TALLADEGA, Ala. — NASCAR officials disqualified cars driven by apparent top-five finishers Ryan Preece and Joey Logano from Sunday’s Cup Series race at Talladega Superspeedway after finding technical violations in both cars’ rear spoilers in post-race inspection.
Preece’s No. 60 RFK Racing Ford took the checkered flag in what was initially a career-best second place, half a car-length behind race winner Austin Cindric’s No. 2 Team Penske Mustang in Sunday’s Jack Link’s 500. Officials, however, discovered unapproved shims in the rear spoiler area.
Logano had driven the No. 22 Ford to an apparent fifth-place finish, a result that would have been his first top-five result of the season. Officials, however, found the No. 22 to be in violation of Section 14.5.8.E, which covers spoiler braces that are used as superspeedway events, and Section 14.1.P under General Vehicle Assembly, which states, “All fasteners must be securely fastened at all times during an Event.”
“The No. 22 Team Penske Ford Mustang was disqualified following post-race inspection at Talladega today,” Team Penske released in a statement. “One of the 18 bolts on the surface of the spoiler that connect to the base was found to be loose, and NASCAR penalized the team as a result. This was not intentional and happened throughout the course of the race event. Team Penske accepts the disqualification.”
On Monday, RFK Racing announced on social media that it also accepts the penalty and will not file an appeal.
“RFK Racing acknowledges and accepts NASCAR’s decision to disqualify the No. 60 Ford Mustang following post-race inspection at Talladega and will not appeal the ruling,” the team’s statement said. “The infraction stemmed from an unintentional adjustment during pre-race inspection to correct a spoiler angle issue. While the change did not provide a competitive advantage, it did not meet the approved compliance method. We respect the ruling and remain committed to integrity and adherence to NASCAR’s standards.”
Preece was relegated to 38th in the 39-car field, with Logano placed last in the official results. Both drivers also earned just one point in the championship standings, with the disqualification erasing what would have been a 40-point day for Preece and 41 points for Logano.
The outcome rounded out a dismal day for RFK Racing, which suffered early retirements by Chris Buescher (34th place) and owner/driver Brad Keselowski (36th) because of Stage 1 crashes. Logano joined teammate Ryan Blaney, who was 37th after being caught up in the Keselowski crack-up, near the bottom of the order.
NASCAR officials also indicated that four cars would return to its Research & Development Center for further inspection. The No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet (driver Kyle Larson) and No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford (Josh Berry) will have a full inspection and engine dyno tests. The No. 10 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet (Ty Dillon) and No. 23 23XI Racing Toyota (Bubba Wallace) will also be observed on the engine dyno.
The NASCAR Xfinity Series rolls into Texas Motor Speedway for the Andy’s Frozen Custard 300 on Saturday (2 p.m. ET, The CW, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Katherine Legge makes her third Xfinity start of the season, once again piloting the No. 32 Jordan Anderson Racing Chevrolet. Forty cars are on the entry list, but only 38 cars will start Saturday’s event, meaning two teams will fail to qualify.
Take a look at the full entry list for Saturday’s event:
The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series returns after an off week for a trip to Texas Motor Speedway this weekend for the SpeedyCash.com 250 (8 p.m. ET, FS1, NASCAR Racing Network Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
The NASCAR Cup Series travels to the Lone Star State this weekend, where the field will do battle this Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway in the Würth 400 presented by Liqui Moly (3:30 p.m. ET, FS1, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Jesse Love, who made his Cup Series debut at Bristol Motor Speedway, suits up for his second start in NASCAR’s premier series, wheeling the No. 62 Beard Motorsports Chevrolet.
See the full entry list for the 267-lap event at the 1.5-miler:
A promising day for Ford Performance took a downturn for two blue oval teams at Talladega Superspeedway as post-race inspection revealed that Joey Logano and Ryan Preece were disqualified due to separate spoiler violations. Logano was ultimately credited with a 39th-place finish, with Ryan Preece slotting one position ahead in 38th.
JOEY LOGANO Points to playoff cutline Bristol: +47 (10th in standings) Talladega (Pre-DQ): +73 (10th in standings) Talladega (Post-DQ): +36 (13th in standings)
Joey Logano crossed the start/finish line in the fifth position at the completion of the 500-miler and propelled his team to an even more comfortable 10th place in the Cup Series standings with a 73-point buffer on the elimination line of the playoffs. With Logano’s disqualification and subsequent last-place finish only receiving one point, the three-time champion was relegated to 13th in the current standings.
While Logano is still comfortably in the playoff picture with plenty of regular-season racing to play out, the No. 22 driver will quickly look to turn the momentum back in his favor this weekend at Texas Motor Speedway, where he has one victory in the premier series (2014) driving for Team Penske.
RYAN PREECE Points to playoff cutline Bristol: +3 (15th in standings) Talladega (Pre-DQ): +28 (14th in standings) Talladega (Post-DQ): -14 (19th in standings)
Ryan Preece has been off to a career-best start to his 2025 Cup Series campaign. With three finishes inside the top 10 and almost knocking on the door of his first premier series victory with a third-place finish at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, this post-race inspection setback knocks the No. 60 RFK Racing Ford pilot out of the playoff conversation and drops him to 19th place in the playoff leaderboard.
As mentioned with his Ford Performance counterpart in Logano, there is still plenty of racing left and a chance that Preece punches his ticket into Victory Lane before we lock in our Round of 16 drivers, but the road to the Cup Series Playoffs just got a little bit tougher for the former modified driver from Berlin, Connecticut.
No, that wasn’t Joey Logano congratulating his Team Penske teammate Austin Cindric on capturing his third career Cup Series victory at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday. Rather, it was Logano sounding off on the No. 2 driver over his scanner following the conclusion of Stage 2 when, coming to the green-white-checkered flag, Cindric didn’t give the No. 22 driver the push he appeared to be looking for to possibly win the stage.
The defending champ Logano pulled out of his line and in front of his teammate after exiting Turn 4, perhaps expecting Cindric to file in line in the top lane and allow both ride back the start/finish line past Bubba Wallace, who was leading for most of the final lap.
Cindric instead lifted as he approached Logano’s bumper, moving closer to the wall and zapping their momentum and leaving Logano scrambling to find help to score stage points. It resulted in Wallace taking his second stage victory of the season and Cindric settling for third in the middle frame.
“I felt like I kind of just got pinched,” Cindric said after the race. “I was trying not to wreck the cars in front of me, including Joey. It was a messy end of the stage that I feel like between myself, the 21, Joey could have probably done better. We let one slip there.
“I can understand his frustration without kind of seeing the whole picture. These are the types of things that when you’re expecting someone to have your best interest, those are the challenges, right? We have a lot of meetings centered around that. I feel like it requires constant maintenance. It’s not always pretty. The conversations aren’t always easy.”
Logano talked Tuesday on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, saying he and Cindric discussed the incident and have moved forward.
“There’s a multitude of things that kind of lead up to that moment,” Logano explained. “And when you go superspeedway racing, there are different rules in place for the teams. There are OEM rules, there are team rules, and you try to put these all in place to give your cars the best chance to win.
“The rules that were set in place weren’t followed, and that ticked me off quite a bit because I feel like I’ve always done the right thing and I try really hard to do that. And the rules have been put in place because of things we’ve done wrong in the past.”
Logano, the defending Cup champion, was frustrated because he saw Cindric’s move as a repeated hinderance rather than a one-off mistake.
“It wasn’t the first offense kind of situation, it was the straw that broke the camel’s back,” Logano said. “And yeah, I lit up pretty quickly because I care. I am into it, man. I like racing, I am in 100%, and I expect things to go a certain way and when they don’t, yeah, I get pissed off. …
“Should I have hit the button and spouted off so much? Probably not. It probably blew up into a little bigger situation than what it needed to, but the conversation either way needed to happen. Like I said, I care about this stuff. This is my life. Racing is everything.”
Michael Nelson, president of Team Penske’s NASCAR operations, believes the stable’s drivers do an excellent job of teamwork on and off the track, believing the circumstance illustrates the desire to win for the organization.
“I think our team has done a really good job of working together as a team over the years, especially at these races,” Nelson said. “But when you see that, you realize how difficult it is behind the scenes. I guess it again proves these guys that we have, they want to win the races, right? They want to win for their team.
“At the end of the day, it’s just like a normal family. We have to go in and close the door when we’re not in front of everybody else and work through the issues that we have.”
Cindric powered through in the final stage to win Sunday’s Cup Series at Talladega. Logano was disqualified due to spoiler violations, which scrubbed away a fifth-place result and what would’ve been the three-time champ’s best finish so far in 2025.
Logano and Cindric will gear up again this Sunday at Texas Motor Speedway (3:30 p.m. ET, PRN Radio, Sirius XM NASCAR Radio) for the 11th bout of the 2025 season.
(EDITOR’S NOTE: NASCAR and JDV Productions have postponed Saturday’s Cheshire County Clash NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour event at Monadnock Speedway due to a forecast of inclement weather. Officials from JDV Productions, the racetrack, and NASCAR are working collaboratively to find a date in the best interest of competitors and race fans. An announcement on the new event date is expected to come next week.)
The stars and cars of the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour return to action Saturday night for the running of the Cheshire County Clash 200 at New Hampshire’s Monadnock Speedway (6 p.m. ET on FloRacing).
The race, the third of the 2025 Modified Tour season, doubles as the opening round of the Whelen Short Track Cup mini-series that offers more than $20,000 in additional bonuses to teams that compete in all three rounds.
Saturday’s event will be the 20th Modified Tour race held at Monadnock dating back to 1986, when Ken Bouchard piloted Boehler Racing Enterprises’ Ole Blue No. 3 to victory at the quarter-mile bullring. Jimmy Spencer, Mike Stefanik, Reggie Ruggiero, Jamie Tomaino, Ted Christopher, Todd Szegedy, Ryan Preece, Justin Bonsignore, Doug Coby, Timmy Solomito, Jake Johnson, Trevor Catalano and Patrick Emerling have also secured victories at the venue.
Tickets to Saturday’s Cheshire County Clash 200 are available here. Below is everything you need to know before Saturday’s race.
Cars take the green flag during a recent NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour event at Monadnock Speedway. (Photo: Jaiden Tripi/NASCAR)
Cheshire County Clash 200 at Monadnock Speedway
Bullrings and Modifieds go together like peanut butter and jelly.
That makes Monadnock Speedway and the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour a match made in racing heaven.
Saturday’s race marks the first of two stops for the series at Monadnock during the 2025 season, and a host of drivers are hoping to take their claim to a victory and a quick start to JDV Productions’ annual Whelen Short Track Cup mini-series.
Chief among them is Patrick Emerling, the most recent Modified Tour winner at Monadnock as well as the defending Whelen Short Track Cup champion. Emerling, a winner already this year at Florida’s New Smyrna Speedway, leads the series standings and would further pad his advantage with a victory Saturday.
Among his likely competition will be Ron Silk, the most recent series winner at Thompson Speedway Motorsports Park. Silk has yet to win a race at Monadnock, but he has come agonizingly close in recent years. Justin Bonsignore, the series win leader at Monadnock with five, will look to get on the board with his first win of 2025 this Saturday.
Also looking for his first win of 2025 will be Austin Beers, who remains at the wheel of the No. 64 for KLM Motorsports. Stephen Kopcik, who sits fifth in the series standings, will try to continue his strong start to the season with another top-10 finish in the No. 21 for Wanick Motorsports. Luke Baldwin will again pilot the No. 7 for Tommy Baldwin Racing, while Craig Lutz will look to break his dry spell aboard Goodie Racing’s No. 46.
Perennial threats Matt Hirschman and Jon McKennedy are both expected Saturday at Monadnock. Also scheduled to compete are Tommy Catalano and his younger brother Trevor Catalano, who scored his first Modified Tour victory at Monadnock last season.
Other notable entrants include Woody Pitkat, Kyle Ebersole, Tyler Rypkema, Kyle Bonsignore, Matt Kimball and Anthony Nocella, among others.
The complete entry list for Saturday’s Cheshire County Clash 200 is available here.
A general view during the Winchester Fair for the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour at Monadnock Speedway in Winchester, New Hampshire on September 21, 2024. (Photo: Susan Wong/NASCAR)
SCHEDULE: Saturday, May 3… Practice from 1:05 p.m. to 1:35 p.m. ET … Final practice from 1:45 p.m. to 2:10 p.m. … Qualifying at 4:15 p.m. ET … Cheshire County Clash 200 at 6 p.m. ET (FloRacing).
RE-DRAW PROCEDURE: The fastest qualifier will draw a pill to determine the number of drivers that will re-draw for their starting positions: 4,6,8 or 10 positions will re-draw. Once the fastest qualifier draws the initial pill, NASCAR will have the various buckets ready to immediately start the re-draw procedure. Drivers will re-draw in their qualifying order after qualifying has been completed (1 through 10, or however many are applicable). The pole position and/or any bonus point(s), if applicable, will be awarded to the fastest qualifier and will be the pole of record. If, due to adverse conditions, qualifying is canceled, the field will be set in accordance with the 2025 NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour Rule Book. The re-draw procedure will still take place regardless of how the field is set.
QUALIFYING: Two consecutive qualifying laps. (EIRI) Faster lap determines qualifying position. Adjustments or repairs may not be made on the vehicle after the vehicle has taken the green flag at the start/finish line. NASCAR reserves the right to have more than one vehicle engage in qualifying runs at the same time. Starting field for the 4th Annual Cheshire County Clash 200 is limited to 28 starters including Provisional Positions.
TIRE ALLOTMENT: The maximum tire allotment available for this event is eight (8) tires per team. All tires used for qualifying and the race must be purchased at the track and scanned by Hoosier, unless otherwise approved in advance by the Series Director. Four (4) tires must be used for qualifying and to begin the race. All qualifying tires must remain in impound until released by NASCAR Officials. The remaining tire allotment may be used for practice and/or change tires during the event. The tire change rule is one (1) tire per caution period.
TALLADEGA, Ala. — Austin Cindric walked into Talladega Superspeedway’s media center for post-race interviews still savoring the spoils of his just-earned win, and it was more than conspicuous. If the racing fire suit wasn’t enough of a giveaway, the giant horseshoe-shaped wreath of flowers that was placed around his neck in Victory Lane made it obvious.
The tradition of floral festivities began with Talladega’s earliest winners. It lasted all of three races, but archivist-minded promoters brought it back for the track’s 50th anniversary in 2019. Each triumphant driver since has worn the wreath, fashioned out of 33 yards of ribbon and more than 300 carnations. Cindric became the latest keeper of that celebration custom Sunday evening. Where he broke with tradition was how long he planned to wear it.
“Your concept of ‘a little bit of time’ is different than mine,” Cindric said, once told that the wreath rarely leaves Victory Lane with the driver after the team photos. “I’m going to try to walk on the plane with this thing.”
Cindric had plenty of reason to relish the moment a little longer after winning Sunday’s Jack Link’s 500 — cashing in on a successful late-race strategy, providing his engine supplier with a milestone win and making up for a pair of near-misses at drafting-style tracks earlier this season. His third Cup Series victory may also help to dull the perception that perhaps he’s a third wheel on a Team Penske roster stacked with NASCAR champions.
While it’s true that three-time champ Joey Logano and 2023 title-holder Ryan Blaney are among his teammates, after Sunday, it’s also true that for the third time in the last four years, he’s the first Team Penske driver to clinch an all-important berth in the Cup Series Playoffs.
“I mean, I think certainly anytime you can have an example set and try at a bare minimum to not just meet that example. I want to be better. I want to be the best, right?” Cindric said. “Just being as good in my mind, as farfetched as it might be as a two-, three-year Cup driver to say I want to be better than the champion. That’s how you have to think. I commit way too much of my time. I ask a lot out of the people I work with. I try to reciprocate with that. The ‘as good’ is not good enough in my mind.
“Is it a motivator? Perhaps. I look at it as an example, as a competitive advantage for us to be able to have that type of example in-house.”
Any other needed motivation could have stemmed from the opportunities that fizzled in the season’s other drafting-type races. Cindric was the leader at the drop of the white flag in the Daytona 500, where he led a race-best 59 of the 201 laps before a final-lap crash eliminated him. A week later, he was squeezed into the outside wall in a late-race contest for the lead with Kyle Larson at Atlanta Motor Speedway, leaving him 28th.
Sunday at Talladega, Cindric gained the upper hand on a run-long strategy and his final fuel-only pit stop — a well-executed 3.2-second heater, fastest of the field — that put him at the front of the field. Once there, he kept his momentum and had a countermove for each of the last-gasp challenges, ending his superspeedway dismay and making sure that the hard work he’s invested in trying to be the best would finally pay off.
“I’ve known Austin for a really long time, since he was a kid. Watched him grow and develop over time, the amount of work he’s put in, in multiple series,” said Michael Nelson, president of Team Penske’s NASCAR operations. “Once getting into the Cup Series, the amount of effort that he’s put in and everything that he’s gone through. I know he was really frustrated to not have won a couple of these races so far. Yeah, it’s really rewarding to see people go through, put the work in and achieve something that they set out to do.”
That logic applies for Brian Wilson, the No. 2 team’s crew chief and another colleague with a long-running relationship with his 26-year-old driver.
“I think the first time I crew-chiefed him was about 10 years ago. I’ve seen him grow quite a bit,” Wilson said. “I think he’s the type of guy that he takes all information in, he really retains it, he wants to study it. I think the type of driver he is really fits the way that Team Penske operates. We’re data-driven, really. We love to provide things for him to be able to study. I think he’s really done a great job applying it.”
The Talladega triumph ended up being a major source of pride for Team Penske, which had reached the quarter-mark of the season without visiting Victory Lane. The organization had an extra week to stew on it, carrying that 0-for-9 mark into an off weekend for the NASCAR Cup Series. Maybe that’s why the winner’s circle seemed especially crowded and jubilant, all at once.
But it was also a milestone for Roush Yates Engines, Ford’s power supplier, which achieved its 200th points-paying Cup Series win at one of its historical strongholds. Doug Yates, the group’s current president and CEO, shared a beaming smile in the middle of that raucous Victory Lane bash with a host of well-wishers in the late-afternoon sun. One called out: “Hey Doug, I owe you a beer!” Yates gave an approving nod.
Sean Gardner | Getty Images
Doug’s father, Hall of Famer and engine-building maestro Robert Yates, had always held Talladega in high regard. Even in the restrictor-plate and speed-limiting era, the 2.66-mile track has always been a venue where his powerplants could seemingly make a difference. He celebrated Davey Allison’s first Cup Series victory here in 1987, his first win as a car owner in 1989 (with Allison again) and his final victory as a team owner with Dale Jarrett in 2005 — all at Talladega.
“It’s really special,” Doug Yates said. “You know, I was kind of getting little chills and choked up when you said that. I mean, my dad loved this place.”
Cindric now has his own passion for the series’ largest oval. He wore that pride draped on his shoulders for longer stretches than most Sunday, noting that the flowers smelled especially sweet.
That red-white-and-blue wreath was a must-have accessory for Cindric, who set his season on the right course on one of the sport’s biggest stages. Just don’t call the U-shaped flower arrangement a lucky horseshoe.
“I don’t believe in luck. I believe in the law of averages. My faith continues to be restored,” Cindric said. “Sometimes I have to have more patience in the law of averages. You keep swinging the bat the right way, eventually you’re going to hit a homer.”
Talladega, Ala. – Kyle Larson and William Byron were sitting in prime position late in Sunday’s Jack Link’s 500 at Talladega Superspeedway. The Hendrick Motorsports teammates were in the mix after pitting for the final time on Lap 171. Yet when the checkered flag flew, Team Penske earned its first win of the 2025 season.
Austin Cindric exited the final pit cycle with the lead, commanding the lower lane. Byron led the way on the top lane until Ryan Preece scooted by and jumped to the top ahead of Byron. The HMS duo filled the second row, with Alex Bowman in line behind the No. 24 Chevrolet as the third car up top.
Coming to the checkered flag, Byron remained committed to pushing Preece, who lost out by .022 seconds to Cindric before being disqualified in post-race inspection for violating rule 14.5.8.F (Spoiler) in the NASCAR Rule Book. Larson was bumped to second after the DQ with Byron earning a third-place finish.
On the final lap, Bowman got out of line on the frontstretch and fell to ninth. With Preece and Joey Logano — 14.5.8.E; 14.1.P overall assembled vehicle rules — both failing post-race inspection, the No. 48 car jumped to seventh in the official results. The fourth HMS driver, Chase Elliott, was credited with a fifth-place finish after the pair of DQs, putting all four Hendrick cars inside the top 10 for the third time this season (Phoenix Raceway and Las Vegas Motor Speedway).
Being in a similar position during one of the races last season at Talladega, Byron never thought about jumping out of line for the win. He hoped the seas parted ways, similar to his victory in this year’s Daytona 500 where he went from ninth to first on the final lap.
“I just didn’t feel like I was going to win from where I was at,” Byron said about his positioning. “I felt like I needed to push [Preece] clear and I never got him clear enough to make a move. He was already behind Cindric coming through the tri-oval, so my job is to push him back even and hope that I can finish third. At that point, I don’t think I ever thought win because if I go top of three like I did last year, it looks good but you’re just behind.”
Having an HMS teammate behind Byron didn’t change his thought process. Bowman was frustrated with a move that Byron made that allowed Preece to get ahead and control the outside line.
“It’s one of those days where none of the moves worked out,” Bowman told FOX Sports after the race. “There at the end [Byron] zigged left down the backstretch as I got to him and that broke up apart and let [Preece] get up and control the race from there. Hate that for everyone at HMS.
“I thought we were sitting in a good spot and unfortunately it just didn’t work out. I thought we had a shot at it, we had good strategy, good execution in the final stage. One of those that just didn’t work out.”
It wasn’t all dire for HMS. Larson won the opening stage, his first stage victory at Talladega. Dating back to Atlanta Motor Speedway in February, he has consecutive third-place finishes at superspeedways with a stage victory in each event. It’s also his second top-five in a row at Talladega.
Like Byron, Larson was jammed in line with nowhere to go. His lone option was to push Cindric, hoping to get clear where he could jump to the top. He couldn’t generate enough momentum to make that happen and settled for second after Preece’s disqualification gained him a spot in the finishing order.
“I think we were both doing a really good job of pushing the guys in front of us,” Larson stated. “Their cars were stable, so it made it easy to push them. I was trying for the final 10 laps to shove [Cindric] out clear to where I could get clear, but I only had one chance at that.
“I was trying to do everything I could to win and get clear. I wasn’t thinking about any of that in the moment, I was just doing what I could to advance my lane.”
Scoring a race-high 54 points, Larson leaped two positions in the regular season championship standings to second, chopping into Byron’s lead by 11 markers (31 points behind).
