Dillon bringing it all back home
Are the times really a-changin’ with a new wave of NASCAR talent? Well, not yet. Instead, Austin Dillon took an emotional last-gasp win with the #3 Chevy
The new generation made its mark in the 60th Daytona 500, but in a way it lost out to its own exuberance. Instead, the race boiled down to a wild finale between those who’ve been around a little longer. To describe eventual winner Austin Dillon as a wily, wise veteran would be inaccurate – at 27, he is in ‘only’ his fifth full-time Cup season and had just one top-level career win to his credit before last Sunday. But the way in which he surged to the front seconds from the flag – after a last-lap scrap with fellow medium-termer Aric Almirola and long-time topliner Denny Hamlin – bore the hallmarks of experience.
Dillon poignantly took the #3 Richard Childress Chevrolet combination made famous by the late Dale Earnhardt Sr into Victory Lane, while there was in the end a victory of sorts for youth, as Darrell Wallace Jr pipped Hamlin for second.
There’s a cliche about new kids and blocking that would perfectly summarise last Sunday’s race day. But, rather than take the cop-out, seven-time Cup champion Jimmie Johnson had a better summary of the on-track conduct.
The Hendrick Motorsports star was caught out in a huge nine-car pile-up at the end of the first stage, having failed to make much of an impression on the leading pack. Having been cleared from the medical centre, he turned to the cameras and said: “There was some great racing throughout but, unfortunately, many thought it was the black-and-white chequered flag and not the green-andwhite chequered flag. On lap 59 [of what
would transpire to be 207, rather than the scheduled 200], to be throwing blocks like that – just a lot of wrecked race cars.”
He quickly added: “I’m not picking on the young guys by any stretch. Veterans typically cause more problems out there because we have more confidence and experience and usually create more issues than the young guys do. I’m not sure everybody was thinking big picture and really using their head through that.”
Certainly, almost one quarter of the 40-car field did not during a single incident that summarised an often aggressive and sometimes close-to--
farcical race. Drivers had predicted beforehand that the race was likely to be a single-file, cautious one, with everyone expecting the usual late dives for victory. But instead, from the off, the field raced like it was a 10-lap sprint. Often three cars wide, the lead changed hands 24 times during a frenetic afternoon in Florida.
But one man was able to take a decisive stranglehold on the race and ruffle a few feathers on track in the form of Penske Ford wonderkid Ryan Blaney. Ford’s dominance of restrictor- plate racing – seven wins in a row heading into Daytona – was never in doubt and Penske led the charge in the race. But not before Blaney learned a lesson at the end of the first stage. Chasing down Ricky Stenhouse Jr on entry to Turn 3, he nudged his rival as they battled for third and Stenhouse got loose, collecting Daniel Suarez as others – including Johnson – wrecked out.
Blaney now knew the fine margins of Daytona, and he set about controlling the race after that shunt, which had come a lap before the first stage ended.
Last year’s Daytona 500 winner Kurt Busch handed Blaney the lead at the start of the second stage after the Stewarthaas Racing Ford man slid past his pitbox and was forced to do another lap before stopping. After taking the lead on lap 68, Blaney held on to win the second stage, aided by the Ford lockout at the front, with his team-mate Joey Logano and the ‘sister’ Wood Brothers car of Paul Menard helping him stay clear.
With the NASCAR off-season dominated by talk of the series’ new generation having riled up the two Busch brothers in particular, here was a chance for Blaney to silence Kurt Busch’s criticisms that none of them had actually won a race. Yet ironically, Blaney’s dominance – he would lead 114 laps in the race – was scuppered by another of the new kids: 20-year-old reigning Xfinity champion William Byron.
Byron had picked up damage in the crash that had caught out his Hendrick Chevrolet team-mate Johnson, and quick repairs meant he continued well down the order. But having worked his way up to 12th by lap 91, he suffered a highspeed puncture and created a fourth caution of the race.
That was all the chance that Blaney’s Penske team-mate Brad Keselowski needed. The pre-race favourite had been forced to drop to the back of the field in the starting line-up, having switched to his back-up car following damage in Thursday’s qualifying races. But Keselowski, the master of restrictorplate racing, climbed the order to be third at the time of Byron’s incident, and threatened Blaney as soon as the race went green a few laps later.
Having nudged the fluorescent-green leading Ford several times, Keselowski took it one step too far at the midway point. The expected successor to Dale Earnhardt Jr in the popularity stakes, Hendrick’s Chase Elliott, was to lose out. Having led a handful of early laps, Elliott pulled one stunningly aggressive move after another to climb the top 10.
Spotting Keselowski’s time loss behind Blaney, Elliott snuck past the 2012 Cup champion, only for Keselowski to respond by punting him straight into the outside wall. Keselowski was too aggressive; Elliott defending too forcefully. Karma levelled it up between
those two, with Elliott collecting Keselowski, but the quietly impressive and unfortunate Kevin Harvick and another five cars were out on the spot.
The wonders of Blaney’s defensive driving were twofold: his ability to cover both lines and predict an attack was stunning to watch, but in a looking-through-the-gaps-between-your-fingers way. And further twists were inevitable.
To the surprise of few, Blaney’s next opponent was the Furniture Row Racing Toyota of reigning Cup champion Martin Truex Jr. Having qualified a lowly 24th, Truex prioritised stage points in the first segment, and stayed out several laps longer than the rest to be fourth at one-third distance. When his rivals crashed out, he followed Blaney to second. Running off-sequence, while Penske never replaced all four of Blaney’s tyres in one stop, Truex had the benefit of fresh rubber.
Penske’s gamble meant that Blaney’s left-side tyres were almost 90 laps older than Truex’s. But if the final result looked inevitable, Blaney defied belief once again when Byron, for the second
time, threatened to ruin the race leader’s day. Continuing to run with his barely repaired Chevrolet, Byron once again suffered a puncture and caused yet another caution.
Now with a 20-lap sprint to the end, Blaney was not so lucky this time. While Truex’s restart was poor and allowed his rival clear, Kurt Busch and the Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota of Denny Hamlin, following a stunning recovery drive, set up an intriguing finale.
Front-row starter Hamlin’s pace had not been in doubt at any point in the weekend, the 2016 Daytona 500 winner having opted to sit out the last two practice sessions, content with his Toyota. Sure enough, Hamlin beat pole sitting Hendrick Chevrolet man Alex Bowman into the lead early on, before falling a lap down for a needless one-lap penalty for refuelling outside his pitbox.
But the patience and pace paid off as Hamlin was clearly quicker than Blaney. Hamlin’s move on the leader cost Blaney three places, as Kurt Busch and new SHR recruit Aric Almirola blocked him on all three sides. With no way out, Blaney pushed Busch along and spun him into the outside wall with five laps to go, triggering an enormous pile-up that left just eight cars on the lead lap as the pair took out another nine machines.
Blaney would limp on to seventh, but his mistake opened up the most unexpected battle in the final two laps between Hamlin and Almirola. Hamlin had little answer to the increasing prowess of Almirola on the final lap of overtime, and instead the battle was decided by Dillon.
Dillon was another who had benefited from contenders dropping like flies, had used the draft to keep his Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet in the top 10, and that was enough to put him in place for the showdown. Dillon then used brute force to nail Almirola into the outside wall and charge clear to win in a farcical decider in which he led just one lap – the last.
“He’s not driving too aggressively, he’s trying to win the Daytona 500 just like I was,” Almirola said. “I saw him come with the momentum and I pulled up to block and did exactly what I needed to do to try to win the Daytona 500. I wasn’t going to just let him have it. I wasn’t going to just stay on the bottom and let him rail the outside, so I blocked and he got to my bumper and pushed, and I thought I was still going to be OK and somehow I got hooked. I still haven’t seen the replay, so I don’t know what happened, but I’m just devastated.”
It was a sour end to a race that had promised much – not that Dillon minded as he gave Chevrolet’s new Camaro a debut win. “I guess I could have lifted and given it to him [Almirola],” said Dillon. “I guess that was my other option, give up a Daytona 500 ring that I’m wearing. I don’t know, I’m glad he’s not mad. If he needs to do it to me at Talladega for everybody to feel good, I’ve got a Daytona 500 championship trophy, ring, whatever.”
In a race that almost provided a feelgood story in the form of Blaney’s second Cup win and a chance for the next generation to prove its mettle, the wily tactics of veterans eventually decided it, with the helping hand of youngster Byron’s escapades.
Thankfully, there was a promising moment for NASCAR’S youth as Wallace finished a career-best second ahead of Hamlin. The trailblazing Africanamerican has faced plenty of pressure driving for the team of NASCAR deity Richard Petty, but ‘Bubba’ has relished it. “I just went out and tried not to be a hero, like ‘The King’ told me right before climbing in,” a choked-up Wallace said.
When ‘The King’ explains, you listen. NASCAR puts a premium on experience, and no-one has more than Petty. That lack of knowhow turned the race on its head and cost Blaney, Elliott and others dear.
“You can have the best car in the world and not win the race,” Blaney said. “I thought we had a good car today but you just try to figure out what you can do better for next time and it’s a shame it didn’t work out for us, but you try to live and learn and move on. Yeah, you’re disappointed, you dominate a good race, but that’s the way it goes.”