Ryan Preece
19. Harrison Burton
20. Denny Hamlin, 71 laps led, Stage 2 winner
21. Corey LaJoie
22. Bubba Wallace, one lap led
23. Daniel Suarez
24. William Byron, 117 laps led, Stage 1 winner
25. Austin Dillon, one lap down
26. Ryan Blaney, one lap down
27. AJ Allmendinger, one lap down
28. Austin Cindric, one lap down
29. Justin Haley, one lap down
30. Chris Buescher, two laps down
31. Erik Jones, two laps down
32. Ty Dillon, two laps down
33. Anthony Alfredo, four laps down
34. Cody Ware, five laps down
35. Ricky Stenhouse Jr., 16 laps down
36. JJ Yeley, 17 laps down
37. Noah Gragson – OUT, Accident
Next on the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the third annual running of the Food City Dirt Race at the Bristol Motor Speedway Dirt Course in Bristol, Tennessee. The event is scheduled for next Sunday, April 9, on Easter at 7 p.m. ET on FS1.
1. Joey Logano: Logano started on the pole and was the class of the field at Atlanta, winning Stage 1 and leading 140 on his way to the win in the Ambetter Health 400.
“I knew I would win this race,” Logano said, “because I ‘am better’ than everyone else.”
2. Christopher Bell: Bell came home third at Atlanta as the top Toyota finisher. Bell helped Joey Logano to the win with a strong push that helped move Logano past Brad Keselowski.
“Notice that no Hendrick Motorsports cars were racing for the win,” Bell said. “Atlanta Motor Speedway may have 28-degree banking in the turns, but at least on Sunday, it was a totally ‘level playing field.’”
3. Kyle Busch: Busch survived a spin in the Kevin Harvick-Ross Chastain incident, and damage was minimal. Busch recovered to post a solid 10th at Atlanta.
“NASCAR really came down hard on Hendrick Motorsports,” Busch said. “NASCAR must have found some really incriminating violations in those inspections. I may have been caught with a gun in Mexico, but at least it wasn’t a smoking gun.”
4. William Byron: Byron was eliminated from the Ambetter Health 400 as an innocent victim of a crash with 71 laps left, caused when Kevin Harvick got loose in tight quarters and collected several cars.
“And speaking of ‘innocent victim,’” Byron said, “most people are saying Hendrick Motorsports is not one after their huge penalties and fines as a result of failed inspections. It’s one thing to be the victim; it’s another thing to play the victim. One of those things we do very well.”
5. Kevin Harvick: Harvick was a victim in one of two final stage wrecks at Atlanta. With 71 laps left, Harvick got loose with Ross Chastain right on his bumper, and Harvick spun into traffic, triggering a crash that involved 12 cars.
“The easy way out would be for me to blame Chastain for causing the crash,” Harvick said. “Why? Because everyone would believe it, even Ross himself.”
6. Ryan Blaney: Blaney posted his second consecutive top 10 with a seventh at Atlanta. He is fourth in the points standings,
“NASCAR handed down quite a list of penalties, suspensions, and fines to Hendrick Motorsports,” Blaney said. “Heck, I bet when NASCAR made the announcement, they, like Hendrick themselves, probably used a ‘cheat sheet.’”
7. Ross Chastain: Chastain had an eventful day at Atlanta on his way to a 13th-place finish in the Ambetter Health 400.
“Obviously,” Chastain said, “my reputation precedes me. Just ask Kevin Harvick. Now, I’m being accused of wrecking people even when I don’t even touch them.”
8. Kyle Larson: Larson was, unfortunately, running behind Aric Almirola with 52 laps left, as Almirola, on old tires, blew a right rear tire and collected Larson, who was competing in his 300th Cup series start.
“I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time,” Larson said, “much like the thousands of gamers who were listening to me back in April of 2020.
“Hendrick Motorsport’s best finish was a 14th by Alex Bowman. It was a sad day for Hendrick. But I must say, I’ve seen worse days, pretty recently, actually.”
9. Brad Keselowski: Keselowski settled for the runner-up spot at Atlanta, unable to hold off former teammate Joey Logano on the final lap. It was Keselowski’s best result of the year.
“Me and Joey go way back,” Logano said. “Or at least Joey says I go way back, because he won the Cup last year; I won it way back in 2012.”
10. Denny Hamlin: Hamlin finished sixth at Atlanta, joining Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Christopher Bell (third) and Ty Gibbs (ninth) in the top 10.
“I was penalized 25 driver points and fined $50,000 for making intentional contact with Ross Chastain at Phoenix,” Hamlin said. “And, as I am prone to do, I’ll ‘admit’ it, and say it was worth every penny.”
