Did You Notice? … Two of the four NASCAR Cup Series playoff races have been won by drivers that failed to qualify for the postseason?
While non-playoff drivers playing spoiler in the postseason is nothing new, it’s the nature in how Chris Buescher and Ross Chastain scored their wins at Watkins Glen International and Kansas Speedway, respectively, that has raised eyebrows.
At Watkins Glen International, five of the top-10 starters were non-playoff drivers. Chastain won the pole, while his Trackhouse Racing proxy teammate Shane van Gisbergen started third. The pair dominated the first stage, but they sacrificed stage points and hit pit road early in order to maintain track position.
Eight of the top-10 finishers in stage one consisted of playoff drivers, and they were immediately banished to the back of the field at the start of stage two, never to return to winning contention.
You see, Watkins Glen was promised as a race of tire wear, with tires that were reportedly losing two seconds of lap time in a 20-lap run. It was expected that the tire wear would lead to more passing, but that’s not what happened at all. All the playoff drivers thinking that they could make up that lost ground suddenly found themselves making zero progress, and the drivers that pitted before stage end never relinquished their advantage.
For non-playoff drivers, stage points meant absolutely nothing. Track position and racing for the win were the only things that mattered, and they had the race on lock. Non-playoff drivers combined to lead 81 of the race’s 92 laps, and when it came time for drivers to pit before the end of stage two, all the drivers that got burned by staying out in stage one humorously hit pit road the first moment they could.
Buescher, who missed a playoff spot by a mere six points, short pit both stages and found himself in the top five as the highest running car on fresh tires to start the final stage. The final stage developed into a battle between Buescher, van Gisbergen, Chastain and Carson Hocevar, with Buescher prevailing over van Gisbergen in a thrilling final lap duel.
Just two playoff drivers finished in the top 10, with Chase Briscoe finishing the best of the playoff faithful in sixth. The entire top five of a playoff race was swept by non-playoff drivers, marking the first time that had ever happened in the 21-year history of NASCAR’s postseason.
Flash forward to Kansas, and it was a similar flip of track position that allowed non-playoff drivers to shine. The first two stages had been relatively cut and dry with Christopher Bell domination, until a rash of late cautions toward the end of stage two led to a split decision on pit road.
The playoff drivers, wanting to capitalize on the lucrative stage points, stayed on the track, aside from a few exceptions like Tyler Reddick. Meanwhile, the non-playoff drivers of Chastain, Hocevar, Kyle Busch, Martin Truex Jr. (who had been eliminated) and Hocevar pitted before the end of stage two and found themselves as the leaders to start stage three.
All the front-running playoff drivers that stayed out — Alex Bowman, William Byron, Denny Hamlin and Bell to a name a few — suddenly found themselves mired outside the top 20 after pitting.
What didn’t help matters was a 65-lap green flag run, which allowed all the non-playoff drivers at the front of the field to lengthen their advantage through a round of the green flag pit stops. The playoff drivers on fresher tires did make their way toward the front. But the tires eventually equalized, and those drivers were forced to play catch up against the non-playoff drivers that strategized for the win.
Byron went from 24th to second, while Bowman, Bell and Hamlin climbed back to finish sixth, seventh and eighth, respectively. But the entire final stage was controlled by the non-playoff cars of Busch, Chastain and Truex. Byron gave Chastain a run for his money in the final 20-lap dash, but the deficit was too much to overcome.
That parallels of Watkins Glen and Kansas are all too familiar: the non-playoff drivers only had to focus on chasing wins, and they utilized pit strategy to go for the win. Meanwhile, the playoff drivers played a race-losing strategy that allowed them to acquire extra stage points at the expense of a potential trophy.
It’s rather paradoxical that in a championship format that emphasizes winning, it’s the non-playoff drivers that have prioritized winning, while the championship hopefuls have done the exact opposite: they’re points racing.
Only a fraction of the playoff field can win in each round, so the conventional logic says that it’s better for playoff drivers to score stage points in the hopes that others won’t.
The playoff teams were faced with 4th & Goal at the one-yard line at both Watkins Glen and Kansas, and instead of going for the touchdown, they took the chip-shot field goal. They led at halftime but lost by the end of regulation.
Points racing doesn’t appear in the regular season, even when a driver has already punched their playoff ticket. There’s a 26-race season before the playoff points are rewarded and the points are reset, so there is far less risk in drivers gambling for wins.
But we’re now in the midst of three-race seasons, and losing points from a failed gamble hurts far more now than it does at any other point of the year. Instead of seeing playoff drivers make aggressive moves for the win and seeing crew chiefs employ unorthodox strategies to win, everyone has to play it safe.
Time travel two weeks ahead to the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL and it’s going to be the same story. The non-playoff drivers will forego stage points and monopolize track position while the playoff drivers close to the cut line will have to reluctantly take the stage points and throw their chances of winning out the window.
Whether it’s by design or an unintended consequence of the rules, teams in the playoffs have been boxed into running the same conservative, points-racing playbook that led to the playoffs in the first place.
Did You Notice? … Quick hits before taking off …
- Truex finished third for his first top-five finish since Kansas in May. More importantly, the finish ended an absolute horror show of results for the No. 19 team, as Truex entered Kansas with eight consecutive finishes of 20th or worse.
- Kyle Larson led zero laps at Kansas after a crash in stage one, which marked the first 1.5-mile race since 2022 where he failed to lead at least one lap. Entering Kansas, he had led 1,097 laps in his last 11 starts on 1.5-milers.
- Despite winning the pole and leading 122 laps, Bell was only able to muster a seventh-place finish after hitting the wall twice. The polesitter has only gone on to win one of the last 49 Cup races.
- Kansas marked 44 consecutive Cup races without a repeat winner, two away from breaking the longest drought in Cup Series history. The most recent driver to go back-to-back was Buescher at Richmond Raceway and Michigan International Speedway in August 2023.
About the author
Stephen Stumpf is the NASCAR Content Director for Frontstretch and is a three-year veteran of the site. His weekly columns include “Stat Sheet” and “4 Burning Questions.” He also writes commentary, contributes to podcasts, edits articles and is frequently at the track for on-site coverage.
Can find on Twitter @stephen_stumpf.
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Isn’t it great that drivers are not racing for POINTS any more, just like Brian envisioned when he changed the POINTS system because the Latford system was too confusing?
They’re racing to the next cut line. Wins are great but harder to get. 2nd is good enough. Could even get you the championship if you finished 2nd ahead of the other three.
Yes they’ve always raced for points when they couldn’t get the win. This points system gives them more options and strategies to get those points so they can race for the championship.
What championship is that. ONE race, highest finisher among 4 teams is the season champion. 3 cars blow an engine, the 4th is the season champion. Yeah right, nice championship.