William Byron won the rain-shortened Atlanta race for his series leading fourth win of the year. Byron was leading the field when the caution for rain flew and with the race past the halfway point, it was a legit finish when the rain made its way to the track.
Ford was on the pole at the beginning of the race that saw Aric Almirola and Ryan Blaney leading the field to green. Almirola led 46 laps and Blaney 20 as the Fords led much of the early going. Blaney won an intensely fought Stage 1. The racing was about as good as I have seen this year. The repaved track combined with this package allowed for passing and high speed door to door racing, and this is before the drivers even were told about inclement weather approaching.
Once word got out, the racing was still action packed and saw Fords lead the way again with Brad Keselowski, leading a total of 19 race laps, winning Stage 2 followed by the Fords of Ryan Blaney, Chris Buescher and Austin Cindric to sweep the top five positions.
With weather approaching, Chevy had made it up to the front with Byron fighting off challenges from Daniel Suarez, AJ Allmendinger and Michael McDowell. It was not an easy race night for Byron. He started 18th but knew he had a fast car. He then spun on lap 80 and was penalized for a pit road violation before winding his way up to the front.
Pit strategies had worked themselves out as the rain approached. At one point, teams felt that the race would get called before the end of Stage 2 and then it became clear that we would see that Stage end under green. Teams that had gambled on a shorter race were suddenly pitting for fuel to make it until the rain hit. Interestingly, some of the teams that gambled on the rain saw their drivers up front at the end through strategy and attrition.
Kyle Larson led 4 laps but then ended up junk after he got loose and triggered a spin. Corey Lajoie was having a decent race before coming into contact with Erik Jones, who was in contact with a few other drivers during the race and probably didn’t make a lot of new friends.
Sentimental favorite Kevin Harvick had a rough night not leading anything but parade laps with Richard Childress and then found himself spinning and finishing P30.
Denny Hamlin had a front row seat to more than one spin and was responsible for some of the action himself. Not sure if that was due to an ill handling car or because he has so much respect for how others drive that he just couldn’t stay off of them.
Things of note: It was a good points night for several teams
In addition to Byron winning his 4th race, Suarez (P2) and McDowell (P3) finished strong and are sitting on the cusp of final playoff positions. If McDowell had not had some front end damage, he was strong enough to have won the race.
AJ Allmendinger (P4) also had a good race and sits just below the cut playoff off. Pointing his way in will be very hard but he still has a couple of chances at wins with Indy and Watkins Glen road courses coming up. This race showed their superspeedway program is improving.
RFK is getting better every week and although Chris Buescher (P15) fell out of the Top 10, the organization has to like where they are headed.
And while they are nowhere near a playoff position, Justin Haley (P8) and JJ Yeley (P7) had to be proud of their finishes as well. That’s two solid finishes for Haley in a row.
Chase Elliott is still mired deep in the field and his finish (P13) didn’t help him out at all in his quest to get into the playoffs. He still has chances with 7 races left, but he can’t rely on drivers he needs to leapfrog having a bad day. Several of those drivers finished ahead of him once again and that is not a recipe for getting into the playoffs. Contending for wins is how you do it and that team is far off that mark right now.
Next up: New Hampshire
Another mid-afternoon start for NBC and another potential win for Kevin Harvick. He has two wins here and has finished out of the Top 5 just once in the last five races and that was a P6 finish.
Christopher Bell is the defending race winner and finished P2 in 2021.
Chase Elliott was P2 in 2022 but this has been a hit or miss track for him. He is ranked 6th in average finishes amongst active drivers since 2020. Not the greatest to get back to the front.
Brad Keselowksi won here in 2020 and leads drivers in laps led (26%) since 2020. He also has a Top 5 and Top 10 in his past two NH races.
Toyota posted 4 drivers in the top 6 last year and I could see another strong Toyota outing. Christopher Bell has been just behind teammate MTJ and Denny Hamlin should be able to get a Top 10 in spite of his lack of performance lately. MTJ led 172 laps and won both NH Stages in 2022.
Ford posted the same kind of P1-6 dominance in 2021 with Aric Almirola bringing home P1. The one outlier? Bell in P2. Ford also posted 6 out of the top 8 in 2020 with Hamlin and MTJ messing up the sweep. Keselowksi took P1.
So yeah, kind of a track that has seen Ford and Toyota ruining any Chevy celebration.
Choose wisely, grasshopper.
(Photo by Jim Fluharty/HHP for Chevy Racing)
