Posted on by Brandon White

The NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour will make its third and final stop at Monadnock Speedway this season with Saturday night’s running of the Winchester Fair presented by USNE.

Having been a part of the Modified Tour schedule for different stretches in the 1980s and 2010s, Monadnock became a staple of the series during the 2020s. The 2024 season marks the first time the facility has three races on the calendar after previously hosting two in 2023.

As part of the track’s increased number of events, JDV Productions founder and Monadnock track promoter Josh Vanada moved the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup to the facility. More than $20,000 in bonus money has been available to Modified Tour drivers at Monadnock this year, with $6,000 being distributed to the top three in points.

With one race remaining, the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup championship is still up for grabs. The top seven in the point standings are separated by single digits, which primarily consists of seasoned Modified competitors looking for crucial momentum to close out 2024.

Tickets for the Winchester Fair presented by USNE can be purchased here. Below is everything to know ahead of the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup finale.

Patrick Emerling
Patrick Emerling enters Saturday’s Winchester Fair at Monadnock Speedway with a three-point lead in the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup. (Photo: Jaiden Tripi/NASCAR)

Winchester Fair presented by USNE

Although he trails Justin Bonsignore and Ron Silk in the NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour championship standings, Patrick Emerling sits atop the Whelen Granite State Short Track cup points by a narrow margin.

A two-time winner on the Modified Tour this year, consecutive third-place finishes at the prior Monadnock Speedway events enabled Emerling to secure the points lead in the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup. Those performances are Emerling’s best across 10 career starts at Monadnock.

Emerling will have to fend off several other talented drivers to close out the Whelen Granite State Short Track cup title. This includes Matt Hirschman, who only trails Emerling by three points and is still searching for his first Modified Tour victory at Monadnock despite never finishing outside the top 10 at the New Hampshire track.

Silk (-4) and Bonsignore (-8) also remain within striking distance of Emerling’s advantage. Silk himself has never visited Monadnock’s Victory Lane, but Bonsignore boasts the best track record of any Modified Tour competitor at the complex with five victories on his resume.

A potential underdog contender for the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup is Trevor Catalano, who picked up his first NASCAR Whelen Modified Tour victory during the most recent trip to Monadnock. The triumph put Catalano nine points back from Emerling, but he has not recorded another top-five since then.

Austin Beers (-6) and Craig Lutz (-8) are also in contention for the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup title. They will be joined in the field by Jon McKennedy, Woody Pitkat, Stephen Kopcik, Anthony Nocella and Matt Kimball, among others.

The complete entry list for the Winchester Fair presented by USNE can be viewed here.

Monadnock Speedway
Jake Johnson (3) and Trevor Catalano (56) won the other two events at Monadnock Speedway that comprised the Whelen Granite State Short Track Cup. (Photo: Jaiden Tripi/NASCAR)

RACING REFERENCE:

RACE FACTS

Race Winchester Fair presented by USNE
Date Saturday, September 21, 2024
Track Monadnock Speedway
Layout 0.25-mile asphalt oval
Location Winchester, New Hampshire
Start time 6 p.m. ET
Laps 200
Posted Awards $85,234
Tickets Here
How To Watch FloRacing

SCHEDULE: Saturday, September 21… Final practice from 1:15 p.m. to 2 p.m. ET … Qualifying at 4:15 p.m. ET … Winchester Fair presented by USNE 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.

QUALIFYING: Two consecutive qualifying laps. 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 2nd Annual Winchester Fair presented by USNE Power 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.

Posted on by Staff Report

The NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series and Xfinity Series will each feature fun names behind the wheel at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Rising sprint-car star Corey Day will make his NASCAR national series debut in the Truck Series’ Thursday night feature at the 0.533-mile high-banked short track driving the No. 81 Chevrolet for McAnally-Hilgemann Racing, his first of four races scheduled for 2024. Joining him will be Connor Zilisch, the 18-year-old sensation who won last weekend’s Xfinity Series race at Watkins Glen International in his debut start. Zilisch will drive the No. 7 Chevrolet for Spire Motorsports Thursday night in his third series start.

RELATED: Full Truck Series entry list | Xfinity Series entry list

William Sawalich, the 17-year-old defending ARCA Menards Series East champion and a seven-time ARCA winner in 2024, will make his fifth start of the year in Tricon Garage’s No. 1 Toyota on Thursday night, eyeing his first top-10 finish of 2024. Marco Andretti, a two-time winner in IndyCar competition, will make his seventh career start in the Truck Series Thursday in the No. 04 Chevrolet for Roper Racing in his fourth appearance of the season.

The UNOH 200 Presented by Ohio Logistics is set for Thursday at 8 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

The Xfinity Series features a return for two-time champion Dale Earnhardt Jr., a Class of 2021 inductee of the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Friday’s 300-lapper marks Earnhardt’s lone race of the 2024 campaign. The 15-time most popular driver and 26-time winner in Cup competition returned to Bristol in 2023 and led 47 laps in a stellar showing before a mechanical issue ended his day in flames. Earnhardt will compete in the No. 88 Chevrolet for JR Motorsports.

MORE: Dale Jr. through the years

Also racing in Friday’s Xfinity event will be Jeffrey Earnhardt, Dale Jr.’s nephew, who will drive the No. 26 Toyota for Sam Hunt Racing in his fifth start of 2024.

The Food City 300 will fire off Friday at 7 p.m. ET on CW, PRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.

MORE: Full Bristol weekend schedule

Posted on by John Crane

When the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series schedule was announced in October 2023, it didn’t take long for the 2024 Cup Series Playoffs docket — and in particular, the Round of 16 — to quickly draw attention.

Assumptions popped up almost immediately. Atlanta Motor Speedway, Watkins Glen International and Bristol Motor Speedway — a drafting-style track, road course and short track, respectively — were bound to keep 2024 title hopefuls on their toes and create a bounty of scenarios that could jumble the postseason in as many ways as could be imagined.

RELATED: Recap Watkins Glen playoff thriller | Race results

“The first round is the scariest it’s been in a long time,” Christopher Bell said during Cup Series Playoffs Media Day. “You know, with Atlanta, a superspeedway starting us off, we all know how that can go. And then we go to Watkins Glen, which should be a normal race track, but with the expected tire degradation with the tire change that we’ve had, I mean, it could be a Bristol-style race where people are wearing tires out really early and struggling to make laps and having to pit all the time. So that could be another wild-card race. And then Bristol, I think everybody’s expecting it to be more of the same as what we had in the spring. So, the first round could be very different than what we’ve seen in the past.”

Atlanta’s overtime fireworks, not to mention the unknowns of The Glen’s playoff debut, contributed to the fright. And in Watkins Glen’s case, a new tire compound prioritizing fall-off, combined with freshly recessed rumble strips, gave the entirety of the Cup field a different flavor than the road course had typically put forth during the circuit’s annual visit there. And with postseason implications now on the line, the tension was much more magnified.

And those tensions came to fruition, indeed. After the checkered flag waved in overtime, only two playoff drivers (Chase Briscoe and Austin Cindric) finished inside the top 10. High-profile names, including Brad Keselowski, Tyler Reddick, William Byron and 2023 Cup Series champion Ryan Blaney, finished outside the top 25. The rest of the postseason field finished anywhere from 12th (Kyle Larson) to 24th (Harrison Burton).

So, what happened?

Cautions, for one. An opening-lap wreck involving Blaney, Keselowski, Denny Hamlin and Christopher Bell — all playoff drivers — was the first of seven yellows during Sunday’s 92-lap affair. The crash proved terminal for Blaney, and the No. 12 Team Penske Ford finished last in the field. Hamlin and Keselowski, meanwhile, were caught up in additional incidents, with the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota spinning out through the esses during the race’s final stage; Keselowski tangled with William Byron (another playoff driver) in Turn 2 during the race’s waning moments. Hamlin and Keselowski finished 23rd and 26th, respectively.

Next was strategy … and miscues on pit road. The decision whether to pit before the stage end and restart at the front of the field to retain track position — known as “flipping” the stages — versus staying out to collect valuable stage points and trading away track position was more than apparent in conjunction with the race yellows. For playoff drivers, the goal was clear: collect points. Stage 1’s conclusion saw eight playoff drivers collect stage points, while seven postseason pilots tallied points following Stage 2’s end under caution.

But issues on pit road could flip everything on its side, and such was the case for Larson and Keselowski after penalties forced them to the rear, thus opening them up to the possibility of being caught up in traffic … and perhaps trouble.

WATKINS GLEN: Blaney out after Lap 1 damage | Hamlin below elimination line following wrecks

When combining yellows, strategy shifts and pit-road blunders, Watkins Glen’s chaos can be quantified in numerics. Twelve of the 16 playoff drivers were “involved” in at least one of the two problem areas in question, with only Briscoe, Cindric, Alex Bowman and Ty Gibbs coming out of The Glen’s contest cleanly.

Ultimately, the effect on the playoff standings was stark, indeed. Of the 12 drivers currently above the elimination line, Cindric (plus-43) was the biggest gainer, vaulting from seventh in the playoff standings to just three points behind Bell (plus-46) for first among postseason drivers yet to clinch. Following him is Bowman (plus-41), two points behind the No. 2 Team Penske Ford. Daniel Suárez (despite getting stuck in the gravel in Stage 2) is up next in the playoff table (plus-36), and while he might not be inside the top five, Briscoe’s 27-point gain saw the No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford leap from last in the playoff standings to 11th, six points clear of the elimination line with one Round of 16 race to go.

With the shift up top, two former Cup Series champions and a perennial title contender now find themselves underneath the elimination line, with Hamlin (minus-6), Keselowski (minus-12), Martin Truex Jr. (minus-14) and Burton (minus-20) on the outside looking in. And while anything can go in the playoffs, needing to perform extremely well to the point of finding Victory Lane might be the only course of action for these drivers to survive the Round of 16’s onslaught.

Chaos was the expectation for this year’s playoffs, and as a track new to the postseason, Watkins Glen didn’t fail to shift this year’s playoff grid tremendously. With different tires and configuration changes to boot, the New York road course proved that no driver is safe.

MORE: Cup Series standings | Cup Series schedule 

Saturday’s Round of 16 finale at Bristol Motor Speedway (7 p.m. ET, USA, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App) is sure to deliver after its spring running saw unique tire situations dictate the race’s outcome.

There’s no question how much the Round of 16 has already delivered in the playoff-shaking department. After what we’ve already seen at Atlanta and Watkins Glen, when looking ahead to the upcoming Bristol contest — expecting the unexpected should be a given.

Posted on by Dustin Albino

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — For the first time in the history of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, no championship-eligible driver cracked the top five in the finishing order in Sunday’s Go Bowling at The Glen at Watkins Glen International. Best in class was Chase Briscoe, managing a sixth-place finish.

With an early departure from the playoff opener at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Briscoe needed a stellar performance at The Glen to give him a fighting chance going into the Round of 16 elimination race at Bristol Motor Speedway.

RELATED: Buescher shakes up playoff field with Watkins Glen win | Race results from Sunday

In a chaotic 92-lap overtime contest, few playoff drivers didn’t have some semblance of an issue. Briscoe was the lead playoff car for much of the race, though, finishing third to Martin Truex Jr. and Alex Bowman in the opening stage. After starting deep in the field for Stage 2, he hustled the No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford to seventh, tallying 12 stage points for the afternoon.

Playing a two-stop strategy, Briscoe hit pit road for the final time on Lap 57, along with race leaders Ross Chastain and Shane van Gisbergen. When the race cycled out, the No. 14 remained inside the top 10.

Multiple late cautions didn’t harm Briscoe. With a sixth-place finish, he tallied 43 points for his day of work, outscoring the other 15 playoff drivers by at least 10 points. (Austin Cindric scored the second-most points among playoff drivers with 33.) He leaped five positions in the standings, moving from 16th to a tie for 11th, with a 27-point swing from where he started the race.

“We did everything we needed to do,” Briscoe told NASCAR.com after the race. “We probably only gave up two or three points that we could have got. Really good day. To get the most points scored is what we needed to do out of all the playoff drivers. It was everything we needed.

“We just have to go on to Bristol and hopefully survive the chaos. If we can go and do what we did today, get stage points, qualify well, it makes your way of getting through to the next round much easier. Stage points are going to be the name of the game — always are — and we need to qualify really well. It’s going to be a big difference maker for Bristol, so we need to do that.”

Bristol has been hit or miss for Briscoe in four Cup attempts. He often qualifies well, which bodes well for scoring stage points. But he will likely need to better his average finishing position of 16.8 if he wants to advance to the next round.

Stewart-Haas Racing has had recent success at the track with Kevin Harvick. Aric Almirola won the pole in 2022, the same race Briscoe qualified on the front row.

MORE: Cup Series standings | Cup Series schedule

That leaves Briscoe confident heading to Thunder Valley on Saturday, where the postseason field will officially be trimmed from 16 to 12 playoff drivers (7:30 p.m. ET, USA, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App).

Briscoe expects chaos, similar to Watkins Glen. Only two playoff drivers managed top-10 finishes on Sunday, with half of the 16 drivers finishing 20th or worse.

“I feel like that’s one of our best tracks as a company,” Briscoe said. “It’s hard to know what Bristol race we’re going to have. Are we going to have one like the spring, or are we going to have one like we typically do? I feel good about it either way.”

Posted on by Dustin Albino

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. – The famed seven-turn Watkins Glen International has had numerous thrilling finishes over the years. Sunday’s Go Bowling at The Glen was added to the list thanks to an epic battle to the finish between Chris Buescher and Shane van Gisbergen.

After executing the strategy right, Buescher sailed to a lead north of four seconds. Then, a caution flew for Harrison Burton, blowing a tire and having the carcass cover the track. All that hard work was erased.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

Buescher cleared the field, with rookie Carson Hocevar lining up to his outside during the next two restarts. Ultimately, the race was sent to overtime for a multi-car incident in the esses.

“I sure did like it being four seconds out front and cruising to victory, that sure seemed a lot easier,” Buescher said. “A little bit wilder at the end to have caution after caution was certainly frustrating.”

On the overtime restart, van Gisbergen lined up inside the second row and, while entering Turn 1, moved Buescher up the track to take the lead. The race for the win was on.

Van Gisbergen scooted away from Buescher for the next lap, but Buescher noticed he was reeling the No. 16 Chevrolet back in coming to the white flag. He knew passing a road course ace would be a tall order.

“We went up through the esses and I saw him hanging on to it, really loose,” Buescher said. “I went to a point where I wasn’t really comfortable at my entry marker into the Bus Stop, and I think he was still going. I had a feeling something big was going to happen and sure enough, he had that big slide.”

The No. 16 car went wide in the inner loop, clipping the grass. That allowed Buescher to cross over to the inside of van Gisbergen entering the carousel where the two collided. Buescher escaped with the lead, snapping a 37-race winless streak dating back to the 2023 regular-season finale at Daytona International Speedway.

“I knew when he got that spot on us on that last restart that it was going to be tricky to get back by him,” Buescher explained. “Wanted to make sure we stayed in the hunt and drove the thing hard and kept the pressure on him and made him realize that we were still there and it wasn’t going to be a cruise away. I think that was the ticket to make sure that you get other drivers looking up in their mirror instead of looking forward and it’s a good old-fashioned hard battle at the end.

“There have been so many fantastic last one or two laps here at The Glen and I certainly feel like I’m going to go back and watch that one, and it’s going to feel like it’s going to add up with some of the old school Ambrose, Keselowski battles or a handful of others.”

Van Gisbergen expected the contact after giving it to Buescher on the restart. He considered the contact from Buescher fair.

“I did, because I gave [a bump],” van Gisbergen told NASCAR.com, walking up pit road. “Just a little tap to get position on him. I knew there was a chance he would try to get me back. I was pushing really hard on the entries, and I had a little wobble into the Bus Stop and it put me in too early and just clipped the grass.”

Compared to the overtime finish of Saturday’s Xfinity Series race, van Gisbergen thought it was clean.

“There’s a scale of it where it’s like that and then another scale where it’s like the Xfinity race yesterday which was just crap,” he added. “I think it can work well sometimes.”

Had van Gisbergen not made a mistake in the inner loop, Buescher wasn’t going to go as far as wrecking him for the victory. That would have been unnecessary in his book.

MORE: Buescher details last-lap pass | SVG ‘gutted’ by loss

But after scoring a pair of runner-up finishes this season, including being on the wrong side of the closest finish in NASCAR history at Kansas Speedway in May, Buescher was content with how it played out.

“I didn’t like losing the lead there, but I didn’t think it was dirty; it was very aggressive racing,” Buescher stated. “I’m not out here to flat out wreck somebody. He didn’t do anything to me that deserved something like that, but we were going to race hard for it and have a battle all the way to the finish.”

After the race, van Gisbergen congratulated Buescher on the hard-fought win in Victory Lane. There was zero bad blood between the two drivers.

“I didn’t feel like there was anything that was dirty about it,” Buescher noted of his pass. “I didn’t expect him coming over to be mad about anything.

“On that note, I think that’s the one guy out here that’s bigger than me. So if there’s that moment where I feel like he is mad coming over, I better take note, right? Just on the flip side, I’m sure some others don’t like seeing me.”

A good pat on the back was all that was needed.

Posted on by Cameron Richardson

Most of the 16-driver playoff field will be limping into Bristol Motor Speedway on Saturday for the Round of 16 elimination race as only two drivers scored top 10s at Watkins Glen International on Sunday. It wasn’t who you would expect either, as Chase Briscoe and Austin Cindric kept their Fords clean through a chaotic 92-lap affair in the Finger Lakes to finish sixth and 10th, respectively.

WINNER

He had his heart broken multiple times in the regular season and ultimately came up short, unable to return to the postseason. Still, Chris Buescher shedded some of that misfortune at Watkins Glen as he moved Shane van Gisbergen in the carousel on the final lap to snag his first victory of 2024 and first of his career on a road course. It marks the fourth win in a row for Ford in the Cup Series.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos: Watkins Glen

WHO’S HOT?

Chase Briscoe. The driver of the No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford was easily the big winner of the day among the playoff field as Briscoe’s sixth-place finish was highest of the championship-eligible 16 drivers. Sunday was the first time dating back to the postseason’s introduction in 2004 that zero playoff drivers grabbed a top-five result. Briscoe capitalized on 12 stage points by the halfway point and kept his car out of the trouble in the final stage to bring home his second top 10 in the last three races. Going from minus-21 to the elimination line to plus-6, Briscoe will have a lot of momentum heading to Bristol where he can advance to the Round of 12.

Austin Cindric. A big day last weekend at Atlanta was doubled at Watkins Glen as Cindric’s 10th-place finish put him in third in the playoff standings and a whopping 43 points above the elimination line. Much like Briscoe, Cindric stayed out for the Stage 1 finish and snagged six points. The driver of the No. 2 Ford also stayed out of harm’s way throughout the final stage. Barring a bad outcome early at Bristol, Cindric is in exceptional position to advance to the Round of 12 and will just need to stay out of trouble, which is easier said than done at Bristol.

WHO’S NOT?

Everyone else. It’s hard to pinpoint just a handful of playoff drivers who aren’t hot because the remaining 14 drivers all struggled or were caught up in incidents at Watkins Glen.

Kyle Larson was the best of those to finish outside the top 10 with a 12th-place result. It was a good recovery for the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports team after a vehicle interference penalty sent Larson to the rear of the field during the final stage. He also grabbed three points in Stage 1 that salvaged an otherwise so-so day for the 2021 Cup champion. Daniel Suárez and Christopher Bell also recovered for top-15 results after both spun in Sunday’s race. The No. 99 Trackhouse Racing driver could not capitalize on everyone’s misfortunes but scored seven key points in Stage 1 and leaves The Glen 36 points above the elimination line despite his Stage 2 spin. Bell is the highest in the playoff standings without a win at plus-46.

bell spins at watkins glen
Sean Gardner | Getty Images

Joey Logano (15th), Alex Bowman (18th), Chase Elliott (19th) and Martin Truex Jr. (20th) rounded out the top 20 for playoff drivers. Elliott and Truex were caught up in late-race incidents that caused heavy damage to the likes of Brad Keselowski (26th) and William Byron (34th).

Ty Gibbs (22nd) and Tyler Reddick (27th) could not find their way to the front of the field after poor qualifying efforts Saturday and Reddick was spun in the closing laps, leading the race into NASCAR Overtime. Harrison Burton, who finished 24th, blew a tire with 11 laps to go and is now 20 points below the elimination line entering Bristol and last of the 16-driver standings.

The playoff-driver woes Sunday began with Denny Hamlin and Ryan Blaney from the get-go on Lap 1 as Corey LaJoie spun Kyle Busch in the Bus Stop, culminating in a chain-reaction wreck. Hamlin hit Busch and had another setback later in the race as Keselowski spun Hamlin as the No. 11, Keselowski and Larson tried going three-wide through the esses.

Blaney’s day ended after left-rear contact with Keselowski brought the No. 12 Ford to a halt on the track and Blaney couldn’t drive his vehicle back to pit road.

HAMLIN INCIDENTS: Lap 1 wreck | Final stage spin

Despite two separate incidents, Hamlin recovered for a 23rd-place result and sits just six points below the elimination race heading to Bristol where he’s won the last two concrete races.

BUBBLE WATCH

RANKDRIVERCUTOFF
9Kyle Larson26
10William Byron25
11Chase Briscoe6
12Ty Gibbs6
ELIMINATION LINE
13Denny Hamlin-6
14Brad Keselowski-12
15Martin Truex Jr.-14
16Harrison Burton-20
Posted on by Holly Cain

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — In a largely chaotic race — action-packed literally from the drop of the green flag — it was RFK Racing’s Chris Buescher who prevailed in NASCAR Overtime in Sunday’s Go Bowling at The Glen, passing road-course ace Shane van Gisbergen in a bumper-to-bumper last-lap duel to claim his first career road-course victory at the famed Watkins Glen International.

Van Gisbergen took the lead from the second row in a daring three-wide move on an overtime restart, but Buescher chased him down. Buescher’s No. 17 RFK Racing Ford and van Gisbergen’s No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet made contact in the course’s famous Bus Stop, then Buescher slid his Mustang inside van Gisbergen’s Camaro in the esses and motored off to a 0.979-second win over the New Zealand superstar in the second NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs race of the season.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

Spire Motorsports’ Carson Hocevar, Trackhouse Racing’s Ross Chastain and Spire’s Zane Smith rounded out the top five. Stewart-Haas Racing’s Chase Briscoe placed sixth as the highest-finishing playoff driver, followed by Front Row Motorsports’ Michael McDowell, Spire’s Corey LaJoie, SHR’s Ryan Preece and Team Penske’s Austin Cindric.

Briscoe and Cindric were the only two playoff drivers to finish among the top 10 in what was a perpetually dramatic day for the 16 playoff drivers racing for the NASCAR Cup Series championship.

“Oh man, it was such a good Ford Mustang, speed was so great and long-run speed phenomenal,” said the 31-year-old Texan Buescher, who just missed qualifying for the playoffs when Chase Briscoe won the regular-season finale at Darlington Raceway three weeks ago.

“I thought we lost it there on the last one, but, man, to stay right there with him. It was a spot he was better than us, but he just missed it, so I tried to cross over and just hard racing. What an awesome finish. To be that good for so much at the end of the race — all race — to get a win is good.

“We came here to be spoilers, and we’re going to do that.”

Van Gisbergen, who won the Chicago Street Race last season in his NASCAR Cup Series debut, was a factor all day, as expected for the former Australian Supercars champion, who will compete full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series next year in the No. 88 Chevrolet for Trackhouse Racing.

“Driver error, yeah,” van Gisbergen said of his slip in the Bus Stop. “I knew Chris was really going to send it and push me if he could get there, and as I turned back, I was a bit loose and clipped the inside wall. Just driver error, and I’m gutted.

“The race was really awesome there with Ross [Chastain] and Chris [Buescher] and the others at the end, I’m gutted we couldn’t get it. We had a lot of fun, but I’m pretty angry at myself.”

It was a fitting dramatic ending to a day that shook up the playoff standings from the opening lap to the final lap (92). Twelve of the 16 Playoff drivers suffered some sort of “challenge” on the day.

RELATED: Latest NASCAR Playoffs standings

Reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion Ryan Blaney — who led the points standings entering the race — was eliminated from the race on Lap 1 after being innocently caught up in a collision that included half a dozen cars, including fellow playoff competitors Denny Hamlin, Brad Keselowski and Christopher Bell.

It was just the beginning of a long, challenging day for Hamlin, who was involved in another accident mid-race. He was part of a three-wide line of playoff drivers – also including Kyle Larson and Keselowski – trying to make it through the track’s famous series of turns called the esses. Unfortunately for Hamlin, there wasn’t enough room for the wide challenges, and his No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota again suffered damage.

SHOP: Race winner gear

Larson and fellow playoff drivers Regular Season Champion Tyler Reddick, Bell, Hendrick Motorsports’ Chase Elliott and William Byron were involved in multiple incidents throughout the day.

The high-speed, high-action day ended a streak of five consecutive Hendrick Motorsports wins at the historic 2.45-mile Watkins Glen track. Among the playoff drivers, Larson finished 12th, followed by Trackhouse Racing’s Daniel Suarez, Bell and Logano rounding out the top 15.

Hendrick’s Alex Bowman was 18th, followed — in order — by teammate Elliott and Joe Gibbs Racing’s Martin Truex Jr.

JGR’s Ty Gibbs was 22nd, followed immediately by his teammate Hamlin and Wood Brothers’ Harrison Burton. Keselowski was 26th and Reddick 27th. Byron ended up 34th, and Blaney was 38th, the first car out.

Those results mean that with one race left in this opening three-race playoff round, Bell holds a three-point edge on Cindric atop the standings, with Bowman five points back. Logano’s win at Atlanta two weeks ago scored him an automatic bid into the next round.

Heading into next Saturday night’s first-round elimination race at Bristol Motor Speedway, Hamlin is now ranked 13th, six points below his JGR teammate Gibbs on the elimination line. Keselowski is 12 points back, Truex 14 points back and Burton is 20 points off the transfer position.

“I thought our Camry was solid, needed to be better on long runs for sure, but worked hard and persevered and had a decent day, but as always, you get the cautions at the end, and guys just run through you,” said a frustrated but determined Truex, who ran up front early and was — at one point — more than a dozen points above the elimination line.

MORE: Cup Series schedule

“It’s just crazy all these races always come down to this and I don’t really understand how guys can call themselves the best in the world when they just drive through everyone on restarts at the end of these races,” Truex added. “It’s very frustrating, but it is what it is these days.”

The NASCAR Cup Series will conclude a triple-header race weekend at the famed Bristol high-banks with Saturday night’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race (7 p.m. ET, USA, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App). Denny Hamlin is the defending winner.

NOTE: Post-race inspection in the Cup Series garage at Watkins Glen concluded without issue, confirming Buescher as the race winner.

Posted on by Dustin Albino

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — Denny Hamlin is delighted that the Round of 16 closes with Bristol Motor Speedway because the first two weeks of the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs have been calamity for the No. 11 team.

That frustration continued Sunday at Watkins Glen International, where the driver of the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota finished 23rd, collecting just 15 points in the second race of the postseason and leaving the 2.45-mile road course beneath the provisional elimination line.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

By overdriving Turn 1 during qualifying, Hamlin was credited with a 22nd-place starting position. That threw the No. 11 team behind the eight ball from the get-go, needing to score stage points. Hamlin didn’t even make it half a lap into the 90-lap race before he had sizable damage. Christopher Bell and Kyle Busch spun around in the Bus Stop, and when Busch came across the race track, Hamlin piled in.

“It sucks because I knew the damage was bad,” Hamlin said of his mindset after the opening lap. “I was really looking forward to this race, believe it or not, because we made some really good adjustments overnight to help with where I felt like we were going to be a little bit off. I wanted to just race and see what my car had. Just never had a chance.”

In the same wreck that retired Ryan Blaney from the race, Chris Gabehart, crew chief of the No. 11 team, had a synchronized plan in place. In an extended caution, the team had seven minutes to work on the car on pit road, make minimum speed and get off the damaged vehicle policy clock. That goal was accomplished.

“You’re a whisker from finishing dead last, not getting off of DVP,” Gabehart told NASCAR.com. “Once my team, who I’m so proud of, Brandon Griffith my car chief, all the mechanics, the pit crew — it takes everyone being coordinated to work your way out of a hole like that in just seven minutes. I can’t say enough how proud I am for even giving us a shot. The minute we left that scenario, the new goal was to try to figure out a way to run about 25th or 26th because realistically, I thought it was the best we could do with the damage we had and at least give ourselves a shot to go to Bristol.”

Hamlin lost a lap but was the free-pass recipient at the end of the opening stage. With a variety of strategies playing out, he even scored a stage point in Stage 2.

MORE: Truex wins Stage 1 | Suárez stuck in gravel at Stage 2 end

In a three-wide battle with Brad Keselowski and Kyle Larson through the esses, Hamlin’s race derailed for a second time on Lap 46. The No. 11 car backed into the outside wall and ricocheted around to receive nose damage.

“We were three-wide and [Keselowski], I thought, could have let off there because we were so far ahead,” Hamlin added. “He kept it three-wide and I wrecked.”

Hamlin received another free pass in the waning laps and avoided chaos in a rash of late cautions. He took the checkered flag in 23rd, ahead of five other playoff drivers.

“Great effort to keep us in it,” Hamlin said. “Obviously, the car is just destroyed. To finish 23rd, I guess is a positive. We were in a worse place that mostly all day and luckily, we had some attrition at the end that helped us out.”

With Bristol on the horizon, the No. 11 team is confident. Hamlin has won the last two races at the ‘World’s Fastest Half-Mile,’ combining to lead 305 of 1,000 laps contested in those events. He enters the race six points below the elimination line, which is currently held by both Ty Gibbs and Chase Briscoe in a tie six points above the line.

“I feel like we can go there and win,” Hamlin stated. “… We feel like we control our destiny there.

Gabehart is just as confident.

“Six out ain’t going to be enough to hold the 11 back at Bristol,” he said. “The ‘but’ is, we’ve got to have the asteroids to quit falling on top of the 11 car. Our performance is matched by very, very few. We just aren’t on the lucky side of things right now.

“This week, we made our luck by qualifying poorly. No one is perfect and this team showed that it’s championship caliber today. I can promise you nobody is going to beat us on performance at Bristol. Six ain’t enough. Now, does it go our way? We’ll see, but six isn’t enough to beat us on performance.”

The Round of 16 finale is set for Saturday at 7:30 p.m. ET on USA, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio and NBC Sports App.

Posted on by Staff Report

Multiple playoff cars were involved in a Lap 1 wreck through the Bus Stop at Watkins Glen International on Sunday afternoon, and no one felt the impact worse — literally, figuratively — than Ryan Blaney.

Contact with Corey LaJoie caused Kyle Busch’s No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet to spin around and collect playoff drivers Blaney, Brad Keselowski, Denny Hamlin and Christopher Bell through the exit, immediately creating postseason implications in the second of three Round of 16 races in the 2024 Cup Series Playoffs.

RELATED: Race results | At-track photos

Damage to Blaney’s No. 12 Team Penske Ford proved terminal, with Blaney’s car taken to the garage and finished the race in 38th place, last. Damage to Hamlin’s No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota additionally forced him to pit road, costing him and the team one lap as repairs were made — and while Hamlin would get his lap back, he was involved in another wreck on Lap 46 racing three-wide with Keselowski and Kyle Larson.

“Yeah, I don’t know,” Blaney said of his perspective of the incident. “Just running easy through the Bus Stop, and I don’t know who got into who or spun. Thought I had it missed, and we all hit pretty lightly and I hit the left front in the wrong spot and it did something to it.

“Yeah, we made a half a lap. Very disappointing, but we will see how the day goes and have to go to work at Bristol next week.”

Blaney, the defending Cup Series champion, entered the day 45 points above the elimination line, highest among all playoff drivers to yet collect a playoff victory.

Also involved in the incident were Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Bubba Wallace and Ryan Preece. Stenhouse was unable to continue and was credited with a 37th-place finish.

Posted on by Dustin Albino

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — Adam Stevens was enjoying a warm summer night in Ohio at his sister’s house during the two-week Olympic break, jumping into the pool, playing with his niece and nephews. Then, it all went wrong.

Jumping off the diving board for what Stevens believes to be the seventh or eighth time, both of his patella tendons ruptured. The next day, the championship-winning crew chief returned to North Carolina to get an MRI and on Thursday morning went into surgery.

With the NASCAR season getting back underway at Richmond Raceway on Aug. 11, he knew he was going to have to adjust the way he worked on Christopher Bell’s No. 20 Toyota. Car chief Chris Sherwood was named the interim crew chief while Stevens set up shop at Joe Gibbs Racing’s headquarters in Huntersville, North Carolina.

RELATED: Full weekend schedule for Watkins Glen | At-track photos

“It’s the exact same role, you’re just not at the track,” Stevens told NASCAR.com on Sunday morning at Watkins Glen International, site of the Round of 16 playoff race (3 p.m. ET, USA.) “You don’t have hands on, eyes on everything, so you’re relying on your people that much more. As far as the functions and the responsibilities, it didn’t change.”

The only thing that changed during the weekends were the debriefs. Instead of gathering in a group in the team hauler, Stevens would chime in via Zoom or by phone.

“I didn’t really notice much difference,” Bell stated. “Other than [Stevens] being there and having his presence around the team, it was important. As far as on-track performance, I don’t think it made much of a difference.”

During the four-week stretch to end the regular season, Bell had three top-10 finishes. The lone exception was getting involved in a multi-car wreck at Michigan International Speedway when Kyle Larson spun near the front of the field.

Stevens returned to the track for the first time at Atlanta Motor Speedway for only race day. He was hobbling around with big leg braces, measuring from kneecap to shin, locking his legs straight out. He said he was having to “walk like Frankenstein.”

The logistics of getting on and off the plane, in addition to on and off the pit box were planned out. But he had enough room to weasel his way in and be somewhat comfortable.

This weekend at Watkins Glen International marks Stevens’ first full race weekend back at the track. He’s able to walk around much easier now, having a smaller brace. He was happy being back at the track.

MORE: Full crew rosters for The Glen

“I think I’m far enough along now — six weeks post-surgery, which is the mark that they will start letting you bend your knees,” he said. “It’s hard to get around when you can’t bend your knees.”

The No. 20 Toyota will take the green flag from 17th position in today’s second race in the Round of 16. Bell enters the 90-lap event third on the playoff grid, with a 40-point buffer over Brad Keselowski, who is the first driver on the outside looking in.

“We weren’t as good as we wanted to be in practice, but we made it a little bit better,” Stevens said. “We didn’t qualify well, but the race is going to be a different animal. We didn’t qualify that great last year, either and finished third.

“You’ve got to keep the perspective of what we’re trying to do here. We’re trying to advance to the next round. We need to have a solid day, limit our mistakes and capitalize on other people’s mistakes and go home happy.”

In three starts at Watkins Glen, Bell has never finished worse than eighth.