Brad Keselowski Struggles As Driver But Wins As Owner At Watkins Glen

Brad Keselowski has mightily struggled on road courses for the past few years, and Sunday's Watkins Glen race was no exception. After a poor qualifying run and two penalties for speeding and a loose tire, Keselowski's team still made an aggressive strategy play in Stage 3 to go extra long on his final set of […]

Austin Cindric Beats Most Playoff Drivers In Second Straight 10th-Place Finish

Austin Cindric backed up his 10th-place finish at Atlanta with another at Watkins Glen on Sunday, placing him three points behind Christopher Bell for the playoff points lead. Although two 10th-place finishes would normally be nowhere near the points lead, he had the great fortune that most of the other playoff contenders either crashed or […]

Ross Chastain's Dominant Run Ultimately Foiled By Stage 2 Caution

Although Ross Chastain has surprisingly lacked speed for most of the season, he had his best run of the year in Sunday's Watkins Glen race. Chastain is not normally a great qualifier, so his pole indicated that he would probably be a significant race contender. He dominated the first two stages and led 51 laps, […]

Alex Bowman's Stage-Point Play Costs Him But Helps His Playoff Position

Although Alex Bowman's fourth-place starting position at Watkins Glen matched his best of the season, he was one of many drivers who elected to go for stage points at the end of Stage 1 even if it took him out of the race for the win later. Bowman remained in fourth for the entirety of […]

Ryan Blaney Likely Safe To Advance In Playoffs Despite Lap 1 Crash

Ryan Blaney, who entered Sunday's Go Bowling at the Glen as the playoff points leader, crashed and finished last in an opening-lap crash triggered when Corey LaJoie spun out Kyle Busch. While trying to weave his way through the wrecked cars, he was lightly grazed on the door by John Hunter Nemechek. Although it looked […]

Bubba Wallace Improving On Road Courses But Likely Won't Contend At Watkins Glen

Road courses have always been Bubba Wallace's Achilles heel in the NASCAR Cup Series, as he has only achieved one top-five and two top-10 finishes in 30 road-course starts, with those coming on the Indianapolis and Charlotte rovals that are quite different from a natural road course like Watkins Glen. Having said that, he's definitely […]

Daniel Suarez's Momentum And Watkins Glen Record Bode Well For Playoffs

Although Daniel Suarez is not a lock to advance in the playoffs by any means, it's looking pretty good for him despite how slow he was for most of the season. His second-place finish at Atlanta put him 22 points above the cutline and now he is going to Watkins Glen, where he starts eighth […]

Juan Pablo Montoya Returns To NASCAR But Is Well Past His Prime

Juan Pablo Montoya makes his return to the NASCAR Cup Series for the first time in a decade at Watkins Glen, which brought a lot of renewed attention to his career and legacy. Although many ignorant fans reduced his career to little more than crashing into a jet dryer in the 2012 Daytona 500, it's […]

Road Courses A Low-Key Strength For Corey LaJoie

Although Corey LaJoie has caught more heat for his performance than any driver in a long time, road courses have been one of the sole bright spots for LaJoie this year as he gave Spire Motorsports its then-best qualifying run of fifth at Circuit of the Americas and scored his best-ever driver rating on a […]

Brad Keselowski In Danger Of Missing The Round Of 12

Brad Keselowski's season has been fairly underrated as he currently leads the NASCAR Cup Series in pass differential with 363, which is not something you would likely deduce by the eye test. However, even though he's probably been a top 12 this season, his hopes of advancing to the Round of 12 do not look […]

Road Courses Remain Erik Jones' Achilles Heel

Erik Jones has had a fairly disastrous 2024 season, as he has failed to lead a lap, and his only top-10 finish came 27 races ago in the Daytona 500. Don't expect that to change at Watkins Glen, where Jones starts 25th. Although he did have two top-five finishes there with Joe Gibbs Racing, since […]

Carson Hocevar Qualifies Poorly But Should Deliver Another Solid Finish

Carson Hocevar looks poised to win the NASCAR Cup Series Rookie of the Year battle even though Josh Berry has had a faster car mainly because Berry has been the most crash-prone driver on the circuit while Hocevar has been surprisingly clean. He has been delivering consistent finishes with clocklike regularity as he has only […]

Daniel Hemric Could Benefit From Shane van Gisbergen's Setup Notes At Watkins Glen

Daniel Hemric starts 27th for Sunday's Watkins Glen race. He has only raced at this track once in the NASCAR Cup Series with the Gen 6 car in 2019, where he crashed and finished six laps down. Even in the Xfinity Series, he has never registered a top-10 finish, but he did run better as […]

Noah Gragson Qualifies Well But Probably Won't Sustain It

Despite not being particularly noted as a road racer, Noah Gragson delivered an unexpected ninth-place qualifying run for the lame-duck Stewart-Haas Racing team at Watkins Glen on Saturday. He surprisingly outqualified most of the pre-race favorites. However, he has never finished better than 14th in a road course in the NASCAR Cup Series and he's […]

Austin Cindric Weaker On Road Courses Than Advertised

Austin Cindric has a reputation as a road course specialist that is not entirely warranted. Although he was generally very good in his NASCAR Cup Series starts on road courses in 2021 and 2022, he has only managed two top ten finishes in the nine road course races since. It seems he may have had […]

Harrison Burton Not A Noted Road Racer

Harrison Burton did not get the good luck he needed at Atlanta to have any realistic chance of advancing in the NASCAR playoffs, but he probably wouldn't have been able to do it even if his Team Penske satellite team had dominated with the official Penske teams since Watkins Glen has never been a strong […]

Ryan Blaney Unlikely To Run Well At Watkins Glen

Ryan Blaney has never been very good on road courses relative to his performance on other tracks and this trend has been increasingly pronounced with the Next Gen chassis. He has never finished in the top five or seriously contended on any road or street course with this chassis. In his last 13 races on […]

Ty Gibbs Sits On Playoff Bubble But Was The Fastest Driver

In one of Toyota's least competitive races of the season, Ty Gibbs was their primary bright spot at Atlanta on Sunday. He vastly outran the other Toyota drivers and scored three of Toyota's six stage points. Gibbs first took the lead when he and Bubba Wallace stayed out of the pits during the caution for […]

Chase Elliott Does What Was Needed At Atlanta

Chase Elliott had a strong but somewhat anonymous run at Atlanta, spending most of the race in the back half of the top 10 on a day when all the Hendrick Motorsports cars were fast, but none of them seemed to have winning speed. Elliott had an extremely consistent run, finishing seventh in Stage 1, […]

Austin Cindric Wins Stage 2 At Atlanta In Best Career Drive

Although Austin Cindric came up short at Atlanta, he had probably his best ever NASCAR Cup Series run on a day that the three Team Penske teammates dominated in general. After finishing second to his teammate Ryan Blaney in the first stage, he outdueled Alex Bowman early in Stage 2 to take the lead, which […]

Harrison Burton's Playoff Cinderella Story Probably Ends With Last-Lap Crash

Harrison Burton's Penske satellite operation at Wood Brothers did benefit somewhat from Penske's unbeatable speed on Sunday at Atlanta with a 16th-place average running position (one of Burton's best of the season), but admittedly he was nowhere near as fast as the three Team Penske drivers, who each won a stage and had three of […]

Chase Briscoe's Stage 1 Crash Likely Eliminates Him From Round Of 12

Chase Briscoe was always going to be a playoff longshot because he has below average speed this year and even his rookie teammate Josh Berry has generally been faster. Briscoe likely needed a lot of luck to advance in the playoffs, but he did not get that in yesterday's Atlanta race when Kyle Larson hit […]

Ryan Blaney Narrowly Evades Crash To Finish Third And Take Points Lead

Although Ryan Blaney failed to win Sunday's Quaker State 400 at Atlanta, he ran well there as usual, earning a third-place finish. Blaney was the first driver to make a pass for the lead in the race, overtaking pole-sitter Michael McDowell on Lap 30 and leading the rest of Stage 1. Although he never led […]

Bubba Wallace Should Contend at Atlanta, but More Likely to Win at Talladega

Although Bubba Wallace narrowly missed the playoffs after Chase Briscoe's win in last week's Southern 500, drafting tracks tend to be his best track type. However, he tends to be better at Daytona and Talladega than at Atlanta, where he never earned a top ten finish until this year's winter race when he finished fifth. […]

Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. Still Consistent on Drafting Tracks, but Leading Much Less

Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. has been regarded as one of the leading drafting track specialists for many years now, and he did indeed earn a sixth-place finish in the winter race at Atlanta and a fourth at Talladega this year, but his speed decline that has persisted throughout the season has affected him at those tracks […]

Ryan Preece Unlikely to Benefit From Ford Speed at Atlanta

Ryan Preece has not had the speed of any of his Stewart-Haas Racing teammates this season, and that looks likely to continue in this afternoon's Atlanta race. While all three of his teammates have had bursts of speed on drafting tracks, Preece mostly hasn't since his JTG-Daugherty Racing days and his 21st place qualifying run […]

Michael McDowell Wins Series-Best Fifth Pole at Atlanta but Probably Lacks Racecraft to Win

Michael McDowell won his fifth pole of the season for this afternoon's Quaker State 400, tying Kyle Larson for the most this season. This marked his fourth consecutive pole on a drafting track, the longest such streak since Bill Elliott won six straight poles at Daytona and Talladega in 1985 and 1986. However, while qualifying […]

Erik Jones Has Lost Superspeedway Mojo Since Switch to Toyota

Erik Jones used to be regarded for many years as one of the best superspeedway drivers, but this seems to have faded in recent years. Although he did lead often in drafting races in the first year with the Next Gen chassis in 2022, he has seldom contended at those tracks or anywhere else since […]

Expect Carson Hocevar to Ride in the Back Again at Atlanta

Although Carson Hocevar had his first crash DNF since the Daytona 500 in last week's Southern 500, he has been surprisingly good at avoiding crashes despite his overaggressive style, which is the main reason he is beating Josh Berry for Rookie of the Year even though Berry has had more speed. He seems to be […]

Daniel Hemric Consistent on Drafting Tracks Despite Lack of Speed

Although Daniel Hemric has been one of the slowest drivers this season, his 14th-place qualifying run yesterday matches his best of the season at the spring Dover race and he's been genuinely quite consistent on drafting tracks because he's been less crash-prone than most other drivers this year and crash avoidance is often sufficient to […]