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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Would it be safe to call Denny Hamelin nascars posey?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

I’m so glade to see Joey 2nd

A very controversial finish to a pretty good race, Denny potentially jumping the start, using up MTJ, Truex door slamming Larson and bumping Hamlin, a lot happened right at the end of the race. But Berry had a good race, Elliott with a good finish, Larson finishes 3rd after spinning and GAINING 2 SPOTS, Bell getting 6th after a near costly pit road penalty, lots of good and bad

COTA was a rather straightforward race for the Cup series, with a few bumps and spins here and there, but nothing serious enough to bring out any cautions, and with pit strategy and penalties being the biggest determination of track position. It should be noted that moving the restart zone back from the start-finish line towards the beginning of the front-stretch did appear to be successful in preventing the absolute demolition derby we often saw in Turn 1 last year. Anyway, while the Toyotas proved dominant once again, it was William Byron who was able to win for the second time this season (apparently making this the third season in a row where he was the first driver with a second win of the season, an accomplishment last done by Jeff Gordon back in the 1990s).

The races in the other two series at the track proved more exciting. In the Xfinity Series, SVG actually led many laps and battled with Austin Hill on the final lap, only for that duel to allow Kyle Larson to take the win. In the Truck Series, I honestly don’t remember much except for the very weird incident where Marco Andretti suddenly had the entire rear axle assembly break loose from his truck and roll away.

Next up is Easter weekend, and since Bristol Dirt is no longer around, this special weekend will be going to Richmond this year, a rather nice place to watch a night race, so we’ll see how it goes.

That sure was a rather wild race at Bristol. Tire wear-out unexpectedly became such a serious concern that Goodyear was actually allowed by NASCAR to fit an extra set of tires for all the teams. The tire wear also resulted in a massive amount of “marbles” littering the top side of the track, something you rarely see in a NASCAR race. Almost all of the pit stops occurred under caution after someone spun out due to one of their tires giving out from excessive wear, with the only green flag pit stops occurring only near the end of the race. In addition, this race saw far more lead changes than ever before in any NASCAR Cup Series race at any short track (the previous record was at Bristol in spring of 1991). But in the end, the Toyotas of Joe Gibbs Racing dominated once again, with Ty Gibbs winning both of the first two stages and Denny Hamlin taking the race win. Also, this race ended with only five drivers finishing on the lead lap, the first time since Dover in 2004 that no more than that many drivers had finished on the lead lap. Definitely a lot happened in this race that made it worth watching.

Next week is Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas, the first road coarse of the season. It’ll be interesting to see which drivers and teams can do well at this type of track this season.

I wish Joey would get his shit together

Not much to say about the race at Phoenix except there was near total domination by the Toyota teams (literally the only laps not led by any Toyota was when Todd Gilliland stayed out on a pit strategy). Ty Gibbs led several laps, as did Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex, with Tyler Reddick winning a stage, but it was Christopher Bell who won by the largest margin of victory since the introduction of the current generation of cars. There was one caution just a few laps after the start of the race and bunch at the beginning of stage three, but other than that the entire race stayed green, and with the “new short track package” making virtually no difference at all, it was a rather dull race for the most part.

Next week is Bristol, notably no longer on dirt. Hopefully the weather will be favorable for once.

Aside from some very strong wind gusts throughout the weekend making handling difficult for the drivers, this was a rather typical race at Las Vegas. Kyle Larson wins in the Cup Series, John Hunter Nemecheck win in the Xfinity Series, and Rajah Caruth gets his first ever win in the Truck Series. (Rajah winning is particularly historic, as that makes him only the third African American to win a race in NASCAR’s top three series after Wendell Scott and Bubba Wallace.)

Next week’s race will be at Phoenix, which means for the Cup Series it will be the first race using the new short track settings on the cars, so we’ll see how well it’ll improve the racing abilities.

That was easily one of the most epic finishes I’ve ever seen in a NASCAR race! A three way photo finish! With a difference of 0.003 seconds, it’s the third closest finish ever in the Cup series. Between Ryan Blaney, Kyle Busch, and Daniel Suarez, who was declared the winner in Atlanta? Daniel Suarez!

The start of the race was also pretty crazy as well. Joey Logano had to serve a pass-through penalty on the first lap because he used an illegal glove during qualifying, but he was lucky to gain back the lap he would’ve lost because of a huge crash right on lap 2, the biggest crash ever in that track’s history with 16 cars involved. Throughout the race, there were so many cautions for both large crashes and single cars spinning out that, by the end of the race, the list of cars not involved in any incidents was much shorter than those that were involved in cautions. At one point, the leaders managed to race four-wide for at least an entire lap! Another track record set during this race was the number of lead changes at a total of 48. Also notable was Todd Gilliland who not only led more laps in this race than in all of his previous Cup series races combined (including last week’s Daytona 500 where he accomplished the exact same statistic), but also ended up leading the most laps in this race.

Some other crazy things happened in the other two series races in Atlanta as well. In the Truck series race, not only did Kyle Busch win (his first since selling his truck team to Spire Motorsports, for whom he will race with in his limited starts in the Truck series), but also there was a rather funny incident when one truck suddenly had its roof fly off at racing speed (essentially becoming a convertible, as some people joked). In the Xfinity series race, while Jesse Love led almost every lap, he and several others ran out of gas in the final few laps, allowing a lot of other drivers to have much higher finishes than they normally get (though it was Austin Hill once again taking the win on a superspeedway, making him the first driver since Tony Stewart in 2008 to win both of the season’s first two races in the Xfinity series).

Next week’s race will be in Las Vegas, the first true intermediate track on the schedule, so we’ll get to see which drivers and teams are really doing well, despite whatever luck they may have had in the first two races.

William Byron wins the Daytona 500!

With this win, Hendrick Motorsports is now tied with Petty Enterprises for the team with the most Daytona 500 wins at a total of nine. And since he’s the sixth different driver to win the Daytona 500 for his team, that also breaks the tie previously held with Wood Brothers Racing. And to top it all off, this win came on the exact day of the 40th anniversary of the very first NASCAR race that Hendrick Motorsports had ever competed in.

Since I happen to consider William Byron as my favorite NASCAR driver after the success he had last season, I can definitely say this was a very exciting win.

As for the race itself, it managed to stay relatively clean for the majority of the race (which certainly can’t be said for the other series races throughout the weekend, especially the demolition trucks which saw a track record of twelve cautions). The was a rather minor crash just a few laps after the start, then it stayed green (except for stage breaks) until ten laps to go when the big wreck took out a lot of good cars, and then one more large wreak just as the leaders took the white flag, so the race just barely avoided going into overtime (which as we saw last year is usually a recipe for even more destruction).

Next weekend, we get to see the short superspeedway of Atlanta, and seeing some of the unexpected drivers who managed to get a good finish at Daytona, I would not be surprised if we end up seeing an underdog driver win at that track.

Those duel races sure were exciting to watch. Especially seeing as both of them finished with the difference of a fraction of a second between the open car that made it into the big race and the other failing to qualify. The first race had a miscommunication by some drivers on who was going to pit when, which spread out the field and almost caused Jimmie Johnson to fail to qualify. The second race had a rather big wreck near the end, where among the drivers involved was Ryan Blaney once again getting turned head-on into the outside wall with a hard impact.

Things this week are only going to get more exciting from here. Truck Series race on Friday, Xfinity Series race on Saturday, and finally the Daytona 500 for the Cup Series on Sunday.

@Background Pony #5A6B
Good I like Joey I’m pulling for he or brad to win it

While tomorrow’s duel races will set most of the starting positions for the Daytona 500, the front row has been set by the regular qualifying that was done earlier today. Pole position went to Joey Logano, with the other driver on the front row being Michael McDowell. Not only does the all-time record of consecutive front row starts by a specific driver end at 6 for Alex Bowman, but also the active streak of any Hendrick cars starting on the front row now comes to an end at 9 (2015-2023). This also ends the streak of Chevrolet starting on the front row that has endured since 2013. The last time Ford won the pole (as well as swept the front row) was back in 2012.

Also, in addition to the 36 chartered cars, there are six non-chartered cars trying to qualify for only four available spots. Two of those drivers were able to lock themselves into the race by qualifying speed, while the other two openings will be filled based on the finishing positions of the four remaining drivers in tomorrow’s duel races.