WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. – While NASCAR road course racing always presents the potential for dramatic influence on the NASCAR Cup Series championship standings, Sunday’s Go Bowling at The Glen essentially strengthened the stance of those on the upside of the upcoming Playoff grid and further motivated those that will now need a trophy hoist in the remaining two regular season races.
In other words, those that were looking good for Playoff berths before Trackhouse Racing’s Shane Van Gisbergen’s dominating win Sunday remain to the points positive side.
And those needing a clutch effort to land a late Playoff position, remain in need of a walk-off win either in Saturday night’s Cook Out 400 at Richmond (Va.) Raceway (7:30 p.m. ET, USA Network, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) or the next week in the regular season finale at Daytona International Speedway.
Championship leader, Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron was able to add to his points lead with a fourth-place effort Saturday coupled with his teammate Chase Elliott’s 26th-place finish. It marks the first time Elliott has finished a race outside the top-20 all season and now he trails Byron by 42 points in the run for the Regular Season Championship and it’s 15 Playoff bonus point payout.
On the other side of championship contention, Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing’s Chris Buescher won Stage 1 at Watkins Glen and finished third in the race to take a solid, but still tenuous 34-point advantage on his RFK teammate Ryan Preece for that 16th and final Playoff transfer position.
Richard Childress Racing’s Kyle Busch is 102 points behind Buescher and will need a victory for a shot to race for a third career NASCAR Cup Series championship.
“I am really proud of everybody,” Buescher said of his No. 17 RFK Ford team’s work under pressure Sunday. “It was great execution all day. We were able to get a stage win there and still in the hunt [for the win] really. I had a couple more laps on my tires and I used the rears up really hard trying to get by a few cars there. At the end of the day, it is a really solid run. We are greedy. We want more.”
The three-quarter mile Richmond track may be just the place for Buescher to secure his Playoff opportunity via win instead of the nerve-wracking points play he’s been navigating. He is one of four drivers still needing a Playoff position that have won previously at both Richmond and the Daytona 2.5-mile superspeedway.
Buescher scored wins at both Richmond and Daytona in summer 2023. Busch, driver of the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet won the 2008 summer race at Daytona and has six Richmond wins including the 2018 two-race sweep and an incredible streak of four straight spring trophies from 2009-2012.
Busch’s teammate, Austin Dillon is the defending Richmond race winner and the driver of the No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet has a pair of wins at Daytona including the 2016 Daytona 500 and the summer race in 2022.
Buescher’s team co-owner and driving teammate Brad Keselowski is the only other driver currently racing for a Playoff position to have victories at both tracks. The driver of the No. 6 RFK Racing Ford won
the summer races at Richmond in 2014 and 2020 and the summer race at Daytona in 2016.
Apart from Buescher who still holds that final 16th place points position, the other three – Busch, Dillon and Keselowski – need to win one of these two races to move into Playoff contention.
“A win is the way to guarantee your way in but this year we have to be aware of our [points] bubble,” Buescher said. “As much as I hate to admit that, it is where we have found ourselves. For us, this weekend, we want to get on track and have really, really solid speed and say ‘let’s focus’.
“I think where you maybe take a step back and start thinking about the point side more specifically than the race win is through any adversity on the day. When your chance of winning has diminished then maybe there is a Plan B that’s probably more thought through than maybe it would have been several months ago for us.”
Others with a strong resume at Daytona as the regular season concludes are Spire Motorsports teammates Justin Haley (2012-summer) and Michael McDowell (2021 Daytona 500), Legacy Motor Club’s Erik Jones (2018-summer) and HYAK Motorsports’ Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (2016 Daytona 500 and 2022-summer).
“I’ve won at all these [upcoming] places and one of my best tracks is Richmond and I’d guess Daytona is probably our best shot as crazy as that sounds with thirty other guys having that their best shot at winning that race too,” Busch said of his chances as the regular season closes out. “The RCR package has been really fast their over the years and we’ve been really good at having some good runs and coming oh so close to winning.”
The last three years, a driver has won his way into the Playoffs with a victory in the final pair of regular season races.
Practice followed by qualifying for the Cook Out 400 at Richmond starts Friday at 4:30 p.m. ET (truTV, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).