Ryan Reed post-race: ‘I told him we can race like that and I’m totally fine’
NEWTON, Iowa — What opened up as a reasonably clean, meandering NASCAR XFINITY Series race turned into a regular Saturday night showdown, a swashbuckling smashfest in three acts that left bruises on fenders and egos alike at Iowa Speedway.
After traveling 205 of an overtime 260 laps with a harmless three caution periods, short-track bedlam erupted in the late stages, potentially re-opening an old rift between teammates, ruffling the feathers of the defending series champion and sparking a post-race shove further back in the pack.
The earliest sign that the U.S. Cellular 250 would not go quietly into the good Iowa night came with 21 laps left in regulation, when reigning champ Chase Elliott tangled with rookie Brandon Jones on the frontstretch in a contest for sixth place. Elliott, already frustrated by his late fade as the only front-runner to make a two-tire stop in the last exchange, keyed his radio to tell his JR Motorsports crew: “I’m pretty upset right now. That’s all I’m going to say.”
Told that Jones accepted full blame over the his own radio, Elliott replied: “Yeeeeppp. They can tell that to the points tally.”
Jones was apologetic again after the race, telling NASCAR.com that he felt he was clear as he slid up the race track on the exit of Turn 4. He said he didn’t have a chance to issue an apology in person with ninth-place finisher Elliott after the race.
“I think he probably went back to his hauler, but I’ll get back up with him (later) and try to explain what happened, for sure,” said Jones, who finished 20th in just his second XFINITY start. “Me and Chase are really good friends and I didn’t mean for that to happen, but can’t do anything now about it. We’ll go to the next one.”
The next one in terms of post-race flare-ups should make for another interesting team meeting this week at Roush Fenway Racing. Points leader Chris Buescher and teammate Bubba Wallace, who locked horns in May at Dover International Speedway, collided again with two laps left, pushing the race into overtime. Wallace, damaged in an earlier incident with Erik Jones entering pit road, caught the worst of it with fellow teammate Ryan Reed and the retiring Kenny Wallace sliding behind him in the aftermath.
Wallace dismounted from his No. 6 Ford post-race, exchanged words with Buescher’s crew chief Scott Graves, and leaned in to Buescher’s window for a succinct post-race talk.
“I think he said, ‘good job.’ I just grabbed him really quick,” Wallace said. “We screwed up so bad in this race. It was miserable. I let my guys down. I got into Erik there on pit road and that put us in a corner. Just hate it, man. I screwed up tonight. Just paying for it.”
Asked about any potential tension within the Roush ranks, Wallace smiled and shrugged: “He’s racing. We’re racing hard. That’s it. Nothing to it. I just told him good job and we’ll go to Watkins Glen.”
Buescher, the winner here at the .875-mile track in May, was aiming for a rare Iowa season sweep, but on the first green-white-checkered attempt that followed, his No. 60 was heavily damaged by the sliding car of Brennan Poole. He limped home to a 13th-place finish, two spots behind Wallace, but retained his lead in the XFINITY standings.
“Our guys did a heck of a job and we brought back a heck of a car to Iowa and we should’ve been in really good contention for this thing,” Buescher said. “You know, it’s just tough. We had so many restarts there late. Guys are just, they’re tough — just dive-bomb it in there and it’s tough.”
Pressed for specifics about his contact with Wallace, Buescher declined to tell: “I’m not talking about that one. … Nope. Nothing to say.”
Caught in part of the crossfire was Reed, who soldiered to a 19th-place finish and had fireworks of his own to come. In trying to assess the hard-nosed racing between Buescher and Wallace, he said he felt certain the issues would be resolved in time.
“They’re both great drivers and I have a lot of respect for both of them and get along with both of ’em. I can’t really get in the middle of it, but at the same time, I understand how it can be racing teammates,” Reed said. “You want to run everyone as hard as you can, just seems, like you said, they’re magnets and I’m not sure why it’s like that. They’re both great drivers, I have a lot of respect for them, and I’m sure they’ll get through it.”
Reed’s issues weren’t over, though, as his No. 16 Ford scraped across the start-finish line in 19th-place at the checkered flag. Very little cool-down happened on the cool-down lap, with Reed marching over to the No. 4 Chevrolet and giving its driver, Ross Chastain, a swift shove.
“There were a lot of wrecks there at the end. It’s part of short-track racing,” Reed said. “My getting at the 4, like I said in my other interview, it’s kind of the pot calling the kettle black because I got into the 20 (Kenny Wallace), but the 20 was very unintentional. I just went up to the 4 and he just flat-out told me, ‘Hey man, it was a green-white-checkered,’ so I have a hard time with that. I have a really hard time with going in there and just intentionally banzai-ing someone and punting them out of the way. It’s fine. I told him we can race like that and I’m totally fine with that.”
Chastain claimed said he wanted to see video of the incident before making a judgment call.
“I haven’t seen a replay yet, so I can’t say too much. I don’t want to because I don’t want to overstep what I don’t know,” Chastain told NASCAR.com. “What I remember — and it might be completely wrong — is I got to the bottom of (Turn) 1 and the 16 was right outside of me. I thought we were pretty low on the race track and we might’ve gotten together a little bit. It looks like there’s a little mark on my fender, and I just got by him and there was mayhem and chaos everywhere. I don’t know. Until I see a replay, I don’t know.
“Me and him have raced hard all year. It’s good for us that we’re racing against guys like that because people think we shouldn’t be, but we are. When we come to a track like Iowa, we can show what this team’s made out of. I’m proud of my guys. I hate it that he got torn up, but I didn’t feel like I was too in the wrong, but I’ll have to watch a replay to see.”