What Happened?
Ty Gibbs held off a hard-charging and win-hungry Christopher Bell at Iowa Speedway on Sunday, Aug. 9 to pick up his second career NASCAR Cup Series victory. Ryan Blaney, Josh Berry and Denny Hamlin finished behind them to complete the top five finishers.
Gibbs’ victory is the first time a driver has earned his first two career victories on short tracks since Kurt Busch in 2002. It also catapults the No. 54 into second in the standings.
What Really Happened?
A whole lot of shuffling in the points standings, and a whole lot of mixed days for the drivers on the bubble of The Chase.
But in the end, does it even matter?
Surviving into the top 16 in the points standings and qualifying for the postseason this year isn’t like what it was last year. There won’t be any sudden leaps for the points lead from 16th or any shock eliminations like last year or the 11 years prior.
We already know who our contenders are, and we also know who they aren’t.
Ross Chastain had one heck of a much-needed day on Sunday, earning 13 stage points and finishing seventh, matching his second-best finish of the season. Even better for the ailing Trackhouse Racing, a team that only has six top fives among all three full-time cars this year, Chastain moved from 21st in the standings to 18th and moved from 82 points outside the cut line to just 47.
With three races left, Chastain can definitely make that up.
But let’s say he does make it into the top 16 and makes The Chase. Cool story for sure, but it’s doubtful anybody would stand up and consider them a title contender. Having that 100-point deficit to the points lead doesn’t help, either.
For that matter, would anybody really say that any driver currently outside the top 10 in points is a contender? Sure, Daniel Suarez has had an impressive year sitting in 11th in the standings, but not on the level anybody in the top five has had. The same could be said about the likes of Shane van Gisbergen or Austin Cindric.
So, why even bother?
I don’t know about you, but I don’t want to see a fight for a cut line between drivers who I know won’t realistically be able to do anything with it anyway.
But what if we shortened it to the top 10 drivers? You know who would be on the bubble fight if that were the case?
Kyle Larson and William Byron.
Whoa, now that’s a storyline. Imagine the drama of the idea that the reigning champion and his teammate are duking it out for just a position in the postseason, both of which are from the heralded Hendrick Motorsports. That would be something we’d be watching all the way up to the checkered flag at Daytona International Speedway. Both teams are considered elite, and I would argue both certainly deserve a spot in The Chase, so it would make it all the more shocking if one of them wasn’t.
But we won’t get that. Instead, we find ourselves sitting around seeing if Ryan Preece can overcome a 29-point gap to Cindric over three races. Maybe he can, but it’s not something I’m keeping an eye on in anticipation of Preece or Cindric making a run at the title, nor would I be surprised if either don’t make The Chase field.
With all that extra space in what is supposed to be the most elite of the field, it just seems like we’re wasting our time with extra storylines that really shouldn’t be.
Who Stood Out?
Gibbs holding off Bell for the final 40 or so laps of the race is nothing short of impressive. There is an argument that dirty air did a lot of the work for Gibbs, but we’re still talking about having two tires versus four on a track that, really, still did have a decent amount of passing.
Nobody should overlook Gibbs’ performance in that regard, and with him now sitting in second in the points standings with only three races left until the postseason, the idea of the No. 54 making a run for the championship is not farfetched in the least.
But you know who else wouldn’t be farfetched? Bell.
With seven runner-up finishes this year and four of them coming in the last five races, the No. 20 is getting hot at just that sweet spot in the season – the one Jimmie Johnson used when he was stinking up the Chase.
But he’s so low in the standings, right? He can’t make a run when The Chase starts, right?
Wrong. Bell moved from 10th to sixth in Iowa alone and is now only four points behind teammate Chase Briscoe in fifth. That’s only a 50-point difference between Bell and the lead of the points standings with 10 races to get there, around only half the deficit Hamlin overcame on Tyler Reddick in a much smaller timespan earlier this year.
With three races left and one of them being at a track he’s won at before, Bell might be in a much better position than any of us thought.
You know who isn’t, however?
Who Fell Flat?
Hendrick Motorsports.
Byron was the only car from the HMS camp to finish in the top 10 in ninth. Heck, he was the only one to finish on the lead lap.
Well, only 10 cars finished on the lead lap, but you get the message I’m going for.
Like a lot of races lately, it felt like a day where the likes of Larson and perhaps Chase Elliott could really shine. For the latter, it was a topsy-turvy performance that saw him start 32nd and go a lap down before the end of stage one.
Things started looking up after that with him getting a free pass and crew chief Alan Gustafson electing to stay out during the next caution, handing Elliott the lead. It proved to be the right decision, as the No. 9 stayed near the front and caught a well-timed caution to keep that track position.
Until his pit stop moments later nullified all of that.
When Gustafson tried again for the final stage, Elliott couldn’t keep the same track position on older tires. He fell all the way to 15th, finished there one lap down, earned no stage points and lost a position in points to seventh.
And that’s not even the worst of the HMS efforts. His teammate Larson’s day was even worse and depreciated much more instantaneously.
Larson actually started second and had the speed to compete with the front runners to finish third in stage one. However, nearing the end of stage two, Larson was shuffled out of line by John Hunter Nemechek and was squeezed hard into the wall by teammate Alex Bowman, sending both of them behind the wall with damage.
Larson went behind the wall at one point for 16 laps and finished 33rd while teammate Bowman DNF’d in 34th.
What’s worse is the effort saw Larson lose two positions in the standings and fall to 10th. That’s a 70-point buffer between he and the points lead if the postseason were to start now.
It hasn’t been a pretty year for the Hendrick camp. Iowa proved to be no exception. What’s more bad news, the team is heading to both Richmond Raceway and New Hampshire Motor Speedway the next two weeks, both of which are a couple of their lesser performing circuits.
Paint Scheme of the Race
On a day where he put on one of his better performances of the season, Chastain and Busch Light had one of their better car designs as well.
A collection of that Busch Light sky blue featured with images of corn fields and a barn captured that Iowa aesthetic more than probably any other car in the field.
Busch did another wonderful job of celebrating the culture of a track that many other teams normally wouldn’t. Of course, it makes sense when it comes from a track that’s close to their home turf in St. Louis, but hey, that paint scheme will look great in anybody’s diecast collection.
What’s Next?
One last short track before The Chase.
The Cup Series makes its annual visit to The Action Track of Richmond Raceway with only three races left before the Chase begins and the 16-driver field is set.
The Cook Out 400 will be live on USA Network with coverage beginning at 7 p.m. ET.
Dalton Hopkins began writing for Frontstretch in April 2021. Currently, he is the lead writer for the weekly Thinkin' Out Loud column, co-host of the Frontstretch Happy Hour podcast, and one of our lead reporters. Beforehand, he wrote for IMSA shortly after graduating from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in 2019. Simultaneously, he also serves as a Captain in the US Army.
Follow Dalton on Twitter @PitLaneCPT
I 100% agree that 16 cars is too many, That’s almost half the field. 10 or 12 would be better. But we know making the Chase comes with a lot of prestige for their sponsors, even if they have no realistic shot at winning.
Its good to see Ty Gibbs mature like Kyle Busch did. And now he’s not warming the seat for his grandfather.
I’d say the cutoff should be variable. Anyone within 300 points of the leader is in the chase. If that’s 12 guys or 7 guys or 3 guys, so be it. I could never buy into the any format where they gift teams hundreds of points to begin with, but I could live with 300 points.
25% of the chartered cars are Toyotas. Toyotas have won 60% of the races. They account for 50% of the top fives. What have they figured out that the Fords & Chevrolets have not?
Who won the law suit?
Couldn’t agree more that 16 is too many drivers in the Chase. In the past NASCAR has said they aren’t like the stick and ball sports yet here we are with a regular season and a post season playoff type situation. A playoff type situation that has nearly half the field eligible just like the NFL, MLB, NBA and NHL. Ridiculous, IMO. No more than 8 should be eligible to be the Champion, again IMO.
In my opinion Larson ruined his own day, despite the Nascar media wanting to blame bad luck, Nemechek etc. He has a beef with Nemechek for overdriving the corner and pushing him up the track, but instead of falling back in line with plenty of laps to it make up, he tries to make it 4 wide on the next corner and ends up taking his teammate out with him. Not the smartest decision by our defending “champion”.
Other than the monetary benefits and extra exposure for sponsors for making the Chase, there are really only a handful of drivers that are legitimate contenders for the title. I would be happy with max 10, but give the monetary benefits to those in the Top 16 like usual if you want, but have making the playoffs mean something.