This race didn’t give us a lot of action in the middle, but it sure did give us a show at the end with Tyler Reddick stealing it at the line. Michael McDowell made the biggest mistake in NASCAR, blocking more than once.
A huge win for 23XI Racing. This is the first win for Tyler Reddick this season. Michael McDowell was pushed by Brad Keselowski. Keselowski went for the win, but McDowell blocked him twice, and was spun around.
Reddick in his Jordan Brand No. 45 Toyota Camry was right there and drag-raced Keselowski to the finish line.
Stage 1 was stale
Talk about the worst of superspeedway racing. The new fuel-saving strategy has been something for sure. At Daytona fans were not happy about the strategy and I think they were even more unhappy to see it used again at Talladega.
The way the field was forming, they could race three-wide but were only going 170 MPH or so. That means drivers could move up whenever they wanted to but were unable to pull away from the field. When the pace did pick up, things went double-file again and passing was all but gone.
By the end of this stage, the cars started to move. Following the green flag pit stops, drivers were more willing to race. Especially for those precious stage points. Austin Cindric took Chase Elliott to the line in a photo finish and plucked that stage win and the playoff point that comes with it, from the Hendrick driver.
Stage 2 went caution-free to make history
For the first time since stage racing was introduced, Talladega went through the first two stages without a caution flag. It didn’t make for the most exciting racing at Talladega. People often complain there are too many wrecks at tracks like this. Well, there honestly weren’t enough today.
The fuel-saving strategy was still dominating the field. No one wanted to push the pace and no one could without other teams willing to go with them. We did see the race start to form into a Toyota and Ford battle, which isn’t surprising.
In this stage, things just played out more or less the same as Stage 1. Austin Cindric was there with a chance to sweep the stages, but it would be Joey Logano taking the Stage 2 win.
Thankfully, the final stage gave us a little action and drama. It wasn’t a lot, though.
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