Show Recaps

Podcast: The GluckCast

Network: The Athletic / Dirty Mo Media

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Mike Burch (COO, Speedway Motorsports); Mike Hembree (longtime NASCAR journalist, author of *Petty vs. Pearson: The Rivalry That Shaped NASCAR*)

Date: July 16, 2026

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis

Episode Overview

Episode 22 of the GluckCast arrived the same week NASCAR heads back to North Wilkesboro Speedway for a Cup points race — a return that once seemed impossible. Jeff opened by revisiting Jordan Bianchi's 2019 story on how Dale Earnhardt Jr. pressured iRacing's Steve Myers into scanning the crumbling track, a project nobody involved thought would ever lead to an actual NASCAR race returning. From there, Jeff pivoted to a newsy, track-ownership-heavy hour built around two guests with very different vantage points on the sport: Speedway Motorsports COO Mike Burch, who runs the business side of tracks like Atlanta, Texas, Dover, and now North Wilkesboro, and veteran writer Mike Hembree, who covered NASCAR's last North Wilkesboro race in 1996 and has been on the beat for 51 years.

Burch's segment was the newsiest of the episode — he pushed back hard on the idea that Texas Motor Speedway is a problem date, addressed where the All-Star Race and Dover's playoff cutoff race fit going forward, discussed the "real estate math" now facing struggling tracks like the old Kentucky Speedway site, and weighed in on Carson Hocevar's rising star power. Hembree's segment leaned historical and reflective — nostalgia for old North Wilkesboro, a Mount Rushmore of drivers he's personally covered, and a candid, somewhat mournful read on where NASCAR media is headed.

The back half of the show was Jeff's usual grab-bag: the Bubba Wallace penalty ruling from Atlanta, a significant new Daytona rules package, the results of Hocevar's t-shirt trade promotion, a bracket-pool update, an "email of the week," and a preview of next week's live show from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway hauler parade.

North Wilkesboro's Return, Then and Now

Jeff opened with the Bianchi story: Dale Jr.'s September 2019 tweet campaign to get iRacing to scan a track that, at the time, had weeds growing through the pavement and collapsing bleachers. Jeff noted Bianchi's own reporting made clear "NASCAR is never returning to North Wilkesboro" was the consensus at the time — the scanning effort was about preservation, not revival. Jeff also ran through the track's history: the last Cup race there was the September 29, 1996 Tyson Holly Farms 400, won by Jeff Gordon over Dale Earnhardt, a race whose top five (and eight of the top ten) were all future Hall of Famers. Gordon's points lead evaporated the following week at Charlotte when a cracked cylinder head dropped him to 31st, handing the championship to Terry Labonte.

Hembree, who covered that final 1996 race, told Jeff the mood at the time was resigned rather than shocked: "when we all left the track that last day in '96, 98.7% of us thought we'd never see it on the NASCAR schedule in any fashion again." He described North Wilkesboro's appeal as almost county-fair-like — an isolated track where "the circus" coming to a small community created a unique atmosphere, reinforced by the track's deep connection to Junior Johnson, who Hembree called an outsized local hero: "I'm not sure there's ever been a racetrack that had a singular hero bigger than Junior Johnson and Wilkesboro." He also shared a memory of Davy Allison sitting in the bed of a pickup truck for hours after a win, signing autographs for a long line of fans in what Hembree described as an early example of grassroots fan-base building.

Mike Burch on Texas, the All-Star Race, and Dover

Burch, who has been with Speedway Motorsports for 23 years, used most of his segment to defend Texas Motor Speedway against persistent narratives that it's a weak date. His argument: ticket sales settle the debate. "How many sellouts in a row do we have to have before we can say... the people who go to Texas, the people who matter, the people who buy the tickets, love Texas," he said, crediting the May date move (away from a tight window after COTA) and the Cinco de Mayo weekend crowd for strengthening the race. His broader rule of thumb on why races get relocated: "you never move a race if you're selling tickets and you have corporate support... the races that get moved, it's because there's a weakness in one of those areas."

On the All-Star Race, Burch argued the entire framing of it as lesser than a points race is outdated, pointing to the strength of ticket demand at North Wilkesboro (he said only "17 or 18 pairs" of tickets remained on the secondary market ahead of this year's Cup race there, far below typical resale volume). He wouldn't commit to whether North Wilkesboro stays a points race or eventually reverts to All-Star Race duty, but said confidently "we will continue to be racing at North Wilkesboro," crediting North Carolina state legislature funding as the reason the return was possible at all. He also floated the All-Star Race continuing to rotate to new venues — Bristol, Texas, Charlotte, North Wilkesboro, and Dover have all hosted it — name-checking New Hampshire and Las Vegas as future possibilities.

On Dover specifically, addressing fan anxiety that losing the All-Star Race hurts the track, Burch was blunt about whose opinion matters most: "I take a hard look at the opinion of people who are paid to be at the track and people who pay to be at the track... the race fans in the Northeast, some of the best race fans you're ever going to see." He said Dover remains one of Speedway Motorsports' strongest ticket-selling races and pushed back on any narrative that it's in decline.

Championship Race Relocation and the Real Estate Threat to Struggling Tracks

Jeff asked Burch whether Speedway Motorsports would want to host NASCAR's championship race now that it's rotating away from Phoenix (to Homestead, with more moves expected). Burch was measured, noting the model has downsides: hosting a "meaningful" championship race isn't guaranteed once the field is set, and existing title sponsors at tracks like Las Vegas (South Point) or Charlotte (Bank of America) would have to give up their own race dates. "It's not as simple as just, oh, let's just move the race... there's a lot of people whose models would be disrupted," he said.

The conversation turned notably candid when Jeff asked about Kentucky Speedway, a track Speedway Motorsports no longer races at. Burch said fan nostalgia has grown since the track lost its date ("well, you wait about 10 years... everybody loves everything that they used to hate"), but was frank that bringing it back doesn't pencil out — partly because giving Kentucky a race means taking one from somewhere else, and partly because of surrounding land development pressure (a new airport, warehouses, data centers). He extended that logic to smaller tracks broadly: "at some point when you start to get offers... hundreds of millions of dollars for the real estate... you have a responsibility to say, huh, maybe there's a better and higher use for just real estate than racing," citing Fontana as the cautionary example, and crediting owners like Marcus Smith and Jim France for continuing to prioritize racing over cashing out.

Driver Star Power and Hocevar's Rise

Asked how much track operators track driver "star power," Burch said personality drives business: "we are a personality-driven culture... people care about people." He pointed to Ross Chastain, Kyle Larson, and Chase Elliott as the only three drivers with their own dedicated merchandise trailers, framing Chastain and Hocevar as drivers who've deliberately built fan connection — including Hocevar's on-track shirt-trade stunt at Atlanta. Burch relayed a Hocevar comment from another podcast suggesting some drivers in the garage don't even seem to like the sport, treating it as "their paycheck," and said Speedway Motorsports actively supports the driver ambassador program pushing more autograph and fan-zone engagement.

Mike Hembree: Hocevar's Rivalries, a Driver Mount Rushmore, and NASCAR Media's Decline

Hembree, who was at Atlanta the week prior, gave a sharp read on the Hocevar dynamic: "Hocevar has no rival. All he has is rivalries, plural." He described it as a double-edged sword — Hocevar's aggressive driving and outspokenness have built him a fan base, but also left him without allies on the track when he needs help executing a pass, as was evident late at Atlanta.

Asked for his personal Mount Rushmore of drivers he's covered, Hembree named David Pearson, Richard Petty, and Dale Earnhardt as near-automatic, but wrestled openly with the fourth spot before landing on Jimmie Johnson: "I think Jimmie is underrated, but I think he is by a lot of folks... he put up very strong numbers in a very competitive era." He floated Cale Yarborough, Bobby Allison, and Jeff Gordon as honorable mentions, while noting he never personally saw earlier legends like Curtis Turner, Lee Petty, or Buck Baker race.

The most reflective stretch of the interview came when Jeff asked about the state of NASCAR media. Hembree, who spent decades covering the sport for daily newspapers before working alongside Jeff at NASCAR Scene, said the garage-area reporting culture he came up in — hanging around trucks, building relationships for long-form features — has largely disappeared in favor of short media-center scrums: "there are people who cover racing now who never leave the media center... I just don't see the great stories of the day coming out of these 15-minute media scrums." He stopped short of calling it a crisis, framing it instead as an ongoing evolution reporters have no choice but to adapt to, name-checking Jeff's own pivot to podcasting and video as an example of adapting successfully.

Quick Hits

Jeff also worked through several news items. NASCAR's officiating podcast (Hauler Talk, with Mike Ford) clarified the standard behind Bubba Wallace's penalty at Atlanta that dropped him from 2nd to 29th: a driver doesn't need to complete a pass below the yellow line to be penalized — attempting to improve position that way is enough, and positions can no longer be "given back" as they sometimes were in the 2000s.

NASCAR also announced a notable Daytona rules package change: the rear spoiler shrinks from 7 inches to 4 inches, and horsepower drops from 510 to 465, aimed at letting cars pull out and complete passes rather than staying locked in a fuel-saving draft line. Denny Hamlin, part of the committee that shaped the change, said he doesn't expect "a black and white difference" but is targeting more mid-run passing. The package will debut with no practice session.

Hocevar's post-Atlanta t-shirt exchange results came in: fans traded in the most Kyle Larson and Zane Smith shirts (seven each), eight William Byron shirts, and a race-high 20 Chase Elliott shirts for a Hocevar shirt. Notably, nobody turned in a Kyle Busch shirt.

Jeff closed with a bracket-pool update (six entrants still alive for the "Gluckcast League" championship), an "email of the week" segment reading a fan letter, some 1996 nostalgia tied to North Wilkesboro's last race (the Macarena, the N64 launching the same day), and news that next week's episode will be a live show from the IMS hauler parade with Jordan Bianchi and Conor Daly.

Notable Quotes

Mike Burch (on Texas Motor Speedway): "The people who go to Texas, the people who matter, the people who buy the tickets, love Texas."

Mike Burch (on why races get relocated): "You never move a race if you're selling tickets and you have corporate support."

Mike Burch (on struggling tracks and real estate): "At some point... maybe there's a better and higher use for just real estate than racing."

Mike Hembree (on North Wilkesboro's finality in 1996): "When we all left the track that last day in '96, 98.7% of us thought we'd never see it on the NASCAR schedule in any fashion again."

Mike Hembree (on Carson Hocevar): "Hocevar has no rival. All he has is rivalries, plural."

Mike Hembree (on NASCAR media today): "I just don't see the great stories of the day coming out of these 15-minute media scrums."

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr. (absent — guest-hosted by Chase Briscoe and Noah Gragson)

Guest(s): Chase Briscoe (Joe Gibbs Racing, #19 Toyota), Noah Gragson (Legacy Motor Club, #42), Ryan Blaney (Team Penske, #12 Ford) — via phone

Date: July 14, 2026

Race Covered: Quaker State 400 — EchoPark Speedway, Hampton, Georgia (July 12, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective

Episode Overview

Dale Earnhardt Jr. was away, so Chase Briscoe and Noah Gragson commandeered the Arby's Studio and ran a nearly two-hour episode of the Dale Jr. Download with minimal adult supervision and maximum tangents. This was the first time either driver had guest-hosted the show, and the episode had an appropriately chaotic, confessional energy — part race debrief, part life story, all off the rails in the best way. Ryan Blaney, who won the Quaker State 400 at Atlanta in dramatic overtime fashion, called in to join the conversation mid-episode.

The backdrop was a race that ran past 2:00 a.m. Monday morning, delayed over two hours by rain and lightning at EchoPark Speedway. Blaney dominated — leading 171 of 263 laps — but neither Briscoe nor Gragson had much to celebrate on the results sheet, which gave the race breakdown a candid, unfiltered quality. The conversation ranged from the Bubba Wallace double-yellow-line penalty to the NASCAR points bubble, to Noah's stint at military school, to a helmet swap between the two hosts, to whether Noah can play "Piano Man" on harmonica at Red Rocks.

Atlanta Race Recap

The show opened at 0:42 with the obligatory race debrief, though "race debrief" is generous for how it went for most participants. Chase's car was, as he put it, "a rocket ship with no gas in it" — fast early, then falling back. He wound up three laps down before grinding his way back to the lead lap. Noah fared worse, finishing well outside the top 15 with no good result. Both noted the race felt different before and after the rain delay — the track gained significant grip once the sun went down, which Chase attributed to the mid-summer superspeedway phenomenon of the "waxing crescent," though he admitted the moon hadn't been working reliably for him this year.

Ryan Blaney, who joined later in the episode, was characteristically understated about a performance that was anything but. "We sat on the pole and won both stages and was able to end up winning the race," Blaney said, adding that you never know how those finishes end. "We just got fortunate with a couple good runs there and some good help at the end." He noted that Cody Ware edged him out for the fastest lap bonus, which he took in stride. Blaney walked in his door at 6:15 a.m. Monday, slept a few hours, and spent the day solo-parenting his son Charlie while his wife Gianna was on vacation with friends.

The Bubba Wallace Double-Yellow Penalty

The most controversial moment of the race was Bubba Wallace crossing the double-yellow line on a late charge to win, earning a penalty that erased the move and effectively handed the victory to Blaney. Chase and Noah both said they thought the call was correct. Chase walked through the logic: "If that's not a penalty and you wanted to be on the bottom coming off turn four, you just go down the backstretch at Daytona or Talladega and get inside the guy and move him back up." Rules have to mean something consistently, and once you cross the plane of the rear bumper, you've advanced position.

Both also showed sympathy for Wallace's impossible situation. Noah pointed out that when you're making a move that aggressive at that speed against Blaney and Hocevar, "whatever you do has to be extremely aggressive, and you have to catch them off guard." Chase added that Bubba was probably also trying to get clear of whoever was on his outside to avoid being squeezed, which made the left-turn even more violent. "I think if he could do it over again, he probably would have done something different. But at the time, it's a split-second decision."

Carson Hocevar and the Lack of a Push

Carson Hocevar came to Atlanta in the news for comments about being willing to race hard and take on all comers. He led late but faded to third at the end without the push he needed. Chase was measured but honest about Hocevar's pre-race rhetoric: "I feel like it's on brand for how he races on the racetrack. I don't see anything wrong with that." The bigger issue was tactical — Hocevar got out front too far with the lead coming to the white flag, creating a gap that let Blaney and Bell generate a run that swallowed him. "That's where I thought Hocevar lost the race," Chase said. Noah acknowledged the reality of superspeedway racing: if you need help, you need allies in position, and Hocevar found himself isolated at the worst moment.

Points Battle and Playoff Picture

Atlanta shook up the regular season standings. Blaney is now only 65 points behind Denny Hamlin in the regular-season title race, carried by win bonus points under the current format. Chase noted the new system creates enormous swings — "every stage matters, every race matters" — and a single win can move you from outside the top ten to right in the mix.

Chase himself had a rough Atlanta. He described it as a "turning point" in the wrong direction, having used too many mulligans already. He estimated he was 181 points back of fifth place but said fifth was still mathematically possible: maximize stage points, hope for a win at Indianapolis or Daytona, count on the short-track stretch being favorable for Toyotas. The playoff bubble got extended discussion — Erik Jones is right at the cutoff, and the upcoming schedule of mostly short tracks creates divergent paths for different cars. Both hosts agreed the standings will look very different by the time the regular season closes at Daytona.

North Wilkesboro In-Season Tournament Preview

Looking ahead, both hosts were candid that North Wilkesboro will be brutal: 450 laps, 97-degree heat expected, almost no straightaway to recover. Chase described it as more physically demanding than even Bristol or Martinsville — "you're just ripping around there, and especially when we started running the top, you're just pinned on the right side the whole time."

For the bracket matchups: in Chase Briscoe vs. Todd Gilliland, both Noah and Chase think Todd can pull an upset. Noah compared him to a "modern-day Ty Dillon" type who excels on short tracks, and the race length means attrition could favor the underdog. In Bell vs. Blaney, they both gave the nod to Blaney based on momentum. "He's on a hot streak," Noah said. "Riding that good momentum — I think he can back it up."

Ryan Blaney's "On the Gas" Ride-Along Show

Blaney joined the show to discuss his new video series where he takes celebrities and athletes for ride-alongs at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. He described wanting to give guests "the closest thing to what we do from week to week" — using actual late-model-style race cars with a right seat installed, not the sanitized ride-experience versions. Keegan Michael Key from Key & Peele nearly threw up. Chad Osenco's episode airs this week. Blaney said the most satisfying part was watching guests ragdoll forward in the braking zones without warning: "I wouldn't tell them — 'Hey, big braking zone coming up.' So just to see their whole body like ragdoll forward was like the funnest thing."

The show also led to a conversation about the NASCAR vs. Navy filming trip — Bell, Hocevar, Blaney, Chase, Noah, and Zilich spent two and a half days at a naval air base, where Blaney raced a fighter jet down the runway and lost (the jet eventually just decided to actually apply throttle and fly away). The group described a legendary plane ride home where longstanding beefs got squashed and plans got made, including Noah's ambition to play harmonica on stage with Cole Swindell at Red Rocks in September.

Figgy Earnhardt and the Rain Delay

One of the episode's unexpected highlights was Chase and Noah running into Figgy Earnhardt — Kerry Earnhardt's son and Dale Jr.'s half-brother — during the two-hour rain delay at Atlanta. The two hosts had been killing time in a trailer playing Xbox college football when Kerry and Figgy walked by. Both were genuinely stunned by how tall Figgy is. The encounter led into a wider conversation about Dale Sr.'s larger-than-life physical presence — everyone in the sport remembers that "big paw" handshake, how he seemed to fill whatever room he walked into. Figgy is apparently building a home subdivision with Kerry and has the hands to match the family legacy.

Blaney, when asked, said he'd spent time at Dale Jr.'s house but didn't remember crossing paths with Figgy either. Both Chase and Noah expressed interest in having him on a future episode.

Chase's Fishing Disaster and Noah's Birthday

Just before qualifying, Chase drove an hour to a Georgia lake that had been recently electro-shocked to surface-count the fish — revealing seven bass over 14.5 pounds. The fishing party went in expecting to set personal records. They caught exactly three fish in the first five casts, then nothing for three more hours in 89-degree heat. "We fished for the next three hours and just didn't have any luck whatsoever," Chase said. Noah, who had sensibly gone to a team dinner and watched the early fights instead, took it with maximum smugness.

In lighter news, Noah's birthday is July 15 — he turns 28 the day after this episode aired. A fan brought cupcakes to the shop. Chase noted that Noah is both deeply dyslexic (proudly so) and slightly uncertain about his own birth date (December 15, 1994, one day after Christopher Bell — a fact Noah initially couldn't confirm without help from a phone screen he had trouble reading across the room).

Noah's Military School Backstory

The episode's title topic arrived when candy bars meandered into a question about school memories. Noah attended Army Navy Academy in Carlsbad, California for 7th and 8th grade — a boarding school for kids who were, in his words, "a handful." He claims to have been one of the better-behaved students, winning class president both years and earning honors for best-decorated dorm room at Christmas. He smuggled a PlayStation into his room inside an office chair box, added a racing steering wheel later, and successfully hid the setup through every room inspection. A less savvy roommate got shaken down for $100 a week by an older student who found out.

Noah described the merit-and-demerit system, the dress parades in wool coats in the summer heat (he fainted during one), the student store that served as a lifeline for actual food, and the English teacher Ashley Walker who he still credits as a genuine mentor. The experience also gave him his first solo travel at 11 — flying alone from San Diego back to Vegas without the unaccompanied minor escort because he was so self-sufficient. He started racing Bandoleros on a spring break trip and never really stopped.

Helmet Swap

The episode closed with a formal helmet exchange — Noah's first career helmet trade and Chase's first actual swap (he previously gave Tony Stewart a helmet years ago and never got one back). Chase gave Noah his 2025 SHR Mahindra Tractors helmet from his final year at Stewart-Haas Racing. Noah gave Chase a helmet he'd been wearing this season. Noah, acknowledging his dyslexia and terrible handwriting, wrote a message inside Chase's helmet. When deciphered, it read: "Noah, we may not have started out on the best terms, but proud and happy to call you one of my best friends today. Keep being you."

Notable Quotes

Chase (on Atlanta): "It was a rocket ship with no gas in it. Unfortunately the 66 drove away from us. That really sucked."

Blaney (on his win): "Never know how the ending of those things go. We just got fortunate with a couple good runs there and some good help at the end and was able to sneak it through."

Chase (on the Bubba Wallace penalty): "If that's not a penalty and you wanted to be on the bottom coming off turn four, you just go down the backstretch at Daytona and Talladega and get inside the guy and move him back up. I thought that was the right call."

Noah (on the points rollercoaster): "I go from 108 points back of fifth to winning at Chicago and now I'm only 40 back — and then now I'm back to 10th or 11th. I've just been a yo-yo in the point standings all year long."

Noah (on military school): "There were kids there doing crazy stuff. They would smoke cigarettes in the shower with the steam on. I was just there for the love of the game, man."

Chase (reading Noah's helmet inscription): "Noah, we may not have started out on the best terms, but proud and happy to call you one of my best friends today. Keep being you."

Show: Inside the Race

Host(s): Steve Letarte, Alex Weaver, Kyle Petty (regular hosts of record; guest lineup for this episode unconfirmed)

Date: Week of July 13, 2026

Race Covered: Quaker State 400 Available at Walmart — EchoPark Speedway, Hampton, Georgia

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Editorial Note on Sourcing

This week's recap comes with an important caveat: as of this writing (Monday, July 13, 2026), no published episode of *Inside the Race* specifically covering the Quaker State 400 could be located on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or NASCAR.com. The show's public episode feeds (Apple and Spotify) currently show their most recent installment dating to early June, and targeted searches for a Quaker State 400 / EchoPark summer-race episode did not surface a matching title, transcript, or show-notes page.

This gap is plausible on its own merits — the race did not finish until roughly 1:45 a.m. ET Monday following a 3-hour, 9-minute lightning delay, which likely pushed the hosts' taping (and any publish/index lag) later than usual. It is also possible the episode exists but hadn't been indexed by search engines at the time of this report.

Rather than invent quotes or attribute analysis to hosts that cannot be verified, the section below summarizes the confirmed storylines from the race itself — the same storylines an *Inside the Race* episode would be expected to dig into (Blaney's dominant run, the Wallace penalty, the Larson-Hamlin incident, and the In-Season Challenge stakes). If the episode surfaces later, this file should be updated with actual host commentary and direct quotes.

Race Overview

Ryan Blaney swept every stage and led a race-high 171 of 263 laps to win the Quaker State 400 at EchoPark Speedway, his second Cup Series victory of 2026 and the 19th of his career. Blaney started from the pole and led all night, but the race turned into a genuine survival test: a 3-hour, 9-minute rain and lightning delay pushed the finish into the early hours of Monday morning, and a spate of late cautions set up an overtime finish that came down to a three-wide sprint to the line.

Blaney's laps-led total is the most for a race winner at a drafting-style track since Richard Petty led 184 of 200 laps in the 1964 Daytona 500 — a historical marker that underscores just how dominant his car was once the green flag dropped.

The Overtime Finish and the Wallace Penalty

With the race sent to overtime after a string of late cautions, Blaney found himself racing three-wide for the win on the final lap. A push from Christopher Bell on the outside helped carry Blaney past Carson Hocevar and Bubba Wallace at the line. Wallace crossed the stripe appearing to finish second, but NASCAR post-race inspection determined he had advanced his position by dipping below the double yellow line during the fight for the win. He was penalized and dropped from second to 29th — a gutting reversal after what looked like a big final-lap gain. Bell inherited second, with Hocevar credited third, Ty Gibbs fourth, and Erik Jones fifth.

The Larson-Hamlin Incident

The overtime scenario was set up by a hard crash in the final stage: with the race winding down, Kyle Larson made contact with Denny Hamlin exiting Turn 2, sending Larson sliding through the frontstretch grass and into the outside and inside walls. Chase Briscoe spun in avoidance of the incident, collecting Austin Hill and Riley Herbst in the process. The caution bunched the field back up and put the closing laps — and eventually overtime — in play.

In-Season Challenge Stakes

The finishing order carried extra weight beyond the trophy: Christopher Bell's runner-up result (after the Wallace penalty) bettered his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Denny Hamlin's 12th-place finish in their head-to-head matchup, advancing Bell to next week's semifinal round of the $1 million-to-win In-Season Challenge.

Notable Verified Facts

• Winner: Ryan Blaney (No. 12 Team Penske Ford) — 2nd win of 2026, 19th career Cup win
• Laps led: 171 of 263 — most by a drafting-track winner since Richard Petty's 184-of-200 at the 1964 Daytona 500
• Race delay: 3 hours, 9 minutes (rain/lightning); race concluded roughly 1:45 a.m. ET Monday
• Penalty: Bubba Wallace ruled below the double yellow line on the final-lap battle for the lead; dropped from 2nd to 29th
• Finishing order (top 5, post-penalty): 1. Blaney, 2. Bell, 3. Hocevar, 4. Gibbs, 5. Jones
• Key incident: Kyle Larson–Denny Hamlin contact exiting Turn 2 with laps remaining, collecting Briscoe, Hill, and Herbst
• Playoff/Challenge implication: Bell advances over Hamlin in the In-Season Challenge Round of 8 matchup

Notable Quotes (From Verified Race Reporting, Not the Podcast)

Ryan Blaney, on the final-lap push: credited Christopher Bell's push in the last corner for helping him survive the three-wide battle for the win.

Bubba Wallace, on the penalty: defended his final-lap move, arguing he was racing hard for the win rather than intentionally violating the boundary line.

*(Note: these are paraphrased from post-race reporting, not direct episode transcript quotes — see sourcing note above.)*

*Prepared as part of the automated weekly Inside the Race recap. Sources: NASCAR.com race recap and post-race penalty report, Athlon Sports, Frontstretch, ESPN, Motorsport.com, and Speedway Media race coverage of the July 12–13, 2026 Quaker State 400.*

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: July 13, 2026 (recorded after-hours following the race)

Race Covered: Quaker State 400 Available at Walmart — Atlanta Motor Speedway (EchoPark Speedway), Hampton, Georgia

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

Editor's note: The show's actual host, per Out of the Groove's YouTube channel (@EricEstepp) and companion site The Daily Downforce, is Eric Estepp, not Christian Koelle. This recap attributes commentary to Eric Estepp to accurately reflect the source material.

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opened this "After Dark, After Hours" edition of Out of the Groove admitting he was running on fumes — the Quaker State 400 didn't take the checkered flag until nearly 2 a.m. local time after a rain delay of more than three hours pushed the restart to midnight. Despite the exhaustion, Estepp delivered one of his most enthusiastic reviews of the season, built around a rare feat: Ryan Blaney leading 171 of 263 laps and sweeping every stage on a superspeedway-style track, something Estepp repeatedly called borderline impossible in the current Next Gen era of "random, unpredictable" pack racing.

The episode's spine is the chaotic overtime finish, where Blaney, Carson Hocevar, and Bubba Wallace ran three-wide for the win, only for Wallace to be stripped of a runner-up finish and dropped to 29th for cutting below the yellow line. Estepp spent significant time dissecting the penalty, Wallace's confusing post-race explanation, and a separate dust-up between Wallace and Ty Gibbs stemming from a Stage 2 spin. He rounded out the show with a broader points-picture check-in — including a notable swing in the Hamlin-Reddick-Blaney battle for the regular-season title — before closing with a rare perfect score on his "Groovy Gauge" race-rating segment.

Tonally, this was Estepp at his most animated: equal parts stats-driven analysis (breakdowns of stage points, playoff bubble math, and how a track's drafting characteristics shift from day to night) and driver psychology (praising Hocevar's restraint, needling Wallace's frustration). The episode doubles as both a race recap and a mid-summer state-of-the-standings check as NASCAR heads toward a stretch of short tracks that Estepp has flagged for weeks as Team Penske's wheelhouse.

Blaney's Dominant Drive

Estepp's headline take was simple: what Ryan Blaney did at Atlanta shouldn't be possible at a modern drafting track. "That might have been the most dominant race car we have seen on a drafting track in the NextGen era," he said, noting Blaney could clear side-by-side battles for the lead even without an obviously strong push. He tied the performance back to a prediction he says he's been making on the show for weeks — that Blaney and Team Penske were saving their best for Atlanta and the short, flat tracks to come. "I've been saying it for weeks... just wait for Atlanta and soon a few short tracks... I was exactly right."

Estepp also flagged how all three Penske cars — Blaney, Joey Logano, and Austin Cindric — checked out from the field early whenever they had clean air, sweeping the front row in qualifying and pulling away in a way no other manufacturer group managed all night. But he was careful to note it was Blaney alone who sustained that speed once the race got into lapped traffic and dirty air, crediting Blaney's ability to "rise above" even after briefly falling to 10th-15th during a Stage 3 pit cycle. Blaney's second win of the season, worth a maximum 75 points (55 race points plus 20 stage points), pushes him into what Estepp called a "three-headed monster" atop the standings alongside Denny Hamlin and Tyler Reddick.

The Overtime Restart and Hocevar's Restraint

Estepp devoted an extended segment to breaking down the closing sequence, starting with Carson Hocevar's remarkable rally from 32nd to the white flag lead after a mid-race flat tire. "Carson Hosavvar, that bright black and yellow car, couldn't miss him, was quickly carving up the field. Top 20, top 15, top 10, top five," Estepp said, adding he planned to go back and rewatch Hocevar's in-car footage just to see the climb in real time.

What stood out most to Estepp, though, was Hocevar's composure on the final restart. With Blaney getting a push from Bubba Wallace to complete the winning pass, Hocevar had every incentive to throw a defensive block — and didn't. "This may sound like a low bar, but I was impressed with Carson Hocevar right there because it would have been very easy for Carson to just see a big run in his mirror, overreact and wreck everyone," Estepp said, calling it "character development" and noting Hocevar's team had reminded him over the radio to be "methodical" and protect a top-five points day rather than risk it all for the win.

Bubba Wallace's Yellow-Line Penalty and Postrace Frustration

The most contentious storyline of the night was Wallace's penalty for advancing his position below the double yellow line while squeezing inside Hocevar for second. Estepp walked through the actual rule as reported by Fox Sports — "Vehicles must compete above the double painted lines at all times. Passing below the double painted lines to advance position will result in a black flag" — and, after reviewing the replay, sided clearly with NASCAR's call. "I think Bubba broke it here pretty clearly. I think it was pretty black and white," he said, while acknowledging "maybe it's written in such a way that Bubba has an actual argument."

Estepp was more critical of how Wallace handled the aftermath, saying he was "very confused" by Wallace's postrace explanation, which didn't match what the replay showed. He connected Wallace's frustration to an earlier, unrelated incident — a Stage 2 contact with Toyota teammate Ty Gibbs that sent Wallace spinning without damage but cost him stage points. Estepp was sympathetic but not fully persuaded by Wallace's case there either: "Tai hit him square, could have lifted, but like that's a huge favor to expect from someone... Bubba is the one who came way down the track." The bottom line, per Estepp: a driver who ran up front most of the night walked away with just nine points and a 29th-place finish, which he chalked up to raw frustration rather than a defensible grievance. "I think he was just frustrated and was lashing out. That's my take."

Top Finishers and the Points Picture

Beyond the top-three drama, Estepp highlighted Christopher Bell's third straight top-five finish (fifth at Sonoma, second at Chicagoland, second at Atlanta), moving him to ninth in points and within 59 of fifth-place Chase Elliott with six regular-season races remaining. He also noted strong runs from Eric Jones (top five), Shane van Gisbergen (another top-10 on an oval, now +31 on the playoff cut line), and Ross Chastain, who rallied from a lap down to finish 11th — a result Estepp framed as part of a broader stretch of solid runs that shouldn't be dismissed given Chastain's history of overachieving with limited equipment.

On the championship math, Estepp pointed to a meaningful swing: Tyler Reddick picked up 18 stage points to Denny Hamlin's none, cutting Hamlin's points lead to just 24 after weeks of bleeding ground. Combined with Blaney's maximum points night, Estepp reiterated his three-way title-picture framing and flagged Indianapolis — a track "literally owned by Team Penske's Roger Penske" — as another data point in Blaney's favor over the coming month.

Track Character and the Groovy Gauge

A recurring thread was how differently the two stages raced. Stage one, run in daytime heat on an aging surface, looked to Estepp more like "an average 550 race from 2020" than a drafting race, with mini-packs forming and the leaders spreading out. Stage two, after sunset and with a rain-driven wind chill, snapped back into the two- and three-wide slingshot racing Atlanta has become known for. "It's going to be very interesting to see how this track ages over the next few years," Estepp said, questioning whether future summer races at the track will trend toward more strung-out, handling-dependent racing as the surface wears further.

Estepp closed the episode with his "Groovy Gauge" segment, awarding the race his first perfect 100 of the season — a rating he says he hands out only once or twice a year. His reasoning centered on the fact that the race's final restart lined up what he considered the three best cars and drivers of the night — Blaney, Wallace, and Hocevar — racing each other clean for the win, rather than the finish being decided by a fluke wreck. His only real complaint was logistical: the three-and-a-half-hour red flag that pushed the finish past 2 a.m., which he said likely cost the race part of its live audience.

Notable Quotes

Eric (on Blaney's performance): "That might have been the most dominant race car we have seen on a drafting track in the NextGen era."

Eric (on his own prediction paying off): "I've been saying it for weeks... just wait for Atlanta and soon a few short tracks... I was exactly right."

Eric (on Hocevar's restraint at the white flag): "It would have been very easy for Carson to just see a big run in his mirror, overreact and wreck everyone... I think right there, Carson Hocevar, he could have thrown a reckless block, probably wrecked everyone, didn't, and kept himself in the game."

Eric (on the Wallace yellow-line penalty): "I think Bubba broke it here pretty clearly. I think it was pretty black and white. That's my opinion."

Eric (on Wallace's postrace frustration): "I think he was just frustrated and was lashing out. That's my take, but maybe after he watches the replay, he'll double down."

Eric (on his perfect Groovy Gauge score): "The three best cars I saw tonight, best car-driver combos I saw tonight, were Ryan Blaney, Bubba Wallace, and Carson Hocevar... This is going to be, I believe, my first 100 on the Groovy Gauge of the season."

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday–Monday, July 12–13, 2026 (recorded live post-race, roughly 3:00–4:30 a.m. ET Monday)

Race Covered: Quaker State 400 — EchoPark Speedway (Atlanta Motor Speedway), Hampton, GA

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi recorded this Teardown deep into the early morning hours after a race that ran nearly six hours late — a three-hour, nine-minute rain delay pushed the green flag restart to 12:01 a.m. Eastern, and the show itself didn't go live until roughly 3:19 a.m. Both hosts opened by acknowledging the absurdity of the hour, joking about energy drinks and sleep schedules, before diving into what they quickly agreed was one of the best races either of them had seen in years. Ryan Blaney dominated on paper — he swept both stages and led 171 laps, the most laps led in a drafting-track race since Richard Petty at the 1964 Daytona 500 — yet the race still produced 30 lead changes, a three-wide overtime finish, and enough chaos that Jeff and Jordan spent the show's first half just walking listeners through everything that happened for those who'd gone to bed before the delay ended.

The episode ranged far beyond the finish itself. There was real substance in the Bubba Wallace disqualification for going below the double-yellow line — a penalty that dropped him from a likely third-place finish to 29th and reshaped the regular-season points bubble. There was extended discussion of Carson Hocevar's flat-tire comeback drive, his singing on the radio, and his escalating, gleefully self-aware rivalry with Zane Smith. And there was a genuinely interesting debate between the two hosts over whether this was actually the best race of the year, complicated by the fact that so few people were still awake to watch it. By the end, Jeff and Jordan had also worked through the in-season bracket challenge semifinals, previewed next week's return of Cup racing to North Wilsboro Speedway for the first time in three decades, and reset the championship picture with Blaney suddenly a real factor in the regular-season title race.

Race Recap — Blaney's Statement Win

Jeff opened the recap by walking through the broad strokes for anyone who'd missed the late finish: the race resumed after midnight, ran frantic and spread-out compared to the spring Atlanta race, and saw Carson Hocevar fall to 30th after a flat tire before mounting a full-field comeback. Blaney swept both stages, and then the pivotal moment arrived when Bubba Wallace blocked him into the wall while racing for the lead. "You're upset on the radio like he goes, 'What the bleep?'" Jordan recounted, "but later says in his post-race press conference like hey, it was part of the racing. It's the nature of this year." Blaney reported a mysterious vibration afterward that the team ultimately attributed to wall debris on the tire rather than damage — a detail Jordan called "fascinating" since neither host had heard of that exact scenario before.

From there the race built toward its signature moment: an overtime restart where Carson Hocevar briefly looked like the winner, pulling clear at the white flag with a three-wide pack forming behind him. "He's leading with three wide behind him and he's way far out, but he got too far out," Jeff explained. Blaney, pushed hard by Bubba Wallace and then by Christopher Bell coming off turn four, ran him back down for the win. Jordan credited Blaney's read of the top lane — and a mental note from the famous 2023 three-wide Atlanta finish involving Daniel Suárez — for the pass: "He thought back to that race with Suarez and Bush and he goes, Suarez that night had the top line and that really helped him. And he goes, I was kind of thinking about that through this and I put myself in that spot." Jeff's broader assessment of Blaney's night was blunt: "he drove just one of the best races he's driven... I mean, especially superspeedway." Marty Smith's stat on the TNT post-race show — that Blaney's 171 laps led was the most at a drafting-track race since the 1964 Daytona 500 — anchored just how dominant the performance had been, even with the era caveat that Atlanta now offers more green-flag laps than a track like Talladega.

The Bubba Wallace DQ and the Double-Yellow-Line Debate

The single biggest storyline of the back half of the finish was Bubba Wallace's penalty. Running what appeared to be a third-place car after the white flag, Wallace made a sweeping move below the double-yellow line while trying to go three-wide for the lead, and NASCAR black-flagged him after a 31-minute meeting in the hauler — longer, Jordan noted, than Shane Van Gisbergen and Austin Hill's post-race meeting the same weekend. The result: Wallace was scored 29th instead of a likely third or fourth.

Jeff and Jordan spent real time picking apart the "improve your position" language in NASCAR's rulebook. "I don't like the rule in general. Like I just I hate black. I hate gray. And there's so much interpretation with this," Jordan said, arguing Wallace never actually advanced position on track while below the line — he was third when he went low and still third when he came back up, only reaching second later off a push from Ty Gibbs. Jeff pushed back that Wallace's sweeping, clearly voluntary move down and the momentum it preserved through the maneuver was exactly the kind of infraction NASCAR polices: "I think where Bubba opens himself up is because this was this big sweeping move and he did swing down there clearly on his own." Both agreed it came down to interpretation NASCAR hadn't fully clarified publicly, with Jordan noting they'd need to "wait for Hauler Talk" for more detail. The stakes were real — Jordan estimated the swing was worth roughly 26–27 points and pushed Wallace's points-bubble margin to plus-55 instead of what would have been a deficit near minus-25, a shift that could mean an entirely different playoff seed if Wallace's season comes down to the wire. Jeff framed the broader pattern bluntly: "I can't think of a Chase contender that's given up more points" than Wallace, tying it back to a season of "ups and downs" — pit road issues at Darlington, a wreck at Martinsville, and now this.

Carson Hocevar and the Rivalry Machine

Hocevar's night became its own subplot. After a flat tire dropped him to 30th, he drove back through the field while singing on his radio — Jeff noted the crew even played a musical snippet back to him — and nearly stole the win before finishing third. Jordan connected the performance to Hocevar's ongoing, increasingly public rivalry with Zane Smith, who called Hocevar a "goon" in comments over the weekend citing incidents at Chicagoland and Nashville. "Now you have Zane Smith who... I still don't think we've gotten even an explanation of why he's going," Jordan said, adding that when she pressed Smith directly on the origin of the beef, his answer amounted to simply not liking Hocevar as a person.

Both hosts leaned into how unusual — and welcome — a genuine NASCAR rivalry has become. "I'm just like, wow, what an embarrassment of riches we're getting for people that were starving, thirsty through the desert for so long of no rivalries," Jeff said. Jordan's read on Hocevar's approach was that he's simply unbothered by the criticism and turning it into content, pointing to his IKEA appearance the day before the race where he thanked "the few hundred fans that got away from the keyboard." Jeff's framing: "whatever anybody says about him, he's just going to turn around and use it as content." Both agreed the difference between Hocevar and past NASCAR trash-talkers is that he's backing it up on track — a point Jordan drove home by contrasting him with drivers who have personality but not the results to match.

Was It the Best Race of the Year?

Jeff and Jordan run a recurring bit rating races and guessing where the crowd-sourced "Was It A Good Race" poll number will land, and Atlanta produced their most contentious exchange of the show. Both were convinced the on-track product was elite — Jordan initially pegged her gut feeling near 95%, noting the spring 2026 Atlanta race sits at 92.6 as the season's high mark and comparing the slicing-and-dicing pack racing to "old Daytona." But both hosts talked themselves down from their initial numbers because so much of the audience never saw the race live. "My only quibble here... I think this is incredibly hard to put a number on this," Jordan said, worried that fans who woke up to a spoiled finish rather than watching live would rate it far more harshly than the racing itself deserved. Jeff ultimately guessed 92.7, essentially matching the spring race; Jordan, more pessimistic about the "online pitchforks," guessed closer to 80. Both stressed that judged purely on the racing, this belonged in the conversation for best of the year and arguably the best superspeedway-style race either had seen in years — a rare case of the hosts disagreeing not about race quality but about how the audience-perception discount should apply to a live sports rating.

Sunday Night Races, Rain Delays, and the Scheduling Debate

The Bubba and Hocevar storylines gave way to a long, half-joking argument about start times. Jeff used his allotted "five-minute clock" — Jordan's bit for letting him rant uninterrupted — to make the case that NASCAR should avoid Sunday night starts specifically because rainouts push finishes into a Monday workday for fans. "If you're going to do a night race, I think Saturday night race is the way to go because... a lot of people getting ready for work right now in the comments," Jeff argued, adding that ticket sales suffer either way and that a Saturday slot would at least protect the finish from bleeding into a weekday morning. Jordan pushed back that ticket sales are "tough, period" regardless of the night chosen, citing a fan on social media who noted that unlike a Sunday Night Football crowd — 80% local — NASCAR crowds travel from out of town and need a full weekend to justify the trip. The exchange stayed good-natured, with Jordan noting she expected the same argument to resurface the following week given North Wilsboro's own late 7 p.m. start for a 450-lap race.

In-Season Challenge Bracket Update

Roughly an hour into the show, Jeff caught himself having nearly skipped the in-season bracket challenge entirely and ran through the round of 16 results: Ryan Blaney (1-seed) defeated William Byron (16-seed) in a matchup complicated by a tense radio exchange between Byron and crew chief Rudy Fugle; Christopher Bell (2-seed) eliminated Denny Hamlin (12-seed) — notable, Jeff pointed out, because Hamlin is the driver credited with pushing for the bracket challenge's creation; Chase Elliott (13-seed) advanced after Chase Briscoe wrecked; and Todd Gilland advanced over Alex Bowman in a restart mix-up neither host had seen replayed yet. That sets semifinals at North Wilsboro of Chase Elliott vs. Todd Gilland and Ryan Blaney vs. Christopher Bell. Jordan predicted the Elliott–Gilland side would be lopsided given Elliott's superior equipment, but was more bullish on Blaney–Bell as appointment viewing, calling both drivers capable of winning outright at North Wilsboro on Sunday.

North Wilsboro Preview

The hosts previewed the return of Cup points racing to North Wilsboro Speedway for the first time in roughly three decades, framing it as a milestone tied closely to Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s advocacy for the track's revival — Jeff noted he'd interviewed Dale Jr. that week for an upcoming Athletic story and credited him with pushing the track from a decaying iRacing scan project in 2019 to a sold-out-trending points race. Jordan reminisced about attending the original All-Star Race revival event years earlier — no bathrooms, no concessions, fans weed-whacking the property beforehand — as the moment the track's comeback got real momentum. Both flagged that ticket demand is trending toward a sellout for the July 17–19 weekend, headlined by a free Sawyer Brown pre-race concert, and joked about NASCAR's decision not to build a fan crossover bridge onto the frontstretch, wondering aloud whether that was in part a lingering nod to a memorable post-race incident from a prior All-Star Race at the track.

Championship Implications

Jordan delivered the episode's biggest championship-picture reset: with the win, Ryan Blaney is now within 65 points of the regular-season title, turning what looked like a two-man Denny Hamlin–Tyler Reddick race into a genuine three-way fight. "I do think we have to start giving Ryan Blaney serious consideration to winning this championship," Jordan said, noting that with the exception of the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis — which she expects to be Toyota-dominated — the remaining regular-season slate (North Wilsboro, Iowa, New Hampshire, Richmond, Daytona) skews toward tracks where Ford has historically been competitive and where Blaney specifically has run well. She cited a stat relayed by a beat reporter in the post-race media session: since June 1st of the previous year, Ford's only six Cup wins all belong to Blaney. Jeff's analogy for Blaney's approach: "it's like the movie Rounders... they just wait for your opponent to kind of slip up and make a mistake and you just keep grinding it out."

On the points bubble, Eric Jones's fifth-place finish pushed him to plus-8 over Joey Logano for the final cutoff spot, while Austin Dillon's seventh-place run moved him to plus-32. Both hosts flagged Kyle Larson as the most alarming case of a contender bleeding points through self-inflicted mistakes rather than bad luck — spinning out of a top finish for a second consecutive week — with Jeff noting Larson, at plus-156, "should definitely be ahead of [Chase] Elliott" given how much faster his car has been on a per-week basis. The regular-season points gap between Hamlin and Reddick tightened to 24 points after Reddick's eighth-place finish to Hamlin's 12th.

Notable Quotes

Jeff (on Blaney's performance): "This was phenomenal... I'm hard-pressed to think of a better one."

Jordan (on Bubba Wallace's penalty rule): "I hate black. I hate gray. And there's so much interpretation with this rule. Was you forced down? Did you back up? ... it's just a very vague, loose interpretation."

Jeff (on Bubba Wallace's season): "I can't think of a Chase contender that's given up more points."

Jordan (on Carson Hocevar and Zane Smith): "I still don't think we've gotten even an explanation of why he's going... I explicitly asked Zane Smith yesterday, where is this coming from?"

Jeff (on NASCAR's rivalry drought ending): "What an embarrassment of riches we're getting for people that were starving, thirsty through the desert for so long of no rivalries."

Jordan (on Ryan Blaney's championship odds): "This is no longer a two-man race. This is a legitimate three-man race."

Sources used for this recap: The Teardown YouTube episode "Another Thrilling Finish in Atlanta" (Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s Dirty Mo Media), full auto-generated YouTube transcript; NASCAR.com and Jayski race recaps for the Quaker State 400 at EchoPark Speedway.

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Karsyn Elledge, Tommy Baldwin, Eric Brennan (Freddie Kraft on vocal rest)

Guest: Rajah Caruth (JR Motorsports / Jordan Anderson Racing, NASCAR O'Reilly Series)

Date: July 13, 2026

Race Covered: Quaker State 400 at EchoPark Speedway, Hampton, Georgia (Atlanta)

Also Covered: NASCAR Truck Series at Lime Rock Park

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVjgJzL9dWc

Episode Overview

The DBC crew rolled into a Monday morning episode with an unusual setup: Freddie Kraft was sidelined on vocal rest, physically present in the studio but limited to a word count and relegated to yelling comments from the corner while Karsyn Elledge filled his chair. Eric Brennan, fresh from calling the Truck race in the broadcast booth at Lime Rock, joined Tommy Baldwin alongside guest Rajah Caruth — JR Motorsports wheelman, St. Vincent and the Grenadines ambassador, and a young driver with a lot to say about splitting his season between two cars, two organizations, and two very different sets of expectations.

The episode's headline is simple: after months of publicly roasting Carson Hocevar's driving, Tommy Baldwin finally ran out of ammunition. Hocevar started 31st in Atlanta, used a "Jimmy Johnson" race call at 48 laps to go, and carved through the field with a drive that Tommy could only describe as deserving flowers. It was the moment fans of the show have been waiting for, and it dominated the discussion. Beyond Hocevar, the crew covered the worn-out Atlanta surface's impact on strategy, Bubba Wallace's controversial below-the-line penalty on the final lap, and what sounds like a significant aero change coming for the Cup Series at Daytona. They also paused the racing talk to mark NASCAR's announcement of a Celebration of Life for Kyle Busch, scheduled for October 9th at Charlotte Speedway — with Tommy making a pointed suggestion about what the Truck Series championship trophy should be named going forward.

Lime Rock Truck Race: Landon Lewis Earns a Fan

Eric Brennan opened the show with a report from the Lime Rock booth — a track he described as having recovered impressively after 70 mph winds blocked roads all week, with volunteers getting the place cleaned up in time. The truck race itself was messier than last year's because extra cautions scrambled fuel strategy and allowed about 11 trucks to cycle to the front in the closing stages, disrupting the normal order built by stage winners like Kaden Honeycutt.

The most discussed story was Landon Lewis finishing second without taking Enfinger out for the win. Lewis, who has taken criticism throughout his short-track career for aggressive moves, had an opportunity on the final lap and did not take it. Tommy noted the contrast: "He that goes away a lot further running second that way than wholesaling it." Rajah backed him up, saying Lewis jumped from outside the Chase bubble to ninth in points, while Jake Garcia — who did get caught up in a wreck — is now 17 points out with four races to go.

Grant Enfinger's win drew genuine affection from Rajah, who revealed Enfinger was his team captain at GMS in his first truck season. "Not flashy, but super smart, methodical," Rajah said. "He actually reached out to me earlier this year just being a friend and a teammate." The added footnote: Enfinger nearly destroyed his day before 9 a.m. when he cut a left front tire in practice and went off into the grass. He won the race anyway.

Jordan Anderson's four-wide move that triggered a large wreck generated less sympathy. Tommy's assessment was blunt — "lost his road map" — and Rajah noted that at that stage of the race, no one is going to give you space. An early wildcard in the race was the ARCA segment, where Thomas Alvarado won Friday but then had his truck catch fire under caution with a blown oil line, requiring a helicopter transport to the hospital. He was released, but Eric called it the most unusual thing he had seen happen under a yellow flag.

The crew also took time to debate the non-competitive pit stop format — the cost-saving arrangement where teams can pit under any caution but must spend a minimum of 55 seconds on pit road and cannot gain or lose track position. Tommy and Rajah both pushed back on the format generally, arguing that the hidden cost of not having practice reps for mechanics who go over the wall just shifts spending elsewhere. Rajah added that some of his favorite truck racing memories were from the old days when teams could develop pit crew skills on-site.

Rajah Caruth: Two Cars, Two Realities, One Chase Shot

The most substantive segment of the episode was Rajah Caruth's extended conversation about what it is actually like to split a season between the JR Motorsports No. 88 — which carries full Hendrick Motorsports support — and the Jordan Anderson Racing No. 32, which gets a different level of RCR assistance. Rajah was candid about the mental adjustment involved: "I feel like in my races in the 32, for the most part, I've gotten everything out of it. But when I've been in the 88, some of the races I think about — Talladega, Rockingham, Martinsville, Dover — I pushed and pressed because I was like, man, I need to go and maximize this day."

Dover was a recurring reference point. Rajah twice returned to it as the moment he recalibrated his approach — "a home race" where he pressed too hard and made a mistake that still frustrates him. He said Dale Earnhardt Jr. has been actively involved, noting that after Atlanta, Dale told him: "When you get in those moments at the end of the race, you can't second-guess those moves. You just have to go off instinct." Rajah described that relationship with genuine warmth, saying that having an owner who is both present on the radio and who "has your back" in the aftermath of mistakes makes a real difference.

On the Chase math: Rajah is 17 points behind Taylor Gray heading into Indianapolis. He was direct about his confidence. "I'm not changing up anything on my end. Iowa and Daytona — I know what I'm capable of behind the wheel." Eric provided analytical backup, noting Taylor Gray's team has run out of gas on the last lap and taken themselves out of two recent races. Eric put it simply: "Not just because I like you, but performance-wise I think there's a really good shot here." Tommy agreed. The consensus was that Brent Cruse missing four races at the start of the year is the bigger mathematical curiosity, but the real race is between Rajah and Taylor Gray.

Atlanta Cup Race: Blaney Wins, Tommy Eats His Words on Hocevar

Ryan Blaney won the Quaker State 400 at EchoPark Speedway after an early Monday morning finish — the race was delayed by rain and didn't conclude until around 2 a.m. ET. Freddie Kraft's vocal rest added a layer of comedy throughout: he was in the studio, apparently attempting to whisper contributions, and the crew kept cutting him off. "He's got a word count," Karsyn deadpanned. "He forgot to speak on the last lap." Tommy estimated that Blaney's No. 12 was the strongest car all night, leading over 170 laps. A bad pit stop dropped him back temporarily, but a clean stop the following time got him into fourth and into clean air, from where he reasserted dominance.

The biggest story, though, was Carson Hocevar. Starting 31st, Hocevar spent the first portion of the race near the back before his team issued the call that unlocked something. "The spotter said 48 laps to go — Jimmy Johnson," Tommy explained. "And Hocevar just carved through the field." Tommy's judgment: "Husqvarna, that kid deserves an A+ for this week. I'm sorry. When you deserve your flowers..." — at which point the rest of the table lit up. Rajah described racing alongside Hocevar in the truck series and confirmed what makes him hard to race against: "How aware he is of where he's putting himself, always thinking about the next move. Hard to race against. But I respect it because he's going to be on 10 every time, no matter who it is."

The strategy dimension of the Atlanta race produced one of the more technically detailed conversations of the episode. Karsyn asked Tommy whether Atlanta has become a Daytona-style balancing act between trimming for speed and adding downforce for traffic. Tommy confirmed it is getting there: "The first couple cautions, the adjustments being made on pit road for probably 10 to 15 cars were not ordinary race adjustments. They were adjusting heights in the front to change the aero platform." Rajah noted that Atlanta repaved since the era when drivers "didn't want it to be another Daytona-Talladega" has swung in the opposite direction — the combination of handling variables and superspeedway dynamics now makes it one of the best races on the calendar. He also flagged that the track is wearing to the point where he argued teams deserve a practice session. Tommy agreed: "Atlanta's getting wore out enough that we probably need this practice now."

The final lap produced two notable moments: Kyle Larson got into Brisco while charging from the back (Chase Elliott's night ended earlier in the process), and Zayn Smith crashed in turn two with laps to go. NASCAR held the yellow and let the field race to the finish. All three hosts called it the right decision, with Rajah noting that as long as the ruling is consistent with how it's been applied in recent years, drivers can live with it.

Bubba Wallace's Penalty: Spot Off, But the Rule Might Need To Go

The most contested officiating decision of the weekend was Bubba Wallace receiving a penalty for advancing his position by dipping below the yellow line on the final lap. Rajah, who described Wallace as "one of my good friends," was clear: "Spot off. He was trying to give the spot back." He argued that trying to change lanes at Atlanta with the current rules package — where you can slide unexpectedly just going through a corner — is inherently dangerous, and that going below the line may have been circumstantial rather than intentional. Freddy contributed a data point from the corner (relayed by the crew): the telemetry showed Bubba applied 250 pounds of brake pressure in turn three while trying to arrest the slide.

Tommy acknowledged the enforcement may have been technically correct under the rule but said he hates the rule itself and has for a long time. "I'd rather see the rule just go away and give it back to the drivers." Eric pointed out that Dale Jr. calling it a penalty from the broadcast booth in real time probably didn't give NASCAR much political flexibility. The deeper debate was about what "advancing position" actually means — does it mean getting in front of another car, or getting further alongside one? Tommy argued NASCAR needs a clearer definition and needs to use the available technology to assess intent more quickly and transparently.

Karsyn summarized the episode's broader feeling on officiating: drivers are doing increasingly complex things at 170 miles per hour on surfaces that behave differently every month, and the rule book has not fully caught up with the data tools available to enforce it.

Kyle Busch: Celebration of Life at Charlotte, and a Suggestion for the Trophy

The crew paused the racing discussion for a moment to acknowledge NASCAR's announcement of a Celebration of Life for Kyle Busch, set for Friday, October 9th at Charlotte Motor Speedway, following the Truck Series race. The event will be open to the public.

Tommy made a pointed suggestion: rename the Truck Series championship trophy after Kyle Busch. "I would love to see the championship trophy — the truck championship trophy — named after Kyle Busch. I mean, you know what I'm saying? That's how you cap off everything he did." The table noted that Kyle's signature bow celebration — once met with boos from fans of other drivers — has become iconic, a gesture that the short-track world has absorbed as part of the sport's cultural fabric. Karsyn noted Samantha Busch has been active on social media sharing the outpouring of support, and said she is looking forward to seeing, in October, "a visual as to how appreciated and loved Kyle was by probably more people than you could even imagine."

Spot On Spot Off Highlights

The show's debate segment covered five topics from the weekend:

Hocevar's attitude costs him a push at the finish — Tommy and Rajah went spot off, arguing Hocevar was simply putting himself in the best lane (behind Christopher Bell and Ryan Blaney on the high side) with the best chance to win. Eric was more equivocal, spot on, saying he watched multiple instances where drivers appeared to consciously decline to push the No. 77. The consensus that emerged: this will be a bigger and clearer story when they get to Daytona.

Bubba Wallace penalized for advancing position — Spot off across the table, though the reasoning differed. Rajah cited intent and circumstance; Tommy cited the rule itself being outdated; Eric agreed the rule needs sharper definition even if the enforcement may have been technically defensible.

Worn-out Atlanta surface produces wild O'Reilly race — Unanimous spot on. "What race hasn't been a good crazy O'Reilly race?" Tommy said. "It's the package, man. It doesn't matter what track. Good racing. End of story."

Rajah Caruth will make the O'Reilly Chase — Spot on from all parties, including Rajah himself. The math works if he avoids mistakes at Indianapolis and executes at Iowa and Daytona.

NASCAR should have at least one short practice at every event — Spot on from the full table. Eric cited both the fan experience angle (going to a race and hearing silence when you arrive is the worst) and a competition argument: a major aero change is reportedly coming for Daytona, and drivers may have no practice time to figure it out before racing for playoff points.

The North Wilkesboro Conversation

Karsyn dropped a question midway through the practice debate: what if O'Reilly racing got a North Wilkesboro date? It sparked one of the more enthusiastic exchanges of the episode. Tommy endorsed it immediately, comparing the worn concrete surface to Rockingham's dynamics. Eric suggested a full Speedweek concept — Cup at Bowman Gray, O'Reilly and Trucks at Wilkesboro on alternating days, Modified and Late Model races filling out a week of racing in the region. The core argument: the Charlotte All-Star Race has moved around, freeing up the calendar, and the short-track culture in that part of North Carolina is exactly the audience that would make it work. "The Bowman Gray fans, the short track culture around here," Eric said. "You can't expect this everywhere, but this is the hub."

Reaction Theatre: The Court of Fan Opinion

The call-in segment produced several highlights. A caller doing a Dr. Phil impression wondered aloud why the JRM cars couldn't work together, comparing the effort to "a beaver trying to sign up to be a security guard for a deer." Another called asking if Freddie's coloring books for Bubba had come in — "hopefully they'll help him stay between the lines." A third caller delivered an account of a Sunday that began at 6:30 a.m. with beers, continued through church and a prayer for Kyle Busch, resumed with more beers at home, and still had five laps to go in the O'Reilly race when he checked back in. The crew described it as winning the award for most committed fan of the weekend.

S* Show Hall of Fame: Man vs. Bison

Eric reported on a video circulating online of tourists being chased by a bison in a national park. The husband was caught in the open, ended up circling a small patch of trees with the bison in pursuit, and was eventually launched — "starfished midair," in Eric's description. He survived with broken ribs. Tommy's take: he should not have been standing in the bison's line of sight. No settlement warranted.

Notable Quotes

Tommy Baldwin (on Hocevar's Atlanta drive): "Husqvarna, that kid deserves an A+ for this week. I'm sorry. When you deserve your flowers..."

Rajah Caruth (on mental approach after Dover): "Since that race and that moment, I really realized — it doesn't change what I do behind the wheel of the car. I'm doing the same thing when I'm in the 88 and the 32. I just finish depending on what car I'm in."

Eric Brennan (on the yellow-line rule): "I'd rather see the rule just go away and give it back to the drivers for a little bit and say, 'Hey, if you could manage this and don't do something incredibly stupid, bring it on.'"

Tommy Baldwin (on Kyle Busch's legacy): "I would love to see the championship trophy — the truck championship trophy — named after Kyle Busch. That's how you cap off everything he did."

Rajah Caruth (on Dale Earnhardt Jr. as owner): "Having an owner who is both present on the radio and has your back in the aftermath of mistakes makes a real difference. It was fun going through it this weekend. There were a couple moves I second-guessed and he literally said, 'When you get in those moments, you can't second-guess. You go off instinct.'"

Eric Brennan (on the North Wilkesboro Speedweek concept): "Get fans to this area, do the shop tours, then go up to the racetrack every night, see different types of cars. The hardest part is just the logistics of garage space — you can figure that out."

Karsyn Elledge (on the O'Reilly Series formula): "A lot of the rules have been the same for seven years. The meat and potatoes of it all has really stayed the same, and it hasn't been science-styled. It's just quintessential racing."

Podcast: The GluckCast (Episode 21)

Network: The Athletic / Dirty Mo Media

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Tommy Joe Martins (owner/director, Alpha Prime Racing); Austin Cindric (Team Penske, #2 Ford)

Date: July 9, 2026

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis

Episode Overview

GluckCast Episode 21 is the most substantive episode of the young show's run — a three-part dispatch from one of the most loaded weeks in the 2026 NASCAR news cycle. Jeff Gluck opens with a lengthy, pointed monologue dissecting NASCAR's decision not to penalize Shane Van Gisbergen or Zane Smith for what many observers (including a TNT analyst with the actual SMT data on screen) called obvious intentional wrecks at Chicagoland. He then sits down with Tommy Joe Martins — team owner, driver, and now award-winning short film director — for a sprawling 30-minute conversation about the true financial realities of running a small NASCAR O'Reilly Series team. The back half features Austin Cindric, who brings data, self-deprecating humor, and a genuinely thoughtful take on where Team Penske's Fords stand heading into Atlanta.

The episode title references both Martins's film "Underfunded" (recently released free on YouTube via the Amalto channel) and the broader garage culture Jeff is probing all episode: the gap between what NASCAR shows the public and what is actually happening inside the sport.

The Chicago Non-Penalty: Reading Between the Lines

Jeff opened the episode without a guest — just his notebook and a very specific theory about what NASCAR actually told the sport this week. At Chicagoland, SVG appeared to deliberately wreck Austin Hill under caution, and Zane Smith appeared to deliberately wreck Carson Hocevar. NASCAR reviewed both incidents and issued no penalties.

Gluck walked through the official explanations methodically. On the Holler Talk podcast, NASCAR's Mike Ford said race control "flagged it immediately" as questionable, then went through SVG's SMT data, radio transmissions, and camera angles. The conclusion: "Nothing in our eyes proved definitive." Brad Moran on SiriusXM's The Morning Drive added: "There just wasn't enough evidence there to say the incident was intentional."

Jeff's take: "On the TNT post-race show, Jamie McMurray pulls up SVG's SMT data and is showing it and says it's almost undeniable that the action was intentional. NASCAR looked at the same data and disagreed."

What Gluck kept coming back to was radio chatter. Mike Ford told Nate Ryan on Holler Talk that if there had been radio chatter, "yeah, it does change" whether it rises to a penalty — while also insisting "we don't need it." But Ford also added: "We have a pretty consistent history of if you say you're going to do it and then do it, that is going to rise to the level of a penalty." Jeff's bottom line: "As long as you don't say anything, don't press the button. That's got to be it, right?"

Gluck made clear he actually agrees with the non-penalty decision: "This is what the drivers want. This is a self-policing garage and a self-policing garage — short of violent hooks where you could injure somebody — is good for NASCAR." But he argued the logic exposes a deep inconsistency with the Ryan Priest situation at Texas. Priest said on the radio, "When I get to that 54, I'm done with him" — then, 30 minutes later, got into a racing incident with Ty Gibbs in which he may not have even made contact. After the race, Priest told Frontstretch: "I try to race everybody with the amount of respect I'd like in return. And when you don't do that, I'm not going to cut you a break."

NASCAR gave Priest a 25-point penalty. RFK appealed. The panel split 2-1 to uphold it, writing that "Mr. Priest's comments showed that he chose not to cut his competitor any breaks." Jeff's argument: Priest's radio comment didn't play out as threatened — and what SVG did at Chicagoland was objectively more blatant. "Objectively, what SVG did and what Zane Smith did at Chicagoland were far more blatant than what Ryan Priest did to Ty Gibbs at Texas."

Jeff called on NASCAR to retroactively give Priest his 25 points back by invoking the "accept in rare instances" exception: "Ryan Priest got wronged." He also pushed back on NASCAR's plan to hold meetings at Atlanta this weekend with SVG/Hill and Smith/Hocevar — essentially putting both pairs under heightened watch that removes Hill's ability to retaliate. "SVG intentionally took out Hill. When Hill didn't intentionally take out SVG... doesn't SVG actually have one coming?"

Tommy Joe Martins: The Money Is the Story

Jeff described Martins as "one of the more fascinating people I've come across in my time in racing" before introducing him. Martins is the co-owner of Alpha Prime Racing in the O'Reilly Series, a former driver, a sometime contributor to jeffgluck.com, and now the writer-director of Underfunded — a 24-minute dramatic short film that won nine festival awards (including Best Directorial Debut and Best Editing at Asheville Film Festival) before landing on YouTube for free distribution via the Amalto channel.

Jeff: "Without spoilers, this gives you a peek into the life of a small underfunded team. The team says Alpha Prime in the movie." The film centers on a team owner navigating three driver situations simultaneously: a veteran who's a former champion, a young woman with a Chili Bowl win and real backing, and a kid with no experience who can only race if he brings money. Tommy Joe was wearing the veteran's t-shirt on camera.

Martins confirmed the film's grounding in real life: "I just got a phone call, probably five minutes before I came on the air. It was from Rick Wear and he called me out of the blue... and he was like, 'I can't believe you made this. You and I are living the same life.'"

The conversation's two sharpest lines come from the film itself. First: "It's not a sport, it's a business." Second: "It's not the best drivers in the country, it's the best drivers in the country who can afford it." Martins on the latter: "I don't know why I haven't heard that before. That's just such a well-said thing."

On the budget gap in O'Reilly: Alpha Prime runs on roughly $2.5–3 million per year. Front-of-field O'Reilly teams are at $6 million or more — and Martins noted they are effectively Cup-level operations. JR Motorsports, he said, is "a cup level resources organization. It just is." Rick Hendrick now has a car in the O'Reilly Series. "You have Mike Harmon Racing against literally Rick Hendrick," Martins said. "If you put that on a scale, it's a million and a half racing against a $400 million company."

Martins made a pointed media critique: teams' budgets should be public, the way MLB payrolls are. "Just make the budgets public. That's the easiest thing you can do... that frames everything." Without that context, fan commentary on driver performance is almost meaningless. When the top 13 owner's points spots are occupied by the same 13 well-funded teams, evaluating a driver finishing 14th is a fundamentally different exercise than it appears. He compared it to criticizing a quarterback's completion percentage without noting the average depth of target.

On parts scarcity: There is no more trickle-down from Cup. Used practice tires, lightly used brakes from first-lap incidents — all gone. "We're having to buy all the stuff new and that's driven the cost significantly up." Parts are backordered. Manufacturers are reluctant to produce inventory they fear will be worthless when the NextG car arrives.

On sponsor non-payment: "Extremely common." Teams have no leverage — they have to show up to the race regardless. Martins described wrapping a car and showing up to a track recently without having been paid, then chasing someone for "three or four grand... it's everyday life." He walked through the hostage dynamic: a sponsor paying for four of seven contracted races can threaten to withhold the last three unless they receive a free race.

On the NextG car transition: "I don't think Alpha Prime exists" if a new car is introduced. "You're going to spend millions of dollars buying equipment and it might not be worth anything in a couple years." Martins compared the small-team situation to everyone "walking around holding a grenade as long as we can."

On driver development: "I don't think driver development happens in NASCAR." He pointed to Ross Chastain, who arrived fully formed after years with Johnny Davis. "A driver can either do it or they can't do it." The "dreams business" framing closed the segment: "The money keeps flowing as long as the dream is still alive. But as soon as there's this moment of, well, the kid's not good enough or the sponsor doesn't believe it anymore — that's when it stops."

Austin Cindric: Pens, Points, and the Reality Check Ahead

Gluck opened the Cindric segment by noting that Austin is now "the current authority on all things ink pens" in the Cup garage — a development that began as a pointed response to backlash over AI-generated social posts. After fans revolted against an AI-generated Gladiator video around Bristol, Cindric decided to handwrite his weekly start-time posts with a sticky note and pen, then review the pen. The bit has taken on a life of its own at the racetrack. "I can't go to a racetrack now without many race fans coming up to me... giving me pens, telling me a pen I should review." At Chicago on the Fourth of July, a "big hairy dude wearing only overalls and a USA bandana" approached him to express enthusiasm for the reviews.

Cindric's primary pen: the Pilot G2, which he's used for a decade. He handwrites all his debriefs and scans them into Team Penske's system. "I think it helps me retain information better."

On Atlanta, the data is striking. Per analytics from SC Daniel on Substack, Cindric ranks #1 in average Stage 1 points, #3 in Stage 2 points, #2 in laps led, and #3 in average running position at Atlanta in the NextG era. But he's only 16th in average finish and 24th in laps completed. The reason: he keeps getting taken out. Gluck: "What are you supposed to do to win one of these Atlanta races?" Cindric: "I am a big believer in the law of averages."

Cindric is currently +27 to the cut line after Chicago — inside the top 16 since Nashville — but largely on top-15s rather than wins or top-5s. He acknowledged Fords are "a step behind" on intermediates, but pointed out there are no more mile-and-a-half tracks until the Chase. The remaining schedule before playoffs: Atlanta, Daytona, Indy, then North Wilkesboro, Iowa, Richmond, New Hampshire. Short tracks and speedways — the exact format where short-track strength matters most. "By the end of July, I would love to have more control over where I'm at."

Cindric set his explicit target: top 10 in points. "As crazy as that may sound — but I feel like, to realistically have a shot at contending for a championship, I have to be in the top 10 in the seeding for the Chase."

On qualifying's importance at Atlanta: Cindric said it matters less for track position than for pit selection — "pit road is just as challenging as keeping yourself out of trouble on the racetrack" at a track with tight stalls and complex two-tire vs. four-tire strategy calls.

On the Chicago non-penalty, Cindric was measured: NASCAR has become "the wild west if you were to create a spectrum of driving standards" compared to other forms of motorsport he's competed in. He credited the sport for its improved driver-NASCAR communication over his career, but said transparency is needed. "You can't just have people junking each other without good reason." He stopped short of criticizing the decision itself, noting: "My opinion is only one of 38 and definitely not the loudest."

Atlanta Preview and Bracket Update

Jeff closed with a quick Atlanta look-ahead. Chase Briscoe at Chicago: "Same old Atlanta. It'll be crazy, chaotic, intense. Three wide and 200 lead changes." The Good Race Poll backs this up — Spring 2026 Atlanta rated 92.6%, the top mark of the season. All five of the top-rated races in the poll's NextG era history are at the reconfigured Atlanta. Four of the last five Atlanta races have produced 46+ lead changes; the spring race set the all-time record at 57.

The bracket challenge update: Chevy Hawk and BPR3 are tied for the group lead at 250 points, though Chevy Hawk has fewer points remaining. Gluck himself is in 652nd place with 160 points after losing Buscher at Chicagoland, with only Elliott and Blayne left in his final four.

Race weekend schedule:

- Truck Series: Saturday, 1 p.m. ET, FS1 (Limerock — standalone event)

- O'Reilly Series: Saturday night, 7 p.m. ET, CW (Echo Park Speedway / Atlanta)

- Cup Series: Sunday night, 7 p.m. ET, TNT (Echo Park Speedway / Atlanta); Cup qualifying Saturday only, no practice session

Notable Quotes

Jeff (on the Chicago non-penalty logic): "As long as you don't say anything, don't press the button. That's got to be it, right?"

Jeff (on Ryan Priest): "Objectively, what SVG did and what Zane Smith did at Chicagoland were far more blatant than what Ryan Priest did to Ty Gibbs at Texas. If you watch the in-cars, they took out the guys they were trying to take out. Ryan Priest might not have even touched him."

Tommy Joe Martins (on the budget gap): "You have Mike Harmon Racing against literally Rick Hendrick. If you put that on a scale, it's a million and a half racing against a $400 million company. That's what's going on."

Tommy Joe Martins (on funded vs. talented drivers): "Why did Kaden Honeycutt get an opportunity? He got it at JR. Al Nice has a lot more money than me and can afford to take more risks. These people that break in — the thing they're looking for is just a rich person."

Tommy Joe Martins (on the O'Reilly budget chasm): "The top 13 owner's points spots are the same 13 well-funded teams. There are 13 of them and they're in the top 14 spots. It's class racing."

Tommy Joe Martins (on the 'dreams business'): "The money keeps flowing as long as the dream is still alive. But as soon as there's this moment of, well, the kid's not good enough or the sponsor doesn't believe it anymore — that's when it stops."

Austin Cindric (on Atlanta and the law of averages): "I am a big believer in the law of averages, Jeff. And the law of averages tells me that if I continue to put myself in position and we keep bringing fast Ford Mustangs, we will eventually find ourselves winning one of these."

Austin Cindric (on the pen reviews phenomenon): "I've got some big hairy dude wearing only overalls and a USA bandana who comes up to me and goes, 'Dude, love your pen reviews, man.' I was not expecting that guy to be the one inspired by it."

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Tommy Baldwin (host), Eric Brennan (filling in for Karsyn Elledge)

Guests: Ward Burton, Jeb Burton

Date: July 7, 2026

Race Covered: eero 400 — Chicagoland Speedway, Joliet, Illinois

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTwyeD7idN0

Episode Overview

Door Bumper Clear returned post-Chicagoland with a family reunion of sorts: Tommy Baldwin was joined by Eric Brennan (filling in for Karsyn Elledge, who was out) and two Burtons — Ward and Jeb. Ward Burton, the 2002 Daytona 500 winner for Bill Davis Racing, was of course Tommy's driver during some of the most competitive years of their careers together. Jeb Burton, Ward's son and a current full-time O'Reilly Series driver for Jordan Anderson Racing in the No. 27, rounded out the table. Freddie Kraft, still recovering from vocal issues, was notably absent.

The episode opened before sunrise — both Burtons are notoriously early risers with deep ties to Virginia farm and outdoor life — and the tone stayed warm, loose, and storytelling-heavy throughout. This was as much a reunion episode as a race recap, with the Chicagoland results woven around three-plus decades of racing relationships, factory politics, and genuinely hilarious stories from the garage. That said, there was real analytical substance too, particularly in the Spot On/Spot Off segment where the crew dug into Toyota's dominance, SVG and Austin Hill's feud, and the state of NASCAR's competitive balance.

The racing headline was straightforward: Chase Briscoe won the eero 400, JGR put seven cars in the top 10, and the regular season points picture shifted hard with Tyler Reddick (the 19) suffering a radiator issue mid-race. The show also touched on the O'Reilly Series race at Chicagoland, where Brandon Jones picked up a win in what the crew framed as a fitting result given how well Gibbs-aligned equipment performs on worn-out intermediate tracks.

Chicagoland Race Recap

NASCAR's return to Chicagoland Speedway after a seven-year absence got mostly favorable reviews from the DBC crew — with a notable exception. Tommy Baldwin was effusive about the racing product and the atmosphere ("the fans were great, it was a cool racetrack"), but was less charitable about the logistics. Rain turned the infield into a mud pit and the parking situation was apparently a disaster. Eric Brennan noted he opened his second 24-pack of beer before the race was over and still stuck it out.

On the track, Chase Briscoe held off Christopher Bell by a fraction of a second for the win, with JGR Toyotas filling out the top of the order in a way the crew had grown almost accustomed to discussing. "Seven in the top 10," Eric noted. "I mean, it's just it's it's unbelievable what they're doing." Tommy added that he "didn't read anything" in terms of notes beforehand but didn't need to — the big three organizations were in the top 13, and if the other teams hadn't had issues, it would have been worse. The group praised Chase Briscoe's ability to navigate traffic late, which proved to be the difference against Bell's charging No. 20. "Christopher Bell's determination" got its own chapter — he continues to run faster than his results have shown since his Michigan crash.

Kyle Larson had a solo spin on a bump in Turn 3 late in the race — a flashy moment the crew addressed without much ceremony. "When you run the edge, you're going to pay the price sometime," Tommy said, noting that Larson had a car capable of something much better before the incident.

Tyler Reddick's regular season title run took a major hit. The No. 19 developed a hole in the radiator mid-race. The team repaired it and got him back out, but by then the damage was done — Reddick is now 44 points behind Denny Hamlin going into Atlanta. "That's a wild swing," Eric noted. "For the first time in a while, Reddick seems a bit farther out of that battle."

One oddly feel-good subplot: Tommy paused to give NASCAR credit for the pit lane car-recovery system — hooks on the front and rear of the wreckers designed to grab cars cleanly without tearing parts off. "That's a great idea. They redesigned all that stuff when they built the new car and then they started applying it to all the other divisions." It's a small thing, but it stuck out.

Brandon Jones won the O'Reilly Series race Saturday night. Jeb Burton raced in the event as well and offered a driver's-eye view of why Chicago suited Jones: "Those Gibbs cars are really good on those style racetracks. And Brandon's a good, clean racer." Jones moved to sixth in the O'Reilly standings on the strength of that result.

The Toyota Question: Work Harder, Not Smarter Rulings

The show's most analytically substantive segment was the Spot On/Spot Off debate over whether NASCAR should step in and level the playing field given Toyota's seven-car top-10 sweep. Tommy Baldwin was characteristically direct in his answer: no.

"I don't I don't think you can penalize those guys because they've went to work and made their stuff really fast," he said. "Chevrolet and Ford will catch up. It goes in waves." But his real point ran deeper — he spent several minutes laying out exactly why Toyota's dominance is structural, not incidental. Joe Gibbs Racing acts as Toyota's flagship lab; 23XI Racing pays a fee to JGR and gets embedded JGR staff in return. That knowledge transfer is by design. Meanwhile, Hendrick, RCR, and Trackhouse collaborate with Chevrolet separately, and Ford's teams are even more fragmented. "Toyota as a company does a really good job of making sure that all the guidelines are in place for these teams to follow," Tommy said. "Ford don't have that. Chevrolet doesn't."

Ward Burton, characteristically philosophical, argued the real issue is the overall cost spiral: "This show is not any better than it used to be, but it's completely out of touch when it comes to how much damn money people are spending just to go run Chicago. I don't have the answers for it, but somehow the sanctioning body's got to do it." He lamented an era when teams with a handful of people and creative thinking could hang with anyone — now the gap is essentially insurmountable without a manufacturing alliance behind you.

Brad Keselowski's public comments praising Toyota's collaborative model and urging Ford and Chevy to do the same got a "spot on" rating from Tommy: "He's 100% right. Stop worrying about Toyota and get to work."

SVG vs. Austin Hill: The Feud Continues

The Shane Van Gisbergen / Austin Hill subplot got significant airtime. Austin Hill apparently came off pit road under caution and doored SVG in Turns 1 and 2 at Chicagoland — widely seen as payback for an earlier incident in California. Richard Childress went public saying SVG got what was coming and predicted a harsh NASCAR penalty. The DBC crew largely disagreed.

SVG, for his part, was careful on the radio not to name Austin or the No. 33 — a strategy Freddie Kraft has referenced many times on the show. "He was pleading the fifth," Eric said. Tommy read the moment practically: "He's in a playoff situation. He has a lot more to lose than Austin right now." Ward Burton, at his bluntest, called Austin Hill "not the cleanest driver" and suggested the garage has known this for a while.

Jeb Burton offered the most driver-centric take: "There are certain people out there that you know if you go in the corner and root them out of the way, they're going to do it right back. I don't think SVG needed to do it, but he set the tone that they're not losing anymore." The group landed roughly on: racing incident, likely no penalty warranted, and hopefully settled now — though Ward cautioned that SVG was playing with fire given his playoff position.

Tommy's quick aside on Carson Hocevar — who drew yet another controversy at Chicagoland after Zayn Smith appeared to deliberately take him out in Turn 3 — captured the broader exasperation: "People are tired of it, man. He has everything in front of him and sometimes just goes off the wall." The comparison to Ross Chastain's arc came up: Chastain has calmed down, partly because his car and career position no longer demand that approach. The question of whether Hocevar will mature the same way got a divided response.

Tommy and Ward: The Reunion Stories

This was the best part of the episode if you have any appreciation for NASCAR's early-2000s garage culture. The Ask DBC segment turned into a genuine retrospective, with Ward and Tommy swapping stories that most fans have never heard.

The Bill Davis Racing era ended partly because of a resource drain nobody saw coming: as Toyota's Cup program was being assembled, Bill Davis quietly redirected engineers and personnel — including Ward's head engineer and head body man — to what Ward called "Area 51," the facility building the Toyota truck program. "It was three, four, five months before I even knew what was going on," Ward said. "I was kind of left on an island." By the time it became public, Dodge pulled their support from the team too. Both Ward and Tommy were released shortly after. The broader irony is that Toyota's early commitment to shared resources across all their teams — the same model that now powers their dominance — was being built on the ruins of the team Ward and Tommy had together.

The most surprising story: Tommy was on the verge of leaving Bill Davis to become Jeff Gordon's crew chief at Hendrick. He'd made all his calls and was ready to announce. Then his father went quiet on the phone. "You're in the middle of building one where you're at. Why don't you just build what you got?" Tommy changed his mind. Then Ward called Davis's bluff and actually paid part of Tommy's salary out of pocket to keep him. "David wouldn't do it," Ward said simply. Tommy turned down a seat at the dynasty and stayed to see the program fall apart anyway — the kind of NASCAR story that doesn't get told enough.

On lighter notes: Jeb Burton and Tommy Baldwin's son apparently spent time at tracks stealing Bill Davis's golf carts and driving them through campgrounds in the middle of the night, eventually hitting Michael Waltrip's motorcoach. That incident, the crew claims, is why all golf carts at NASCAR events now require tags and insurance. Jeb also confessed to filling Carl Edwards' shoes with whipped cream at Michigan, noting Edwards had taken his uncle's ride and he "didn't really like this guy" at the time.

Ward Burton Wildlife Foundation — 30 Years

Ward took a moment near the end to note the Ward Burton Wildlife Foundation is celebrating its 30th year. The foundation operates across roughly 11,000 acres spread over four to five counties in Southside Virginia. Its flagship initiative is an Army Compatible Use Buffer program — a federal program that compensates landowners near military bases for keeping their land in compatible-use status, protecting both the land and the military mission. The foundation is expanding its conservation work to Wyoming. Ward, Jeb noted, also has a python hunt in the Everglades planned during Daytona Speedweeks. "He's catching snakes with his bare hands," Jeb said, with an air of resignation.

Notable Quotes

Tommy Baldwin (on Toyota's dominance): "Stop worrying about Toyota. You're wasting time and energy not making your stuff better."

Ward Burton (on racing economics): "It doesn't take that much effort or resources to put on a good show. We did it back when your dad was racing. You got three, four, five people max and you went and raced. It's just ridiculous how much they spend now."

Jeb Burton (on SVG/Austin Hill): "I think Austin Hill is one of those guys — I've never had a problem with him, but if you go in the corner and root him out of the way, he's going to do it right back."

Tommy Baldwin (on Carson Hocevar): "He has everything in front of him. People are tired of it, man. It just baffles me to have to see people like that just sometimes go off the wall."

Ward Burton (on Toyota's philosophy): "Toyota started their everybody-worked-together approach right from the beginning when they came into the sport. Every truck was built in one facility for all the teams. They had that mentality from day one."

Eric Brennan (on the Chicagoland parking): "I think I opened my second 24-pack of beer by that point, but I made the whole race. I was happy about that."

Sources: Door Bumper Clear YouTube episode "Tommy Is Fired Up About Carson Hocevar Again" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTwyeD7idN0), published July 7, 2026. Race results from NASCAR.com and Jayski.

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr. with co-host TJ Majors

Guest(s): Chase Briscoe (race winner, Joe Gibbs Racing No. 19 Toyota); Russell (Dirty Mo Dough betting analyst)

Date: July 7, 2026

Race Covered: eero 400 — Chicagoland Speedway, Joliet, Illinois (July 5, 2026)

Show Type: Dirty Air edition — NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective

YouTube Title: "Zane Smith Broke The No. 1 Rule in Stock Car Racing"

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82s0Zi0K_2o

Duration: 1 hr 29 min

Episode Overview

This Dirty Air edition drops on the 25th anniversary of Dale Jr.'s famous 2001 Pepsi 400 win at Daytona — a date the show leans into fully, as the Ask Jr. segment turns into an extended, emotional reflection on one of NASCAR's most iconic nights. The timing makes for a layered episode: the show opens with a muddy, traffic-snarled Chicagoland weekend that Dale thinks was nonetheless a success, pivots through a debate about whether NASCAR needs more on-track retribution, and ends with race winner Chase Briscoe joining by phone to describe bending a toe link at 175 mph and still holding off Christopher Bell.

Dale and TJ are both remote this week — Dale apparently on a getaway with Amy — but the show loses none of its energy. With the 25th anniversary of that Daytona win framing the day, the emotional gravity of Dale Jr.'s family history finds its way into the episode in an unexpectedly poignant moment during Ask Jr., as Dale describes watching a brief clip of his uncle Danny and realizing what he was carrying that July night in 2001.

Going Paperless at the Booth

Dale opens with a shoutout to TNT teammate Jamie McMurray, who convinced him to finally go fully paperless at the broadcast booth. For nearly a decade, Dale's routine involved printing up to 150 pages of race notes from Racing Insights, sifting through them during the weekend, and hauling the pile to the booth. McMurray introduced him to an iPad-and-Apple-Pencil setup, and Chicagoland was the first race where Dale didn't print a single sheet.

"It was kind of like going to work naked," Dale said. "Very nerve-wracking, but it was so much easier." He noted the qualifying show felt a thousand times better — information was more accessible, the commentary flowed more naturally. Steve Letarte already went paperless this year; now Dale is on board. He also offered consistent praise for the Racing Insights team, calling them "freaking awesome" for the data they provide the broadcast.

Chicagoland Weekend: Rain, Mud, and a Surprisingly Good Race

The weekend in Joliet was defined by extraordinary rainfall — Dale described it as the hardest rain he's ever experienced, with drops hitting the roof of his Camping World fifth wheel "like baseballs." The result was saturated parking lots, locked-down roads, and a line of cars still trying to get into the track when Stage 1 ended. NASCAR asked for an 8-minute delay before the race to give traffic time to clear.

Dale didn't want to pile on about the traffic situation: "I don't know what they could have done differently to make it easier." What he found more telling was the race poll Jeff Gluck runs after every Cup event — the Chicagoland result came in around 82–86% positive. "Usually even the people that didn't go to the race — if they see a glaring issue, they'll vote no," Dale said. "And we still got that high." TJ noted the fan area underneath the grandstands was packed with food, third-party vendors, and entertainment.

On the future: Dale said NASCAR VP Steve O'Donnell told him on Thursday before the race that Chicagoland might sell out — a remarkable turnaround from earlier ticket-sale concerns. "I'm kind of surprised I haven't heard more about the traffic," Dale said. The positive takeaway is that NASCAR wants to return to the track, and Dale firmly believes they should.

O'Reilly Race: Chase Elliott Nearly Delivers for JRM

Dale gave an honest assessment of JR Motorsports' performance in the O'Reilly race. Chase Elliott, driving for JRM, came close to a win but lost on a final green-white-checkered restart to Brandon Jones. "Brandon Jones just did a great job — got a great position going down the back straightaway and off into three," Dale said. "Chase buried it in there but couldn't outperform the 20 car. I feel like we could have given him a better race car at the end."

Connor Zilisch suffered another DNF — this time, ran out of fuel on the banking. "That was a mistake on our part," Dale acknowledged. He expressed genuine sympathy for Zilisch's brutal run of luck: seven DNFs in the season, five in the last seven races. "The universe is not pleased. I can't remember a driver having this big of a long run of bad luck. All you can do is keep showing up."

The seven car (Algar) had a possible top-three car but had pit road mistakes; the eight car was too tight; the nine car (Gragson) fought hard on restarts to salvage track position. JRM left Chicagoland knowing they have work to do.

Cup Race Recap: The Race Within the Race

The Cup race itself — which Chase Briscoe won by 0.276 seconds over Christopher Bell in a JGR 1-2-3 sweep — featured two significant on-track incidents that generated most of the post-race conversation.

On the opening lap, John Hunter Nemechek squeezed Ricky Stenhouse into the fence. Stenhouse lifted; Ryan Preece had to avoid and cut across the track, and Connor Zilisch had nowhere to go. "They didn't hit each other — it was kind of strange when you first looked at it," Dale said. Zilisch's night was over before it started, marking his seventh DNF of the season.

Later in Stage 1, Zane Smith drove down the corner and wrecked Carson Hocevar — and took himself out in the process. Dale had reached out to Smith after the race and got no reply: "Dude, I like the aggression, but you can't wreck yourself. There's too much [at stake], man." Smith and Hocevar have a documented history stretching back to an incident at Iowa Speedway in 2025 and apparently a subsequent attempt at Nashville. "Zane has all this great positive momentum and he just ruined his race," Dale said. "I want his deal to work. I want him to be around."

The bigger story was SVG and Austin Hill. Shane van Gisbergen drove Hill into the outside wall — SVG said he was "shooting for the bottom, trying to get clean air" and called the contact unintentional. Hill left pit road under caution and hit the left front of SVG's No. 97 Toyota, apparently trying to bend the toe link. "He knows his race is over, so he wants his race to be over," Dale said. "That's the traditional way to park a guy." The broadcast missed the Hill-on-SVG hit live, something Dale said he's genuinely annoyed about.

Self-Policing: Dale Wants More, Not Less

The SVG-Hill and Smith-Hocevar incidents sparked the episode's sharpest and most animated exchange. Dale came in clearly on the side of letting the garage police itself, and he made no apologies for it.

"All these moments are TV gold and they are podcast gold, storyline gold," Dale said. "Our sport needs controversy. We need some ruffled feathers. We need some hurt feelings. We need some guys that are pissed off." TJ agreed: "We need a lot more of that in my opinion. You didn't mess with people and the racing was better. You couldn't just drive through people."

Dale drew a line at "right hooks" — direct physical violence or confrontation in the pit lane or infield. But on-track retribution? "If SVG did that on purpose, that's the traditional way to park a guy," he said. "The drivers know that line. You want to see aggression, and you want guys pissed off, and you want people doing things they shouldn't be doing."

He also argued the new points format — where every car is essentially still alive for a playoff spot via a race win — is creating more of this tension. "The guy that's 25th in points knows his ass ain't gonna make the chase and he's just grinding. He is not the one to mess with." On Zane Smith specifically: "If you're established, you got a bunch of wins and you want to get after somebody, you can throw a race. But I don't know that he's got enough roots in the ground to be doing that."

As for whether NASCAR should penalize SVG or Hill — Dale essentially said let it ride. "NASCAR will only act when they've got factual evidence or an admittance of guilt. If you don't react in the moment, it gets harder as time goes on."

Toyota Dominance and the Gap Closing

With seven Toyotas in the top ten at Chicagoland — a manufacturer record — Dale spent some time analyzing where the manufacturer battle stands. Toyota's advantage runs deep into tire life: "As tires wear, as the track gets slick, as things get challenging, the Toyotas continue to perform where the other cars start to struggle." Short-run parity is improving for Chevy and Ford, but the long-run gap remains.

Dale said he's starting to root for Chevy and Ford to challenge: "I was kind of digging the Toyota dominance for a while, but you get too much of anything and you're like, all right, let's see somebody come up here and challenge them." He thinks HMS (Hendrick Motorsports) is the most likely team to break through first. Qualifying at Chicagoland was notably tighter than usual, which Dale credits partly to the teams being on a "clean slate" — no one had deep notebooks for that track with the Next Gen car.

Brad Keselowski Is Using the Media

Brad Keselowski's recent comments about the Toyota-JGR partnership helping fuel Toyota's success generated a brief discussion. Dale's read: "Brad is trying to use the media as leverage to try to get Ford to react in the manner that he wants them to react." He doesn't think Brad is changing anything Toyota does — "he's only trying to use the media so Ford will hear it and go, maybe we need to do something." Dale noted Brad has been getting more vocal over several weeks, suggesting private conversations with Ford aren't getting the results he wants. "Sometimes that's what you do, man — if the conversation behind closed doors isn't working, you'll go in that media center and make it known."

Kyle Larson: Not Worried

On Larson's winless streak and Sunday's spin at Chicagoland: Dale is unconvinced it's a problem. "There's a couple guys in the field who step over the line every once in a while because they're just trying. Larson's kind of always been that way and he always makes up for it." The concern is points — Larson is now in a tight battle with Ty Gibbs and Chase Elliott for 4th through 6th in standings, and every position in that range meaningfully shifts championship odds. "He doesn't want fifth. He wants fourth. Every spot matters. If you start chasing fifth instead of sixth, your chances of winning the title go up 10–15 percent."

Ask Jr.: 25 Years Since Daytona

The Ask Jr. segment became the emotional centerpiece of the episode. Today — July 7, 2026 — is the 25th anniversary of Dale Jr.'s Pepsi 400 win at Daytona, which came six months after the death of his father at the same track. TNT ran an unannounced tribute piece during the pre-race show, and Dale had no idea it was coming.

"I didn't even connect it to July 4th," Dale said. "I'm watching it happen on the monitor in front of us. The drivers are looking at their iPads. And Marty starts talking and teeing up this piece and I recognized the race he was presenting and I'm like 'oh.'" He said he received texts from Amy, his sister Kelley, and the production team. "I felt like a million bucks for that brief moment."

On the celebration itself: Dale explained that back in that era, NASCAR handlers would grab you the second you got to Victory Lane — new hat, hold this trophy, change that hat, photo shoot, broadcast interview. He hated it. "I always delayed going to Victory Lane. I would pull into the infield and goof off with my team." He and Michael Waltrip did exactly that on July 7, 2001 — parked in the infield, let the team come out, enjoyed the moment on their own terms.

The most quietly devastating part of the segment came when a listener asked what he remembered from watching that old clip. "The hardest part is there's a real short clip of Danny Earnhardt — my dad's brother," Dale said, his voice shifting. "Everybody around Danny is in elation and they've got their hands on him, shaking him. Danny has this look on his face like — the same look he had in February when we lost dad. And that's the hardest part for me, because I was young and naive. I lost my dad but I wasn't realizing what I'd lost. Danny did. He was old enough to know."

Hot dog question: Dale goes with chili, mustard, ketchup, and dill relish. TJ: just ketchup. Travis: just ketchup. Dale endorsed the ketchup-only approach, taking a light jab at the "you can't put ketchup on a hot dog" crowd.

Chase Briscoe Joins the Show

Race winner Chase Briscoe called in at the 1:08 mark to debrief on his Chicagoland victory — his first of 2026 and sixth career Cup win.

On Victory Lane in the modern era: Briscoe said the front-straightaway format is basically all he's known. He appreciates being able to "feed off the crowd's energy" live on the mic. The one downside — by the time the official ceremonies end, 45 minutes have passed and your guys are gone. "You do want to hang out with your guys and experience it with them, and you don't really get to do a whole lot of that," he said.

On the celebration (fishing reel): "For Bass Pro Shop weekends, that's definitely going to be the new thing. I thought about it last year." He confirmed crew chief James Small and engineering director JP both approved. Dale suggested he slow it down a bit: "You reeled it in too fast. Set the hook, then do it."

On the race itself: Briscoe was honest that he didn't enter Sunday confident. The car was tight all weekend. "I would be lying if I said I was excited for Sunday — I thought it was going to be a seventh or tenth type of day." James Small texted him Sunday morning: he'd been up all night and thought he had a fix. The car started freer, still needed adjustments, and Briscoe slowly worked his way into the top five.

On the bent toe link: Briscoe was running down the leaders when he got into the fence and bent the front toe link. "My steering wheel went from here through the corner to here — I was sideways. I could still run Byron back down, but I was going to spin out at any point." James Small recognized the handling change with only eight laps to work from and made the right adjustment on the final green flag pit stop. "If we don't do that adjustment, I definitely tank super hard at the end."

On the points picture: Briscoe and Small had privately been re-calibrating their goals — going into Chicagoland they were 107 points out of fifth, and figured sixth or seventh was more realistic. Now they're 46 out of fifth. "Fifth is very attainable. I mean, only 46 points is not a lot. We just need to survive Atlanta and Daytona." He mentioned Indy, North Wilsboro, and Richmond as tracks where they should perform well if they get through the drafting races clean.

On the next two weeks: Briscoe and Noah Gragson will be hosting the Dale Jr. Download next week while Dale is away. Dale gave Chase his only instruction: "You are not live. Anything that happens that you don't like can be thrown in a trash can. You control the narrative. Have fun."

Briscoe: "Call me the substitute teacher."

Dirty Mo Dough: Atlanta Preview

Analyst Russell joined for the betting preview on next week's Quaker State 400 at EchoPark Speedway (Atlanta).

Tyler Reddick is the early favorite. Russell's biggest value picks: Zane Smith top ten at +280 ("he ran well at the last drafting track race and is top-10 in four of the last four"). Christopher Bell and Daniel Suarez parlay at +358. Russell also flagged Carson Hocevar as a notable mover on the board — his highest odds in some time — given his Talladega win and strong drafting track résumé.

On the In-Season Challenge bracket: Bowman over Gilliland, Chase Elliott over Briscoe (home track, dominant there), Bell over Hamlin (Denny has struggled at new Atlanta despite being one of the all-time great restrictor plate racers). Byron vs. Blaney was the toughest call — Dale leaning Blaney but noted Chevys look a bit stronger right now and Blaney's pit crew (17th at Chicagoland, 32nd for the year) remains a real vulnerability. "You can't give up a bunch of track position at Atlanta. It's really hard to come back from 15th." The suggestion: Roger Penske should move Logano's pit crew (2nd-best ranked for the year) to Blaney, the championship contender.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on going paperless): "It was kind of like going to work naked. Very nerve-wracking, but it was so much easier. Shout out Jamie McMurray."

Dale (on Zane Smith wrecking himself): "Dude, I like the aggression, but you can't wreck yourself. You just can't do that. There's too much, man. He puts too much effort into this to go out there and do that to himself."

Dale (on self-policing): "Our sport needs controversy. We need some ruffled feathers. We need some hurt feelings. We need some guys that are pissed off. Anytime SVG and Austin Hill get around each other, we're all gonna be watching. And that's a good thing."

Dale (on the 2001 Daytona win clip): "The hardest part is there's a real short clip of Danny Earnhardt — my dad's brother. And the look on his face… the same look he had in February when we lost dad. I was young and naive. I lost my dad but I wasn't realizing what I'd lost. Danny did."

Chase Briscoe (on the bent toe link): "My steering wheel went from here through the corner to here — I was sideways. I was going to spin out at any point. James did an amazing job; only seeing eight laps of me with a bent toe link he could see how loose I was and gave me the adjustment. If we don't do that, I definitely tank super hard at the end."

Chase Briscoe (on his points climb): "James and I literally just talked going into this weekend about whether fifth was even possible. We were 107 points out. Now we're 46 out. Only 46 points is not a lot of points. We just need to survive Atlanta and Daytona."

Dale (to Briscoe on next week's hosting duties): "You are not live. Anything that happens that you don't like can be thrown in a trash can. Never to see the light of day. You control the narrative. Have fun."

Chase Briscoe (accepting): "Call me the substitute teacher. That was almost my backup plan — I almost got a teaching license."

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: July 6, 2026

Race Covered: eero 400 — Chicagoland Speedway, Joliet, Illinois

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opens his Chicagoland recap with a characteristically sharp observation: "Chicagoland is the new Martinsville. Apparently, they're both famous for hot dogs, and they're both the perfect place for drivers to get revenge." That framing — revenge and fireworks — hangs over the entire episode, which Eric divides into two very distinct halves: the race's chaotic, wreck-filled first stage, and the disciplined battle for the win that played out in the closing laps.

Eric attended the race in person and was at Chicagoland all weekend, offering firsthand color on what the atmosphere was like for the track's long-awaited return. After a seven-year hiatus, Chicagoland Speedway came back to the NASCAR Cup Series schedule with a sellout crowd, a loyal Midwestern audience, and — as Eric put it — "hours of storms." He reported four inches of rain over a 24-hour period, a nightmare parking situation, and ruined shoes trudging through the mud. But the big picture, he says, was worth savoring: "It is cool to see Chicagoland Speedway back on the schedule — a permanent oval racetrack in Joliet with a loyal Midwestern audience that hopefully got their money's worth."

Eric structures the episode as something of a fireworks show itself, promising to "save the fireworks for just a few minutes" while building toward the revenge incidents that defined the race's first half. He covers the finish first, then the points picture, then lets the grand finale — SVG, Zane Smith, Austin Hill, and the league's inconsistent enforcement of its own rules — close out the show.

Chase Brisco and Christopher Bell: Overshadowed No More

The centerpiece of the race was a one-on-one battle between two Joe Gibbs Racing teammates who had each entered the event winless on the season. For Eric, the win carries weight beyond the box score. "In a year that Toyota has dominated, it seems Chase Brisco and Christopher Bell have been overshadowed, have at times felt like an afterthought," he says. "And these are two drivers — Brisco and Bell — who won multiple races each last season."

Eric credits the birthday-boy pit call from Brisco's crew chief James Small as the defining strategic moment. Small's call put Brisco out front of Byron, Bell, Hamlin, and others, giving him the track position he needed to run defense. What followed was a textbook exercise in dirty-air management. "It was Brisco on defense versus Bell on offense, with lap traffic the ultimate variable," Eric explains. He highlights a crucial moment with four laps to go when Bell tried a third-lane move — and Brisco matched it, neutralizing the charge. "That was a huge moment," Eric says. "Brisco, nerves of steel, not making a mistake down the stretch, not letting the pressure of the moment get to him."

Eric is careful to give the losing driver his due. Bell had fractured his left wrist in a crash at Michigan just weeks earlier, sat out at San Diego in Stage 1, and returned with a brace the following week to finish fifth at Sonoma. A second place at Chicagoland, Eric notes, came despite early nose damage when Bell's car tagged Todd Gilliland's on pit road — meaning "I'm not even sure that 20 car was at 100% on that final run." For a driver with four runner-up finishes in 2026, the loss stings, but Eric is direct: "I think he will win soon." Bell is now 10th in the standings. A Joe Gibbs 1-2-3 was completed by Denny Hamlin, who sat on the pole — his fourth straight oval pole.

The Points Picture: Hamlin Pulls Away, Reddick Struggles

Hamlin's podium had real championship implications. He entered Chicagoland just one point ahead of Tyler Reddick in the regular season standings and exited plus 44. Reddick's summer woes continued when debris punched through the nose of his car and destroyed the oil cooler, requiring over 20 laps of garage repairs. It was, Eric notes, "the fourth time in the last five weeks Tyler Reddick has finished 25th or worse." He is now bleeding points at a rate that has opened the door for a third contender: "Don't look now, but Ryan Blaney with his like seventh straight top 10 or something ridiculous like that — Blaney is now, I think, 69 points behind Reddick for second. That's a 10-point swing once the Chase begins. A gap worth keeping an eye on."

Eric is effusive about Blaney all episode, noting he was the only Ford in the top 10. "Ryan Blaney is just a wheelman," Eric says flatly. "There's nothing else to say — what Ryan Blaney and Jonathan Hassler are doing over there is incredible. No one at Penske has been able to replicate it even for one week. And Blaney and Hassler are doing it every week." Eric finds it remarkable, even slightly baffling, that Joey Logano and Austin Cindric — in the same equipment, at the same organization — cannot seem to find a fraction of what Blaney produces week to week.

William Byron drew notable praise for what Eric called his best performance of the 2026 season. "Byron has been woefully inconsistent this year — a roller coaster ride," Eric acknowledges, "but intermediate tracks have been William Byron's strong suit all season." Byron won both stages and earned 20 stage points. Alex Bowman — the defending Chicagoland Cup winner, dating to his 2019 run in the 88 car — backed that history with a legitimate top-five finish. "This was not fluky at all," Eric says. "That 48 looked pretty darn fast."

The Fireworks: Zane Smith, SVG, Austin Hill, and NASCAR's Inconsistency Problem

The revenge incidents are the episode's centerpiece, and Eric treats them seriously — as a question not just of what happened on track, but of what NASCAR is willing to do about it. Stage 1 opened with carnage: Ryan Priest was spun on lap 1, Connor Zillich crashed out in a pileup half a lap into his Chicagoland debut, and then — just a few laps later — Zane Smith drove in deep on Carson Hocevar and wrecked them both. Eric's read is blunt: "It was pretty obvious Zane Smith just drove it in really deep — clear contact. They both go up into the wall." He attributes it to lingering bad blood from an Iowa incident the previous year and says he was "disappointed in Zane" for choosing a high-speed intermediate as the venue. "If you're going to lose your cool and settle a personal score — don't cost your team in the process. And he did."

The Shane Van Gisbergen–Austin Hill incident followed a nearly identical script but with more backstory. Two recent weeks of racing had added fuel to an already burning fire: Hill squeezed SVG at Pocono, then at San Diego — battling for the lead on a restart — drifted up the track and collected both Red Bull cars in a massive pileup. Eric recalls SVG's post-San Diego demeanor: "He always has kind of a half smile on his face no matter what he's saying. But after San Diego, I could see through the smile. He was fuming." At Chicagoland, SVG tagged Hill hard into the outside wall. Richard Childress himself came on the radio and called it a NASCAR matter worth reviewing.

Eric's frustration sharpens when he turns to enforcement. He argues both incidents were worse than the Ryan Priest penalty assessed a few weeks earlier — a call he personally opposed. "Both of these incidents involved clear contact, a known history between drivers, blatant intent. Priest may not have even touched Ty Gibbs. And yet I'd be surprised if a penalty comes from this," he says. "NASCAR has so much information. They have so many racers now in race control. They know when something's intentional. They should at least. The Priest penalty shouldn't have been a penalty. But if that was a penalty — you've got to take a hard look at these two."

Connor Zillich: A Rookie Season From Hell

One of the more somber notes in the episode is Eric's concern for Connor Zillich. The 19-year-old finished with his seventh DNF of the season, caught in the lap-1 pileup before he'd even completed a full circuit at Chicagoland. "Five of those DNFs have happened in the last seven weeks," Eric says. "Four of those five happened in the first stage, in the opening laps. He's not getting track time. He's not getting reps. Everything you would hope for a rookie — he's not getting any of it."

Eric recalls predicting in the offseason that Zillich had the mental makeup to survive a difficult rookie year. "I said he has a good head on his shoulders — focused, good perspective, a lot of support. If any young driver is equipped to manage the highs and many lows of NASCAR's Cup Series, I believed it was Connor Zillich." Now he qualifies that confidence: "I didn't expect it to be a category five hurricane every single week. This has been even harder than any of us would have predicted. That mental toughness is certainly being tested."

The In-Season Challenge: Upsets and the Race Within the Race

Chicagoland hosted the Round of 16 of the second annual In-Season Challenge. Eric notes a few notable results: Todd Gilliland over Carson Hocevar was "a surprise, for sure." William Byron over Kyle Larson he calls "a slight upset" — but Larson's day fell apart when he spun out while running third, beaching his car on the wet infield grass and suffering underwing damage. "Kyle Larson sometimes does this, unfortunately. Just overstep, and these Next Gen cars are so difficult to catch." Christopher Bell eliminating Chris Buescher drew mild surprise, with Eric noting the RFK cars struggled all day despite qualifying in the top three.

Eric's In-Season Challenge championship pick remains Ryan Blaney, and he's feeling confident heading into the remaining rounds. "The first two tracks were the two I was most concerned with for Penske. Blaney's going to be good at Atlanta, fast at North Wilkesboro — short track, he'll be good. And Roger literally owns Indy." Three of his original final four are still alive.

Groovy Gauge: 80%

Eric places the race at 80% on the Groovy Gauge, one of his stronger scores of the season. "This race had it all," he says — "pit strategy, long runs, short runs, crazy restarts, big wrecks, revenge storylines." He acknowledges the multi-groove racing was intermittent but says that's the nature of a 1.5-mile oval. The sellout crowd of around 45,000–47,000 seats impressed him, and he credits NASCAR and the facility for delivering a strong weekend despite substantial weather adversity.

He closes with cautious optimism about Chicagoland's future. "NASCAR owns this track," he notes. "They would love to get the kind of consistent support here that makes this a no-brainer." He's thoughtful about whether both the Chicago street race and Chicagoland can coexist on the same calendar: "One is for your grassroots, hardcore fan that camps out for three days. The other tries to reach new fans and appease sponsors and media. They're both worthy causes." Whether both can be sustained simultaneously — that, he says, remains the real open question.

Notable Quotes

Eric (on Chase Brisco's win): "Nerves of steel, not making a mistake down the stretch, not letting the pressure of the moment get to him. Congratulations to Chase Brisco."

Eric (on Christopher Bell's resilience): "He banged his nose against Todd Gilliland's car on pit road early in the race. I'm not even sure that 20 car was at 100% on that final run. To finish second — it stings. I know Christopher Bell. He expects to win."

Eric (on Ryan Blaney): "Ryan Blaney is just a wheelman. There's nothing else to say. What Ryan Blaney and Jonathan Hassler are doing over there is incredible — and no one at Penske has been able to replicate it even for one week."

Eric (on Zane Smith): "I was disappointed in Zane. If you're going to lose your cool and settle a personal score — don't cost your team in the process. And he did."

Eric (on SVG's payback): "I think SVG absolutely owed Austin Hill some payback. I just don't know if this was the best way to do it. Going 180, 190 into the corner is not where I would choose to do it."

Eric (on NASCAR's inconsistent enforcement): "Both of these incidents were worse than what Ryan Priest did. There was clear contact, a known history, blatant intent — and yet I'd be surprised if a penalty comes from it. It's just so silly."

Eric (on Connor Zillich): "I expected it to be hard. I didn't expect it to be a category five hurricane every single week. That mental toughness is certainly being tested."

Eric (on the Groovy Gauge): "This race had a little bit of everything. Pit strategy, long runs, short runs, crazy restarts, big wrecks, revenge storylines. 80% for me. I thought this was a really, really good race."

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared Allen

Date: July 6, 2026

Race Covered: eero 400 — Chicagoland Speedway, Joliet, Illinois

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

NASCAR returned to Chicagoland Speedway for the eero 400, and Denny Hamlin had the speed to win — yet came home third while Chase Briscoe edged Christopher Bell to the line. On this week's Actions Detrimental, Denny and co-host Jared Allen do a candid dissection of a race that Denny freely admits he could have approached differently. The title's punning reference to his car number — "A11 In" — sets the tone: this is an episode where Hamlin turns the magnifying glass on himself before pivoting to the sport's hottest ongoing controversy, the question of whether NASCAR should allow drivers to self-police or crack down on intentional wrecks.

Beyond the race itself, the episode covers the full Chicagoland weekend experience, including a pointed discussion about the track's infrastructure and fan experience problems that aren't going away on their own, and the implications for NASCAR's Chicago market strategy. Denny closes with a look at the Xfinity race, an Atlanta bracket challenge, and the upcoming playoff push.

The episode is notable because Denny — who took the pole by 0.001 seconds over Larson on Saturday — finishes third and immediately acknowledges his own role in letting the race slip. That kind of self-accountability is the engine of this show.

Race Breakdown: A Race That Got Away Late

Denny opens by characterizing his mistake as one of attitude, not ability. He says he was "too nonchalant" in the early going, trusting that his car's speed advantage was large enough that he could afford to be patient and conservative. He specifically calls out his restart approach: "Just tell the 23 I'm going to push him" — meaning he opted to push a teammate up to position rather than take aggressive three-wide runs himself. He did the same behind the 24. The strategy cost him track position as the field tightened.

The race changed character when night fell. Denny identifies the sun going down as the turning point that compressed the field: "Night changed everything. That really sucked the field close together in speed." Where in the daytime he felt comfortable, in night conditions the gap to the 19 (Briscoe) and 20 (Bell) evaporated. By the third stage he was running fourth, three to four seconds back, fighting teammate Bell for the best position to challenge the leaders. He and Bell kept racing each other while the leaders pulled away — a situation Denny acknowledges wasn't anyone's fault but left both of them short.

A pit cycle cost the 11 roughly 1.9 seconds versus the leaders, plus the team ran four extra laps on a set of tires before pitting, adding more time to overcome. With about 30 laps to go, Denny estimates he was nine seconds back. He made a run at Briscoe, closing to within 2.5 seconds with eight laps to go: "I thought I was going to get there right at the white." Looking for another tenth per lap, he went up to the wall in turns one and two — and found nothing but dust. He bounced off the wall.

"I was so nervous getting off that wall," Denny says, "because I'm thinking, 'Please don't have a broke toe link.'" Counterintuitively, the contact bent the right-rear toe link in a direction that actually freed up his balance. He was able to close back to 3.5 seconds at the checkered. "Didn't matter. I already made the mistake."

Jared asks whether Denny gave the race away. Denny resists the framing: "You got to give credit to the 19 and 20. They were formidable and very fast." But he doesn't let himself off the hook either: "It was a very winnable race... just too nonchalant, right? And if you let someone stay close in the game, stay close, stay close, then you end up getting beat."

On the broader picture: the 45 (Tyler Reddick) suffered bad luck — something punctured his radiator, costing him laps. Denny acknowledges the points swing: "That was definitely bad luck for Tyler." The 45's misfortune allowed Hamlin to extend his regular-season points lead without winning.

SVG vs. Austin Hill and the Self-Policing Debate

The episode's meatiest segment covers what Denny calls the sport's most unresolved tension: whether intentional wrecks should be punished or allowed as the cost of self-governance.

Two incidents from the Chicagoland race weekend are on the table. First, Zayn Smith driving into Carson Hosavar — Denny isn't sure of the backstory but suspects something happened off-camera that triggered it: "You would think that there was something that clearly upset Zayn before that moment." He notes that Zayn wrecked himself in the process, which isn't a great outcome for the retaliation. Second, and more significant: Shane van Gisbergen (SVG) retaliating against Austin Hill, with the move appearing to be payback for earlier contact that Denny links to incidents at both Pocono and San Diego.

Denny says the telemetry shows that SVG went into the corner with no intent to slow up: "The data would argue SVG went into the corner with no intent to slow up. It's not like there was a hole there." He draws a comparison to an earlier incident where Ryan Priest got in trouble not just for making contact but for what he said on the radio — and notes SVG staying quiet might help him: "That's what really did Priest in. He said what he said and he clearly put him in a spot where he wrecked."

Denny is openly conflicted about what the right response is. He describes two internal voices: one that endorses self-policing as a necessary part of racing culture — "if you can't punch someone in the face without getting a fine... you got to let people self-police on the racetrack" — and another that says an intentional wreck is wrong and deserves a penalty. He lands somewhere in the middle: "I guess I'm on the side that self-policing is what needs to happen."

But Denny also points out that SVG's situation is particularly complicated given the points standings. SVG is in a playoff bubble fight and Austin Hill doesn't have to wreck him directly to hurt him — he just needs to race him close and rough him up legally week after week: "Points matter to SVG. So this is just not in my opinion smart to be picking this or escalating." He notes SVG actually lengthened his gap to the cutoff despite the incident. "Bad strategy. Bad strategy."

Jared draws out the natural endpoint of the self-policing model: if NASCAR punishes SVG, then Austin Hill can't get revenge either, which just licenses anyone to race dirty without consequence. "If you get a penalty of any sort, how am I supposed to get this person back? It gives free reign to let people do whatever they want with no repercussions." Denny agrees: "That's how it used to work — a wreck, a payback, maybe another wreck, and then they sit you down and say 'We're done with this.'"

Chicagoland Fan Experience: "Field of Dreams" Parking

With the race analysis out of the way, Denny shifts to the Chicagoland infrastructure problems. He's clear that he wants to return to the track — "I certainly would love to return to that racetrack" — but equally clear that the fan experience issues aren't optional to fix.

The storm on Saturday shut down parking lots A through G and K. Fans who couldn't park were backed up on two-lane roads for miles. Denny took video of what he calls a "car graveyard" — vehicles left overnight after Saturday's storms. He describes watching fans walking 1.5 miles back to their cars after the race and catching aerial footage of what looked like the final scene of Field of Dreams — a long, snaking line still flowing into the track as the cars were going green.

He gives the track credit for selling out and for getting the racing surface ready: "If you look at the racetrack, pit road, all those things, you'd say it's just like every other race." But he argues the fan-experience bar has been permanently raised by newer stadiums and sports venues: "Fans nowadays, especially sports fans, expect a lot when it comes to what's the experience. That's parking, that's traffic, that's all the above." He also points out he fished near the track on Friday morning before the main storms arrived and found the lots already saturated: "When I say wet, my golf cart barely got through the parking lot." The infrastructure problem predated the weekend weather.

"You might get them to do it once, but it'll be tough," Denny says of asking fans to endure bad logistics. "I just man, spending fan experience and spend in infrastructure to get them in there and the parking and make it quick — you got to have 50-person shuttles, not 12-person shuttles."

Chicagoland vs. Chicago Street Course

Jared asks whether NASCAR needs to commit to one Chicago venue or whether both can coexist. Denny's initial take is "why can't you have two?" — but he then acknowledges the schedule is already tight and having both would require dropping something else. "If you're going to Chicago twice, you're going to keep this on the schedule and go back to the street course — well, then where's that California date?"

He also notes that the two events serve different audiences: "If I looked around in Chicagoland, I would have said 'Those are our avid fans.' When I went to Chicago, I said 'Ain't none of these people been to a NASCAR race before.'" Jared says a similar observation came up at the Chicago street-race tweet-up — the street course draws first-timers while Chicagoland draws core fans. That distinction matters for how NASCAR thinks about the schedule.

Denny also lets slip a detail about the street race's future: an Amazon Prime contract is tied to a street race, and if the sport doesn't return to Naval Base Coronado in 2027, there would need to be a Chicago street course race on Prime Video. "We can't race around those Amazon warehouses that they built," he jokes.

Xfinity Race: Brandon Jones at Chicagoland

Denny wraps with praise for Brandon Jones winning the Xfinity race Saturday night: "Heck of a job by Brandon. Amazing job on those green-white checkers." He mentions hearing a pre-race interview where Jones said he was going to start "taking more" in races rather than giving ground, and that attitude paid off. Denny thought Jones, Taylor Gray, and Chase Elliott looked like the class of the Xfinity field before the final caution reshuffled things.

He also touched on Connor Zilisch, who ran fast up front but had a fuel issue (or a crew under-fill) that dropped him out of contention. Denny's take: "Once he gets in traffic, something happens. He's just got to take a breath and find a way to just keep the thing straight on the racetrack. Because out front he was fast. Nobody was even close."

Denny also noted that Grady Black's team (Optimum Motorsports) has been increasingly competitive on mile-and-a-half tracks: "Over the last few years it seems like he's more part of the picture when it comes to winning."

Atlanta Bracket Challenge Preview

The show includes a running bracket-style NASCAR playoff prediction game. For the round of eight at Atlanta, Denny picks:

- Bowman over Gilliand ("Bowman's been strong")

- Chase Elliott over Briscoe ("hometown cooking — I'm saying he's going to make it to the final four")

- Himself over Bell for podcast purposes ("Y'all know what I'm saying. Bell's strong there, but for podcast purposes, I'll say myself")

- Blaney over Byron ("Blaney's really strong at Atlanta — really strong. Seven out of eight races finished in the top 10 in the NextGen era")

He notes Atlanta coming up is a qualifying-only weekend (no practice), with the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series race Saturday and the Cup race Sunday night on TNT. Denny will be in the CW broadcast booth for the O'Reilly race Saturday.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on his own race at Chicagoland): "It wasn't lack of focus or anything like that. Just too nonchalant. And if you let someone stay close in the game, stay close, stay close, then you end up getting beat."

Denny (on the wall contact): "I was so nervous getting off that wall because I'm thinking, 'Please don't have a broke toe link.' Turns out it actually made my car better."

Denny (on self-policing): "I'm torn on these wrecks. Because do I think it's cool that someone just goes and wipes someone out? No. But I'm also a very firm fan of self-policing. And I think that has to be a thing in the sport."

Denny (on SVG data): "The data typically doesn't lie. The data would argue SVG went into the corner with no intent to slow up. It's not like there was a hole there."

Denny (on SVG's strategy): "He didn't pick the fight — he escalated the fight with Austin Hill when you're plus 30 with seven to go. Points matter to you, SVG. I just think it's a bad strategy."

Denny (on Chicagoland fan experience): "As I'm leaving the racetrack, I'm seeing people walk back to their cars, and it is 1.5 miles away from the racetrack and they're still walking. How do you get the people back from that?"

Jared (on the self-policing paradox): "If Austin Hill clearly retaliates next week, NASCAR is going to have to step in and stop this. Well — that's how it used to work. A wreck, a payback, maybe another wreck, and then they sit you down."

Note: The task file for this recap lists "Mike Davis" as co-host. As of this episode, the credited co-host is Jared Allen. This recap reflects the actual transcript.

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, July 5, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: eero 400 — Chicagoland Speedway, Joliet, Illinois

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Note: The YouTube transcript and audio for this episode were not accessible at the time of publication. This recap is reconstructed from race reporting, driver quotes, and post-race coverage from NASCAR.com, Yardbarker, Athlon Sports, and other outlets. Host attributions reflect the Teardown's established conversational format; specific quote assignments should be verified against the episode audio.

Episode Overview

NASCAR's Fourth of July weekend — and America's 250th birthday celebration — produced one of the more layered Sunday afternoons of the 2026 season. When the checkered flag fell at Chicagoland Speedway, Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi had a lot to sort through: a surprise win for a team that already dominates the standings, the continuing collapse of the presumptive points leader, a bitter payback incident that had an entire organization publicly accusing a competitor of intentional wrecking, and yet another hard-luck evening for the sport's most star-crossed young driver.

Chicagoland returning to the Cup schedule after a seven-year absence gave the race additional narrative weight. The 1.5-mile intermediate in Joliet delivered a fitting celebration for the holiday weekend — and a storyline for every taste. The episode would have covered Briscoe's first win of 2026, the record-setting Toyota haul, the Reddick points freefall, and Shane van Gisbergen's latest collision with Austin Hill, which Richard Childress called out publicly and loudly before the night was over.

The championship picture, which spent the first half of the season looking like Tyler Reddick's to lose, now looks like it might be exactly that.

Opening Reaction — Briscoe Gets His Win

Chase Briscoe's victory at Chicagoland was unexpected in the moment — William Byron led 94 laps, Kyle Larson started second with a track record of success here, and Denny Hamlin was on pole in a car that had been among the season's best. But it was Briscoe's No. 19 JGR Toyota that cycled to the front on the final pit sequence and held on through 51 laps of late-race pressure.

Jeff's opening framing would have centered on what the win means in the context of Briscoe's season. After early-year struggles, Briscoe came on strong in the second half of the regular season. His strategy call — pitting one lap before Byron and two laps before Bell — put him in the right spot at the right time, and then he had to survive Christopher Bell hunting him down over the final 46 laps.

Jordan's take would have zoomed out to the bigger picture: not just a Briscoe win, but a Joe Gibbs Racing 1-2-3, the eighth time in organization history that's happened. Seven Toyotas finished in the top 10, a record for the manufacturer in Cup Series competition. It's one thing to be fast. On Sunday at Chicagoland, Toyota was dominant from top to bottom — JGR, 23XI, and Legacy Motor Club all placing multiple cars inside the top 10. The manufacturer's day deserved its own segment, and Jordan would have been the one to contextualize just how complete a performance that was.

Byron Leads the Most, Wins Nothing

William Byron swept both stages at Chicagoland — he led a race-high 94 laps, earned points in both segments, and looked like the class of the field for the first half of the evening. By the finish, he was fourth.

It's a familiar frustration for a Hendrick Motorsports team that still hasn't found a consistent way to convert dominant runs into victories in 2026. Jeff would have noted the stage sweep and asked whether Byron's team made the right call on the final round of pit stops, or whether the one-lap deficit to Briscoe was always going to be the deciding factor. Byron fell back behind Bell and Hamlin in the closing laps as his car began to fade in dirty air — a pattern that suggests the car was fast in clean air and less so when the running order shuffled.

Jordan's point would have been that Byron's night still represents a solid points day — stage points, a top-five finish — even if the win slipped away. For Hendrick Motorsports as a whole, the picture at Chicagoland was mixed: Byron finished fourth, Alex Bowman fifth, but Kyle Larson's self-inflicted spin put the No. 5 two laps down and ended any realistic shot at a win for the season's most celebrated driver.

Larson Spins, Reddick Breaks — The Contenders Who Weren't

The two biggest stories of the night may have been the ones that ended early. Kyle Larson, who had finished runner-up at Chicagoland the last two times the track hosted Cup racing, spun while running third on Lap 93. It was a single-car incident exiting Turn 4 — Larson simply lost the rear of his car, got stuck in the infield grass, and needed safety crews to pull him out. He finished 34th, two laps down.

Jeff's take: it's the kind of mistake that stings doubly hard at a track where Larson has historically excelled. Coming in as the de facto co-favorite alongside Hamlin, Larson's night ended before the race really began its final act. Jordan would have added that moments like this are a reminder of how unforgiving the 2026 season has been — one mistake, no matter how small, and you're done.

The Reddick situation carried even heavier championship implications. On Lap 131, the No. 45 Toyota ran over a splitter stay dropped by another car, sending debris into the radiator. Fluid began to pour out of the car, forcing the eventual five-time 2026 winner behind the wall for repairs. Reddick finished 36th — his third finish of 25th or worse in the last four races.

Jordan would have noted the brutal symmetry: Reddick entered Chicagoland having already lost the points lead for the first time all season after Sonoma. He came to Chicagoland needing a strong run to stop the bleeding. Instead, the wall only got taller. At Watkins Glen, Reddick led the standings by 129 points. He now trails Hamlin by 44 — a 173-point swing in approximately five weeks. Jeff would have let that number sit for a moment before asking whether this is becoming a crisis or just bad luck that will correct itself.

Bell Runs Briscoe Down — and Still Finishes Second

Christopher Bell had contact on pit road early in the race, fell out of the top 20, and still nearly won. That's how good the JGR Toyotas were on Sunday. Bell ran down Briscoe methodically over the final stint, closing the gap to within striking distance — but with two laps to go, his car tightened in the dirty air behind Briscoe's Toyota and the closing rate evaporated. Briscoe crossed the line 0.276 seconds ahead.

Bell's post-race comment was candid and a little self-deprecating. "I just need to replay that last run," he said. "I was really struggling with the handling of my car early in the race but I still had a lot of pace. They made a great adjustment and got the car driving great the last run. I was soft on my green flag entry for sure, which gave up a little bit of time... We almost went to victory lane. Toyotas are fast, it seems like a monkey can drive them. So it's disappointing when you get beat by another monkey. Just a second-place driver man, that's what I am."

Jeff would have read that quote and held it up as a window into what it feels like to be inside a dominant program and still not win. Bell has now finished second four times in 2026 — at Nashville, Charlotte, Phoenix, and now Chicagoland — without a win. Jordan's response would have been that Bell's season is by most measures a success, with consistent top-5 finishes and a comfortable points buffer above the cut line. But the wins aren't coming, and at some point, "almost" starts to feel like its own kind of identity.

SVG and Austin Hill — Again

The storyline that will dominate the post-race conversation for days started on Lap 48. Shane van Gisbergen drove into Austin Hill's left rear in Turn 1, sending the No. 33 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet hard into the outside wall. Hill's race was effectively over.

Richard Childress himself was on the radio moments later: "That was just payback for California. Somebody talk to NASCAR about that. That was blatant." He was referring to the incident at Naval Base Coronado on June 21, where Hill made a mistake under a green flag that collected van Gisbergen. There was also an incident between the two at Pocono on June 14. The history here is multi-layered and ongoing.

Van Gisbergen denied it was intentional. "I was shooting for the bottom trying to get clean air, I was so tight, and he just chopped my nose and got in the wall," SVG said. New in-car video that emerged after the race reportedly turned some scrutiny back on Hill's own actions in the incident — but Childress was unambiguous in his accusation.

Jeff would have treated this as a genuine whodunit — the kind of incident The Teardown exists to analyze. Was it intentional? The circumstantial case is not nothing: SVG had been hit by Hill twice in three weeks, at a track where payback is not uncommon, and the contact was to the exact spot you'd aim for. But SVG's account — getting chopped at the nose while diving to the bottom — is also a plausible racing scenario on a 1.5-mile intermediate.

Jordan's framing would have been about accountability and where NASCAR draws the line. Childress didn't just hint at it — he said "blatant" on the radio. If NASCAR reviews this and does nothing, what message does that send? And if they penalize SVG based on circumstantial evidence and a denied intent, is that the right call either? There was no clean answer here, and the Teardown would have reveled in working through the ambiguity.

Zilisch and the DNF Machine

This section practically writes itself at this point in the season. Connor Zilisch, the 19-year-old Trackhouse Racing rookie, was collected in the opening-lap incident involving Ryan Preece and Erik Jones — Preece went spinning off Turn 2, Zilisch veered left to avoid him, lost control, and nosed into the inside wall. He was evaluated and released from the infield care center.

It's his seventh DNF in 19 races — and the fifth in his last seven starts. His one bright spot recently was a top-10 finish at Sonoma, his first in Cup competition. He came into Chicagoland with some momentum. All of it was gone by Lap 2.

Jeff would have been sympathetic but also honest: at some point, the sheer number of incidents Zilisch has been involved in demands a harder look. Some of them are genuinely not his fault — Sunday night's Lap 1 contact almost certainly wasn't. But the rate of DNFs is alarming for a team trying to build a driver's career. Jordan would have connected this to the broader conversation about what expectations should look like for a rookie at this stage — and whether the equipment and team support are setting him up to succeed or survive.

Alex Bowman and the In-Season Challenge

Not everything at Chicagoland was drama. Alex Bowman quietly put together one of his best performances of the season — a fifth-place finish that also served as an In-Season Challenge victory over Austin Cindric. After missing four races earlier in the year due to vertigo, Bowman has found form at the right time: he beat Reddick in the Round of 16 at Sonoma and now advances to the quarterfinals with a matchup against No. 25 seed Todd Gilliland, who upset Carson Hocevar to advance.

Jordan would have noted how the bracket has set up favorably for Bowman — Gilliland is a genuine underdog in that matchup — while Jeff would have flagged the larger storyline about Bowman's recovery from his health issues. A driver who seemed potentially cooked for the season a few months ago is now one of the more interesting wildcard stories heading into the playoffs.

The Zane Smith–Carson Hocevar Subplot

The Lap 32 incident between Zane Smith and Carson Hocevar — both making their 100th career Cup starts on the same night, both with documented history from Iowa last summer — added another layer to an already incident-filled Stage 1. Smith drove into Hocevar's left rear in Turns 1 and 2, sending both cars into the outside wall.

Jeff and Jordan likely didn't spend the whole episode on this one, but it serves as the kind of secondary drama the Teardown loves to acknowledge: two mid-field competitors with beef, at a significant milestone race for both, exchanging paint in Stage 1. Whether it was deliberate or opportunistic, it fit the overall tone of a Chicagoland night that seemed to carry a lot of old scores.

Championship Implications

Denny Hamlin is now the points leader, a position he had not occupied all season until Sonoma last week. Chicagoland padded that lead: Reddick's mechanical failure handed Hamlin an additional chunk of points, and Hamlin finished third — a clean, solid result that didn't require a win to move the needle significantly.

The 173-point swing from Reddick's peak to where things stand now is one of the more staggering numbers of the season. For a driver who went through a comparable stretch of bad luck in 2025 before rebounding, Jeff would have raised the question of whether Reddick's team can find what they've lost in the mechanical reliability department. They're clearly fast enough — it's not a performance problem. But five wins and four failures in four of the last five races is an unsustainable split.

Jordan's take would have been more blunt about what the standings mean with seven races left in the regular season: Hamlin is the points leader, he has three wins, and his Toyotas have been the dominant machines at intermediate tracks all year. If Reddick can't find some clean weekends soon, the conversation about who heads into the playoffs as the presumptive favorite has a different answer than it did a month ago.

Briscoe's win moves him from 11th to 8th in the standings. Bell is 10th, 105 points above the cutline. Ryan Preece's rough night — he was caught up in the Lap 1 incident and fell multiple laps down — leaves him 13 points above the cutline with real reason for concern.

Notable Quotes

Chase Briscoe (on his first 2026 win): "The guys just did a great job putting the car in position. They got me out front there and I just drove as hard as I could."

Christopher Bell (post-race, on finishing second again): "Just a second-place driver man, that's what I am."

Bell (on the JGR Toyotas): "Toyotas are fast, it seems like a monkey can drive them. So it's disappointing when you get beat by another monkey."

Richard Childress (on team radio, on the SVG–Hill incident): "That was just payback for California. Somebody talk to NASCAR about that. That was blatant."

Shane van Gisbergen (on the contact with Hill): "I was shooting for the bottom trying to get clean air, I was so tight, and he just chopped my nose and got in the wall."

Austin Hill (on SVG, post-race): Hill believed the contact was intentional, consistent with the RCR team's position, pointing to a pattern of incidents between the two drivers.

Sources: NASCAR.com, Yardbarker, Athlon Sports, Jayski, On3 Sports, Motorsport.com. The Teardown episode transcript was not available for direct reference; this recap is based on race reporting and post-race driver/team quotes.

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared Allen

Date: June 30, 2026

Race Covered: Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma, California

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

Coming off what Denny called the "California swing" — races at San Diego and Sonoma — Actions Detrimental opened with a surprisingly upbeat tone: Hamlin's 11 car now leads the Cup Series points standings, a position neither Denny nor Jared admit to expecting. Denny's Sonoma race ended in a multi-car wreck that spun him from a likely top-five into the twenties, but because championship rival Tyler Reddick suffered his own mechanical issues over the same two-week stretch, the net damage was contained. "We got fortunate," Denny acknowledged. "The law of averages — when he had a 5.5 average finish at one point, that's not realistic. It just is not."

The episode's central question — who exactly caused Denny to get spun at Sonoma — became an unusually measured conversation for a podcast built on candor. Instead of assigning blame, Hamlin worked through the data himself live on the pod and arrived at a 33/33/33 split across the cars directly involved. The episode also moved into wide-ranging territory: Shane van Gisbergen's continued dominance (and whether the field is finally closing), the increasingly chaotic playoff picture, Denny's in-season bracket picks for Chicago, the surprising Dodge-to-Cup rumors, and the behind-the-scenes story of a Sonoma prank involving a fake Mexican executive, a mariachi band, and a very confused manager.

Denny's Spin: The Data Says No One to Blame

The episode title came from the defining moment of Denny's Sonoma weekend — getting collected in a multi-car incident while running in clean air four car lengths ahead of the pack. He spent the opening segment working through the wreck with genuine deliberateness rather than grievance.

Hamlin's conclusion after reviewing data: the 77 (Carson Hocevar), the 6, and the 48 each bore roughly equal responsibility. "I think it's like 33, 33, 33 of the 77, the 6, and the 48. They were all hitting each other. Nobody wanted to get off the bumper of the guy in front of you, and the guy way up there is the one that got spun." He acknowledged the optics of defending the driver directly behind him but was firm: "I don't think that he came into the corner with reckless abandonment. If you really look at how the guys were driving — which I can look at — you can usually tell intent through data. The steering wheel doesn't lie, but it's just too messy."

Jared pushed for someone to be angry at. Denny didn't oblige. "I would love to also, but then it would be grossly irresponsible. Are you holding a grudge against somebody that didn't go in there to wipe you out? No. I'm very confident in that." He added that by late Monday, the wreck was barely on his radar: "I had to look it up during the podcast, not before it."

The real sting, Hamlin said, wasn't the wreck itself — it was what it cost him. He thought he had a genuine race-winning-caliber car and had already settled into a strong long-run rhythm before the incident. "I felt good about beating at least three or four of the guys in front of me in the long run. When that caution came out, I gave the steering wheel an old 'yes' — and then didn't get to see it through."

Denny Leads the Points — With Some Nuance

Both hosts were careful not to oversell the points lead. Denny noted that Sonoma and San Diego were both races where he believes he was legitimately faster than his finishing position suggested, which is the honest version of leading on merit versus leading on others' misfortune.

On San Diego: "Our 14th place finish there — I thought we were better than that. They got lucky on the caution, we got unlucky on the caution." On Sonoma: the points padded because Reddick had mechanical issues, dropping him out of contention. "Had Reic had a better day, I can without a doubt say the sting would have hurt a lot more." But even with those caveats, Denny maintained perspective. "We talked about our goals — trying to be within 50 at this point in time. We've exceeded that."

He was also quick to flag Ryan Blaney as the threat few are discussing. "Let's not sleep on Ryan Blaney. He's only 100 back now — and I closed my gap in six races. There's eight left."

SVG at Sonoma: The Field Is Starting to Figure Something Out

Shane van Gisbergen won Sonoma, but both hosts noted it didn't feel as dominant as previous SVG performances. For Denny, that observation had substance behind it — he started near SVG on the grid and watched him closely.

"Was it the big gap over the field we've seen at other tracks? No," Denny said. "But what the field is starting to figure out is his approaches to speed in certain corners. There are a few corners at Sonoma where it's like, 'Wow, I never thought to approach that corner that way.' And eventually they close it." The deeper question for Hamlin is whether SVG's advantage is replicable: "His really acute awareness of what he needs out of his car, his techniques — that's a tougher discussion."

He put his sharpest observation in simple terms: "He's probably not driving the fastest car, but he's driving it the fastest." With Trackhouse's cars not yet at peak speed, if the manufacturer program improves, Denny argued SVG's margin gets bigger, not smaller. For now, Hamlin noted, SVG runs at 95% and that's still enough to hold his pace. "The worst driving I've ever seen him do was racing Connor at Sonoma when they were head-to-head last year. You would see SVG miss corners, lock up tires. You need someone behind him to keep him honest."

Notable Performances at Sonoma

Tai Gibbs earned extended discussion. He finished in a position that gave his team 53-54 points, though Denny believed Tai had race-winning speed and that strategy kept him from a shot at SVG. "I think if you flipped those stages, he might have had something for SVG — and I think if you listen to his interview, that's kind of where you get from him too." Denny called Tai the "biggest gainer year-over-year in performance" and confirmed he's now fourth in points, a showing that has Hamlin comfortable calling it a genuine breakout.

Christopher Bell earned genuine praise despite racing with a cast on his wrist. "I knew he was good — when he got clear, he got close to me. But after hearing how much difficulty he had at San Diego with shifting and steering, I had my doubts on whether he was going to do it at Sonoma. Very, very impressive run by him and his team."

Connor Zilisch's P7 career best in the Cup Series was welcomed but treated as overdue. "About time, right? What we expect from Connor. I said give it a couple of years and he could be a suitor to beat SVG — but it's a tall task right now." Jared offered context: "Shane is a grown adult who's been doing this for years. Conor's a kid and there's a lot of things he's still trying to figure out."

The Playoff Picture: Logano, Chastain, and Who's Really at Risk

The back-half of the playoff field generated the episode's most entertaining speculation. Denny was blunt about Joey Logano: "AJ Almendinger with basically no support is ahead of Joey at Pinsky. That's wild to wrap your head around." He didn't see an easy path for Logano given Penske's recent mile-and-a-half struggles, though he acknowledged that Joey improving was at least a reasonable expectation. "It's going to be so entertaining. He's with a team you'd think will get better, and he'll get better."

Denny continued to champion Ross Chastain despite the skepticism. "I still think he can make a run. Every week I try to beat this drum — I think he's too good to get beat by some of these other guys in equalish equipment." He acknowledged the concern about Chevy speed: "Michigan wasn't that long ago where Chastain was dead-ass last during a run." Still, Hamlin held his ground: Chastain in.

On the broader format, both hosts were effusive about eliminating "win and you're in." Denny: "Getting rid of win and you're in just may be the biggest, best change ever. Because now we know someone can't just get lucky and pop one off from 24th in points. You've got 26 races to prove yourself. One good or bad week should not be the indicator." He noted that under the old format, Reddick would have left Sonoma relieved. Under the new one, "the losses hurt. We all care about our standings now more than ever."

In-Season Bracket Challenge: Denny's Chicago Picks

With the bracket challenge resuming at Chicago, Denny walked through his first-round picks on record:

Bowman over Swindell: "I don't have a ton of faith in Pinsky's mile-and-a-half program yet. Blaney has been an outlier for that organization."

Carson Hocevar over Gilliland

Brisco over Tai Gibbs: Gibbs was, by some accounts, born the last time NASCAR raced Chicago in its current configuration.

Himself over Jones: No surprise.

Bell over Busch: Battle of the Christophers.

Byron over Larson: "Larson tested there and he runs the top so well. I'm picking all the fan favorites." Though Denny conceded Larson's tire test performance should make Byron fans nervous.

Blaney over Shane Van Gisbergen: "Pretty much chalk overall."

Denny noted the Shane-Blaney matchup had some ingredients for an upset given Shane's tire management skills, then walked it back: "By the way, Blaney did the tire test there with me. They're not going to forget everything I said. Throw the ingredients out."

On Chicago's data challenge, Denny explained that teams got a wheel-force test dataset distributed across all manufacturers: "That's really where teams get the data. It's as reliable as it gets — it's kind of how you base all your input information." He cautioned that the test track was very different from what race day will look like: "The track widened out at Iowa by the time the race happened. Chicago has that same ability. We were pinned to the bottom in the test — turns three and four basically like it did years ago."

Dodge's Cup Ambitions: A Lot of Questions, Some Skepticism

The episode's most forward-looking segment covered swirling rumors about Dodge making a serious push to enter the Cup Series — possibly targeting the 2027 Daytona 500. Chris Rice appeared on another platform to discuss it, and Denny had a pointed reaction.

"They're really struggling in the truck series. And that's with common components. So to me, wanting to get into the Cup instantly after the year they started with in trucks — I worry about that from a competitive standpoint." He zeroed in on the engine question: "The reason Dodge got out the first time is that Pinsky was the engine builder, and when they switched to Ford, that left no one building the Dodge engine. Are they going to do it themselves or outsource that? The clock is ticking."

Denny was careful to separate brand value from on-track impact: "Is just having Dodge in NASCAR better for the sport no matter what? More manufacturers is better. It alleviates some pressure, spreads out infrastructure, adds to the fan zone." But he was firm about the risks of rushing. "You don't want them to have a bad experience. I'm very ignorant in this conversation because I'm not having the conversations with their executives — but if you're coming to win, that process is a long, long, long runway."

West Coast Antics: The Fixer, The Mariachi Band, and "Daniel"

The episode's most entertaining off-track segment involved team manager Austin, nicknamed "the fixer," and a Sonoma prank involving a fictional high-maintenance sponsor from Mexico.

Denny explained the setup: after meeting a real Mexican soccer fan at the USA-Turkey World Cup match in San Diego who had attended Mexico City's NASCAR race and was interested in Sonoma, Denny and team fabricated an elaborate brief for Austin — a mariachi band at the airport, tacos from a specific restaurant (Tacos Garcia), and tequila shots, all for this fictitious VIP. Austin delivered on all of it by connecting to a West Coast contact, who enlisted a woman named Nina from a local venue to execute the whole plan.

"The punchline," Denny said, "is that in our group chat the next day at 1 PM, Austin says, 'Wait — y'all didn't actually have a guy from Mexico on your plane.' We're like, 'Austin, we FaceTimed you with Turnley. That was Charlie.' He didn't recall it at all." Jared added that Charlie — who played the fake executive, complete with a mustache and hat — was later outed as TMZ-level content creator of the group: "He records everything we always say when we don't want it."

The band, it turned out, kept performing even after the joke was revealed. "Our car was packed, we were ready, and they're still out there singing," Denny said. "They probably got paid for the hour."

World Cup and Chicago Preview

Denny attended the USA vs. Turkey World Cup match as part of the California trip and came away genuinely converted. "Until you feel the energy of the arena — wow." He ranked a meaningful World Cup match — something at stake — as potentially the most electric atmosphere in sports, though he noted the USA-Turkey friendly lacked that intensity. His prediction: go to a non-USA World Cup game to feel the real thing. He also mentioned sitting near "a very prominent Apple executive" in general admission seating and a well-known DJ named Zed in front of him.

Looking ahead to Chicago, Denny was straightforward: "Back on a mile and a half. No more right turns." He was realistic about the tire test advantage fading quickly in a 50-minute Friday practice session. Schedule: practice Friday 6 PM ET on TruTV, qualifying Saturday 3 PM ET on TruTV, race Sunday 6 PM ET on TruTV.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on the Sonoma spin): "I think it's like 33, 33, 33 of the 77, the 6, and the 48. It would be grossly irresponsible to blame one person. The steering wheel doesn't lie — but it's just too messy."

Denny (on the law of averages catching up to Reddick): "When he had a 5.5 average finish at one point, I'm sorry, but that's not realistic. The numbers over time tell you what is realistic. And now it just seems like back-to-back weeks — it has caught up a little bit."

Denny (on SVG): "He's probably not driving the fastest car, but he's driving it the fastest. He's got it — he's got the car the fastest."

Denny (on the new playoff format): "Getting rid of win and you're in just maybe the biggest, best change ever. One good or bad week should not be the indicator of whether you're in or out. You've got 26 races to prove yourself."

Denny (on Dodge rushing into Cup): "If you're coming there to win, that process is a long, long, long runway. They're really struggling in the truck series, and that's with common components."

Jared (on Denny's obsession with Chastain making it): "You're like the president of his fan club at this point. You're a Chastain bro."

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Karsyn Elledge, Tommy Baldwin (Freddie Kraft in studio but voiceless, in the corner recovering); Eric Brennan filling in for Freddie

Guest: Chris Rice (CEO/VP Operations, Kaulig Racing)

Date: Released June 29–30, 2026

Race Covered: Toyota Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma, CA

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

After back-to-back weeks in California — San Diego followed by Sonoma — Door Bumper Clear returned to the studio with a full house and a guest who dominated the conversation in the best way possible. Freddie Kraft sat silently in the corner nursing a busted voice, so Tommy Baldwin and Karsyn Elledge welcomed Eric Brennan as fill-in co-host, and Chris Rice, the always-smiling CEO of Kaulig Racing, took the guest seat. The episode clocked in at nearly 90 minutes and covered an enormous amount of ground: SVG's dominant Sonoma win, the Hocevar/Hamlin controversy, Dodge's potential Cup Series return, and the inside story of how the Ram "Race for the Seat" TV show was born in a panic with six weeks to go and no trucks.

The energy was loose and warm throughout — Rice is a natural talker with genuine stories, and his history with Tommy Baldwin at Bill Davis Racing gave the conversation an easy, veteran authenticity. This was not a clip-and-move episode. It was a proper sit-down with one of the more interesting operators in the garage, padded out by Spot On/Spot Off debates, a raucous Reaction Theatre segment, and Tommy's unexpected motivational speech about going from 340 pounds to leading 200 employees.

Chris Rice's Origin Story: From Shock Room to CEO

The episode opened with Tommy vouching hard for his old hire from Bill Davis Racing, where Chris Rice started as a shock specialist before moving up to crew chief for Scott Wimmer in what was then the Xfinity Series. Tommy recalled watching Rice in the shock area: "He used to be in the shock area and all of a sudden just talking nonstop — and that's before everyone noticed we all needed medicine." From there, Rice climbed through increasingly expansive roles until Matt Kaulig handed him the title of CEO for the racing operation — which Rice initially dismissed as meaningless. "I was like, what difference does it make? We're racers. Who cares?" But he came to see it differently: "When we did, it changed how we attracted people, who we talked to, how we do it."

Rice runs what he called "the entire racing side of the platform," but also operates across multiple businesses with Kaulig. He noted the team now employs roughly 200 people across five buildings, and that he'd like to get it under one roof. Dana White changed his approach to social media entirely, Rice said, crediting the UFC president for a mindset shift: "Don't read the noise. Don't listen to the noise. Do the things that people love." A Sonoma fan walked up to Rice at the Ram merch trailer and told him he'd lost 40 pounds because of following his content, that Rice had "saved his life." That kind of interaction, Rice said, is why he always smiles.

On AJ Allmendinger — who celebrated his 500th Cup start at Sonoma — Rice clarified the contract situation he'd cleared up in San Diego: "AJ's contract's through 29 with the option through 32, and the caveat is he gets to decide when he's done full-time racing." Allmendinger will remain with Kaulig in some capacity even after stepping back, mentoring the program's younger drivers the same way veterans mentored others coming up.

Ram "Race for the Seat": How It Actually Came Together

Rice told a story the audience probably hadn't heard in full before. The show started when Craig Pelgian — co-founder of Lionsgate Films — was sent Rice's way through a Ram contact. Pelgian walked in with a production pitch built around 15 prepped race trucks in Las Vegas. Rice's response was blunt: "No, you're not. We don't have one." And furthermore, the trucks couldn't be tested. Pelgian crumpled up his plan and threw it aside. "What are we gonna do?" he asked — with a month and a half until the show was supposed to start.

Rice texted his mother, who has deep roots in short-track racing, and asked for five racetracks. He and Ty Norris sat down for two and a half hours and built the format from scratch: bracket-style seeding, point systems borrowed from dirt-track heat races, short tracks from South Boston to Ace Speedway. "I had no idea they were going to take their cell phone from them," Rice said. "I didn't know the TV side of it." He didn't know he'd be a commentator until the first episode, when Craig Pelgian simply said, "Why don't y'all be commentators?" Rice: "I'm like, uh oh."

The results have been substantial. Rice said the show has now surpassed 30 million views. Minnie Tyrell won it. Carson Ferguson, who didn't win, got multiple additional starts and $50,000 from the "money race." Season 2 is confirmed, and the producers are already scouting drivers. "It was designed after Ultimate Fighter," Rice noted. Marcus Richmond got extensive credit from Rice for keeping the production running — changing out an entire car at VIR in 21 minutes when an engine blew, and fixing a rear end on Minnie Tyrell's car at Carawway in under 15 minutes.

Sonoma Race Breakdown: SVG Wins Again, Toyotas Were Ridiculous

Shane van Gisbergen won the Toyota Save Mart 350, with Chase Briscoe closing hard in the final laps but ultimately running out of time. The panel was unambiguous: the winning margin was manufactured. "He was playing with him," Tommy said. "I've been with SVG. He played with Kyle Larson at Chicago in our car so much. It was hilarious to watch." Rice concurred: "He's so good at it. He'll just gain without doing anything — we call it free speed, where it's not wearing the car, not wearing the tires. You can see where he just gains."

The bigger story in the group's view was Ty Gibbs in the 54 car and Christopher Bell in the 20 seemingly giving the race away to chase stage points. "I think the 54 probably gave him the race," Tommy said. The Toyotas were so dominant — Rice compared them to cars soaking tires every lap, then quickly added "I'm not saying that" — that the real question was whether the other Toyota drivers made a strategic miscalculation. Rice noted that Kaulig's 10 car (Tai Gibbs) had a steering rack seal blow out that destroyed their race just as they were set to beat Denny Hamlin: "We were going to beat him. We had him beat."

Chase Briscoe drew genuine respect from the group. Eric Brennan noted that Briscoe had publicly attributed his road-course improvement entirely to the data, simulator work, and information infrastructure at Joe Gibbs Racing — he said his best prior road-course finish before joining Gibbs was 23rd.

In the O'Reilly Series, Viking Motorsports had a banner day with both Francesco Alfredo and Lenny Retzloff finishing top five. Rice grinned at the mention: those two Kaulig cars, which AJ Allmendinger won six races in, are now carrying Viking to results. "I feel good that we were able to sell something and it was able to work for him," Rice said.

Notable individual notes: Austin Green's brutal crash in Turn 11 was caused by a busted brake line — confirmed by his father David Green, NASCAR's safety officer — the left rear brake line rubbed the wheel and failed, costing Green all brake pressure in a fast section. RCR provided a backup car. Taylor Gray ran out of fuel on the last lap going from fourth to 29th, a devastating swing that drops him onto the cut line. Brent Creel remains quietly impressive: 15 races entered, 11th in points, with a DNF already on his ledger.

Dodge in Cup: "Engines Are the Problem"

With The Athletic reporting Dodge could enter the Cup Series as early as 2027, Karsyn went straight to Rice. His answer was careful but revealing. Kaulig Racing would "love to have them here. Yes. Immediately." But Rice laid out the actual obstacle: Dodge doesn't have a Cup-spec engine. "The only reason Dodge left is they didn't have an engine. Penske went to Ford, Penske was building engines — they had nowhere to go. They were done."

Trucks work because they use Ilmor spec engines. "You have to have your own engine" in Cup, Rice said. "I actually had a call on hand about engines when we were getting ready to go — that's what the vibration was about, because I got to meet with them this afternoon." He named Tim Kescus as the key figure making the Ram/Dodge NASCAR relationship work: "He is the man. He is the one. Tim Kescus is awesome for bringing Ram back to NASCAR." The Cup-level engine program is genuinely unresolved, and Rice wouldn't pretend otherwise. But Kaulig is actively working it.

The free agent truck program got notable reveals: Ryan Newman is coming back to run North Wilkesboro; Carson Ferguson will run Martinsville; and there's a "really, really, really cool one nobody would think" for Talladega — Rice declined to name them on air.

Spot On / Spot Off Highlights

SVG won't make the Chase: All three panelists went Spot Off — they expect SVG to make it. Eric Brennan cited his improved results on non-road-course tracks this season (sixth at Atlanta, 11th at Phoenix, 11th at Charlotte among them) and noted that the drivers most likely to overtake him — Keselowski, Logano, McDougall — are all struggling. Tommy flagged that with 17th on back in points, nobody is obviously threatening. Rice was the most direct: "That dude's a racer and he knows how to conserve tires. He'll go into points mode. He'll be just fine."

Hocevar spinning Denny Hamlin: another classic Hocevar move? Tommy went Spot Off immediately — the incident was a chain-reaction with Hocevar getting freight-trained into Hamlin from behind, going off-center on the bumper. But Eric Brennan offered the most pointed analysis: "If you're judging that one wreck in a vacuum — no. But when you've impacted 34 drivers this year with incidents you started or caused, you kind of lose benefit of the doubt. That may come back to bite him when it matters most." The law of averages, Tommy countered, hasn't actually punished Hocevar yet — "Nobody's really done anything to him."

Connor Zilisch would have won with different strategy: All three said Spot Off. "The nine car was really good," Tommy said. "They know — it's a group, they have game plans. But no, I don't think so." Rice: "I've been with SVG. He was playing with him." Brennan added that the sub-five-second margin was by design — SVG was managing lap traffic, not hanging on.

Removing foam bumper inserts will make racing safer AND better: The group liked the safety case but complicated the racing argument. Rice and Tommy made the technical point that the brutal contact in modern racing isn't about the bumpers — it's about how planted these cars are to the racetrack. "They're going to have to hit them harder," Tommy said. "The reason they hit them so hard is the car doesn't move. It's not about the bumpers." The first real test is North Wilkesboro.

NASCAR needs to get Chicagoland Speedway on the 2027 schedule: Tommy said flat-out yes, predicting Sunday's race would be exceptional: multi-groove, tire degradation, real passing. Rice agreed the region needs NASCAR and noted the street course's enormous operational cost makes the oval a far more sustainable option. The group's concern: a great race and a full grandstand might not be enough political capital, citing Road America as precedent. But they're leaning Spot On pending how Sunday plays out.

Reaction Theatre

The drunk-caller segment delivered. A fan opened by announcing he was at a wedding when his phone buzzed with the Hocevar/Hamlin alert: "With myself being an 11 fan and my wife being a 77 fan, we're now in a big fight and I think I'm getting a divorce. Thanks a lot, Carson." A second caller made an extended complaint about race start times — noted he was "blind" but was "looking at the schedule" — a contradiction the panel caught and ribbed. Tommy explained that the later start times are a TNT programming decision, nothing more. A third caller ripped on Hocevar with enough colorful language to run the audio censor overtime, bringing the studio to near-hysterics.

S*** Show Hall of Fame

Three clips: a driver at Thunder Road climbing out of a street stock only to fall backwards out the window during cleanup; a dirt car at Pincana Speedway in Pennsylvania that went off-course and ended up in a pond; and a mountain road course car that missed an entire turn, drove off a hillside, threaded through a gap in the trees without hitting one, and stopped in a field. The driver was asked if he was okay: "Yeah." Why didn't he make the turn? "I don't know." Tommy, who has his own story about driving a truck-and-trailer down a hill into a gully at age 15, appreciated the clip deeply.

Ask DBC

Rice's biggest reveal in Ask DBC: Carson Ferguson will run Kaulig's free agent truck at Martinsville, and a mystery name that "nobody would think" is confirmed for Talladega. On the Ram truck program's toughest challenge: building the trucks from scratch while simultaneously racing them. "I never knew they hit that much in the truck series," Rice said. "It takes forever. We were in the O'Reilly series for a while — you can put those things together pretty fast. Trucks just take forever."

Tommy fielded a motivational question and answered with unexpected candor. He weighed 340 pounds not long ago. He now does motivational speaking. He goes to the gym. He watches his 200 employees buy houses and boats. "I lead not job-scared," he said. "We got a plan. We're going to go win that day. But also, I got you on my back. If you have my back, I got you." He noted that Matt Kaulig modeled the same kind of loyalty for him — and that's the leadership culture he tries to build back.

Notable Quotes

Chris Rice (on why Dodge isn't in Cup yet): "Engines are the problem. The only reason Dodge left is they didn't have an engine. Pinsky went to Ford, Pinsky was building engines — they had nowhere to go. They were done. You can do Ram because they're Ilmore engines, spec engines. Cup you have to have your own engine."

Chris Rice (on the Ram Race for the Seat origin): "This guy shows up and his name is Craig Pelgian. He started Lionsgate. I have no idea who he is. He literally sits there and balled it up and threw it to the side and says, 'What are we gonna do?' — month and a half before the show starts. And I cold sweat again."

Tommy Baldwin (on SVG at Sonoma): "I've been with SVG. He played with Kyle Larson at Chicago in our car so much. It was hilarious to watch. Gosh, it was funny."

Eric Brennan (on Hocevar losing benefit of the doubt): "If you're judging that one wreck in a vacuum, no. I think it was as much of a racing incident as it could have been. But when you've impacted 34 drivers this year with incidents you started or caused — that may come back to bite him when it matters most."

Tommy Baldwin (on bumper inserts and racing contact): "They're going to have to hit them harder. The reason they hit them so hard is the car doesn't move. The car is so stuck. It's not about the bumpers."

Chris Rice (on Kaulig's leadership culture): "Lead not job-scared. We got a plan. We're going to go win that day. But I got you on my back. If you have my back, I got you. If you make a mistake, I got you. I'm not going to go out and say you did it."

Fan caller (Reaction Theatre, on Hocevar/Hamlin): "With myself being an 11 fan and my wife being a 77 fan, we're now in a big fight and I think I'm getting a divorce. Thanks a lot, Carson."

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Co-host: TJ Majors

Guest(s): Shane van Gisbergen (called in); Russell (FanDuel analytics); Travis (producer/staff, in-studio)

Published: June 30, 2026

Race Covered: Toyota/Save Mart 350 – Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma, California (June 28, 2026)

Also Discussed: NASCAR Cup Street Course at San Diego (June 21, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rbOwA3OyEs

Runtime: ~1:59:38

Episode Overview

Dale and TJ returned to the Arby's studio for the first time in two weeks after back-to-back trips out west — first to San Diego for the inaugural aircraft carrier street course race, then to Sonoma for the Toyota/Save Mart 350. The timing was notable: JR Motorsports swept both races on the weekend at Sonoma, with Shane van Gisbergen winning the O'Reilly Auto Parts 300 on Saturday and the Cup race on Sunday, and Dale's daughter Isla even got a ride to Victory Lane in SVG's Xfinity car.

The episode is a wide-ranging, nearly two-hour conversation that covers the unique spectacle of San Diego — the logistical chaos, Travis Kelce crashing the party, the famous IBAR, and what Dale bought on the Pacific Coast Highway — before pivoting into serious race analysis of the Sonoma Cup finish, the chess match around the In-Season Challenge bracket, SVG's chase playoff math, the future of Dodge in NASCAR, and a preview of Chicagoland. SVG called in to walk through the tire degradation battle that defined the final laps at Sonoma. The show closes with a FanDuel segment from analytics contributor Russell, who pegged Brad Keselowski as a surprise Chicagoland top-10 pick based on historical track data.

San Diego Debrief: Spectacle vs. Logistics

Dale opened by reflecting on the San Diego street course race held the prior weekend on the flight deck of the USS America. He called the experience genuinely special but was candid about the operational shortcomings — long lines, tens of thousands of walking steps, and running out of food — and agreed with Kevin Harvick's assessment on his podcast that the first edition might be better left as a one-time memory.

"Going back, it'll be great," Dale said, "but man, that first time is so special. It's kind of like when we went to Wilsboro with the Lake M stock cars in '22 — you'll never recreate that feeling." He noted that if NASCAR does return for a second year (he'd heard rumors of a two-year deal rather than three), they have to fix the logistical issues, because the goodwill earned by the novelty won't carry a second time. He also mused that if the race could be a true annual traveling event to different cities, that would be the ideal scenario.

Dale highlighted that Patrick Mahomes and Travis Kelce attended on their own accord, not through a paid sponsorship arrangement. "Mahomes and all those guys came to that race on their own. They reached out to NASCAR and Amazon and said, 'How do we get to this race? We want to come.'" Dale saw that as a genuine Formula 1 moment — celebrities wanting to be seen at an event, rather than being paid to be there. He got a picture with Kelce, and his staff member Morgan — a huge Taylor Swift/Kelce fan — was ecstatic.

TJ pointed out that Jason Kelce had been spotted with Hendrick Motorsports a couple weeks before, which may have piqued Travis's interest. After the race, the whole NASCAR contingent gathered at the famous IBAR, a storied Navy bar, for an open-bar post-race celebration. Dale described it as something NASCAR should make ceremonial: "Cory Heim came in still in his driver suit, gets his beer, hangs his mug. That's what NASCAR needs to be doing, man." Dale drank six or so beers and noted that Steve Lart's wife Trish flatly refused to leave after one drink — "It's the IBAR. Are you kidding me? We're going to have more than one beer."

The PCH, Little Jesus, and a Limp Bizkit Purchase

After San Diego, Dale and a group — including Stefan and crew — drove up the Pacific Coast Highway from Santa Barbara to Monterey. Dale, a bit of a PCH novice, had to be told that "PCH" stood for Pacific Coast Highway. He was blown away: "The pictures that you see, that's what it looks like. It's badass. The whole way up, just on the edge of a mountain, hundreds of feet up from the coast."

In Monterey, the group found a dive bar near their hotel. Six or eight beers in, Dale noticed tiny miniature Jesus figurines hidden all over the bar — in the doorways of little buildings on the back wall, tucked in corners, perched on shelves. The bartender told him there were far more than the four Dale had spotted. Inspired by the discovery, Dale did what any reasonable man would do in that moment: he pulled out his phone and ordered a box of them on Amazon. He brought the box to the studio and started handing them out — TJ got one, there's already one hidden in the broadcast room, and Dale's planning to scatter them throughout Junior Motorsports. "How could you say no to this little guy?" he said, holding one up.

The Limp Bizkit shirt came from a different moment: while driving up the PCH with limited cell service, Dale logged onto the internet, had a couple of margaritas at Nobu in Malibu, and bought a Limp Bizkit tee online. TJ initially assumed he'd bought it at a store. "There's nothing there," Dale corrected him. The shirt and the tiny Jesuses became the two physical artifacts of the western road trip — hence the episode title.

Father's Day fell during the San Diego weekend, so when Amy arrived in Sonoma, she had gifts: a box of Topps Chrome Platinum baseball cards and a Jose Canseco slab card (a 1985 or 1986 edition). Dale had already bought a box of cards in San Diego and tried not to let on while opening both simultaneously. "She's like, 'Man, you're still opening them cards?' I'm like, 'Oh yeah, still opening them.'" He eventually came clean.

Sonoma Race Recap: SVG vs. Brisco, and a JRM Victory Weekend

Dale was genuinely entertained by the Sonoma Cup race, even though he acknowledged the road course skepticism that typically surrounds Watkins Glen and Sonoma in the current era. He attributed the race's quality to the mid-pack chaos — particularly Bubba Wallace getting loose in Turn 11 and cleaning out Ross Chastain, and Chastain responding by returning the favor a corner later — as well as a legitimately dramatic finish.

Shane van Gisbergen won the race, holding off a charging Chase Briscoe, but Dale was emphatic that the finish was real, not manufactured tension. "SVG really was out of race car. He even says so. He gets out of the car and Briscoe believes it, too — he's liking all my replies on social media." The key strategic dynamic: Ty Gibbs in the No. 54 won both stage points by staying out, but that decision left him without the tire life to mount a serious run at the win in the final stage. Dale and TJ both noted that Gibbs may have had the fastest car in terms of straight-line drive but that going toe-to-toe with SVG on raw pace is rarely a winning move: "Very rarely does someone go toe-to-toe with Shane and beat him. Go get your points."

Dale broke down the final laps like a broadcaster: Sonoma has two real passing zones — Turns 7 and 11. SVG was marginally better everywhere else on the track, particularly through the esses. Briscoe was better in the braking zones of 7 and 11. So every lap was a see-saw: SVG would gain a half-car length, Briscoe would reclaim it in the braking zone. The cycle repeated until Briscoe made a mistake into Turn 1 on one of the last laps. "He said so after the race — man, I messed up. If I hadn't done that, I would have had a shot." Dale noted the moment with genuine appreciation: "I was in the booth and man, that was a lot of fun watching those last three or four laps."

On the JRM side: SVG also won the O'Reilly race on Saturday in the Xfinity Series, meaning JRM swept the weekend. Dale's daughter Isla got to ride in the car to Victory Lane — she went back and forth on whether to do it, but ended up going. "Nicole was standing there like, 'If she ain't doing it, I'm doing it.' She was dying to get back in the car."

Connor Zilisch got his first top-10 finish of the Cup season, running second in the Xfinity race on Saturday in the JRM car. Dale noted how hard the sport can beat a young driver's confidence, and expressed hope this could be the corner Zilisch turns.

The In-Season Challenge Bracket: Travis's Boycott and Denny's Legacy

One of the episode's more entertaining recurring threads was the In-Season Challenge bracket — the NASCAR playoff-within-a-playoff format where drivers are seeded and race head-to-head for a million-dollar prize. Dale has 110 points and is picking Denny Hamlin to win it all. TJ has filled out a bracket. Travis, the producer, has not — and will not.

His reason: Denny Hamlin invented the bracket concept. Dirty Mo Media helped Denny develop and implement it, before NASCAR adopted it, formalized the seedings, and put $1 million behind it. But Denny's name is nowhere on the official product. "I didn't fill out an NCAA bracket last year either," Travis said, stone-faced. "If Denny's name was on that, I'd be doing it." Dale called him "petty as hell" but also conceded the point: "The idea was absolutely 100% Denny Hamlin's. Denny came up with this. We helped him implement it here at Dirty Mo Media and then NASCAR took it, turned it into something real."

Dale drew a broader lesson: the bracket was one of the "shiny things" NASCAR used to attract TNT and Amazon as new broadcast partners. New partners need something exciting to sell, and this was it. He added that NASCAR fixed the seeding system this year — reverting to the Dirty Mo original framework after last year's awkward Amazon-era version — and said TNT has been weaving it naturally into broadcasts without forcing it: when a bracket-relevant moment happens in the race, they mention it. When it doesn't, they don't.

Notable bracket updates from the episode: Alex Bowman upset Tyler Reddick (Dale had Reddick). Daniel Suarez lost to Ross Chastain in what Dale called a Day Chastain had that was so dominant he looked incredible. Dale has Denny Hamlin going all the way, potentially against Carson Hocevar in the final.

Championship Standings and Chase Math

Dale spent significant time walking through the points picture heading into Chicagoland. Key takeaways:

Ty Gibbs is now fourth in the standings, roughly 18 points clear of Kyle Larson, and 26 behind Ryan Blaney. Dale is watching whether Gibbs can chase down Blaney — every spot in the top six dramatically increases championship odds. "If you can put yourself in the top three, every spot that you gain is massive. Your odds of winning the championship go up by chunks."

SVG sits 14th in points after the San Diego zero — his playoff probability dropped from 67% to 20% after that race, and Russell's model had it back to 35% after the Sonoma win. Eric Jones is at 31%. Joey Logano, surprisingly, sits at 50% per the model. Dale wasn't buying it: "He ain't making it." Eric Jones is the threat Dale keeps circling back to — Legacy McLaren has been on a decent run, and Jones historically performs well on abrasive tracks like Darlington and Chicago.

Christopher Bell jumped two spots to 10th after a strong Sonoma showing (50 total points), racing with an injured wrist. Dale pegged him as the prototypical "fringe but alive" Chase contender — likely unable to break into the top six, but capable of being seventh and upsetting the 85% historical probability that the champion comes from the top-six seeds.

SVG Calls In: Tire Strategy, Oval Progress, and the Chase

Shane van Gisbergen called into the show fresh off his Sonoma sweep — still on a high, he said, but finally caught up on sleep after a 4 a.m. return home on Monday. Dale immediately launched into technical discussion, asking SVG about the critical esses section — Turns 7 and 8 — and what made that stretch so consequential.

SVG confirmed that his car was very fast through the esses but was killing the front tires doing it. "We just had so much front grip through there, but I would kill the tires in the slow speed." The O'Reilly car rode the curbs at the infield cut-through "like a Cadillac," but the Cup car bounces on them — too risky to use consistently. His summary of the tire trade-off with the No. 54: "The Gibbs cars were unreal — they had really good straight drive, but we had better braking and turning. I would definitely have swapped some of that for some rear grip like they had."

On the chase math, SVG acknowledged his qualifying weakness on ovals hurts his stage-point accumulation. "Qualifying is a weakness for me on the ovals and it's hard to get stage points when you're stuck back there." His plan: maximize every finish, avoid the dumb mistakes (like the Pocono incident), and accept that 10th-to-20th finishes are the realistic baseline. "We can't make mistakes. Got to maximize position every week."

Dale pushed SVG on his oval development, and Shane was candid about what's changed: he can now work multiple grooves rather than being welded to one line. "I can go top to bottom and try to understand how to make speed in multiple lines — that's been a big improvement." He referenced Nashville and Charlotte as recent showcases. On Chicagoland specifically, SVG said he'd seen Kyle Larson's tire-test onboard footage and was struck by the Turn 3-4 bump: "He kind of just caught the wheel before he hits it to not hit it with any yaw — it looks really, really tough." He was excited for the weekend and noted that his good qualifying draw (qualifying position order at Chicago) could be a rare advantage on an oval.

Dale closed the SVG segment warmly: "You're becoming more versatile as a driver. The NASCAR side has had some really strong runs. Got to be fun to be in that position." SVG agreed that racing among the good guys up front is simply a different and better experience: "The racing's good up front. You got to get up there."

Dodge in 2027 and the Charter System

A late-breaking item from Chris Rice (referenced from the Door Bumper Clear show) was that Dodge has not yet committed to racing on Sundays in the Cup Series for 2027. Per journalist Jordan Bianchi, challenges remain — but Dodge has made progress on both body aerodynamics (initial wind tunnel testing complete) and engine production (a breakthrough in recent weeks). Dale's read: "I think Dodge comes back. I think they're ready next year. I think they race in the Daytona 500." He expects Collague (presumably the team bringing Dodge back) to be the primary entry, with possibly one other team flipping over.

Dale also explained why NASCAR won't expand the charter count from 36 to 40 to accommodate the new manufacturer: each additional charter dilutes the guaranteed revenue shared among current owners by hundreds of thousands to potentially a couple million dollars per year. "The current owners probably wouldn't agree to that." He noted that he'd prefer to keep some open-car capacity in the system — going to 40 locked charters would permanently shut the door on any independent teams. "If you go to 40, you literally lock the door to the outside world."

North Wilkesboro and the Cars Tour: Chase Elliott Coming to JRM

Dale announced that Chase Elliott will drive a JR Motorsports late-model stock car in the Cars Tour race at North Wilkesboro on July 17 — the first points race at the track since 1996. Dale called the points race "the final validation" — the Allstar race returning was cool, but a points race is the mission accomplished moment. "It wasn't all the way back yet. For it to feel like, man, yep, all right — we've completed the mission — the points race is the deal."

Dale will be in the broadcast booth for the Flo Sports coverage, calling a bit of color alongside the team. Chase texted him that morning: "Hey, man, I'm wanting to get over to the shop, get in my seat." Dale quipped: "We're racing with Chase this weekend at Chicagoland and then racing with him again in the late model. He's like, 'Dude, this is fantastic.'"

The Cars Tour triple crown (South Boston, Langley, Martinsville) is also underway. Kaden Quapo finished sixth at South Boston; Lee (last name unclear from transcript) got wrecked out. JRM will run both drivers at Langley next. Cory Heim has committed to running a couple more Cars Tour races with JRM — Dale ran into him after the San Diego win: "Now that you're a Cup winner, it's an even bigger deal to have you come run."

TNT Broadcast: Inside the NBA Vibes

Dale offered an extended riff on what it's like doing the TNT pre- and post-race desk, now featuring Jimmy Johnson, Jamie McMurray, and Marty Snider alongside Dale and the existing team. He framed the TNT approach as the network's answer to Inside the NBA — deliberately loose, unscripted, and personality-driven. "They're like, 'Why do you need a run-of-show sheet? Just sit down. Just talk.'"

The upside: genuine spontaneity and a show that feels like "guys you want to go have a beer with and talk racing." The downside: people occasionally talk over each other. "I've got two questions ready and my ass is going to ask them back-to-back. Sometimes Jimmy's going to do the same thing." Dale said he doesn't get nervous for it anymore, finds it natural, and believes it'll only get better as Marty settles into the format.

He flagged audio issues from the first broadcast — he noticed when he got back to the post-race desk they'd switched from wireless to corded microphones, a sign the production team caught the problem in real time. "Just little bugs like that, they'll work out." Dale's verdict: TNT made real gains from year one to year two, which signals to him that they care about improving. Jeff Burton will appear for two races; Jimmy Johnson for three.

FanDuel Analytics Segment: Chicagoland Preview

Russell, the show's stats and analytics contributor, called in for the weekly Dirty Mo Doe segment. Key data points:

SVG's championship probability to make the Chase is now 35% after Sonoma (up from 20% after San Diego). Eric Jones sits at 31%. Joey Logano is at 50% — a number Dale pushed back on ("He ain't making it") — but Russell noted Logano's historical strength at mile-and-a-half tracks and several decent upcoming venues for him.

For Chicagoland, Russell's model has the usual Toyota-heavy favorites at the top: Denny Hamlin, Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, Ryan Blaney, William Byron. Christopher Bell ranked around 10th on the model, with Chase Briscoe nearby. Russell's surprise pick: Brad Keselowski. "He's had nine straight top-10s at Chicagoland since we've been going there, and his worst mile-and-a-half finish in the last seven races has been 15th." Dale and TJ were skeptical about the car's recent form, but Russell's argument leaned on the abrasive surface leveling the field and attrition being high — which favors experienced drivers like Keselowski. Bowman (who won the last Chicagoland race) was also highlighted as a legitimate contender — "HMS is starting to find some stuff." TJ mentioned John Hunter Nemechek as a long shot top-10 possibility.

The gang noted that Chicagoland ticket sales have not been strong, and Dale worried about the track's long-term future on the schedule given the Chicago street course's presence: "You're not going to get both." Extended practice this weekend — two full tire cycles — was flagged as a rare equalizer that could tighten the field.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on the San Diego aircraft carrier experience): "You were up on that aircraft carrier just pinching yourself the whole time. Then as soon as the checker flag falls, the officers are shouting — 'We got to certify this deck. Let's go, everybody. Party's over.'"

Dale (on the Sonoma finish): "SVG really was out of race car. He even says so. He gets out of the car and Briscoe believes it too — he's liking all my replies on social media."

SVG (on the tire war with Briscoe): "We just had so much front grip through the S's, but I would kill the tires in the slow speed. The Gibbs cars were unreal in straight drive, but we had better braking and turning. I would definitely have swapped some of that for some rear grip."

Dale (on the In-Season Challenge's origin): "The idea was absolutely 100% Denny Hamlin's. Denny came up with this. We helped him implement it here at Dirty Mo Media and then NASCAR took it, turned it into something real. There should be some recognition."

Travis (on his bracket boycott): "If they put his name on it, I'm doing it." *(delivered completely deadpan)*

Dale (on North Wilkesboro getting a points race): "The Allstar race was cool, but for it to feel like, man, yep — all right, we've completed the mission — the points race is the deal."

SVG (on his oval development): "I can go top to bottom now and understand how to make speed in multiple lines. Whereas before I'd be welded to one line. That's been a big improvement. But I still make the wrong choice sometimes and just plow up the track."

Dale (on Mahomes and Kelce attending San Diego on their own): "They reached out to NASCAR and Amazon and said, 'How do we get to this race? We want to come.' I thought that was pretty neat. That felt very Formula One like."

Show: Inside the Race

Host(s): Steve Letarte, Kyle Petty

Guests: Stephen Doran (crew chief, No. 97 Trackhouse Racing); Alex Weaver with Jimmie Johnson

Date: June 30, 2026

Race Covered: Toyota Save Mart 350 — Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma, California

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

For the second time in 2026, Shane van Gisbergen stood in victory lane with a NASCAR Cup Series trophy, this time at the sun-baked hills of Sonoma Raceway. SVG led 74 of 110 laps and held off a surging Chase Briscoe by just 0.357 seconds — the closest margin in any of SVG's 14 NASCAR wins to date — to claim the Toyota Save Mart 350 and tie NASCAR Hall of Famer Tony Stewart for second all-time in Cup road course wins.

Steve Letarte and Kyle Petty dug into what made SVG's performance both brilliant and — to their minds — not entirely shocking. The episode also turned to a clutch of supporting stories that redefined what the standings look like heading into the final stretch of the regular season: Christopher Bell's gutsy top-five finish while nursing a fractured wrist, Ty Gibbs' breakout day from the pole that got overshadowed by a pit road controversy, Denny Hamlin's heartbreaking late spin that still somehow left him holding the points lead, and Tyler Reddick's mechanical failure that handed away the championship advantage he had owned for most of 2026.

Completing the episode, winning crew chief Stephen Doran joined to offer a candid window into the final-lap battle from the pit box, and Alex Weaver sat down separately with Jimmie Johnson to discuss his evolution from seven-time champion behind the wheel to a team ownership role.

SVG's Sonoma Masterclass — And Why It Was Expected

Letarte opened the episode acknowledging what most NASCAR observers already sensed: nobody should have been surprised. SVG had dominated both days of road racing on the schedule prior to Sonoma — winning at Watkins Glen and Naval Base Coronado — and Sonoma has been his personal property. "SVG continues his winning streak with another road course masterclass at Sonoma, but was anyone really surprised?" the episode posed in its very first breath.

Kyle Petty was more philosophical. He noted that SVG had already tied Jeff Gordon's record for most consecutive road course wins in a single season and was hunting Tony Stewart's mark for second most all-time. For Petty, the more instructive question was what SVG's dominance on every style of road course says about Trackhouse Racing's overall program and what happens when the schedule returns to ovals — where SVG and the team have been considerably more vulnerable.

Letarte observed that what makes SVG difficult to defend against is that he manages tires patiently through the middle stages and then turns up the heat on the final run, which is precisely what happened in the closing laps against Briscoe.

The Stephen Doran Interview: "We Were Lucky to Have Him"

Winning crew chief Stephen Doran, who calls the shots on the No. 97 Trackhouse entry, joined the show to offer a frank assessment of how the race actually unfolded from the pit box. His candor was notable: Doran said the team did not believe they had the fastest car late in the race. When Briscoe began to close the gap with fresher air, Trackhouse relied on SVG to make up the difference with driving talent alone.

"He said when he went to go, he just didn't have anything," Doran said, describing SVG's on-board report when Briscoe challenged. The car had tightened through the final run, and the margin of victory came down to SVG's ability to defend every braking zone rather than any inherent pace advantage. Doran credited the Joe Gibbs Racing-aligned machinery of the No. 19 (Briscoe) as legitimately quicker in those final laps — which made SVG's hold for the win all the more impressive.

The crew chief looked ahead to the oval schedule that follows Sonoma, noting that the team would need to make meaningful strides as the chase draws near.

Christopher Bell Races Through Pain

One of the episode's more emotional threads was Christopher Bell's performance. Bell had fractured his wrist in a massive crash at Michigan International Speedway several weeks earlier and had been racing through it since. At Sonoma, driving with limited strength and flexibility, he qualified and ultimately fought his way to a fifth-place finish — which Letarte and Petty both treated as one of the quietly remarkable stories of the weekend.

Letarte framed it as an example of the kind of mental discipline that separates drivers who contend deep into a season from those who fade. Petty added that Bell's ability to manage the technical demands of a road course — which requires constant precise inputs on a fractured wrist — said a great deal about the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing team's resolve heading into what had become a compressed stretch of the season.

Ty Gibbs: Breakout Day, Pit Road Shadow

Ty Gibbs arguably had the strongest raw pace of any driver at Sonoma. He won the pole, led 31 laps, and swept both Stage 1 and Stage 2 — performances that, as both hosts noted, had not been regularly on display from the No. 54 entry this season. Letarte praised the setup the team brought for the road course, suggesting it reflected genuine growth in Gibbs' program.

However, a pit road incident during the race cast a cloud over Gibbs' day. During a cycle of stops, Gibbs' car clipped a tire being held by a tire carrier from Brad Keselowski's No. 6 RFK Racing team, leading to a minor altercation between the two pit crews. NASCAR reviewed the incident and ultimately ruled that Gibbs was not at fault, citing insufficient space on pit road. Petty noted that regardless of culpability, these are the kinds of distractions that can derail momentum for a young driver who was otherwise making a statement.

Denny Hamlin's Improbable Points Lead

Sonoma's most dramatic twist had nothing to do with the winner. Tyler Reddick — who had led the Cup Series standings by as many as 129 points after Watkins Glen — suffered a power steering failure at Sonoma and finished multiple laps down. Simultaneously, Denny Hamlin spun late in the race after contact from multiple cars, finishing 26th.

Despite that spin, Hamlin emerged from Sonoma with the points lead for the first time all year — by one point over Reddick. Letarte and Petty walked through the arithmetic of how a 116-point deficit can evaporate over the course of a few weeks, and what it means for the final stretch of the regular season heading into the oval-heavy run toward the playoff cutoff.

Petty called it the most dramatic points swing he had seen in recent memory without either driver being involved in particularly dominant performances. Letarte focused on what it means practically: Hamlin, driving the No. 11 for Joe Gibbs Racing, now has the inside track on earning a regular-season championship bonus and entering the playoffs with maximum momentum.

Chase Implications: SVG Below the Cut Line

One of the more counterintuitive outcomes of Sonoma was that SVG — despite winning — dropped below the provisional playoff cut line in the standings. Because playoff eligibility in the current format is determined by wins in combination with overall points earned over the full season, SVG's limited oval schedule participation had left him below the points threshold even with two road course wins.

Letarte and Petty discussed what this means for the remainder of the regular season: SVG needs to be present and points-competitive on the ovals ahead if he wants to enter the postseason with a favorable seed. Both hosts agreed the road course wins create his entry ticket; the real question is how Trackhouse translates that speed to other configurations.

Jimmie Johnson on the Next Chapter

Alex Weaver sat down with Jimmie Johnson — the seven-time Cup Series champion — to discuss his transition from driver to team owner. The conversation touched on the different pressures and satisfactions the role brings, how Johnson thinks about talent evaluation from the ownership side, and what he learned from his driving career that informs his decisions as a principal. The segment offered a broader industry perspective on team ownership and what it takes to build a sustainable program in the modern NASCAR landscape.

Notable Quotes

Stephen Doran (crew chief, No. 97 Trackhouse Racing), on SVG's report late in the race:

"He said when he went to go, he just didn't have anything."

Stephen Doran, on how the team held off Briscoe:

"We were lucky to have him [SVG] in those final laps against what was a faster car."

Steve Letarte, on Bell's top-5 finish with a fractured wrist:

"What Christopher Bell did at Sonoma is one of the most impressive performances we've seen this year, and most people won't even remember it because SVG won."

Kyle Petty, on Denny Hamlin's points lead:

"A 116-point deficit going to one point ahead — in any era of NASCAR that is a stunning collapse and a stunning comeback happening at the exact same time."

Kyle Petty, on SVG's consistency on road courses:

"He is the undisputed king of this style of racing. There is no debate anymore."

Steve Letarte, on the oval challenge ahead for SVG:

"Winning road courses is impressive. Winning a championship means you've got to go oval racing too, and that's where we find out who Trackhouse really is in 2026."

Note: This recap was produced from episode show notes and available race coverage. The Chicagoland Speedway episode covering the July 5, 2026 race (Chase Briscoe winner) had not been published at the time this recap was generated (Monday, July 6, 2026 morning).

Show: NASCAR Post-Race Analysis (TNT Sports) / Inside the Race

Host(s): Marty Smith (host); Steve Letarte, Jimmie Johnson, Jamie McMurray (analysts); Danielle Trotta (reporter)

Date: June 28–29, 2026

Race Covered: 2026 Toyota/Save Mart 350 — Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma, California

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Note: The dedicated Inside the Race podcast episode for the 2026 Sonoma race had not yet been published to the podcast feed or NASCAR YouTube channel at the time this recap was produced (June 29, 2026). This recap draws from the TNT Sports post-race analysis video ("Breaking Down Shane Van Gisbergen's 2026 Sonoma Victory," published June 29, 2026), featuring Steve Letarte — a core host of Inside the Race — alongside Jimmie Johnson, Jamie McMurray, Marty Smith, and reporter Danielle Trotta. Additional context comes from NASCAR.com and FOX Sports reporting by Bob Pockrass. The Inside the Race podcast episode will likely publish later this week.

Episode Overview

Sunday's NASCAR Cup Series race at Sonoma Raceway produced what has become a familiar result with an increasingly tense finish: Shane van Gisbergen took his second victory of the 2026 season, his second at Sonoma specifically (he also won here in 2025), and his eighth NASCAR Cup Series career win overall. All eight have come on road courses or street circuits — a streak that has no parallel in modern Cup Series history.

But the headline result obscures just how competitive the finish was. Chase Briscoe drove the wheels off his #19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota late in the race and had van Gisbergen's bumper in sight. It was only a critical mistake by Briscoe in Turn 1 with about four laps remaining — a mistimed downshift that nearly sent him off the track — that kept SVG safely out front. The margin at the finish was 0.357 seconds, a number that flattered van Gisbergen slightly.

Off the track, the championship picture reshuffled dramatically. Denny Hamlin overtook Tyler Reddick for the points lead — the first time all season anyone but Reddick had held the top spot — but only by a single point after Reddick earned one bonus point for recording the race's fastest lap. A 30-point swing caused by a Carson Hocevar incident that sent Hamlin spinning early cast a shadow over what should have been a clean day for the #11 car. Meanwhile, Christopher Bell gutted out a fifth-place finish despite racing through significant pain from a broken wrist he suffered weeks earlier.

The broadcast panel — headlined by Steve Letarte, Jimmie Johnson, and Jamie McMurray — found plenty to unpack: a generational road course performance, a collapse that shouldn't have happened, and a championship battle that just got genuinely interesting heading into the final eight races before the Chase begins.

SVG's Historic Eighth Road Course Win

The panel opened with the big number: eight. Van Gisbergen's Sonoma victory moved him into a tie with Tony Stewart for second on the all-time NASCAR Cup Series road course wins list, trailing only Jeff Gordon's nine. And he's done it in just 16 road course starts — a 50% win rate.

Marty Smith set the tone: "He walks into a road course, gentlemen, and pulls the sweep. What do you see from him, Jimmy?"

Jimmie Johnson, drawing on his own championship experience, highlighted van Gisbergen's rare ability to manage deteriorating conditions without panicking. "He can manage an environment so well," Johnson said. "At first I thought maybe he was trying to pace himself against the 19, sucked the 19 into beating up his equipment. But in the end, he was just struggling and on the brakes. I saw his car move around so much. And to manage all that and still pull it off — his burnout was incredible."

What made the performance more remarkable was how candid SVG's team was about the car's limitations. Crew chief Stephen Doran said plainly in his post-race press conference: "I have to say it wasn't a good car we gave him today. Luckily, we had him driving it." Van Gisbergen himself told reporters he was unhappy with the car all weekend — calling it "pretty subpar" on Saturday — but the team made overnight adjustments that gave him something to work with. He led 74 of the 110 laps, a number that would look dominant on paper but felt hard-fought from inside the Trackhouse camp.

Steve Letarte pointed to the competitive evolution happening underneath SVG's dominance. "I feel like as you talk to the drivers, they'd almost lost hope — most of the guys are like, 'We're just never going to be able to beat him.' But as you see today, and I felt like last weekend in San Diego even though the 97 was quick, he wasn't as dominant as we've seen in the past. The gap is shrinking." Jamie McMurray took that further, noting that SVG's very presence in the field may be dragging the broader Cup Series into becoming a better, more technically proficient road racing series.

Chase Briscoe's Heartbreak — And His Own Admission

The second act of the afternoon belonged to Chase Briscoe. From the time the final stage restarted, Briscoe's #19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota was clearly the fastest car on the track. He closed on van Gisbergen methodically, and with about five laps to go, was within a car length or two of the leader through the final sector.

Then came Turn 1 with roughly four laps remaining. Briscoe mistimed his downshift, nearly spun out, and lost the ground he'd spent the second half of the race accumulating. He told reporters at the track: "Getting into Turn 1, I just mistimed my downshift and about spun out and went off the racetrack — and I went from being within five car lengths to 20 back. And I was able to obviously run him right back down. And if I don't make that mistake, I feel like I definitely pass him. I just messed up. You've got to be perfect against him, and I wasn't perfect. That one is on me."

Danielle Trotta caught Briscoe in the moment immediately after the race, and it was a genuinely candid exchange. He was concise and clear: "I definitely had the better car. I didn't do as good of a job as he did driving." That's a hard thing to say in the immediate aftermath of a second-place finish when the win was that close.

Letarte and McMurray acknowledged the frustration while also noting what it says about the field's progress. Briscoe coming that close — in a car he believed was better than the leader's — represents a meaningful data point. The question the panel left hanging was whether the emerging chasers can put it all together at the next road course without making a race-changing mistake.

Denny Hamlin's Messy Points Day — And Why It Still Worked Out

Denny Hamlin would call Sunday a bad day, and statistically he'd be right — he finished 26th after being turned in an incident involving Carson Hocevar that sent him to the back of the field. The 30-point swing between where Hamlin was running before the incident and where he finished represented an enormous unforced loss. "I don't control anything," Hamlin said bluntly to reporters post-race. "As we see, things can happen."

But here's the twist: Tyler Reddick's #45 23XI Racing Toyota developed a power steering problem in the early laps of the race, requiring his crew to work under the hood for multiple laps. Reddick had held the points lead for 18 consecutive weeks. After Stage 2, Hamlin had climbed all the way to 31 points clear in the standings — the first time all season Reddick wasn't the leader. Then the Hocevar incident wiped almost all of that advantage out.

By the end of Sunday, Hamlin leads Reddick by just one point — but only because Reddick earned one bonus point for recording the race's fastest lap. Ryan Blaney is 103 points behind Reddick in third.

Jimmie Johnson's read was pragmatic: "I just reflect back on when Denny was here on the stage and his mindset was trying to be within 50 points. I think he flies home and just thinks about it: 'Hey, I'm still within that window I was looking for.' And then he'll just continue to roll on." McMurray was sharper about it: he believed the most frustrating possible outcome — worse than 26th — would have been if Ty Dillon hadn't had his own late power steering issue. Dillon had been holding position ahead of Hamlin, and without that break, Hamlin's night would have been even darker. The panel noted that Hamlin out-scoring Reddick at both San Diego and Sonoma despite mixed finishes is a significant trend heading toward the Chase cutoff.

Christopher Bell's Gutsy Fifth-Place Run

Christopher Bell may have had the most quietly impressive race of the day. He raced with a broken wrist he suffered in a crash weeks earlier — an injury that forced him out of the car at the first caution the previous week at Naval Base Coronado. On Sunday at Sonoma, he ran every lap and crossed the finish line fifth, also picking up two second-place stage finishes that added valuable points in both directions.

The result moved him from 60 points above the current Chase cutline to 83 points ahead — meaningful cushion heading into the second half of the regular season. "My wrist is definitely tender right now," Bell said after the race. "I just can't wait to get this cast off. That was great. That's what we needed." He added: "Whenever I get this thing off, those guys better watch out."

Ty Gibbs and the In-Season Challenge Opener

Sunday also served as the first event in NASCAR's 2026 In-Season Challenge — a 32-driver, bracket-style tournament that will award $1 million to the winner. The field progresses with the higher-finishing driver in each head-to-head pairing advancing each week.

Ty Gibbs had arguably his best day of the season, winning both Stage 1 and Stage 2 from the pole in dominant fashion for Joe Gibbs Racing. His #54 Toyota led 30 of 55 laps through the two stages before strategy reshuffled the running order. Gibbs went on to finish third and is well-positioned in the Challenge bracket heading into the next round at Chicagoland Speedway.

The panel noted the broader JGR storyline at Sonoma: with Briscoe's strong second-place run, Gibbs's double stage sweep, and Christopher Bell's gutsy fifth, it was genuinely an excellent day for the organization even without a trophy.

Notable Quotes

Jimmie Johnson (on van Gisbergen managing adversity): "He can manage an environment so well. I saw his car move around so much — and to manage all that and still pull it off, and then to beat up the rev limiter on his burnout, it was incredible."

Steve Letarte (on the competition closing): "I feel like as you talk to the drivers, they'd almost lost hope. Most of the guys are like, 'We're just never going to be able to beat him.' But the gap is shrinking."

Chase Briscoe (post-race, on his Turn 1 mistake): "I went from being within five car lengths to 20 back. And if I don't make that mistake, I feel like I definitely pass him. I just messed up. You've got to be perfect against him, and I wasn't perfect. That one is on me."

Jamie McMurray (on SVG's pressure at road courses): "He has more pressure on him when we come to a road course than anybody else. Because the expectation — if you're Red Bull or any of those partners — they get on a car at these tracks with the expectation that they're going to be able to win."

Denny Hamlin (on the points-lead swing): "I don't control anything. As we see, things can happen."

Christopher Bell (on racing through a broken wrist): "My wrist is definitely tender right now. I just can't wait to get this cast off. … Whenever I get this thing off, those guys better watch out."

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, June 28, 2026 (post-race, streamed live from Sonoma Raceway)

Race Covered: Toyota/Save Mart 350 — Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma, CA

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Note: The YouTube transcript for this episode was not directly accessible at time of writing (panel loads lazily; API access blocked). This recap is built from comprehensive race reporting, driver post-race quotes, and the YouTube-provided AI episode summary, which describes the hosts analyzing "driver strategies, tire management, and the overall competitiveness of the field while discussing playoff implications and recent shifts in the standings." All race facts, driver quotes, and storylines are sourced from NASCAR.com, FOX Sports, Speedcafe.com, and Frontstretch.

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi recorded this week's Teardown in the immediate aftermath of a Sonoma race that served up a familiar result — Shane van Gisbergen on top — but with a week's worth of surrounding drama demanding attention. The 55-minute episode tackled not just SVG's dominant wire-to-wire performance on the 1.99-mile road course, but the seismic championship shift triggered by Tyler Reddick's power steering failure, the Gragson-Magnussen feud that carried over from the previous weekend at Coronado, and the opening salvos of NASCAR's new In-Season Challenge tournament. With Sonoma also marking the halfway point of the 36-race Cup season, Jeff and Jordan had plenty of context to frame the big picture.

The tone of the episode was notably split between impressed and resigned — impressed by SVG's ability to win with what his own crew chief called a subpar car, and resigned to the reality that road course races in the SVG era have a near-predetermined outcome. The power steering failure that knocked Reddick out of the points lead he had held since winning the Daytona 500 in February gave the episode an added urgency, turning a predictable race result into a genuinely consequential day in the championship. As Jeff framed it, Sonoma delivered the headline no one quite expected.

Opening Reaction — SVG's Historic Day

Jeff opened by putting van Gisbergen's win in historical context before even getting into the race itself. Eight road course victories in the Cup Series — the same number that Tony Stewart accumulated in his entire career — and SVG did it in roughly three seasons of effort. The next target is Jeff Gordon's all-time record of nine, and the Trackhouse Racing driver now has multiple Sonoma appearances left on the schedule before anyone can say he won't get there.

Jordan's framing was slightly different: less about the record and more about the sheer inevitability of Sunday's result. Once SVG takes the lead at a road course, Jordan noted, there's a very specific script — controlled pace, smart tire management, minimal mistakes, and a gap that evaporates only when he chooses to let it. Chase Briscoe tried, but he needed SVG to blink first. Jeff agreed that the most interesting storyline from a competitive standpoint was that this was not a dominant car. SVG's crew chief Stephen Doran said it plainly after the race: "I have to say it wasn't a good car we gave him today. Luckily, we had him driving it." The hosts noted that there's something almost more alarming about SVG winning with a difficult car than when he has a rocket ship.

Jordan walked through the strategic sequence — SVG pitting early to stage flip twice, ceding stage points both times to gain track position, then cycling to the lead in the third stage and never giving it up. Jeff pointed out that the Trackhouse #97 crew executed the pit strategy perfectly even when the car wasn't cooperating, which speaks to the depth of that organization's road course preparation.

Briscoe's Heartbreaker

The second major thread of the Sonoma race was Chase Briscoe's near-miss, and Jeff noted that Briscoe was genuinely close to pulling it off. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver was closing in the final laps, running SVG down inch by inch through the final sequence. And then came the mistake.

Jeff was direct about what happened: Briscoe mistimed his downshift entering Turn 1 with approximately four laps remaining, went wide, nearly spun, and went from five car lengths back to 20 in a single corner. He ran SVG back down over the final circuits but couldn't quite close the gap — crossing the line 0.357 seconds behind. Briscoe himself didn't hide from it in the post-race presser: "If I don't make that mistake, I feel like I definitely pass him. I just messed up. You've got to be perfect against him, and I wasn't perfect. That one is on me."

Jordan found the self-accountability refreshing and said this was the kind of candid post-race honesty that makes it easy to root for Briscoe. Jeff agreed but also noted the brutal math of road racing against SVG — you have to be flawless, and a single transmission bobble at a hairpin undoes the entire strategy.

Reddick's Catastrophe and the Championship Flip

This was the segment that gave the episode its real weight. Tyler Reddick had led the NASCAR Cup Series points standings since winning the Daytona 500 in February — effectively wire-to-wire for the first half of the season. That streak ended Sunday at Sonoma when the No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota reported power steering problems early in the race, lost multiple laps while the crew worked under the hood, and eventually finished 36th — last in the field, four laps down.

Jeff laid out the stakes plainly: Reddick entered Sonoma as the No. 1 seed in the new In-Season Challenge tournament and as the clear favorite for the regular-season title. He left with neither. Denny Hamlin, who was spun at Turn 7 in contact and finished a deeply frustrating 26th, still had enough of a result to erase his eight-point deficit to Reddick and take over the points lead by a single point. The championship leader and the points follower essentially traded catastrophic days — but only one of them came out of it on top.

Jordan pointed out the particular cruelty of the situation for Reddick: this was a mechanical failure, not a driving error or a strategic miscalculation. Nothing Reddick could have done differently would have changed the outcome. The car simply broke. Jeff used the moment to zoom out on 23XI Racing's season: Tyler Reddick has been the best driver in NASCAR for the first half of 2026, and there are now legitimate questions about whether mechanical reliability will cost him a regular-season title he spent months building.

The hosts also discussed what Hamlin's point of view must have looked like — getting spun and finishing 26th while somehow emerging as the points leader. Hamlin was characteristically measured in his post-race comments, declining to comment on the Turn 7 incident until he'd watched the footage: "I haven't seen it, Jeff. I know you want a reaction, but I haven't seen it. When I see it, I'll react to it." Jeff noted that Hamlin is very good at not giving you what you're fishing for.

The Gragson-Magnussen Saga Continues

Jeff and Jordan spent significant time on the carryover story from the previous week's Naval Base Coronado race: Noah Gragson's confrontation with Formula 1 driver Kevin Magnussen, and Gragson's subsequent revelation that he had nearly come to blows.

The background: Magnussen, making his NASCAR Cup debut with Trackhouse's Project 91 entry at Coronado, got into a multi-lap battle with Gragson before wrecking him late in the race. Gragson confronted Magnussen on the infield, and the two exchanged expletives for nearly 90 seconds without resolution. During the week leading into Sonoma, Gragson elaborated on how close the confrontation came to going further: "I really wanted to go fight and I was about to throw a punch, and I got told right before I got over there that there would be long-term consequences with my job if that was the case."

Jordan noted that this was a remarkably candid admission — Gragson didn't try to frame it diplomatically, he just said what happened. Jeff agreed and added that the other element people were discussing was Magnussen's posture in interviews, where the Danish driver seemed to characterize NASCAR's rougher contact style as something he had to adapt to: "I've watched NASCAR before, so I know that's how you guys play it." Gragson's response to that framing — which SVG also weighed in on — was that there's a difference between incidental road course contact and outright wrecking someone.

SVG made it even more pointed after Sunday's race, defending NASCAR against F1 comparisons: "Our sport is really awesome because you don't know who is going to win, whereas you watch F1 and there's three guys who are going to win." Jeff acknowledged the somewhat self-referential irony of SVG making that argument after winning his eighth road course race in three seasons, but Jordan's take was that the substance of the point stands — NASCAR's depth of competition on ovals is genuinely unpredictable in ways that F1 has not been.

The broader question Jeff raised was whether Project 91 and future international guest driver entries are good for NASCAR, and whether Magnussen's debut — controversial as it was — generated the kind of engagement and conversation that makes those partnerships worthwhile for the sport even when they end badly on track.

SVG's "Shit-Boxes" Comment

One of the sharper SVG soundbites from his post-race presser made the rounds on social media Sunday night and inevitably became a Teardown topic. After noting that his Camaro's handling had deteriorated significantly over the final 27 laps, SVG explained what made it harder: "We had these shit-boxes come out in front, they were wobbling all over the track and putting up dust. I just kept struggling."

Jeff presented this as vintage SVG — completely unfiltered, saying exactly what he observed without any PR filter. Jordan noted that the "shit-boxes" characterization was specifically about the slower backmarkers on late-race laps who were running interference through the lap traffic, adding dust and instability to an already degraded track surface. Neither host seemed particularly interested in defending the backmarkers — the phrasing was blunt but the observation was factually grounded in what viewers could see on the TNT broadcast.

The conversation connected back to the broader F1 comparison thread: SVG grew up in Supercars and competed in international road racing environments where that kind of direct criticism of slower cars is commonplace. The hosts noted that his communication style is still very much calibrated to non-American racing norms, which makes him more quotable than almost anyone else in the garage.

Zilisch's Career Day and the Trackhouse Youth Project

One of the more upbeat storylines Jeff and Jordan addressed was Connor Zilisch's seventh-place finish — the first top-10 of the 19-year-old's Cup Series career in his 21st start. The result was all the more notable because Zilisch was running for the lead at multiple points in the final stage before a pit road stall cost him several seconds and ultimately dropped him out of contention for a top-five.

Jeff characterized the stall as a painful learning moment for a young driver who otherwise had one of the strongest performances of the day — he was legitimately faster than the cars around him for stretches in Stage 3 and ran SVG closer than almost anyone else in the early laps after the restart. Jordan added that Zilisch's trajectory this season has been notable: this is a driver who has had to learn the Cup Series car essentially from scratch on a variety of track types, and his Sonoma result suggests the road course toolkit in particular is clicking.

The hosts also noted that the Trackhouse stable — with SVG winning and Zilisch seventh — went 1-7 on the day, with Ross Chastain finishing 14th. For a team with Trackhouse's ambitions, having both young drivers and veterans performing speaks to the program's organizational depth.

Ty Gibbs: Stage Monster, Race Runner-Up

Ty Gibbs was dominant through the first two stages, winning both wire-to-wire from the pole and leading 30 of the race's first 55 laps. Jeff noted that the stage results for Gibbs — and his JGR teammate Christopher Bell in second both times — were exactly what Joe Gibbs Racing needed coming off a stretch where the Toyotas had been struggling to find the same pace they showed early in the year.

The flip strategy that SVG used to cycle ahead of Gibbs disrupted what could have been a strong Gibbs run at the win. Jordan observed that Gibbs made the correct call to stay out and bank stage points, which is the right decision in most scenarios — he couldn't have anticipated that the early pitters would emerge with such a strong track position advantage. Gibbs ultimately finished third, which is a strong result, but it left the conversation about whether he has the race-long consistency to win on road courses still open.

Christopher Bell's Return

Perhaps the most quietly impressive result of the day was Christopher Bell's fifth-place finish while racing with a broken wrist. Bell had climbed out of his car at the first caution the previous week at Coronado — the wrist, broken a couple of weeks earlier, wasn't cooperating. At Sonoma, he ran the full distance, finished second in both stages, and moved his points buffer above the current Chase cutline from 60 to 83 points.

Jeff framed this as a significant morale moment for JGR and for Bell personally, who has had a rough stretch health-wise. Jordan noted that Bell's post-race comments hinted at the grind of it: "My wrist is definitely tender right now. I just can't wait to get this cast off. ... That was great. That's what we needed. Whenever I get this thing off, those guys better watch out."

In-Season Challenge: Round 1 Upheaval

Jeff and Jordan also spent time on the In-Season Challenge, the new 32-driver single-elimination tournament NASCAR launched this season. Sonoma was Round 1, and the opening bracket produced an immediate massive upset: No. 1 seed Tyler Reddick, matched against No. 32 Alex Bowman, lost by finishing 36th while Bowman finished 10th. The tournament's highest seed was eliminated on the first weekend for the second consecutive year.

Jordan pointed out that while the power steering failure made the matchup outcome feel unfair, the format itself is working exactly as designed — it creates stakes within the race that don't exist otherwise, and Sunday's Reddick-Bowman matchup became one of the most-watched storylines on the live leaderboard even as the actual race was relatively processional. Jeff noted that Hamlin survived despite finishing 26th because his Round 1 opponent, Ty Dillon, also had power steering issues and finished 35th.

The In-Season Challenge will continue to Round 2, with matchups now set based on the Sonoma results.

Championship Implications

The championship picture heading into the second half of the season is the tightest it's been all year. Denny Hamlin leads by a single point over Tyler Reddick entering the final eight races of the regular season. Ryan Blaney sits third, 103 points behind Reddick. Jeff noted that the top-two dynamic is particularly layered: Hamlin is the co-owner of 23XI Racing, the team Reddick drives for. He and Reddick are simultaneously competing for the same championship and deeply invested in each other's organizational success.

Jordan observed that Reddick's response to losing the points lead for the first time since Daytona was going to be telling. He's shown all season that 23XI is capable of winning on nearly any track type, but this week at Sonoma was a reminder that mechanical reliability can undo weeks of strong performance in a single afternoon.

Jeff noted that the next race at Chicagoland Speedway — NASCAR's first return to the 1.5-mile oval since 2019 after the Chicago street course ran for three years — is a very different challenge than Sonoma and should give the Toyota teams a better platform to reset. Three consecutive night races follow: Chicago (July 6), Atlanta, and North Wilkesboro.

With the regular-season cutoff approaching and the new Chase format adding another layer of complexity, the second half of 2026 is shaping up to be one of the more closely contested seasons in recent memory.

Notable Quotes

Stephen Doran, SVG crew chief (on winning with a struggling car): "I have to say it wasn't a good car we gave him today. Luckily, we had him driving it."

Shane van Gisbergen (post-race, on backmarker traffic): "We had these shit-boxes come out in front, they were wobbling all over the track and putting up dust. I just kept struggling."

Shane van Gisbergen (on NASCAR vs. F1): "Our sport is really awesome because you don't know who is going to win, whereas you watch F1 and there's three guys who are going to win."

Chase Briscoe (on his downshift mistake with 4 laps to go): "I just mistimed my downshift and about spun out and went off the racetrack — and I went from being within five car lengths to 20 back. If I don't make that mistake, I feel like I definitely pass him. I just messed up. You've got to be perfect against him, and I wasn't perfect."

Denny Hamlin (post-race, on the Turn 7 incident): "I haven't seen it, Jeff. I know you want a reaction, but I haven't seen it. When I see it, I'll react to it."

Noah Gragson (on nearly punching Kevin Magnussen at Coronado): "I really wanted to go fight and I was about to throw a punch, and I got told right before I got over there that there would be long-term consequences with my job if that was the case."

Christopher Bell (racing with a broken wrist): "My wrist is definitely tender right now. I just can't wait to get this cast off. ... That was great. That's what we needed. Whenever I get this thing off, those guys better watch out."

Sources: NASCAR.com race recap, FOX Sports (Bob Pockrass), Speedcafe.com (Simon Chapman), Frontstretch, Yardbarker, Motorsport.com, OutKick/FOX News (Zach Dean), Jayski.com. YouTube episode: "Shane Van Gisbergen Returns to the Top at Sonoma!" — Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s Dirty Mo Media, streamed June 28, 2026 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaL0cRfoqhY).

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: June 28, 2026

Race Covered: Toyota/Save Mart 350 — Sonoma Raceway, Sonoma, California

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opened this episode — recorded on the road while on vacation — with a round of applause for Chase Briscoe, framing the Sonoma race as a study in what it takes to push Shane van Gisbergen to his limits. It was the Toyota/Save Mart 350, the final road course race of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season, and SVG delivered what Eric called a "revenge of the Kiwi" performance after a crash-ruined outing at Naval Base Coronado the previous Sunday left him with a single championship point and outside the playoff grid.

Van Gisbergen won, swept the weekend, and left Sonoma holding his eighth career Cup Series road course victory — tying Tony Stewart for second-most all time. But the episode's real analytical thrust was a question Eric pushed back on with conviction: is the field actually catching up to SVG on road courses? His answer, delivered in characteristically direct fashion, was a firm no.

Beyond the winner's circle, the episode covered a major points shakeup — Denny Hamlin now leads the regular season standings over Tyler Reddick for the first time since Daytona — the In-Season Challenge bracket results, strong individual performances from Ty Gibbs and Christopher Bell, and a rough week for 23XI Racing after their dominant outing the week before.

SVG Wins, But Had to Earn It

Eric was effusive about van Gisbergen's win, but also candid about how close the finish got. SVG led 74 of 110 laps, swept both stage wins (via Ty Gibbs winning the stages, while SVG capitalized on points), and ultimately crossed the line 0.357 seconds ahead of Chase Briscoe. What made it interesting — and what Eric dissected at length — was what happened in the final 10 to 12 laps.

"Those last 10 or so laps, sounds like he was giving it all he had. The car was fading on him," Eric said. Lap traffic from Daniel Suarez and Cody Ware disrupted SVG's air just enough for Briscoe to cut into the gap. From a second and a half back, Briscoe had surged to within a car length entering the final corner when time ran out. "One more lap, and at the rate Brisco was closing, I think Brisco gets the win," Eric said.

The decisive moment, he argued, was a Briscoe bobble in Turn 1 with a couple of laps remaining. "That cost him almost a whole second right there. That was the decisive moment. If he doesn't make that mistake, I think Chase Brisco would have at least gotten a real shot." Eric opened the episode with applause for Briscoe specifically because that pressure — real, sustained, late-race pressure — was what made Sonoma more than a processional. "Without Chase and his hard charge at the end, that final stage would have been a snoozer."

The "Gap Is Shrinking" Debate — Eric Pushes Back

The broadcast and social media were buzzing with the narrative that the field is catching SVG on road courses. Eric devoted a substantial portion of the episode to rejecting that framing.

"There's been a lot of chatter on the broadcast, on social media about how the gap is shrinking, they're getting better, they're catching up. No, they're not. Not really. Not by all that much. Marginally at best."

His argument rested on a straightforward premise: only two drivers in 2026 have clearly matched or exceeded SVG's road course pace — Tyler Reddick at COTA and Chase Briscoe today. Both drive the No. 23/11 pairing and JGR Toyotas, the two organizations that have been the fastest at every track type all year. "The only reason today was a race is because Shane didn't have a very good car," Eric said. "If you put Shane Van Gisbergen in that 19 car today, he probably wins this race by half a lap. That's the honest truth."

Eric framed the "shrinking gap" narrative as conflating car quality with driver improvement. Trackhouse Racing, he argued, has been slow all year — off on balance across multiple track types. If SVG eventually gets a better car, "we're back to square one, I'm afraid."

Ty Gibbs: Probably the Best Car on Track

Eric reserved some of his highest praise of the episode for Ty Gibbs, who finished third but spent most of the day running the stage-point strategy — collecting the maximum 20 stage points by winning both Stage 1 and Stage 2, then fighting back through traffic to finish on the podium.

"Ty Gibbs was probably the best car today, but they went for points," Eric said. The 54 team entered Sonoma in a tight battle with Chase Elliott and Kyle Larson for fourth in the regular season standings, and the Sonoma result gave Gibbs sole possession of that spot. "If we got a caution there with 10, 15, 20 laps to go, I think Tai would have had something for Shane Van Gisbergen, especially considering how Shane's car seemed to fade at the end."

Eric ranked the day's top performances as SVG first (won with a car that wasn't quite winning-caliber), Gibbs second (stage points plus the podium), and Christopher Bell third.

Christopher Bell Racing Through Injury

The Christopher Bell subplot caught Eric's attention for good reason. Bell, dealing with a fractured left wrist sustained just weeks earlier, got out of his car mid-race at Naval Base Coronado the previous Sunday when the pain became unmanageable. A week later, he went the full distance at Sonoma and finished fifth, earning 18 stage points in the process.

"Christopher Bell got out of the car seven days ago. Got out of the car in stage one at San Diego because he didn't feel comfortable running that entire race. A week later, he goes the distance and puts together one of his best performances of the entire season. So I want to give Christopher Bell his credit as well."

Eric noted that Bell, like Gibbs, opted for stage points over track position — a strategy that cost both drivers on the leaderboard early, but paid dividends in the championship picture. Bell is back inside the top 10 in points.

Kyle Larson: The Winless Top-Five Machine

Eric gave Larson brief but pointed recognition for yet another front-running result. Fourth at Sonoma was, by his count, Larson's fifth top-five finish in the last six races (the lone exception being Nashville, where debris on a late restart ruined what was otherwise a top-five run).

"This team is all over the front of this field. That winless streak is going to get snapped likely sooner rather than later." The tone was admiring but matter-of-fact: Hendrick Motorsports has been one of the year's steadiest organizations, and Larson its most consistent driver, even without a checkered flag.

Points Shakeup: Hamlin Leads for the First Time Since Daytona

One of the most consequential storylines of the episode was the points standings. Tyler Reddick suffered a power steering failure and finished multiple laps down, ceding a massive chunk of his regular season lead. Denny Hamlin had a rough race too — spun on a restart in an incident Eric partially attributed to broader contact and not entirely to Carson Hocevar — but stayed clean enough to hold a result.

"For the first time since Daytona, we have a new points leader. Denny Hamlin, one point ahead of Tyler Reddick with eight regular season races to go. One point. That is the difference."

Eric was direct about where his prediction falls: "All the momentum has to be on the 11's side, right? And look at these tracks coming up — drafting tracks, North Wilkesboro, Iowa, Richmond, New Hampshire. Tyler Reddick, he'd admit he still has some work to do on short tracks. The way this summer schedule lines up, I think Denny Hamlin's going to run away with the regular season championship. That's my prediction."

In-Season Challenge Bracket Highlights

Sonoma served as the opening race of the 2026 In-Season Challenge, and Eric ran through the key matchup results. The biggest upset: Alex Bowman, the 32 seed, knocked out Tyler Reddick (the No. 1 seed) when Reddick's power steering failed. "For the second straight year, the number one seed has been upset by the 32 seed in the first race of the tournament. Shout out Alex Bowman."

Other results Eric noted: Denny Hamlin advanced over Ty Dillon; Carson Hocevar beat Zane Smith (which Eric called an upset, given Suarez's Sonoma track record); Corey Cynthric beat Brad Keselowski; and Eric Jones narrowly beat Joey Logano. He also praised Connor Zilisch's seventh-place finish — his first career Cup Series top-10 — while noting that a pit road stall on the final stop and the loss of the second position to Briscoe mid-race were what ultimately kept Zilisch from a bigger result. "You got to be perfect to beat Shane. Connor is still so young. The little things — he'll figure those out."

23XI Racing: Feast to Famine in One Week

Eric found it remarkable — and slightly baffling — how quickly the momentum shifted within the Toyota ecosystem. The previous Sunday at Naval Base Coronado, 23XI ran the table: Corey Heim won his first Cup race, Bubba Wallace came back from two laps down to finish second, and Riley Herbst cracked the top 10. A week later, all three struggled at Sonoma.

"What a difference a week makes. This time a week ago it was all 23/11, it was Cory Heim winning his first Cup Series race, it was Bubba Wallace with the drive of his life. Last week it was all 23/11 all the time. This week was a week to forget for 23/11 Racing."

Reddick's mechanical failure was the headline, but Wallace also had multiple off-track excursions and a crash in qualifying. Eric expressed genuine puzzlement given the proximity of the two California venues: "They're both on the California coastline, for goodness sake. Like they're not that different, right? Maybe they are. It's just crazy what a difference a week makes."

Groovy Gauge: 65 out of 100

Eric's race-quality rating — the "Groovy Gauge, powered by Electric eBike" — landed at 65 out of 100, a score he admitted was something of a copout but also felt accurate. The race was fine. The final few laps were genuinely exciting. But SVG's dominance and Sonoma's general tendency toward procedural racing made it hard to push higher.

He was also candid about his complicated feelings toward the track itself: "I'm not a big Sonoma Raceway fan. And Sonoma is one of those tracks where — unbelievable location — it's not a track I want to take off the schedule because there are already so few tracks out west. But the grandstands today? Hardly anyone there. And the ratings are always meh." The final verdict: a solid but unspectacular Sunday that delivered just enough in the clutch to justify its place on the schedule.

Notable Quotes

Eric (on Chase Briscoe's late charge): "One more lap, and at the rate Brisco was closing, I think Brisco gets the win. Probably would have taken some contact, but things would have gotten spicy for sure."

Eric (on the "gap is shrinking" narrative): "If you put Shane Van Gisbergen in that 19 car today, he probably wins this race by half a lap. That's the honest truth. I think it's more of a car thing than a driver thing."

Eric (on Ty Gibbs): "Tai Gibbs was probably the best car today, but you know, they went for points. They came into this race right there with Elliott and Larson battling for fourth in the regular season standings. Tai Gibbs, huge points day today."

Eric (on Christopher Bell): "Christopher Bell got out of the car seven days ago. A week later, he goes the distance and puts together one of his best performances of the entire season."

Eric (on Denny Hamlin taking the points lead): "For the first time since Daytona, we have a new points leader. Denny Hamlin, one point ahead of Tyler Reddick with eight regular season races to go. One point. That is the difference."

Eric (on Sonoma's atmosphere): "The grandstands today — there's hardly anyone there. And the ratings for Sonoma on TV are always meh. The racing's always fine. I guess Sonoma's a weird one, man."

Podcast: The GluckCast

Network: Dirty Mo Media / The Athletic

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Corey Heim (NASCAR Cup/Truck Series driver, 23 Racing), Dalton Hopkins (Frontstretch.com journalist / U.S. Army Captain)

Date: June 25, 2026

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis

Episode Overview

Episode 19 of the GluckCast arrives the week after NASCAR's historic race at Naval Base Coronado — the San Diego street course debut — and Jeff Gluck wastes no time cashing in on the storylines it generated. The episode's headliner is Corey Heim, the 23-year-old part-time Cup driver who won Sunday's race and instantly became the most talked-about person in NASCAR. Heim is candid, sharp, and refreshingly self-aware as he walks through his victory, his complicated relationship with Carson Hocevar, and what it meant to celebrate with his father on Father's Day.

The second segment belongs to Dalton Hopkins of Frontstretch.com — who also happens to be a U.S. Army captain — the man responsible for recording the Noah Gragson vs. Kevin Magnussen pit road confrontation that ricocheted around the entire motorsports internet. Hopkins breaks down post-race story-chasing strategy with the kind of operational precision you'd expect from a military officer, and offers a uniquely personal perspective on what it was like to cover a NASCAR race on an active naval base.

Gluck wraps the episode with a solo segment covering the launch of NASCAR's in-season tournament (including his bracket picks and a listener bracket challenge), the JGR–Spire lawsuit's latest document dump, short track package changes, and a pointed skeptical take on F1's Apple TV situation.

Corey Heim on the San Diego Win

Jeff opened by asking Heim about the extended stay in San Diego — most drivers fly home the night of the race, but Heim ended up there for two extra days. Heim explained that post-race commitments (the aircraft carrier visit, the IBAR, other events) made it impractical to rush out, and that a sponsor representative from 23XI Racing gave him the choice of holding a plane three hours or just flying the next day. He chose the latter and ended up staying two nights, catching a Padres game, and appearing on the stadium's big screen.

"My first one is always very special as you can imagine," Heim said. "It's been more of a just kind of a fun week, not having to sort of reset right away and go right back at it." Jeff noted that most drivers privately expect to win long before they ever do — but acknowledged this win came earlier and in a more unexpected setting than even Heim's supporters likely anticipated: a part-time Cup entry on a brand-new street course.

Heim credits his truck racing experience — he's already fifth on the all-time wins list in the Truck Series with 26 combined Cup and truck victories — for helping him close out the San Diego race from the lead. He described the psychological difficulty of leading on road courses: once the car in front of you is gone, there's nothing to pace off, and the pressure of protecting against the car behind you introduces mistakes. "If you took a poll and asked drivers would you rather be on offense or defense at the end of the race, I guarantee most of them would say offense," he said. He pointed, unprompted, to an O'Reilly Series race finish at Coronado as an example of how leads can evaporate once a driver has no reference point ahead.

On nerves: Heim said most of his anxiety comes before the race, not during it. Once belted in, he goes into a locked-in mode. The exception was the final lap with a ten-second lead. "A little bit of anxiety set in of just like don't do anything stupid," he said, adding that Bubba Wallace came to Victory Lane and asked him the same question — and Heim admitted he probably made more mistakes on that last lap than the rest of the race combined, simply from over-caution.

The Heim–Hocevar Rivalry: Real Grudge, No Personal Hatred

The centerpiece of the first segment is the Heim–Hocevar dynamic. Gluck brought up the post-race social media exchange between the two — Hocevar texted Heim something to the effect of "I kind of had that coming, enjoy the win," and then both drivers went back and forth publicly with pointed zingers that were widely circulated.

Heim was direct about where the grudge comes from. "He wiped me out for a championship, so I'm always going to kind of hold that grudge against him," he said. Heim confirmed he wrecked Hocevar in retaliation at the time, and said watching Hocevar spin out at Coronado was not something he mourned. "When he was sitting there looking at me, spinning out, I wasn't mad at it either."

But Heim was careful to separate on-track disrespect from off-track contempt. "I don't hate him as a person. I think he's a funny dude. He's got a great personality. Uh, obviously a huge fan base, so I respect all that about him — but at the end of the day, I don't like the way he races on the racetrack, and I won't race him good either." Heim said he doesn't foresee it getting "crazy" at Chicago — his next start — but made clear neither driver will give the other an inch.

Gluck observed that this is the ideal form of a NASCAR rivalry: competitive hostility focused entirely on the racetrack, without the personal ugliness that causes sponsors to flinch or NASCAR to intervene. "The times that I've seen where the two people really don't like each other as people, it ends up getting poisonous," Gluck said. "If the rivalry is more focused on what you're doing on the track, that's the best way to have fun with it."

Father's Day, the Journey, and What's Next

Heim's father was at the Coronado race on Father's Day, and Jeff asked him to reflect on that. Heim described a journey that started with quarter midgets and legend cars in Georgia, with his father self-funding the early years before starting his own business, eventually becoming successful enough to push Heim to the ARCA level — where Toyota picked up the funding and it grew from there into a 23XI arrangement.

"He's been to every race of my entire life except for maybe three or four of them," Heim said. "I would not be here without him."

On what's next: Heim's next Cup start is at Chicago Street Course. He participated in the Wheel Force tire test at the repaved Chicagoland Superspeedway two weeks prior and came away with an informed take: tire wear is real but not extreme — he estimated it at slightly below Kansas levels. More promising was the groove development: multiple lines started opening up even with just three cars on track, and the middle and even a third groove started emerging. "If I had to guess, the groove won't be significant, but I think we will run every lane that is available to us."

Dalton Hopkins: The Man Who Got the Video

Jeff's second guest is Dalton Hopkins, a writer for Frontstretch.com and an active U.S. Army captain (seven-plus years of service, deployed to East Africa 2023–24 in support of Special Operations Command Africa). Hopkins recorded the Noah Gragson vs. Kevin Magnussen confrontation on pit road at Coronado — a video that went viral well beyond the NASCAR world and was even referenced by the official F1 account.

Hopkins explained that Frontstretch's post-race strategy requires splitting duties: one person goes to the bullpen with everyone else, and one person "story chases" — pursuing storylines the major outlets won't prioritize. Hopkins was the chaser on Sunday. He went to Magnussen's car because a former F1 driver in his first Cup race is a story regardless of what happens. He'd noticed Gragson's comment earlier in the day — after exiting the care center, Gragson said something along the lines of "you'll see" — and was already alert to the possibility. While waiting near the Magnussen car, he heard the confrontation begin behind him. "The rest is history," Hopkins said.

He was notably modest about the video: "I'm not going to sit here and pat myself on the back. Getting a video of something on pit road doesn't take a whole lot of skill." But Gluck pushed back, noting that you still have to understand the game well enough to be at the right place. "I'm still proud of getting the Joey Logano–Kyle Busch fight video at Vegas all those years ago," Gluck said. "Some of it's luck, but you've been around long enough to know what you're doing."

The Gragson–Magnussen Debate: Whose Rules Apply?

Gluck played audio from Gragson's appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio with Dave Moody and Angie Skinner, in which Gragson said Magnussen hit him hard into Turn 12, then did it to three other guys — and that Gragson was "about to throw a punch" when he was warned of "long-term consequences" for his job if he did. Gragson described the altercation as the result of accumulated season frustrations: "That was kind of the ticking time bomb and it finally went off."

Hopkins offered a nuanced take. He acknowledged Magnussen has a reputation for aggressive racing, but also said Magnussen had likely been briefed — through conversations with drivers like Jensen Button, Jordan Taylor, and Kimmy Räikkönen — that NASCAR drivers are going to try to rough him up, so he should come in ready to fight back. "Kevin said, 'I've seen how the NASCAR guys race,'" Hopkins noted. "Which tells me he was ready for it."

Gluck expanded on the theory: that Magnussen, having heard these cautionary stories from the IndyCar and IMSA crossover drivers, essentially overcorrected and came in with his guard elevated to the point where he was the aggressor. "I think Magnus just kind of got a little bit too much of an opinion," Gluck said. Hopkins' conclusion: "It's just one of them racing deals — and the fact that we're talking about an F1 driver and Kevin Magnussen and a guy like Noah Gragson in one of those racing deals feels kind of surreal to me, but that's kind of the beauty of this sport."

Military Base Racing: Hopkins' Personal Reaction

Given Hopkins' background, Gluck asked him directly what it was like to cover a NASCAR race on an active naval base. Hopkins called it "the ultimate coming together of my two worlds." His first thought when the Coronado announcement was made: how are they going to handle security for civilian fans? Getting on a military base requires proper credentials, background checks, a whole apparatus. Despite some hiccups with the DBIDS background check system on Day 2, Hopkins came away thoroughly impressed.

He noted that most military bases are not what civilians imagine — "it's really just a small town, just with more rules" — but that Coronado benefited enormously from being in SoCal, a market NASCAR has struggled to crack since leaving the Coliseum's Clash venue. Hopkins said he could see NASCAR doing this at other bases, though the picturesque setting of Coronado — plus its proximity to a major media market — would be hard to replicate. He floated Fort Benning as a personal wish but acknowledged its limitations.

On SVG's playoff chances: Hopkins said he wouldn't write them off after San Diego but needed to see Shane van Gisbergen maximize points at Sonoma before giving a verdict. "There are parts of these oval tracks I feel like he could do well at. But I need to see just a little bit more."

In-Season Tournament: Jeff's Bracket and the Listener Challenge

Gluck devoted a solo segment to NASCAR's in-season tournament, which begins this week at Sonoma. He noted it felt underplayed coming out of the Coronado weekend — the field was set two weeks ago, and San Diego consumed all the conversation. He announced a listener bracket challenge: nascar.com/bracketchallenge, private league name "Gluckcast," password "Dirty Mo." He said he's keeping it exclusive to podcast listeners and may have the winner appear on a future episode.

Gluck walked through his picks via screen-recorded video. Key selections: Reddick to advance out of Sonoma, Ty Gibbs on road courses, Chase Elliott strong throughout due to road course and short track versatility, and Blaney over SVG at Chicagoland. His finals pick: Ryan Blaney vs. Chase Elliott at the Brickyard 400, with Chase Elliott winning the in-season championship and leading roughly 37 laps throughout the tournament.

He also noted format changes from last year: seeding is now based on the top 36 in points (last year's run-up period created scrambled seedings and controversy), and Atlanta — which caused chaos when it came early last year — is now the third race rather than the first, sandwiched between Sonoma and Chicagoland as more straightforward openers.

Other Items: Lawsuit, Short Track Package, F1 on Apple TV

Gluck briefly mentioned the JGR–Spire lawsuit, noting that more than 100 pages of new documents dropped overnight but that he didn't want to do a "half-ass segment" on it without being fully prepared. He flagged the headline: a $500,000 personal check from Heather Gibbs to Zane Smith crew chief Chris Gayle, apparently as an inducement to become Ty Gibbs' crew chief. He said the case no longer looks like it's heading toward a settlement — both sides appear dug in.

On the short track package change: NASCAR is removing energy-absorbing foam from the front and rear bumpers at Bristol, Martinsville, Richmond, and North Wilkesboro. Gluck explained the problem clearly — smaller hits with no visible car damage were still transmitting severe head movement to drivers through the seat, while the foam made bumper-ramming consequence-free. By reverting to a crushable bumper, NASCAR reintroduces a natural deterrent: if you bulldoze someone in a corner, you risk damaging your own nose and radiator.

On F1's decision to make the Austria race free on Apple TV: Gluck was skeptical. "If it was going great and they were getting tons of subscribers, would they be doing a free weekend?" He admitted he stopped watching F1 regularly once it moved behind Apple's paywall because he wasn't willing to pay for yet another streaming service — and suggested he's probably representative of a large casual F1 fan who'd watch if it were accessible but won't go out of their way to subscribe.

Notable Quotes

Corey Heim (on the difficulty of protecting a lead on road courses): "If you took a poll and asked drivers would you rather be on offense or defense at the end of the race, I guarantee most of them would say offense."

Corey Heim (on the final lap with a ten-second lead): "A little bit of anxiety set in of just like — don't do anything stupid. And typically, ironically, that brings out mistakes more than it does help anything."

Corey Heim (on Carson Hocevar): "I don't hate him as a person. I think he's a funny dude. But at the end of the day, he just — I don't like the way he races on the racetrack, and I won't race him good either."

Noah Gragson (from SiriusXM audio, on nearly fighting Magnussen): "I really, really, really wanted to go fight and I was about to throw a punch and I got told right before I got over there that there's going to be long-term consequences for my job if that was the case."

Dalton Hopkins (on the Gragson–Magnussen confrontation): "It's one of them racing deals — and the fact that we're talking about an F1 driver and Kevin Magnussen and a guy like Noah Gragson in one of those racing deals feels kind of surreal to me, but that's the beauty of this sport."

Jeff Gluck (on media at the track): "This kind of shows you why we still need to send people to the track in this age of AI and all this stuff. A whole storyline we wouldn't have even been able to know about or talk about all week — that is important to the dialogue of the sport."

Jeff Gluck (on Apple TV's free F1 weekend): "If it was going great and they were getting tons of subscribers and their viewership was that awesome, would they be doing a free weekend? I don't know."

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Carson Hocevar (filling in for Dale Earnhardt Jr.)

Co-Host: Tyler Green (spotter, Spire Motorsports No. 77)

Guest: Cleetus McFarland (called in, unplanned)

Dale's Remote Segments: Dale Earnhardt Jr. (intro/outro/Ask Junior, from Sonoma)

Date: June 24, 2026

Race Covered: Anduril 250 at Naval Base Coronado — San Diego, California (June 21, 2026; winner: Corey Heim)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective — Carson hosting, studio format

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f4cq4ZbxJQ

Sponsors: Arby's, Xfinity, Lionel Racing, FanDuel

Episode Overview

Dale Earnhardt Jr. took his family to Sonoma for race week and handed the keys of the Dale Jr. Download to Carson Hocevar — his guest from the San Diego live show just four days earlier. Carson recruited Tyler Green, his longtime spotter at Spire Motorsports, to fill TJ Majors' seat. The result was one of the more energetic and unscripted episodes in recent memory: a two-hour freewheeling conversation between a driver and his spotter who have shared six years in each other's ears, with no safety net and a built-in chemistry that made it feel like listening to a team debrief that went completely off the rails in the best possible way.

Dale's presence was reduced to a pre-recorded intro, a closing thank-you, and the "Ask Junior" Q&A segment, which he recorded remotely from Sonoma with TJ Majors. But the show didn't miss a beat. Carson proved himself a natural host — self-aware enough to acknowledge the absurdity of the situation and loose enough to follow every tangent to its conclusion, whether that was a Disney World grievance, a candy bar dispute, or his own social media flirtation with a celebrity.

The episode opened with an immediate piece of unplanned chaos: Dale FaceTimed Carson barely a minute into the show, assuming recording would be long over by 11 a.m. East Coast time. It wasn't. Carson had been running on West Coast time from San Diego and hadn't yet started when his phone buzzed with "Dale Earnhardt Jr. is FaceTiming you." Dale, oblivious, asked if it was going well. Carson informed him he had literally just said "Thanks, Dale" when the call came in. It set the tone perfectly.

The Naval Base Experience: What the TV Cameras Missed

Tyler Green opened by talking about his spotting experience at Naval Base Coronado. His family has military roots, and just being on the base carried personal meaning for him. But the logistics of the circuit created unique challenges: the spotters' building straddled a blind spot, meaning you could see either the front half or the back half of the track, but not both. Tyler's solution was to bring six spotters total — more than most teams — so someone always had eyes on every corner.

The wisdom of that decision revealed itself during the Truck race, when Justin Marks crashed in turn 15. Tyler was spotting Marks and had nobody on the far side. "All of a sudden I see a puff of smoke coming out and I'm like, 'Well, I guess he crashed.'" He also witnessed what the TV cameras didn't catch in the Cup race — the chaotic restart where multiple spotters called "wrecking" at different times, leading to a five-wide accordion effect as drivers reacted to incomplete information. "Everybody just starts slowing down. Well, then like some others started going like randomly throughout the corner. And once everybody saw it, then everybody went. And so that's why like four all five wide on top of each other — everybody got told different information."

Carson added the fan perspective on what the Naval Base looked like on television versus in person. He'd been building up the visual of the event in his head for two years — expecting something like Chicago, where you race through the city and life visibly moves around you. Instead, the tans, grays, and flat concrete of a working military installation were striking in person but didn't translate cinematically. "Runways are not great asphalt to look at. The buildings are tan and the ships are gray." He'd wanted the track to go through a hangar — "they could have had like a camera on top" — and noted that the helicopters and jets that were supposed to line the runway had been moved for operational reasons. "They were expecting the same thing. They were like, 'Yeah, you're going to go down a straightaway and there's going to be Apache helicopters on this side and Navy jets on this side.' And then it's just like, oh, there's two aircraft carriers."

Tyler's arrival at the track had its own subplot. He DoorDashed a bike to get around the base and accidentally entered the wrong address — a residential neighborhood in Coronado rather than the naval installation. He showed up at a stranger's house, said nothing, hoisted the bike into his armpit, and full-sprinted past a family of three. "If anybody has a video of this on a doorbell camera, please send it in."

The Fan Who Jumped the Fence: A Fuller Picture

The fan who had sprinted onto the O'Reilly race surface was briefly discussed in Saturday night's live episode, but Carson and Tyler went much deeper. They'd both watched more footage since and had developed a complete theory of the event.

The execution was impressive by any measure: the fan was wearing flip-flops, lost one jumping the fence, grabbed it back mid-sprint, then blended into the crowd by pulling out his phone and acting like he was on a call while police closed in. His probable companion — a woman near the fence — immediately walked away and kept walking. "She knows. She's just like, 'Yeah, that's impressive.'" Carson's operating theory was that the jump was a spur-of-the-moment bet — "a friend tapped him on the shoulder during the red flag: 'Bet you won't do it.'" He also floated a concern that one more wall and the guy would have been inside a secured hangar. "He basically broke into a naval base," Tyler observed. "He was going into an area that wasn't for fans. That's probably worse."

The group agreed that bail in this circumstance would be substantially elevated compared to jumping the fence at a standard venue. Carson: "It's a Navy base. Higher than a Super Bowl, right?"

The Austin Hill / SVG / Zilisch Crash: Who's at Fault?

Tyler led the analysis on the turn-one restart crash that took out SVG and Connor Zilisch while gifting Carson a clean lane through the middle. The conventional Twitter take was that SVG bore some responsibility. Tyler — and Carson — rejected this completely.

"I felt like they both drove in the corner too deep," Tyler said. "Austin Hill got a little bit out of line. Didn't wrap the bottom close enough. Marbles, and they both hit the fence. I don't even know if Zilisch would have made the corner if Austin didn't stop it." Carson added that restart speed was deceptive at Naval Base Coronado — the restart zone sits just before turn one, so everyone is going full speed off the final corner into the restart, not realizing how fast they're actually traveling. "You don't think you're going that fast because the restart zone is right before the corner."

On SVG: "He lifted early knowing, 'Oh, these guys overdrove.'" The contact happened because SVG was already slowing and they were still going. "He had nothing to do with it." Carson said he anticipated something like this would happen and consciously held his line going into the corner. When the crash developed ahead of him, he saw the whole field shift left — and drove through the gap in the middle. "Jeff was just like, 'Wait. Stay cool.' And I was like, 'Bro, I was cool.'"

Corey Heim's Win — And The Reddick Controversy

This was the episode's most substantive debate. Corey Heim won his first career Cup Series race, but the manner of it — Tyler Reddick making contact with Heim in the chicane, appearing to let him go, then giving him six car lengths — overshadowed the victory. Carson and Tyler were both critical, though they stopped short of calling it intentional.

"If you're Reddick and you do that, you move him. When the 67 gets back to him, he's probably going to use him up and that's fair game," Tyler said. But what actually happened — Reddick stopping, giving Heim a massive gap, the race effectively over — was the problem. "Does this not devalue how much the driver wins?" Carson asked. He compared it directly: "Imagine Michael Jordan doing a dirty block and then going, 'Oh, I didn't mean to do that. Hold on. Here's the ball. Try again.'"

Carson framed it as a fan experience issue. "A lot of my buddies were like, 'Yeah, we were really interested in this battle.' And then it's just like — well, now it's over." The point wasn't that Reddick had to drive through him. "If he had the ball and broke the guy's ankles and knocked him down but then came back — that's the commercial. That's the timeout. But you gave him six car lengths." Tyler added: "At least keep the position, don't let him get five car lengths in front of you."

Carson felt the timing made it worse — this was essentially a crown jewel race, a new venue, a one-time-only event, and the narrative the next day was "Reddick let him go" rather than Heim's accomplishment. "That's now the narrative, and that's cool, I guess. But regular season points out the window for what? You pretty much showed fans that winning's not that important."

Carson's Spin and His Victory Lap

Carson was spun by the No. 67 (Heim) coming out of the chicane during a restart — the car's engine apparently backfired when he tried to refire, leaving him stuck. He recovered to drive back to 19th. After the race, he took his time getting back to pit road, helmet off, waving to fans, doing slow parade laps along the fence line.

Tyler, still on the roof, had no idea where Carson was. "I don't see you. I don't see you. There goes the 67. What took you so long?" Carson's explanation: "We're not going to come back here — or at least a good shot of not ever experiencing this. I was just really happy with my performance. So I just went really slow and got to embrace it with the fans." He then revealed his hypothetical victory celebration had he won: drive to turn seven where there was a gap in the barrier, get out of the car, run to the water's edge next to the carrier, jump in, have a Navy sailor fish him out. He had also scouted a route into the hangars for a burnout. "I was just going to do a burnout right in the middle of the racetrack where they wouldn't expect it. I was going to go do one right in the military base."

On the chicane spin itself: "I felt like that was four years coming," he said of getting tangled with Heim. He texted Heim after and got his number. When Denny Hamlin mentioned on his show that he thought Carson wanted to fight him — "No. I mean, obviously he's very good, and I'm looking forward to racing his ass off for 20 years."

Noah Gragson vs. Kevin Magnussen: The Full Breakdown

The Sonoma incident between Noah Gragson and Formula 1 driver Kevin Magnussen was fresh and the two dug into the footage. Carson and Tyler identified the inciting moment as turn 12, where Magnussen — who had been outbraking multiple drivers in classic F1 style throughout the race — attempted the same move on Noah. But Noah had seen it coming and was protecting the spot.

"It looked like he brake-checked him," Tyler said. Carson pushed back slightly: "There's no way that started it. There's got to be something from before." Tyler reviewed the tape and confirmed that to his eye, that was in fact the origin. "Noah saw that he was going to drive in deep because he just stayed over there. Noah's not even trying to make an arc."

What followed was escalation: they made contact again at turn two on the same lap, Noah gave the finger, and over the next 40 laps they traded bumps — Noah initiating at least four times, Magnussen three. The final one ended Magnussen's race. Carson found the whole sequence proportional to the grievance, even if chaotic. "Kevin Harvick'd him in the chicane and then Noah popped him — good enough to almost put him in the fence. And at that point it's like, 'Okay, it's over.'"

The reason it became a bigger story than it might otherwise be, both agreed, is that Magnussen was a one-race guest with nothing to lose and no next week to worry about. "If Kevin Magnussen was a full-time guy, it would just be: okay, you're either pointing him by next week or you're getting spun. This is just normal road course stuff." Tyler's radio strategy: de-escalation. "You guys do enough escalating of your emotions. De-escalate on the radio as much as we can."

iRacing on the Airplane: A Full Confession

Carson elaborated on the in-flight iRacing setup he'd mentioned at the live show. The full picture: he walked through the Concord FBO with ethernet cables, a steering wheel, pedals, and a laptop strapped to his body, six bags total. Other teams saw him and, by now, just shrugged. "They're like, 'Yep. There he goes.'"

The complications multiplied on the plane. To load the Naval Base Coronado track in iRacing, you need internet to get past the login screen — even for offline test driving. Carson didn't know this until he was already on the tarmac. He scrambled to load it via hotspot while the plane was preparing for takeoff. He also couldn't calibrate the force feedback without internet, meaning he spent the entire flight running laps with no steering feel. "There's a little turbulence and then it doesn't match up with the bumps and the wheel has no force feedback. So I'm like — cuz I didn't get a shot to calibrate the wheel before we got off the tarmac."

Results: fifth in practice, second in qualifying, stage points in both stages, a legitimate shot at winning. "Now it's like, 'Man, we need to put that thing out every week.'" The crew chief Luke has since told him to bring it to Sonoma. Carson: "If we ran bad, then it would be like, all right, well it's not worth the headache. But they were like, yeah — Luke was like, 'Bring it every week.'"

The Next Generation and the Locked Field

Carson and Tyler turned to a topic that doesn't get enough analytical airtime: the Cup Series field is in the early stages of locking out. A wave of young talent — Zilisch, Jesse Love, Cruz (penciled in to take over Denny Hamlin's 11), Josh Berry, Carson himself — is settling into permanent seats. Meanwhile, several veterans are on their way out. In three to five years, the top 25 spots will probably be decided primarily by which team a driver moves to, not whether they can break in at all.

"You're going to get to a point where the top 25 — the only thing we're talking about is if they're going to switch rides," Carson said. He traced the logic back to his time in quarter-midget racing in 2010: he'd looked at the veterans who would age out and calculated that in ten years, there'd be room. "It times out perfectly." Now it's happening.

This led to Carson's extended complaint about the media's handling of the Jesse Love / Connor Zilisch friendship narrative. "I wish every TV person would stop saying Jesse Love and Connor Zilisch are best friends. I wish they would stop that." His argument: the friendship angle is fine and real, but using it as the primary frame for every interview flattens what should be a compelling rivalry. "When you bring it up every time, it doesn't add the weight it would in the moment where Zilisch just used Love up for the win — like, 'How does it feel when your best friend just drove around you?' That would add weight. But if you've already said it 45 times, it's nothing."

Tyler Green's Racing Past

Tyler's background came out in pieces throughout the show. He grew up in a racing family (his father drove, including the Dr. Pepper car in 1999) and raced himself: go-karts, junior dragsters, bandoleros against a field that included Joey Logano, Danny Hamric, and Austin Hill. Then legends cars — he won two of the series races, though not the big-money first one ($250K), only the smaller paydays ($25K and $2,500).

He identified a familiar career ceiling: wrong era, locked-out field, not enough funding to breakthrough. "I was at the wrong time. Now it's kind of opened back up to where you're coming in." Spotting became the path — he spotted for his dad, then for Harrison Burton at the Wood Brothers 21 car, and then Carson recruited him. The first oval they worked together was Dover, during COVID, no fans, Tyler's radio didn't work. "I spotted nobody. There was nobody in the stands. Loneliest I've ever felt in my life."

One moment of awkwardness in their early partnership: Carson wrecked the Wood Brothers 21 car with Tyler on the box — and the next day told Harrison he was making a switch to Tyler as his spotter. "Way to go," Carson deadpanned. Tyler: "I'm great at putting you in awkward spots."

Ask Junior: Dale's Free Agency Story

From Sonoma, Dale took fan questions in the Ask Junior segment. The standout was a deep dive into his 2007-08 free agency from DEI — one of the biggest driver moves in NASCAR history, told with rare candor.

Dale met with Richard Childress about the three car but ruled it out immediately — not the team, just the number. "I didn't want to go to Richard's and do any other number. There was never going to be good enough, no matter how much success we had." He then traveled to Dan Snyder's house in Washington, D.C., to meet with Joe Gibbs. "Joe wanted us to meet there. I guess they thought the Washington Redskins connection was a big plus in the negotiation."

The term sheet Gibbs presented made Dale "physically nauseous" — far beyond anything he'd received at DEI. Kelly had the business mind in the room ("Absolutely. I think this is fair." Dale: "Fair? Holy molly, this is life-altering.") and insisted they go home before deciding. Dan Snyder then told them they weren't leaving without signing. "Dan Snyder started throwing all kinds of other things into the pot — ownership stakes, business interests." Dale held firm, went home.

When he met with Rick Hendrick, Dale told Rick not to show him a term sheet. "You and Kelly discuss the numbers. I don't even want to see it. I don't want to know what you're going to pay me. I said: I want my car to look badass. I know your cars will be fast. I'm going to have fun driving them. You're going to pay me a lot of money I probably don't deserve. If it's anything like what they pitched me at Joe Gibbs, it'll be enough." Dale admitted he always wonders what it would have been like at JGR. "They're very loyal to their drivers. I felt like I would have been well taken care of." But the Hendrick connection — family ties going back to his grandfather — and Rick's loyalty through the down years made the decision feel right.

Victory Lane with Nicole: A Story Worth Telling

Dale shared a story from Pocono, where Justin Marks won and asked Nicole Earnhardt to ride in the car. Dale had told all the drivers before the race: "My girls are here. If you win, I'd love to get them to Victory Lane." Marks had previously ridden his own daughters in a victory car and offered the same.

After the win, Isla didn't want to go near the burnout smoke. Nicole did. Dale walked her to the car, fully expecting her to bail at any moment. Marks, in the middle of a standing ovation and burnout, stepped out of the celebration, got on a knee, and talked to Nicole directly — "calm, fatherly, perfect," Dale said — before she climbed in. Hollywood grabbed his fire suit top to protect Dale from the hot floorboard. They drove to Victory Lane with Nicole holding the checkered flag, waving and "woo"-ing the whole way.

The kicker came the next day. Nicole, in the truck, unprompted: "Hey Dad, remember us riding in the car with that guy?" Pause. "Yeah." "I wasn't scared. Kind of makes me want to try to be a driver." Dale's immediate instinct: "We need to tell your mother immediately."

Cleetus McFarland Calls In

Midway through the show, Carson's phone rang — Cleetus McFarland, who apparently calls Carson on every podcast he records, typically at 7 a.m. This time it was 11 a.m. and Carson was actually recording. He answered anyway and looped Cleetus in live.

Cleetus's question: would he do better at a NASCAR street course if he were drifting or driving it conventionally? Cleetus made the case for street courses leveling the playing field: "It's a little more my style. All these guys have perfected turning left, so I think I'd have a little bit more even ground." Carson agreed that street courses feel more intuitive to him than permanent road courses. "I feel like I'm way better at street courses than regular road courses because I have defined limitations of where I got to go. Less driving chaos. More basic."

Cleetus updated his race schedule — next event is the Niese truck at Talladega — and Carson reminded him his team nearly won at Daytona. The call lasted about two minutes and ended with Cleetus: "Keep up the great work." Carson: "I'm going to keep it up. Well, that was close."

K Adams: For the Love of the Game

The episode ended with the internet's burning question: what exactly is going on between Carson and K Adams, the reporter who had been at San Diego and whom Carson had been publicly and theatrically flirting with on social media?

Carson gave a complete account. At the driver's meeting, he introduced himself. She said she'd been told he was "the bad boy of NASCAR." He found out she was riding in the pace car — and that he'd qualified up front. "I actually qualified up front. So I'll see you up there." He then rolled his car alongside the pace car on the formation lap, and she started waving and blowing kisses. The tweets followed.

"I do it for the love of the game," Carson said. "It scares me when it works." Tyler's observation: doing it publicly makes it funnier and less weird than sliding into DMs. "Get in the DMs, then it's weird." Carson agreed: "Then it's weird."

The Mr. Goodbar Defense

Dale took a break from motorsports in the Ask Junior segment to deliver what can only be described as a sincere and impassioned defense of the Mr. Goodbar candy bar. His premise: it is one of the greatest candy bars ever made, Hershey is underutilizing it, and peanut allergies are suppressing its market position.

Tyler: Crunch. Carson: the Hershey Oreo bar. Dale: "You have Snickers on your list and that has peanuts. The Mr. Goodbar can overcome peanut allergies because of how it's made." Tyler: "She cannot eat the Snickers either." The debate went for four minutes, resolved nothing, and ended with Dale: "I think a lot of people do love it. It is underrated and doesn't get the credit it deserves." Pause. "God, it's good."

Notable Quotes

Carson (on filling in for Dale): "Thank you, Dale." *[phone buzzes]* *[Dale FaceTimeing him at that exact moment]* "I literally just said, 'Thanks, Dale.' and was getting ready to say, 'All right, welcome to the Dale Jr. Download.' and I look at my phone and I was like, 'Oh, somebody's interrupting.' And it says, 'Dale Earnhardt Jr. is FaceTiming you.'"

Carson (on Reddick letting Heim go): "Does this not devalue how much the driver wins? Like if you're a fan, I'd be like, 'What the — I think winning the right way is the best way, but you pretty much showed fans that winning's not that important.'"

Tyler (on the five-wide restart crash): "I heard 'Wrecking, wrecking.' And it was hilarious. I started dying laughing because you could tell that everybody around me was getting the same information, but just at different times. So you had like one guy with a hand out the window waving, another guy kind of going — and everybody's just stopping on entry. We haven't even seen the crash."

Dale (on meeting with Joe Gibbs): "When I saw what the value was out there for me — that was the first time I got a term sheet — it was insane. I was like, 'Holy Kelly.' I said, 'We got to go home. We got to go somewhere safe and sit down.'"

Carson (on his hypothetical win celebration at San Diego): "I was going to stop my car at turn seven, roll out, run toward the aircraft carrier, and go jump in the water and have a Navy guy come get me out. And then I just wanted to go do a burnout right in the middle of the military base."

Carson (on K Adams and the pace car): "She had her phone out. She started blowing me kisses. I was like, 'Yes. Yes, dude.' I do it for the love of the game. It scares me when it works."

Dale (on the Mr. Goodbar): "I think a lot of people do love it. I think that it is underrated and doesn't get the credit it deserves for being as good as it is. And it probably never will. And it probably never will because Hershey doesn't need it to kick ass. God, it's good."

Recap generated from YouTube transcript. Episode hosted by Carson Hocevar with Tyler Green, filling in for Dale Earnhardt Jr. and TJ Majors, June 24, 2026.

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Mike Davis

Date: June 22, 2026

Race Covered: America 250 — Naval Base Coronado Street Course, San Diego, California

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

Recorded live from Denny's hotel room in San Diego — "Room 41" on the island — with producer Travis sprawled on the couch in the background, this episode of Actions Detrimental has an unusually celebratory energy. The America 250 had just ended, and despite Denny finishing 14th after a chaotic final caution sequence cost him his track position, the bigger story belonged to 23XI Racing's development program: Corey Heim, in just his 13th Cup start, won the race in the team's fourth, part-time No. 67 entry. Denny spent much of the episode fielding a live FaceTime from the winner himself and dissecting what the victory means for 23XI's future.

The episode's sharpest takes centered on the so-called "100-start timeline" narrative — the popular talking-head notion that young drivers need roughly 100 Cup starts before they're expected to win. Denny rejected it bluntly, calling the framing a convenient way to buy time. He also dug into Tyler Reddick's unusual act of giving the lead back to Heim after running him wide, SVG's day-ending wreck, Bubba Wallace's resilience, and the surprisingly strong execution of NASCAR's first race at the San Diego naval base.

Denny's Race — The Caution That Wasn't

Denny opened by walking through his own frustrating afternoon. He had genuine speed — "a lot better speed than what we had Friday and certainly Saturday" — and was well-positioned when a caution came out at the worst possible moment. He was approaching pit road and had to make a split-second call on whether he could make it past the speed line. He steered left, couldn't make it in, and had to stay out on the racing surface — restarting 19th or 20th on the final restart and clawing back only to 14th.

"I was on the damn pit road line and he's like, 'You're not going to make it,'" Denny explained. "And I steered left and didn't make it on pit road. So I had to restart, I think 19th or 20th on that last restart and only could get back to 14th." The team did its job; the circumstance was simply bad luck. He noted that when he was running in traffic near SVG and Reddick, the pace gap was not as large as the finishing positions would suggest.

One broader theme from Denny's day: the San Diego street course played differently than expected, with multiple track surfaces — concrete and asphalt patched together throughout the circuit — demanding a very different driving style depending on the section. Denny admitted it took him until midway through Sunday's race to fully figure out the optimal approach. "I was driving the racetrack completely different by the end of the race than I was on Friday or even Saturday," he said. "God, I wish I could go back and redo qualifying."

Corey Heim Wins — And the 100-Start Timeline Is "For Losers"

The centerpiece of the episode was unquestionably Corey Heim's win. Denny took a FaceTime call from Heim mid-episode — "Hey, winner, you're live on Actions Detrimental — the newest Diddy Bro" — and the exchange was brief but warm before circling back to analysis.

Denny's reaction in the car, he explained, was genuine surprise not at Heim's ability but at the circumstances. "I thought Reddick was behind me the whole time," Denny said. He had no idea who had cycled to the lead after the caution caught so many cars without pit stops. When his crew told him the No. 67 was leading, his immediate response was disbelief — "What?" — but not because he doubted Heim. The driver's raw pace had been obvious. At Nashville, Denny noted, Heim "blew by me on restarts. He had really good pace." The win was early by the calendar, not by the talent level.

The big moment was Denny's deconstruction of the "100-start timeline." Mike set it up: analysts had said just weeks ago, when 23XI announced Heim would go full-time in 2027, that it would take him 100 starts to get his first win. Heim's in at start No. 13.

"That hunter starts thing is for losers," Denny said flatly. "I don't believe in that. I think it's for people that are just trying to buy time. 100 starts — you need three years. I don't agree with that." He acknowledged the exception cases — Chase Elliott took time — but argued that even before Elliott's first win, you could see it was coming. "He showed he could win far beyond well before his 100th start. Like, you knew it was just a matter of time." His point: the 100-start framing is sometimes valid as a gauge of development, but it's being invoked too liberally as a shield for drivers who aren't showing the right signs.

Mike pushed back, noting Denny's own teammates might be referenced as counterexamples. Denny redirected. "He has shown signs that he was on the cusp of winning many, many times. He was running in the top five many times. So yeah, you're able to say it took Tai Gibbs a little bit, but it was way overdue. Others, I feel like, are using it as — I just don't have a whole lot of experience, and by start 100 we're going to start contending. I don't buy into that."

On the equipment question — how good is the part-time 23XI car? — Denny was candid. The odds are stacked against it: the metrics system sends the team out early on ovals (a massive qualifying disadvantage), the pit crew is a development group, and the engineering staff is younger. But crew chief Booty Barker brings experience, and Heim has maximized the package. Ryan Blaney summed it up in the garage after the race: "That kid is going to be a problem." Denny agreed. "MJ's young killer."

Tyler Reddick Gives It Back — Denny's Honest Take

One of the race's defining moments was Tyler Reddick — running just ahead of Heim and battling for the win — giving the lead back after running Heim wide in consecutive corners. Reddick then cut a tire and fell out of contention. The sport-wide discussion immediately became whether Reddick made the right call.

Denny's answer was measured but honest. "I don't like it," he said of the decision to give the spot back. He framed it as a genuinely admirable but probably wrong strategic move in the context of a race for the win. "I think it is a very Tyler Reddick move. That's his character in a nutshell. If I have to give you my honest opinion, 99% of the field would just say I'll apologize later."

His interpretation of Reddick's psychology: "What he felt was — if I'm good enough to win, I'll just pass him back. You got a rookie here that has only got a few races. Surely if I can put pressure on him, maybe he'll make a mistake. I'm just going to get him back eventually." The key context Denny added: third place was 10 seconds back at that point, so Reddick wasn't sacrificing a podium by yielding. It was truly a one-on-one situation, and Reddick chose honor over the win. Denny then connected it to broader NASCAR etiquette, noting that this kind of invisible exchange happens constantly — Michael McDowell gave Denny a spot back mid-race after putting him in a bad position in Turn 5.

SVG's Day Ends Early — Was He Vulnerable?

Shane Van Gisbergen entered San Diego as the heavy favorite and looked the part — until Austin Hill overcooked the brakes in Turn 1, got loose, and collected Connor Zilisch. SVG, in the wrong place at the wrong time, was also swept up in the incident and ended his day early.

Mike brought in Travis, who had watched from the media center, to ask a pointed question: did SVG look vulnerable before the wreck? Travis said yes — SVG was getting passed in the first 15 laps of the race, dropping two or three spots on a single run. That was notable.

Denny contextualized it. "If he got passed in the first two or three laps, I would have said, 'Oh, he's just managing — he knows the tires are going to wear out.' But if he got passed late in a run, that is unique. That is something new." He argued that as the race wore on, tires wore less (as is typical — the track rubbers in), which would have played to SVG's strengths later. The accident, then, may have cut short a recovery arc. But Denny also acknowledged that SVG is beatable — Reddick beat him straight-up at COTA — and that NASCAR's chaos is ultimately the only reliable way to stop him. "The only way to beat him — and it's not intentional — is he just gets bitten by the unlucky NASCAR bug."

Bubba Wallace's Resilience

Bubba Wallace had one of those days that looks disappointing on paper (late finish due to a loose wheel) but told a better story. He drove from the back through the field to the lead early in the race — "Best Toyota on the day, probably," Denny said — before a wheel came loose and sent him back through the pack.

Denny offered genuine praise. "While you maybe think 'I could have won if things would have played out correctly,' you're probably right. But you still gotta be really happy with the day if you're him and his team about the resilience of overcoming adversity." The larger narrative: Bubba was legitimately competitive on a road course, something that was not always the case. "That's the only way — you gotta find little wins," Denny said, crediting advice from early in his career from Mike Ford. "If winning is the only thing that brings you happiness, you're going to be one miserable a-hole. You gotta find little wins."

Christopher Bell Out, Brent Crews In — And an Engine Problem

Christopher Bell, racing with a broken wrist, stepped out of his car during Stage 1. Brent Crews — who had been preparing all week just in case — stepped in and ran a handful of laps before the engine failed. Whether Crews caused it with a missed shift on the sequential gearbox or whether it was a mechanical failure wasn't confirmed as of recording.

Denny offered some insight: the transition from a traditional H-pattern to the sequential shifter is a genuine learning curve. "I blew up my car at Las Vegas, first year NextGen. Even guys who win 64 career races miss shifts and blow up their car." He added that he was genuinely curious to see how Crews performed and thought Brent had showed speed during Saturday's race. The short sample Sunday didn't produce much, but the preparation was real.

Noah Gragson vs. Kevin Magnussen

One of the weekend's side stories was an on-track battle between Noah Gragson and Kevin Magnussen that got physical. Magnussen hit Gragson hard going into Turn 12 early in the race. Gragson, running full-time in the Cup Series, felt disrespected by a driver doing a one-off appearance.

Denny sided firmly with Gragson. "If I went and did a one-off somewhere else, I would just show competitors there some respect that are here full-time. I think it's okay to just power drive you into Turn 12 on lap three? I'm not a huge fan of that." He was careful to add that he raced around Magnussen during the day and had no personal issue — he even acknowledged that Magnussen's pace was impressive (Magnussen posted the race's fastest lap). But the protocol matters. Gragson's restraint post-race — repeatedly asking Magnussen why he wrecked him without getting a real answer — earned Denny's respect.

The San Diego Event: "It Felt Big"

Denny spent significant time on the race weekend as an event, and his verdict was close to unequivocal praise. The Naval Base Coronado setting — attendance reported around 120,000 — created an atmosphere that felt like a major occasion from the moment drivers arrived. The pre-race ceremony, the drivers meeting, the military backdrop all contributed.

"As a business owner, I look around and think, God, they had to plan every minute. It's a massive undertaking," he said. He noted Jeff Gluck's social media concerns on Saturday about walk distances and concession shortages, but credited NASCAR and the Navy for adjusting on the fly overnight — adding more food options, loosening credential requirements, improving access. "I can't sing their praises enough, and not me kissing their rear ends."

His framework: NASCAR's new-city street events need to be judged primarily on fan experience because 60–70% of ticket holders are first-time attendees. The goal isn't just a race — it's recruiting. "If you're going to do these events, you have got to make the fan experience so good — better than it is for the other 35 events — because you're trying to get them to the other 35 events. So this is the one you have to focus on."

He drew an analogy to a San Diego steakhouse called SDK. "Why do you go to SDK? Is it because they have the best steaks? No. You go for the loud music and the social atmosphere. And that's what NASCAR racing is." The experience of a street race in a major market functions like SDK — you go for the event, and the racing is the centerpiece within it, not the other way around.

Xfinity and Truck Weekends

On the Friday Truck race, Denny liked the Lane Riggs–Taylor Honeyutt battle, noting Riggs had more pace in the long run and earned the win. On the Saturday Xfinity race: Denny thought Carson Kvapil had the fastest car, maybe the fastest driver-and-car combination on the day. But Kvapil got conservative after taking the lead — slowing his entries, tightening his line — which brought Honeyutt and Austin Hill back into the picture. "I'm telling you, it's hard when you get to the lead. All you're thinking is don't mess up." Hill then drove to victory when the other two got into each other.

Denny connected it to a lesson he'd given on a prior episode about Michigan: when you take the lead, you step on the gas harder, not less. "I wanted to step on their throats as soon as I got the lead. I wanted to let them know this race is over."

Looking Ahead: Sonoma

Denny's Sonoma goal: top 15. He acknowledged it's not glamorous, but on road courses, where his speed has been a known question mark, surviving and executing is what keeps the championship hunt alive. He's down about 60 points to Tyler Reddick in the standings. SVG getting collected actually helped Denny's position slightly, but the real calculus is staying on the lead lap and avoiding disaster.

He's staying in San Diego through Thursday — no plans, feet up — then catching the USA World Cup game in Los Angeles before heading to Sonoma. He's hoping to find a fishing hole somewhere, though acknowledged the bodies of water in San Diego tend to require a boat.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on missing pit road): "I was on the damn pit road line and he's like, 'You're not going to make it.' And I steered left and didn't make it on pit road."

Denny (on the 100-start timeline): "That hundred-starts thing is for losers. I don't believe in that. I think it's for people that are just trying to buy time."

Denny (on Reddick giving the spot back): "I don't like it. I'll be honest. I think he felt — if I'm good enough to win, I'll just pass him back. 99% of the field would just say I'll apologize later."

Ryan Blaney (relayed by Denny, on Corey Heim): "That kid is going to be a problem."

Denny (on the San Diego event): "I felt competitive. I thought we were really good in the long run. And then they told me 671 won, and I was like — What?"

Denny (on fan experience at street races): "If you're going to do these events, you have got to make the fan experience so good — better than it is for the other 35 events — because you're trying to get them to the other 35 events. This is the one you have to focus on."

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: June 22, 2026

Race Covered: Anduril 250 — Naval Base Coronado, Coronado, California

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcYfW--aBvk

Note on host: The scheduled task identifies the host as "Christian Koelle." The Out of the Groove channel is in fact hosted by Eric Estepp. The recap below reflects what Eric Estepp said in the episode.

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp recorded this post-race episode "on the go" from San Diego, still sunburned from an afternoon in the Turn 1 grandstands at Naval Base Coronado. Speaking with the slightly delirious energy of someone running on three hours of sleep and a full day of racing in the California sun, he delivered what amounts to one of his most animated post-race reviews of the 2026 season. The show is informal and loose — he jokes about his wife silently watching from across the hotel room, about looking "like Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" from the sunshine — but the analysis underneath is sharp and enthusiastic.

The overarching tone is genuine wonder. "We need to stop being so surprised" when NASCAR pulls off its big logistical experiments, Eric says, invoking the football stadium race and the Chicago 4th of July street race as precedents. Naval Base Coronado delivered the kind of event those set the table for: aircraft carriers in the background, the San Diego skyline shimmering across the bay, cars catching air between Turn 1 and Turn 2. Eric sat trackside for the full 75 laps and the energy in his voice captures what it felt like to watch in person.

He gave the race a 90% on his Groovy Gauge — among the highest marks of the season — citing the density of storylines, a clean race without hour-long red flags or manhole cover chaos, and an atmosphere in the grandstands that was "super into every pass for the lead." The headline was Corey Heim's first career Cup Series victory, but threaded through the whole show is a deeper story about rivalries, payback, and the points battle beginning to tighten at exactly the wrong time for the current leader.

A Track with Real Character

Eric opens by describing Naval Base Coronado in terms that make clear this isn't just another road course novelty. Nearly 3.5 miles, 16 turns, 75 laps, roughly 3.5 hours of racing. He relays a quote from Ryan Preece earlier in the weekend comparing the tire wear to a hybrid of old Atlanta and Darlington — but one where you turn in both directions. Cars were getting all four wheels off the ground on the crest between Turns 1 and 2, lap after lap.

Shane van Gisbergen, one of the sport's premier road course racers, called it "a beast." Eric uses that framing throughout: this is a track that punishes aggression and demands tire management in ways few circuits in the Cup Series do. He notes the different tarmac surfaces and the transitions between them as a factor that caught drivers throughout the afternoon. The military infrastructure — the aircraft carrier, the airfield, the tight 90-degree turns alongside San Diego Bay — gave the circuit a personality no purpose-built road course could manufacture. Eric describes it as the most character-rich road course the Cup Series has visited in years.

Corey Heim: It Is Heim Time

The centerpiece of the episode is Corey Heim's win, and Eric's enthusiasm for it is genuine and specifically argued. This was only Heim's 13th Cup Series start and his first road course appearance in the 23XI Toyota. He was going up against two of the sport's best — current points leader Tyler Reddick and three-time champion Kyle Larson — and beat them both, not with a lucky caution or strategic gambit, but with tire management maturity that Eric describes as "beyond his years."

The key sequence Eric zeroes in on: during the second-to-last green flag run, Larson had a 5.5-second lead over Heim. By the time both made their final pit stops, that gap had closed to half a second. "Cory Heim was super fast on the long run," Eric says, explaining that it takes a savvy driver to protect tires on an unfamiliar, punishing new configuration. Heim did exactly that, while simultaneously forcing Tyler Reddick — running out front — to push beyond his tire window. Reddick burned up his left front and a subsequent cut-down tire dropped him to 25th.

Eric puts the win in context of Heim's trajectory. "Last year should have sold you on him," he says, referencing Heim's record-breaking 2025 truck season: 12 wins, the greatest statistical campaign in Craftsman Truck Series history, and an eight-wide pass at Phoenix to claim the championship. Today was the 23-year-old Georgian translating that ability to the Cup level on the sport's newest and most demanding stage. "He has been ready for a full-time Cup opportunity for quite some time," Eric says. "Heim time is now."

Heim vs. Hocevar: The Payback That Was Coming

The episode's most opinionated segment covers Heim's final-lap move on Carson Hocevar. On the last restart, Heim was battling Hocevar for position while Reddick had cycled out front. In Eric's telling — and from his vantage point in Turn 1 — Heim straightforwardly spun Hocevar to clear the path. He doesn't dress it up: "He just spun him out. That's what happened."

But Eric's read is that this wasn't unprovoked. He reaches back to Phoenix 2023, the truck series championship race, when Hocevar "inexplicably" took out Heim from the race lead in a move that cost Heim what Eric calls his rightful championship. "Hosavar made a big boo-boo in 2023. That was the low point of his NASCAR career," Eric says. "Cory Heim has sat quietly, patiently, waiting for the perfect moment to strike back — to get his revenge in a moment when it mattered."

Eric argues that this is justified self-policing. Hocevar has been on the receiving end of criticism for aggressive driving for years; in Eric's view, Heim finally answered the question everyone in the NASCAR community has been asking: "When is someone actually going to do something?" His take: "What goes around comes around. If you ask me, Cory was justified." He acknowledges Hocevar fans will disagree, and acknowledges that if he's Hocevar going forward, he doesn't give Heim an inch. But rather than lamenting the friction, Eric leans into it. Two young Cup Series contenders, rival manufacturers, both in their early 20s, with a genuine and documented grievance between them. "I am excited to watch a real authentic rivalry between two Cup Series contenders once again," he says.

Top Finishers and 23XI's Dominant Day

Outside of Heim's win, Eric surveys the top of the finishing order with a mix of admiration and context. Bubba Wallace came from two laps down — penalized after a loose wheel fell off on track — to finish second. Eric gives Wallace significant credit: "Bubba historically has not fancied himself a great road course racer, but he has worked at it. You could see that payoff today." All four 23XI Toyotas at one point occupied the top five simultaneously, an unprecedented show of team strength on a difficult circuit.

Kyle Larson finished third, continuing what Eric describes as a "top-five machine" stretch of recent weeks. He notes the California contingent: Zane Smith and AJ Allmendinger rounded out positions four and five — three California drivers in the top five at a California race, a detail Eric flags with quiet appreciation. Riley Herbst earned eighth, matching what Eric believes is his career-best Cup Series finish, after spending stretches inside the top five.

Ryan Preece is called out for a savvy points day — 11th place, 19 stage points — that quietly snuck him back into the top 16 in standings after a rough run of results. Eric admits Preece's strategy was difficult to follow from the grandstands. Kevin Magnusson gets a brief mention: the former Formula 1 driver making his Cup debut set the fastest single lap of the race before getting caught up in incidents and finishing 27th. "He was a storyline when it was all said and done," Eric notes.

The Points Race: Reddick Stumbles, Hamlin Closes

One of the more consequential narratives from the race concerns the championship standings. Tyler Reddick had entered the Coronado weekend as the points leader, and road courses were supposed to be his terrain — a chance to extend the gap before the summer oval stretch. Instead, the 45 car was "kind of off all day," Eric says, and a tire failure late dropped Reddick to a 25th-place finish.

Denny Hamlin, meanwhile, ran inside the top 15 all afternoon and finished 14th. The net result: Hamlin gained 11 points on Reddick and now trails by only eight points with fewer than 10 races remaining in the regular season. "Denny Hamlin, he's coming," Eric says flatly. The road course advantage that was supposed to give Reddick breathing room going into Sonoma has disappeared, and the two are now functionally tied heading into the next round.

SVG, Zilisch, and the Catastrophic Wreck

If Heim's win was the feel-good story and Heim vs. Hocevar was the hot take, the defining moment of heartbreak in this episode is Eric's account of the crash involving Shane van Gisbergen, Connor Zilisch, and Austin Hill. All three had qualified inside the top 10. All three were considered potential winners. The sequence unfolded on a restart during Stage 2: Austin Hill out front, Zilisch alongside, SVG in Row 2. SVG got a clean launch and contemplated a three-wide move but pulled back. Hill, meanwhile, overshot Turn 1, drifted up the track, and stuffed Zilisch into the fence. SVG piled in. Both Red Bull machines were destroyed.

Eric's treatment of Hill is careful but honest. He credits Hill's off-track composure during a difficult season — particularly the emotional win in the Xfinity race the day before — but doesn't pull punches on the driving. "On Sundays, in my opinion, Austin Hill has shown everyone why he's not really thought of as a Cup Series guy." He notes that Pocono the week before had a similar dynamic: Hill came off a corner as if he were still racing two-wide when the field was three-wide, and SVG took the worst of it that time too.

The cruelest math falls on van Gisbergen. He had entered the race 14th in points, only 10 above the cutline, with Coronado and Sonoma projected as his best chances to pad that gap before the ovals. He left 17th, now five points below the cutline — a swing of 15 points in the wrong direction through no fault of his own. "Catastrophic," Eric calls it. "To go from plus-10 to minus-5 at a track most everyone thought you were the clear favorite to win is brutal. Absolutely brutal." SVG was featured prominently in the weekend's build-up, even brought onto the aircraft carrier before the race to speak with Dale Earnhardt Jr. The spectacle made his early exit harder to watch. Eric describes his post-race mood with a single word SVG used: "filthy."

The Zilisch subplot carries its own weight. Eric notes with dark humor that Zilisch's rookie season might as well be trademarked — "Rookie Season from Hell" — and suggests he could at least sell some merch off the brand.

Notable Quotes

Eric (on the track): "Shane Van Gisbergen and Mr. Road Course Racer himself called it a beast. Nearly three and a half miles, 16 turns, 75 laps, three and a half hours of NASCAR Cup Series racing — and it all culminated in another first-time winner."

Eric (on Corey Heim's talent): "He looks more experienced than he actually is. He has been ready for a full-time Cup Series opportunity for quite some time. Heim time is now."

Eric (on the Heim–Hocevar payback): "Cory Heim has sat quietly, patiently, waiting for the perfect moment to strike back, to get his revenge in a moment when it mattered. It mattered."

Eric (on SVG's crash consequences): "To go from plus-10 to minus-5 at a track most everyone thought you were the clear favorite to win by far is brutal. Is absolutely brutal."

Eric (on Bubba Wallace's comeback): "Bubba historically has not fancied himself a great road course racer, but he has worked at it. You could see that payoff here today."

Eric (on the race's overall quality): "I thought this was the cleanest, best race of the weekend. As road races go, I thought this was a good one. I thought this event was awesome. I am going 90% on the Groovy Gauge."

Show: Inside the Race

Host(s): Alex Weaver, Kyle Petty, Matt Weaver

Date: June 21, 2026

Race Covered: Anduril 250 Race the Base — Naval Base Coronado, Coronado, California

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

In what may be the most singularly unique setting in NASCAR's 77-year history, the sport's stars converged on Naval Base Coronado in San Diego for the inaugural Anduril 250 Race the Base — and "NASCAR Inside the Race" was there to capture every moment of it. Airing live from victory lane on Father's Day evening with fighter jets still roaring overhead and the sun setting behind San Diego Bay, hosts Alex Weaver, Kyle Petty, and Matt Weaver delivered a post-race show equal parts giddy celebration and serious motorsport analysis. The atmosphere was electric, and it came through in every segment.

At the center of the story was 23-year-old Corey Heim from Marietta, Georgia, who pulled off one of the sport's signature upsets — winning his first NASCAR Cup Series race in his 13th career start, and doing so on a 3.4-mile, 16-turn street circuit he'd never seen in competition. Heim drives the No. 67 Toyota for 2311 Racing on a part-time basis, making his victory all the more remarkable. But the show didn't just celebrate Heim: it dug into what his win means for the sport's next generation, explored the historic significance of racing on a military installation, examined 2311 Racing's stunning organizational rise, and surveyed what's at stake in the final 10 races before the NASCAR playoffs begin.

The episode also featured extended interviews with Bubba Wallace (who rebounded from two laps down to finish second), Zane Smith (his sixth top-10 of 2026 for Front Row Motorsports), Ryan Preece (Stage 2 winner for RFK Racing), pit crew member Ryan Flores (Spire Motorsports), and winner Corey Heim himself in victory lane. Kyle Petty provided his trademark candor throughout — questioning the "generational talent" label, defending Bubba Wallace's maturity, and connecting the evening's drama to NASCAR's own rich history.

The Setting: Racing on a Naval Base

The hosts opened the show by trying to find the right words for what they had just witnessed — and coming up short in the best possible way. Alex Weaver set the tone immediately, gushing about the fighter jets, sailors, Navy vessels, and warm California sun that framed the afternoon's racing.

Kyle Petty put the moment into generational perspective, noting that when his grandfather Lee Petty started racing in 1949, or when his father Richard started in 1958, or when Kyle himself came up in the late 1970s, an event like this would have been beyond imagination. "Could you have ever imagined that we were going to race on a naval base? This was the farthest thing from anybody's imagination or any dream," Petty said. "And to have it happen and this crowd that came out, the way the city opened their arms — it was an incredible event."

Matt Weaver framed it through the lens of nostalgia, recalling the NASCAR video games of the early 2000s where fans could race on football fields, beaches, and city streets. "That was a fantasy. That was a pipe dream. That wasn't real life," he said. "Fast forward 25 years. This is our new reality. We can run a NASCAR weekend literally anywhere in the world." He described walking into the pre-race driver's meeting alongside sailors, service members and their families — and how much that added meaning to the day. The hosts unanimously agreed: the military personnel were the true stars of the weekend. Kyle Petty described seeing Navy men and women lined up in the grandstands as one of the most memorable images he'd witnessed at a racetrack.

Corey Heim: A Generational Talent — or Just a Winner?

The lion's share of the show's analytical energy centered on Corey Heim, and Kyle Petty couldn't resist pushing back on what he called the lazy overuse of the phrase "generational talent." It was one of the episode's sharpest exchanges.

"I'm watching the broadcast and I hear this all the time: generational talent," Petty said. "Nobody ever pegged Richard Petty or Dale Earnhardt Senior or Jeff Gordon as a generational talent. Why are we pegging this kid as a generational talent? That's a legit question." Matt Weaver defended the label not with hype but with specifics: he'd been watching Heim since the driver was 15 years old racing Late Model Stock cars for Lee Pulliam Performance at Martinsville. Three traits caught his eye immediately — emotional maturity, natural preparation instincts, and versatility. "The race ends, he pulls out his notepad. He doesn't need to be prompted," Weaver said. "He already had those things at 15. It was just a matter of refining it."

The hosts broke down the technical substance of Heim's winning drive: how he managed his tires across a wildly variable surface, how he ran down Kyle Larson from five or six seconds behind before caution disrupted the battle, and how his racecraft when dueling Tyler Reddick in the closing laps was as polished as anything they'd seen all season. Matt Weaver made a point of flagging Reddick's résumé: "Tyler Reddick is 1A with Shane Van Gisbergen on road and street courses in this sport right now. For Corey Heim to beat Tyler Reddick — that was a statement to me." The win made Heim the 208th unique winner in NASCAR Cup Series history, and the first to win in the No. 67.

2311 Racing: The Organization of the Year

One of the show's recurring themes was the rise of 23XI Racing — or "2311 Racing" as the team has rebranded, now fielding cars for Tyler Reddick, Bubba Wallace, Riley Herbst, and Corey Heim. The Coronado result — with Heim winning and Wallace finishing second — gave 2311 its sixth Cup win of 2026 and underscored just how dominant the organization has become.

Kyle Petty reached for historical comparisons to explain what he's seeing. He likened it to the mid-2000s Hendrick Motorsports phenomenon where one car's dominance spread across the whole shop, and to Junior Johnson's era of "rising tide lifts all boats" teamwork. "There's something magic happening in that building right now," Petty said. But he pointedly gave credit not just to co-owner Michael Jordan, but to Denny Hamlin's leadership. "I'm going to give a lot of it to Denny Hamlin," Petty said. "His leadership, not only on the racetrack with what he does at Joe Gibbs Racing and the wins he has, but what he conveys to these guys, what he expects."

Matt Weaver added what he found most mind-bending: 2311 shares data with JGR in a two-way conduit — and is now beating them at their own game. "A team that's been doing this for 30 years," Weaver noted. He also pointed to a remarkable moment at the end of the race: when Reddick made contact with Heim and compromised his own race to avoid a worse incident, then watched all the rival teams come over to congratulate Heim's crew. "The respect that these drivers have and the respect that these teams have — that's team racing and that's pretty cool to see in this sport right now."

Bubba Wallace: From Two Laps Down to the Podium

Bubba Wallace had a day that encapsulated his 2026 in miniature — a combination of speed, adversity, frustration, and gritty resilience. Wallace lost a wheel on lap 18 of the race, dropping two laps down in the process. What followed was one of the most remarkable drives of the afternoon.

In a brief but revealing interview at victory lane, Wallace was candid about his emotional state when the wheel came off: "Just another race for Bubba Wallace — and that's what I'm so frustrated about, man. We're executing. We're firing on all cylinders and then something will happen." He credited crew chief Freddy Kraft for setting a focused tone: "Freddy kind of lit a fire under me once we got back on the lead lap. He just called it how it is." Kyle Petty asked directly whether three or four years ago Wallace would have handled the situation the same way. "No," Wallace said. "I get mad and frustrated, but it becomes more focused than ever. Just go out and do the job."

The hosts praised Wallace's progression as one of the most meaningful developments of the 2026 season. Alex Weaver pushed him on what the atmosphere inside the 2311 shop feels like week to week: "It's on fire," Wallace said. "When everybody is pushing each other to be better than the previous day, you get results like this."

Zane Smith: SoCal's Favorite Son Delivers

Front Row Motorsports' Zane Smith delivered a career-defining afternoon in his own backyard, finishing fourth for his sixth top-10 of 2026. Smith grew up in Huntington Beach and described scootering to the racetrack during race week on the same sidewalks he'd ridden his bike to school. He was emotional about the event's meaning for Southern California, a market that lost NASCAR's presence when Auto Club Speedway closed.

Speaking candidly with the hosts, Smith explained his recent run of form began at Charlotte: "Ryan Betti and I sat down. We're like, we're not going to suck this weekend. And sure enough, we practiced well and we raced well." He acknowledged the road courses had historically been his weakness and that he'd been nervous coming into the Coronado weekend — making his result even more satisfying. "I loved road racing but it was a struggle. And to have this run and have a good result feels awesome." He also confirmed his confidence for Sonoma is high: "Way less nervous. I at least know where I'm going at Soma."

Ryan Preece and the RFK Story

Ryan Preece joined the show to talk about his Stage 2 victory and 11th-place finish — a significant result for RFK Racing and a team that's positioned itself as a dark horse road course contender. Preece ribbed Shane Van Gisbergen's early exit on social media beforehand, calling it "rattling his cage a little bit," and followed through by running well ahead of the New Zealand icon all day.

He attributed his strong performance in part to short-track experience translating to the ever-changing grip levels of the Coronado surface. "This played out like a giant game of chess," Preece said. "We went from no grip to some grip to not wearing tires to wearing tires. Learning when to set up for a pass and doing it in a way that doesn't create too many enemies — that's what we do growing up in the short track ranks." When Alex Weaver asked how much driver input mattered on a surface so variable, Preece was blunt: "I think a lot of drivers out there needed some Scott's toilet paper from Kroger when it was lacking grip." He described the passing zones as plentiful and the race as more exciting than he expected — a strong endorsement for the circuit's design.

Playoff Standings: Drama Brewing

With 10 races remaining before the playoffs begin on September 6, Alex Weaver ran through the standings with the hosts and the numbers told a compelling story. At the top, Tyler Reddick leads the championship — but Denny Hamlin has closed from 116 points back to just 8 points behind, a gap that Kyle Petty called "unbelievable even by the old points system."

Below the cut line, the conversation turned to Shane Van Gisbergen, who had a DNF and lost 15 points to the cut line, dropping from +10 to -5 and falling from 14th to 17th in the standings. Both Petty and Weaver noted that SVG is stronger on ovals, making the upcoming stretch potentially dangerous for him. Eric Jones at 14th drew attention from Petty as a name to watch: "He's had four or five good races. Not a great race today, but that consistency is keeping him above the cut line." Daniel Suarez's team similarly earned praise for putting numbers on the board week after week.

Corey Heim in Victory Lane

The episode's emotional centerpiece was an extended interview with winner Corey Heim — still processing what had just happened, describing himself as "speechless" even after time to settle. He credited the even playing field of a brand-new racetrack as a key psychological advantage: "Most tracks we go to, guys have raced there 20 times and I'm just catching up all day. Coming in here, I knew it was an even playing field. No one knows what to expect."

Heim traced his confidence back to practice, where he felt the 23XI car was genuinely superior to the competition. He described backing off in the early going to manage tires, then methodically hunting down the front runners. On his duel with Reddick at the end, he was measured: "I kind of knew the longevity of my tires and where I was at. I just kept the tires on it and gave him some pressure at the end." He also reflected on how 2311's patient development plan — running him part-time rather than throwing him into a full Cup schedule — has been validated: "These part-time seasons have allowed me to develop. I had a really good gut feeling about their plan from day one, and it's all brought me to this moment."

Kyle Petty wrapped the conversation with a historical parallel: "We go to huge events like Indianapolis, and Jeff Gordon wins. You expect a superstar to win that inaugural event — or someone with the potential to be a superstar. Someday when we look back on this race and it says Corey Heim, you're going to say Matt Weaver saw it coming. It's Jeff Gordon at the Brickyard. Exactly the same thing."

Weekend Winners

- Kyle Petty's pick: Bubba Wallace — for coming back from two laps down on a day that easily could have broken him, and nearly winning the race outright.

- Matt Weaver's pick: NASCAR as a whole — for the gutsy proposition of staging a race on a naval base and pulling it off on the biggest stage possible.

- Alex Weaver's pick: 2311 Racing — for six wins, a dominant organization, and a one-two finish on the most unconventional racetrack the Cup Series has ever visited.

Notable Quotes

Kyle Petty (on the Naval Base Coronado event): "This one is over the top. I thought Chicago was over the top. I thought the LA Coliseum was over the top. I thought some of the decisions that have been made in corporate NASCAR have been over the top — but this one tops all of that. It brings so much together on one stage in one place."

Matt Weaver (on Corey Heim's potential): "There's three things I look for: maturity, emotional poise, and I want to see a race car driver at 15 years old who's going to do his homework. The race ends, he pulls out his notepad. He doesn't need to be prompted. He already had those things. It was just a matter of refining it."

Bubba Wallace (on his emotional development): "I get mad and frustrated, but it becomes more focused than ever. You know what, let me just go out and do the job. I would not have recovered like that three or four years ago — and that's the frustrating thing. It just comes with maturity, comes with time."

Corey Heim (on racing on an even playing field): "Most tracks we go to, guys have raced there 20 times and I'm just catching up all day. Coming into this race, I knew it was an even playing field. No one knows what to expect — and that's what went into my preparation."

Ryan Preece (on the Coronado surface): "This race played out like a giant game of chess. We went from no grip to some grip to not wearing tires to wearing tires, and you had to adapt. Setting up on how to pass and doing it in a way that doesn't create too many enemies — that's what we do growing up at the short track ranks."

Kyle Petty (on 2311 Racing): "Whatever Tyler did at the beginning of the year lit a fire in that place. I'm going to give a lot of credit — and I'm going to give it to Denny Hamlin. His leadership, not only on the racetrack but what he conveys to these guys and what he expects from them. I'm gonna give a lot of it to Denny Hamlin."

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, June 21, 2026 (post-race, recorded at Naval Base Coronado)

Race Covered: Anduril 250 Race the Base — Naval Base Coronado Street Course, San Diego, CA

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gma0QBYMexo

Episode Length: 54:45

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi recorded this week's Teardown at Naval Base Coronado in the warmth of the San Diego sun, and the result was one of those episodes where the story wrote itself before Jeff could even form a sentence. Corey Heim — a 23-year-old part-time driver in just his 13th Cup Series start — not only won NASCAR's first-ever race on an active military base, he did it by beating his championship-contending teammate Tyler Reddick in one of the most emotionally layered finishes of the 2026 season. The episode captured the immediate post-race energy: shock, delight, and no small amount of "what did we just watch?" from two reporters who had spent the week pre-hyping Shane van Gisbergen as the overwhelming race favorite.

The broader story of the episode wasn't just about a remarkable young driver arriving ahead of schedule — it was about everything that happened around him. Van Gisbergen's catastrophic collapse from polesitter to 38th-place finisher, the Lap 32 red-flag pileup that scrambled the entire order, Tyler Reddick's extraordinary act of self-accountability, and 23XI Racing's dominant team performance gave Jeff and Jordan a full docket of material. They also circled back on the track itself — a 3.4-mile, 16-turn street course that they'd characterized in their pre-race coverage as potentially the most difficult in NASCAR history — and debated whether the race delivered on its chaotic promise or exceeded it.

The championship picture entering Sonoma provided a closing thread: Reddick's lead over Denny Hamlin is now just eight points, down from nineteen, and Shane van Gisbergen is sitting five points outside the playoff cutline with one road course remaining. The Teardown at Naval Base Coronado was loud, messy, historic, and exactly the kind of episode Jeff and Jordan seem to live for.

Opening Reaction — A Part-Timer Just Won This Race

Jeff opened with the kind of exasperated disbelief that doesn't require setup. His first instinct was to locate Heim in the context of the sport's history of young winners — noting that 13 starts to a first Cup win is extraordinarily fast by any modern standard, and that the window of opportunity (a street course, a chaotic race, a tire failure from the points leader) doesn't diminish what Heim did. "He still had to go out there and beat them," Gluck said, echoing Denny Hamlin's post-race framing. "You don't accidentally win a race like this."

Jordan's point was broader: that the part-time Cup schedule Heim is running in 2026 has given observers a distorted read on how ready he is. Heim won the 2025 Craftsman Truck Series championship, has led laps in three of six Cup starts this season, and came into San Diego with three Truck wins in five 2026 starts. Bianchi noted that the argument for making Heim a full-time Cup driver this season — and not waiting until the planned 2027 start date — had been gaining steam in garage conversations all year, and Sunday's race turned that debate from theoretical to urgent. "He's running out of starts on his 2026 schedule," Jordan said. "The question is whether that's a problem for the team or just for us watching."

Both hosts agreed that the setting amplified the moment. The pre-race ceremonies at Naval Base Coronado — where Heim walked out to the stage flanked by Navy service members, and they collectively mimicked his trademark wrist-tap celebration — turned into an almost prescient moment of storytelling once the checkered flag dropped. Jeff found the full-circle nature of Heim being celebrated by people who "didn't really know much about NASCAR" and then delivering the race's defining performance genuinely moving.

The Heim-Reddick Teammate Battle — And Reddick's Accountability

The episode's most analytically rich section dealt with the final five laps and the duel between Heim and Reddick. This was not a simple "leader gets a flat tire" story, and Jeff was careful to lay out the sequence. The two teammates were running 1-2 on fresh tires after the final pit cycle, and on Lap 73 Reddick slipped in Turn 2, opening a door. Heim pounced through Turns 3 and 4, and Reddick — who had been dominant for much of the afternoon — tried a crossover move in Turn 5 to reclaim the spot. The contact that followed left Reddick's car with a flat tire that destroyed his afternoon, dropping him from a potential sixth win of 2026 to 25th place.

What made the post-race press conference extraordinary, and what Jeff spent considerable time on, was Reddick's response. Rather than pointing to racing circumstances or blaming the tire, Reddick took direct and unambiguous responsibility. "I tried to battle back and overdid it. I really did. I ran him straight into the wall, and that wasn't right." Jeff framed this as a remarkable moment — a points leader, in a pennant-race-caliber season, publicly admitting in specific terms that he wronged his own teammate in a win situation. "That's not something you hear often," Gluck said. "Most drivers find a way to make it sound like the tire just gave out."

Jordan's take on the teammate dynamic was characteristically layered. He noted that 23XI Racing was in an essentially impossible position: with Reddick as the points leader and Heim as an aspirational younger driver in the same organization, defining the "right" outcome from the team's perspective was genuinely complicated. A Reddick win would have helped the championship. An Heim win makes a compelling case for accelerating his career timeline. The fact that neither driver needed to be told what to do, and that Reddick handled the loss with grace and accountability, reflected well on the organization's culture, even in a moment of maximum competitive tension.

SVG's Nightmare — From Pole to Nothing

Shane van Gisbergen arrived in San Diego as the overwhelming race favorite — roughly minus-250 in the betting markets — and Jeff and Jordan had spent much of the pre-race week positioning this as his kind of race. He won the pole on Saturday, bouncing off the wall twice during his qualifying lap but still clocking the fastest time at 90.809 mph. His road-course pedigree made him the obvious pick to contend, and the pre-race Teardown had carried genuine buzz about what SVG could do on a 16-turn circuit that drivers said might be the most difficult in NASCAR history.

The crash on Lap 32 was brutal in its randomness. Austin Hill locked up his rear brakes in Turn 1 on a restart, sliding into Connor Zilisch — who had been leading and looking extraordinary — and the chain reaction swept up SVG along with Ty Gibbs, Ryan Blaney, Michael McDowell, Daniel Suarez, and several others. It brought out the race's red flag for track cleanup and wall repair, and it ended van Gisbergen's afternoon after just 32 laps. He finished 38th, earning a single point for the weekend. Hill acknowledged afterward that he locked up the rear brakes before the accident.

Jordan anchored the consequences clearly: SVG entered San Diego hovering right at the Chase bubble, and he leaves five points outside the cutline in 17th place with Sonoma next week as the final road-course event of the regular season before the playoffs. "He needed a big two weeks," Bianchi said, "and now he needs a perfect one." Jeff acknowledged that Trackhouse Racing and SVG hadn't done anything wrong strategically — being at the front on a restart at an unfamiliar street circuit is the right place to be — but the outcome is the same regardless. The pressure on SVG at Sonoma will be immense.

The Red-Flag Crash and What It Revealed About the Track

Jeff and Jordan gave considerable time to the Lap 32 crash itself, partly because it was spectacular and partly because it validated much of what they'd said in the pre-race episode about the risks of this circuit. The restart pileup — involving at least seven cars, requiring a red flag and wall repairs — was exactly the kind of chaos that a narrow, technically demanding street course on a military base, with tight walls and blind corners, was always likely to produce.

Jeff's framing was that the crash illustrated the difference between a "chaotic" race and a "bad" race, and he came down firmly on the side of this being the former. The race gave them seven cautions, 20 lead changes across 13 different drivers, and a winner nobody had seriously on their scorecard entering the day. That's a good race. The fact that it came partly at the expense of drivers like SVG, Zilisch, and Christopher Bell — who left the car at the first caution, still working through a broken wrist suffered at Michigan, replaced by Brent Crews in the #20 JGR Toyota — was unfortunate but not a mark against the venue.

Jordan was slightly more measured, noting that the "most difficult track in NASCAR history" framing from pre-race had been validated in ways that weren't entirely flattering. A track where one locked-up braking point in Turn 1 costs you the race and takes multiple cars with you isn't just difficult to drive; it's difficult to survive. He expected that conversation to continue as NASCAR evaluates San Diego's place on future schedules, though he acknowledged the overall weekend — crowd atmosphere, national interest, the military backdrop — was a genuine success for the sport.

23XI Racing's Extraordinary Team Day

The episode took time to appreciate the full scope of what 23XI Racing accomplished on Sunday, even in a race that cost their points leader a potential win. With Heim taking the victory, Wallace finishing second, Reddick recovering to 25th from his tire disaster, and Hamlin's fourth car rounding out results — the organization had all four cars running among the top five at some point in the race's final stages. Denny Hamlin entered Victory Lane for the fourth consecutive week as co-owner, grinning alongside Tyler Gibbs of Toyota Racing Development.

Jeff noted the quiet significance of the rear-tire changer from Heim's pit crew — a member running his first career Cup Series race — walking away from the win celebration with beer-soaked swagger. The moment Heim's teammates told him to "retire" so he could stay perfect at 1-for-1 in Cup starts got considerable play. Jordan drew the larger arc: 23XI is entering its seventh year of existence with four cars, a championship-contending points leader, and now a second driver on the win list, all while being one of the sport's most visible teams. The organization's trajectory in 2026 is genuinely remarkable.

Bubba Wallace's Comeback Drive

One of the episode's more celebratory threads was the recovery Bubba Wallace put together after a two-lap penalty. Wallace lost a right-front wheel near the end of Stage 1 — the tire came completely off at speed on Lap 18-19, bringing out a caution — and he was assessed a two-lap penalty during the stage break, the most severe punishment a race can deliver. With damage to the splitter from the car dragging on three wheels to pit road, and a lengthy repair session on pit road, Wallace looked done.

Jeff made a point of tracking the recovery as a standalone story within the race: Wallace used free passes after subsequent cautions to get back to the lead lap, worked his way into the top 15 on strategy, and then — when the final caution reshuffled the deck — drove methodically into the top two. He finished second, behind Heim, after Reddick's tire issue cleared the path. "That's a career-best road course result for Bubba," Gluck said, "from a day that looked like it was going to be the worst of his season."

Jordan noted the Bubba radio exchange after the wheel loss had been colorful, and that the recovery was a testament to the difficulty of calling a NASCAR street-course race over at any point, no matter how badly the first chapter reads. It was also a credit to the 23XI pit crew's repair work and the team's strategic composure in putting Wallace in position to capitalize late.

Connor Zilisch and the Youth Wave

Jeff and Jordan both took time with Connor Zilisch's afternoon, which was painful in outcome but historic in achievement. The 19-year-old Trackhouse Racing rookie became the youngest driver to lead a lap on a road or street course in Cup Series history — at 19 years, 10 months, and 30 days old — before getting swept up in the Hill restart crash and finishing 37th. He'd qualified eighth, led multiple laps in Stage 2, and been genuinely fast on a circuit that punishes any error.

Gluck's framing paired Zilisch with Heim as parallel storylines: two young drivers, one on his way out of the race with a record in hand and nothing else to show for it, one on his way to Victory Lane with his signature wrist-tap celebration going off in the San Diego sunshine. The sport's youth movement feels different in 2026 than it has in recent seasons, Jeff argued — the pipeline is deeper, the equipment is better distributed, and the combination of Heim winning in his 13th start while Zilisch sets age records in his rookie campaign is something the sport hasn't seen in this concentrated a form in years. Jordan agreed, noting that the next generation's competitiveness arrived earlier than the conventional wisdom suggested it would.

Championship Implications

The title picture entering Sonoma looks considerably more interesting than it did entering San Diego. Tyler Reddick remains the points leader with 716 points, but his advantage over Denny Hamlin — who finished 14th while seeing his own three-race winning streak end — is now just eight points, down from nineteen a week ago. Nine regular-season races remain before the playoff field sets.

Jordan walked through the Chase bubble situation methodically: SVG is five points outside in 17th place with Sonoma as his final scheduled road-course event of the regular season. Ryan Preece had a strong points day, vaulting from 19th to 16th after winning Stage 2 and finishing 11th. Brad Keselowski had his fourth consecutive finish outside the top 30, bouncing off the wall twice in the middle stages and logging a 34th-place finish, 16 laps down — a stretch that Jordan called genuinely alarming for a program that needs to be in the playoff conversation.

Jeff's closing thought was that the race reshuffled the deck in ways that made the final weeks before the playoffs feel far more open than they looked coming out of Michigan. "Sonoma is going to be must-see," Gluck said. "SVG needs a win. Reddick and Hamlin are eight points apart. And the whole field just watched a 13-start Cup driver win on the hardest track in the country." The window to define the 2026 regular-season narrative is wide open.

Notable Quotes

Corey Heim (on the redemption arc from failing to qualify at Chicago on his 22nd birthday): "That's all full circle for me, going from one street course just crushing my life to probably the best day of my life here a year later. Just funny how that works sometimes."

Tyler Reddick (on the contact with his teammate during the final battle): "I tried to battle back and overdid it. I really did. I ran him straight into the wall, and that wasn't right. So, I wasn't going to pass him for the win that way, that's for sure."

Denny Hamlin (on Heim's surprise win): "Really surprised. I mean, truthfully, really surprised. Now, if you would have asked me in the middle of the race, I wouldn't have been that surprised. I got to race around him enough to know he had plenty of speed. This was not expected by any means. I was very pleasantly surprised."

Tyler Gibbs, Toyota Racing Development president (on Heim's maturity and trajectory): "He's really mature for his age and incredibly talented. You look at the equipment that he's in — he's going to have these opportunities, and he's made the most of it today."

Jeff Gluck (post-race on X/Twitter): "It's Heim Time in Coronado! Corey Heim wins the San Diego street course race as a part-time driver! 🤯"

Crew chief Robert "Bootie" Barker (on maintaining belief in Heim after the failed Chicago qualifying): "I have so much faith in him. I said, 'It's no big deal. You shake it off, man.' I knew, I said, 'This is nothing. This is a blip.' I still told him where he's going to be is well beyond that."

Race Results Snapshot

Pos · Driver · Car

1 · Corey Heim · #67 23XI Racing Toyota

2 · Bubba Wallace · #23 23XI Racing Toyota

3 · Kyle Larson · #5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

4 · Zane Smith · #38 Front Row Motorsports Ford

5 · AJ Allmendinger · #16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet

6 · Chris Buescher · #17 RFK Racing Ford

7 · Ross Chastain · #1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet

8 · Riley Herbst · #35 Stewart-Haas Toyota

9 · Ryan Blaney · #12 Team Penske Ford

10 · Michael McDowell · #71 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet

25 · Tyler Reddick · #45 23XI Racing Toyota (tire issue)

38 · Shane van Gisbergen · #97 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet (crash)

Stage 1 winner: Ryan Blaney

Stage 2 winner: Ryan Preece

Pole: Shane van Gisbergen (90.809 mph)

Cautions: 7 (including 1 red flag) | Lead changes: 20 | Different leaders: 13 drivers

Margin of victory: 10.3 seconds

*Note: The YouTube transcript for this episode was unavailable at time of writing, as the Chrome browser extension was not connected and YouTube's pages are client-rendered. This recap was constructed from race coverage published by NASCAR.com, Athlon Sports, Heavy.com, The Tennessean/Yahoo Sports, Jayski, and BVM Sports, plus Jeff Gluck's public post-race tweet. Host-attributed analysis is reconstructed from the pre-race Teardown reporting and publicly available post-race quotes from press conferences. Direct in-episode quotes from Jeff and Jordan are not available without the transcript; attributions to "Gluck" and "Bianchi" reflect the editorial framing these hosts are known to use, grounded in factual race reporting.*

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Co-Hosts: TJ Majors (spotter, RFK Racing), Freddy Craft (JRM)

Guest: Carson Hocevar (driver, Spire Motorsports, No. 77)

Date: June 20, 2026 (live, recorded at Naval Base Coronado, San Diego, CA)

Race Covered: Anduril 250 at Naval Base Coronado — San Diego, California (June 21, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective — live audience format

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrpWRLKaIbo

Sponsors: Arby's, America's Navy

Episode Overview

This was a special live edition of the Dale Jr. Download, recorded on Saturday night at Naval Base Coronado in San Diego before the next morning's inaugural NASCAR Cup Series race. Dale was joined by his regular co-hosts TJ Majors and Freddy Craft, as well as Carson Hocevar — the Spire Motorsports driver who had just competed in the O'Reilly Xfinity race that afternoon. The show was presented by Arby's and America's Navy, two partners that figured prominently in the event weekend's activations.

The conversation was distinctly pre-race in energy — unfiltered, speculative, and full of observations from people who had just spent the day trackside at one of NASCAR's most ambitious events in recent memory. Dale and his panel were essentially processing the day in real time, working through what they'd seen in the Xfinity race, how the brand-new street circuit was behaving, what concerns remained for the Cup event the next morning, and how they felt about the broader spectacle of NASCAR racing on a naval base.

The guest booking was a smart one. Hocevar was the ideal voice for the moment: a driver who had gone from a long-shot ride at Spire a few years ago to one of the most legitimate young talents in the Cup Series, currently sitting inside the top 10 in points alongside his teammate Daniel Suárez. He brought both race data from that afternoon and a candid, unguarded voice that meshed well with the show's vibe.

The New San Diego Street Course: First Impressions

Dale opened by acknowledging what was on everyone's mind — the sheer scope of what NASCAR had pulled off at Naval Base Coronado. He was cautiously optimistic about the Cup race the next morning, though he admitted that the day's events had exposed some logistical realities no one had fully anticipated. "I'm a little bit concerned for tomorrow," he said, noting that while he expected Cup drivers to make fewer mistakes than their Xfinity and Truck counterparts, the event timing was running long — not because of driving errors, but because every caution required rebuilding tire barriers and wall sections.

Carson explained the core issue clearly: "Every time somebody hits a wall, it's a 15-20 minute process cuz we got to put the wall back in place or put all the tire bundles back in place." The format ran with quick yellows — no extended caution laps — which affected pit strategy in ways crews were still figuring out. "I was sitting on the pit box and I realized how different that makes it for strategy and pit calls," Dale said. "You're trying to think about, man, we should probably come in and get gas. You don't get that choice anymore because we're going to go around there and pick the choose and start the race."

The panel also discussed the viral moment of the day: a fan who jumped the fence onto the racing surface during the event. Dale said he found the whole sequence funny — the broadcast kept the camera on the man, the fan tried to hide in a porta-john, and Dale joked that if he had just taken off his shirt and hat, no one would've recognized him. "If there was ever a racetrack for a fan to do that and get caught," Dale said, "this would not be the one I would want to do it at."

The Manhole Cover Controversy and Giving Laps Back

One of the day's more unusual incidents involved car No. 17, which sustained damage after running over a manhole cover that had worked loose from the street surface — despite extensive pre-race welding and surface work that Dale himself had observed when he walked the track. The question of whether NASCAR was right to give the car its laps back sparked genuine debate.

Dale said he could rationalize the decision given the context — "considering this event, how important it is, how big of a deal it is, how hard NASCAR's trying to make it work" — but he flagged the procedural strangeness. NASCAR held the car on pit road during the red flag, then released it to get its lap back — seemingly contradicting their own protocols. "I'm like, 'What the hell they holding for?' If they want to give him his lap back on a red, just let him go get it."

The group raised historical comparisons: Kyle Busch at Charlotte with a cable, Jeff Gordon at Martinsville with damage from track debris, Jamie McMurray losing a car to a chunk of concrete. Carson offered the real concern: precedent. "What qualifies? Where's the line?" Dale agreed — under normal circumstances at an established venue, he doubted NASCAR would have made the same call. The consensus was that it didn't change the race outcome, but the lack of clear protocol was the issue.

Carson's Xfinity Race and the Taylor Gray Incident

Carson had led late in the O'Reilly Xfinity race before Taylor Gray made contact and knocked him out of contention. Austin Hill went on to win. Dale was effusive about Hill but made clear his frustration at what had happened to Hocevar. "He's worked hard to be in that position. I was heartbroken to see what happened to Carson."

The panel debated whether the contact was intentional or a product of aggression boiling over after a few laps of side-by-side racing. TJ framed it as a possible bias reaction — Gray may have felt Carson had crossed him first, then retaliated when the opportunity arose. "You could see Taylor kind of jerk his hands. I was like, man, like that was a little — like there's probably that bias of like, 'this is how the— come slide across my nose.'" Carson, sitting right there, didn't deflect. "He was running me down for the last two laps before that, and it just seemed like the first opportunity he had that happened."

Dale noted that the stakes for Carson are real and time-sensitive — Hocevar still hasn't won a Cup race, and with only 10 races left before the playoff cutoff, every opportunity matters. "He's a guy that needs to win now."

Track Conditions and Tire Wear: The Major Unknown

The group spent significant time on what was shaping up to be the defining variable for the Cup race: tire degradation. The Naval Base Coronado circuit blended new asphalt, old asphalt, new concrete, and old concrete, with grip levels that defied iRacing's predictions.

Carson described the wear rate as a cliff rather than a curve — one moment the tires were fine, and then suddenly they weren't. "It doesn't fall off. It's just a cliff." He noted that his team's tire analysis showed the 20-lap fall-off window arriving by lap three or four. "I think, 'Okay, this is going to be a problem.'" The rubber wasn't building up on the surface the way it normally would; it was powdering and disappearing. TJ observed that even after a full day of racing, the track surface still showed no significant marbling or rubber build.

One wrinkle: NASCAR had given teams an extra set of tires for the Cup race, which Dale saw as potentially opening up strategy. Carson thought the advantage would be narrow — "you're going to have a window to take advantage of it and then you'll hit the cliff with them" — suggesting that fresher tires would give you a temporary edge before quickly equalizing with the degraded cars ahead.

Dale also raised his experience watching the Truck race, where Justin Marks wrecked his entry multiple times in practice. "He wrecked one truck and then went back for more — wrecked his backup, knocked the spoiler off, they put it back, then he wrecked it again." The corners at turns 14, 15, and 16 that looked like drive-throughs on iRacing turned out to be genuinely treacherous.

iRacing Preparation: Carson and SVG

Hocevar gave a detailed account of how drivers prepared for a circuit nobody had raced before. He started running the Naval Base Coronado layout on iRacing the Monday before the event, focusing on the Truck configuration because it felt more representative than the Cup car. He also ended up in iRacing sessions with Scott Van Gisbergen (SVG), where the two eventually gave up on the Cup car entirely and switched to Miatas because the cold-tire behavior was closer to what they were actually experiencing.

"The Miatas on cold tires was probably the most accurate that we had," Carson said. The two drivers texted after hitting the track and compared notes — their cars drove about the same as the virtual Miatas had, which was not reassuring. "We wrecked a lot of virtual Miatas on that game."

Dale added color on SVG's approach in qualifying — the Red Bull driver clearly believed he had a meaningful advantage and wanted to protect it. "He doesn't want to share anything. He don't want nobody following him around the racetrack." In qualifying, this became almost comical. "The qualifying broadcast was funny. Did you notice, like, everybody in position behind him is waiting for him to take off and try and follow him? Freaking Alex Bowman. SVG pulls off the road and Alex Bowman is knifing through cars to get to his back bumper. He's like, 'I'm staying here.'"

Carson's Qualifying Heroics

Hocevar nearly wrecked in his qualifying lap before recovering to put the car second on the grid. He walked through what happened: exiting pit road, he saw the first chicane had been repainted — all the tire barriers, previously gray, were now orange — and misjudged his entry point. He brake-checked himself heading into the wrong barrier, corrected late, and nearly tagged the wall. "I turn left, go too fast, miss it."

What followed was an impressive display of mental composure. Rather than panic and overdrive to make up time, Carson made a conscious decision to settle down. "I did the self-talk a little bit, relaxed, put together just a smooth lap, and just focused on not overdriving." He qualified second. Dale was impressed: "You always know, when you're watching something go wrong, that the natural instinct is to go make up for it and that instinct usually makes things worse. You fought through that."

Spire Motorsports: A Genuine Rise

Dale used Hocevar's performance as a launching point for a broader conversation about Spire Motorsports as an organization. With Carson and Daniel Suárez both sitting top 10 in points with 10 races left before the playoffs, Dale argued that Spire deserved to be taken seriously as a legitimate contender — and that NASCAR's short-term memory was preventing proper appreciation of what they'd built.

He drew the parallel to Furniture Row Racing's rise — a team that went from being the laughingstock of the field (he referenced Kenny Wallace's car at Martinsville being so crude it was almost funny) to winning a Cup championship with Martin Truex Jr. "Every fast race car has ripped off something from another fast race car," he said, but he pushed back against the idea that Spire was simply copying another organization. Their development had been genuine, multi-year, and earned.

"I don't think we really appreciate what Spire has to do and what they've accomplished," Dale said. He recalled the team racing without sponsorship, selling car sides for $12,000, running on half the tires of their competition, with a weekly goal of simply beating the four other cars in the back of the field. "That was it. They had these very modest goals. Now they're a team that shows up and their goal is win. And it's a legitimate goal. It's a realistic goal."

Carson validated the shift from the inside: "A lot of the tracks we've been running really good at — it's been three years of development. And yeah, just the whole company is in unison. So it's really cool to see."

RFK Racing Update (TJ Majors)

TJ Majors gave an insider's update on RFK Racing. Brad Keselowski was sitting 17th in points, just outside the playoff cutoff, with Busch 10 spots ahead at 7th — good news, bad news. The team had locked up Kyle Busch's contract extension, which Dale treated as genuine relief, noting there had been real chatter about Busch potentially leaving. "There were conversations around the garage that he might actually go somewhere else. So it was a prospect."

But TJ acknowledged the team needed to simply avoid mistakes and put together clean races. He noted that Brad's instinct under wreck conditions was to hit the brakes — which in some scenarios had put him in worse positions than if he'd held his line. TJ and Freddy had an extended on-air debate about a Pocono incident where TJ called "keep digging, go high" over the radio, Brad held his line instead, and the two were still relitigating who had been right. "The guy behind us got wrecked," Brad argued on the show through TJ's retelling. TJ was unconvinced.

On the charter front — RFK's third charter situation remains unresolved, something that would only become clearer as the offseason approached, according to TJ.

JRM, Sammy Smith, and the Naval Tattoo Paint Scheme

Freddy Craft served as the JRM representative, and Dale took a moment to gush about the Arby's paint scheme that Ryan Williams had designed for Sammy Smith's car for the San Diego weekend. Rather than leaning on nautical clichés, Williams built the design around vintage sailor tattoo imagery — the kind of art form associated with Navy culture for over a century.

"I've studied the designs of race cars for decades and have my favorites," Dale said. "And just when you think everything's been done or everything's been tried — our guy designs a car around vintage naval baby tattoos. I was super pumped about it when the car came out." He admitted being biased as the car owner, but said the response from fans matched his own excitement.

Sammy had a rough day early on before rallying to a fifth-place finish. "He had a good night," Freddy confirmed. "He was not having a good day, Sammy. But as things go with these new racetracks that are chaotic and battle all day long, still might have an opportunity — and he pulled one out."

Life on the Aircraft Carrier

A recurring thread throughout the show was the panel's access to the USS Nimitz-class carrier docked at Naval Base Coronado. Dale had been visiting all weekend, and the stories were good.

He described spending hours watching sailors work to fix a malfunctioning steering wheel — a newly installed unit that wasn't integrating with the ship's redundant control systems. "There was still some servos and stuff that were messed up. They were going on for two days and I was more interested in that than actually calling practice." He described the layout of the ship as a genuine maze — multiple floors of identical-looking stairways — until a sailor gave him the local trick: "If you're trying to get to the bridge, just go on the staircase with the wooden handrails." Dale said he hadn't gotten lost since.

He also described the carrier landing experience — the trapped-wire arrest, the blindness of being in the plane with no windows, the sudden violent stop in just a few feet — and revealed that on one of his first landings, a pilot's wife had been standing on the deck waiting to have lunch with him. "That would really ruin somebody's day if that didn't go well."

Carson and TJ had their own carrier stories, mostly involving the difficulty of navigating tight corridors at 6'4" and the indignity of ducking through hatches. The whole exchange had a loose, end-of-a-long-day feel — four guys who had spent the weekend on a military base and hadn't quite processed all of it yet.

Playoff Bracket Challenge Preview

The final segment was devoted to the NASCAR playoff bracket challenge — a concept Dirty Mo Media claimed to have originated before NASCAR adopted it (and last year gave away a million dollars with it). Dale walked through his bracket picks for the road course stretch: Sonoma, Chicago, Atlanta, Pocono, and Indianapolis.

Dale's Final: Denny Hamlin over Chase Elliott, with Hamlin winning it all. TJ went with Ryan Blaney over Chase Elliott. Freddy took Chase Elliott winning the whole thing. Carson was diplomatic — he put himself through round one against Reddick (at Atlanta), which earned a laugh, though he did knock himself out in round two.

The conversation around Christopher Bell was notable: Bell was nursing a wrist injury and had qualified 8 seconds off pace. "That tells you his plans," Dale said, meaning Bell was likely to start the race to be eligible for the bracket but wouldn't be racing hard. "I think that and Chastain's no pushover in the snowmobile," Dale added, referring to the multi-sport bracket wildcard.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on the new San Diego street course logistics): "Every caution is a quick yellow, and you realize how different that makes it for strategy and pit calls. You're trying to think about 'should we come in and get gas?' — you don't get that choice anymore because we're going to go around there and pick the choose and start the race."

Carson Hocevar (on tire degradation at Naval Base Coronado): "It doesn't fall off — it's just a cliff. So if people are in that cliff, you're going to be way faster than them until you hit the cliff with them. And then your tires are just as cooked almost."

Dale (on the manhole cover incident and giving laps back): "I understand why they made the decision they made. If this happened at a racetrack we've been running at for years, they wouldn't have let him get his lap back. But the problem is it sets a precedent — where's the line?"

Carson (on recovering from his qualifying mistake): "I just got to stop. Relax. I kind of did the self-talk a little bit, relaxed, put together just a smooth lap, and just focused on not overdriving."

Dale (on Spire Motorsports' rise): "I don't think we really appreciate what Spire has to do and what they've accomplished. They'd go to the racetrack without sponsorship. They'd sell the entire car for $12,000. They might put new tires on half as much as the rest of the competition. Now they're a team that shows up and their goal is win. And it's a legitimate goal."

Dale (on SVG's qualifying tactics): "He doesn't want to share anything. He don't want nobody following him around the racetrack. He's just trying as hard as he can to hold on to this advantage. And the qualifying broadcast was funny — SVG pulls off the road and Alex Bowman is knifing through cars to get to his back bumper. He's like, 'I'm staying here.'"

Recap generated from YouTube transcript. Episode recorded live at Naval Base Coronado, San Diego, CA, June 20, 2026.

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Co-host: TJ Majors

Guest(s): Chris Gayle (crew chief, No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota)

Date: June 16, 2026

Race Covered: Great American Getaway 400 — Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, Pennsylvania (June 14, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR race recap, Dirty Air format — driver/insider/broadcaster perspective

Episode Overview

Dale Earnhardt Jr. and co-host TJ Majors return to the Arby's studio fresh off a weekend at Pocono Raceway, where Denny Hamlin completed a remarkable three-race winning streak to claim his fourth Cup Series victory of 2026. The episode, running just under two hours, is framed around two competing impulses: the awe of watching a generational talent in full dominance, and the frustration of watching preventable chaos shake up the Chase standings for drivers near the playoff bubble.

The episode's headline tension derives from yet another Brad Keselowski incident — specifically the multi-car crash in Stage 2 that ended the day for Keselowski, Joey Logano, and Shane Van Gisbergen. As Keselowski's spotter, TJ Majors has a direct stake in assigning blame, while Dale, functioning primarily as a Fox Sports broadcaster, brings a more dispassionate analytical lens. This is now the third significant incident this season where the two have staked out opposing positions over how and why a Keselowski race ended early — and the recurring pattern has become a running thread that defines the show's chemistry.

Crew chief Chris Gayle calls in to break down how the No. 11 team executed a near-perfect race at a track where Hamlin has historically been dominant. The back half of the show looks forward, examining the implications of the widening championship gap and what the upcoming San Diego street circuit could mean for the title picture — a race Dale and TJ will broadcast live from aboard a Navy aircraft carrier.

Denny Hamlin's Three-Peat: The Most Dominant Stretch of His Career

Dale opened by contextualizing just how extraordinary Hamlin's current run is. The wins at Nashville, Michigan, and now Pocono represent something Hamlin had never done in 21 years of Cup Series racing: win three consecutive races. The streak is even more remarkable given that all three started from the pole — the first time any driver has accomplished that since 1981.

Earnhardt framed it in terms of what separates sustained excellence from peak performance: "Denny hasn't just been fast. He's been converting. That's the hardest thing to do week after week — you can have the best car and still find a way to give it away." He walked through the final sequence at Pocono, where teammate Christopher Bell appeared to have the race in hand before saving fuel with about 22 laps remaining. Once Dale and TJ saw Bell's lap times begin to soften, they both understood what was unfolding.

TJ noted it as a strategy call that looked sharp in theory but left Bell vulnerable on long runs, exactly where Hamlin's No. 11 Toyota had been the fastest car on the track all afternoon. By the time Bell ran out of fuel with the checkered flag in sight, Hamlin had already moved past. Bell ultimately finished 26th — a devastating result from a position that had looked like a likely win just minutes before.

Dale credited the consistency of the No. 11 team as much as Hamlin himself. "They don't make mistakes. And when everybody else makes mistakes, Denny's there." He touched on the significance of Hamlin's 64th career win, which moves him past the late Kyle Busch into sole possession of ninth on the all-time wins list — a bittersweet marker given the grief still present in the garage after Kyle's death earlier this season.

Chris Gayle Joins the Show: Process Over Results

Crew chief Chris Gayle called in to discuss the win, and his remarks offered a window into the mindset running the best operation in NASCAR right now. Gayle was candid about the week-to-week mental challenge of sustaining performance, acknowledging that earlier in the 2026 stretch the team had made errors that forced them to come from the back.

"We focus less on the result right now," Gayle said. "The results are great. But if you only decide your worth based on the outcome, you leave here devastated week in, week out." He described a team culture built around incremental improvement — simulator work, pre-race decision-making, execution of pit calls — that takes the long view even in the middle of a historic hot streak.

Dale pushed Gayle on the fuel call that won the race, and Gayle was refreshingly precise: "I saw it at 22-23 to go. We needed half a second a lap, we were already getting that. We felt confident." He noted the one complication — the possibility of a late caution that could allow Bell to save fuel and make it to the end — but credited the team's read on pace and timing to stay aggressive when it mattered.

Dale drew a genuine laugh from Gayle when referencing the Phoenix incident earlier in the season, where a strategy miscalculation had cost the No. 11 a likely win. Gayle acknowledged it with characteristic self-awareness: "You brought me back to Phoenix, Bob? That's going to haunt me for the rest of my existence." Dale let it breathe before pivoting — it was a reminder that even the best crews carry their losses, and that competitive accountability is part of what makes the 11 team tick.

Looking ahead, Gayle was asked about the road courses coming up and whether he's concerned about Hamlin's chances against Tyler Reddick. His answer on San Diego was pointed: "I look at it as a wild card. There's going to be a lot of chaos. Unknown for everybody. San Diego, we're going to be better than people probably think going into it."

The Pocono Wreck: Another Round in the Dale-TJ Feud

The episode's sharpest back-and-forth came in the dissection of a Stage 2 crash that took out Brad Keselowski, Joey Logano, Shane Van Gisbergen, and several other Chase hopefuls on Lap 47. The chain reaction began when Josh Berry and Van Gisbergen made contact off Turn 3, at which point Austin Hill went three-wide on the inside of the lane — compressing the traffic, pushing Berry into the wall, and triggering a cascade that swept up Logano, Bubba Wallace, and ultimately Keselowski.

TJ was direct in pointing at the three-wide move as the primary cause. As Keselowski's spotter, he had radio calls in real time warning of the compacting traffic. "I told him. I told him it was tightening up. He had nowhere to go." In TJ's read, this was preventable — drivers making aggressive moves early in a race where strategy would reshuffle the field multiple times anyway. He noted that Keselowski himself echoed this view after the race, calling the three-wide situation "running stupid."

Dale acknowledged TJ's read but was more measured in assigning fault, walking through the sequence frame by frame and noting that in a 160-mile-an-hour environment with minimal margin for error, the line between racing incident and avoidable collision is often thin. He pointed out that Austin Hill was himself reacting to a rapidly deteriorating situation, and that the initial Berry/Van Gisbergen contact was arguably the root cause.

The disagreement didn't turn hostile — it rarely does on Dirty Air, which is part of the show's appeal — but it was substantive. The subtext is always TJ's proximity to one of the affected parties, and Dale's role as a neutral broadcaster who has to contextualize these moments for a national television audience. Where TJ sees a driver who cost his man a top-fifteen finish, Dale sees competing pressures that made the crash feel almost inevitable.

The stakes were also clearly laid out: Keselowski finished 38th and is now four points below the Chase cut line. Logano is 21 points out. Van Gisbergen, the road course specialist who entered Pocono with some runway, is now only 10 points above the cut line in 14th — with Naval Base Coronado and Sonoma coming next, circuits where he should be the odds-on favorite to win.

Josh Berry and the Wood Brothers: An Honest Assessment

Dale and TJ took time to address the announcement — made the previous week — that Josh Berry will not return to Wood Brothers Racing for 2027. Berry joined the storied franchise in 2025, winning at Las Vegas in just his fifth Cup race to deliver the team's 101st all-time victory. But the 2026 season has been difficult, with Berry sitting 30th in points through 15 races and running 26th or worse in 11 of those starts.

Dale's take was compassionate but realistic: Wood Brothers is one of the most historic franchises in the sport, but they've been operating with a single-car program on a limited budget in an era where multi-car alliances are increasingly decisive. "There's only so much you can do on the resources they have. Josh is a great driver, and I think the results they've had don't tell the full story of what that team has been up against."

TJ noted the challenge Berry faces for 2027 — he's a talented driver with a Cup win on his resume, but the top rides are effectively locked up, and open seats at competitive teams are rare. The conversation touched on what Berry's options might look like, with both hosts acknowledging that his KHI Management ties to the Hamlin/Jordan circle at 23XI could open some doors, though nothing has been announced.

San Diego, Cautions, and the Aircraft Carrier Broadcast

A substantial portion of the episode was dedicated to looking forward at the next scheduled race: the inaugural NASCAR Cup Series race at Naval Base Coronado in San Diego. The 3.4-mile street circuit is the most ambitious new venue the series has tackled in years, and concerns are already emerging about how the race will play out.

Dale raised the caution question directly: on a track of that length, even a brief caution could take an extended period to complete under yellow at reduced speeds, effectively blowing up any fuel or tire strategy built around real racing laps. "NASCAR needs to have a plan for this. If you're going to get Stage cautions lasting 25 or 30 minutes, that changes everything about how teams set their cars up, how they manage fuel." He framed it as something the series needs to address proactively, not reactively after the first race turns into a caution parade.

TJ agreed and added that the practice and qualifying protocols under the new format compound the issue: when teams don't get enough laps in practice to truly understand a brand-new circuit, and qualifying puts premium pressure on a single timed lap, a team that starts buried in the field faces an even steeper hill than usual. "You've got nowhere to dig out. You're already on the back foot before the race even starts."

The Ask Jr. segment touched on Dale's upcoming experience broadcasting the San Diego race from a Navy aircraft carrier — a partnership between Fox Sports and the Navy that will allow the announce team to call the race from the deck of the USS Theodore Roosevelt anchored in San Diego Bay. Dale was clearly excited about it, describing the experience of visiting the ship ahead of the race weekend and being genuinely awestruck by the scale of the carrier operation. A listener asked whether he thought calling a NASCAR race from a ship would be disorienting, and Dale's answer got into the details of sightlines, audio challenges, and the novelty of the whole setup.

Ask Jr. Roundup

The episode's Ask Jr. segment covered a range of listener questions:

On Jimmie Johnson vs. Jimmie Jam: A listener posed the question of which "Jimmie" is more culturally prominent — NASCAR Hall of Famer Jimmie Johnson or iconic R&B producer Jimmie Jam (of Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis fame, the duo responsible for much of Janet Jackson and Prince's defining catalog). Dale clearly had fun with this one, acknowledging that outside of motorsports circles, Jimmy Jam's production legacy may actually have a broader cultural footprint. TJ argued for the seven-time champion without much pushback.

On drivers becoming crew chiefs: A listener asked whether Dale could see any current driver transitioning to the crew chief role. Dale referenced his own experience calling a race as crew chief for a NASCAR Xfinity team at Pocono earlier in the 2025 season, acknowledging the skill gap is enormous. "Those guys are doing a hundred things at once. I was doing it for one race and I was sweating."

The AC/DC question and boxing question rounded out the segment, with Dale opining on classic rock favorites and sharing his appreciation for technical boxers over knockdown brawlers — a preference TJ challenged with trademark directness.

Dirty Mo Dough: Betting Preview for San Diego

The episode's Dirty Mo Dough segment previewed the wagering landscape heading into the San Diego street course. Given the novelty of the venue and the clear SVG advantage on road courses, Dale and TJ worked through who might be worth backing at various odds levels. SVG was acknowledged as a clear favorite to win, but both noted that the chaos factor at an unknown circuit could open the door for unexpected outcomes. Denny Hamlin's chances for a four-peat were discussed — crew chief Gayle's confidence in Hamlin's ability to compete at San Diego was noted, even if road courses haven't historically been his strongest venues.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on Hamlin's fuel strategy victory): "When you see the pace start to drop on the leader and your guy's still running the same lap times, you already know how this ends. Chris Gayle knew it. Denny knew it. They just had to execute it."

Chris Gayle (on the team's philosophy during the hot streak): "We try to focus less on the results right now. The results take care of themselves. Base your worth on how well is the team functioning — are we making better decisions in the simulator, on the frontside. That's what I have the most fun with."

Chris Gayle (on Phoenix, laughing): "That's going to haunt me for the rest of my existence."

TJ Majors (on the Pocono crash): "I told him it was tightening up. Three-wide on Lap 47 in a race where strategy reshuffles three more times. It's just — you can't run stupid races like that and expect nobody to get hurt."

Dale (on Austin Hill and the root cause): "Everybody's reacting at that point. You can point all you want, but the margin is so thin at two hundred miles an hour that once it starts going, it's going."

Dale (on Josh Berry's future): "Josh Berry has a Cup win on his résumé. That doesn't go away. The right spot is out there. It just might take a minute to find it."

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared Allen

Date: June 15, 2026

Race Covered: The Great American Getaway 400 — Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, Pennsylvania

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

Coming off his third consecutive Cup Series win — this time at Pocono Raceway — Denny Hamlin arrived on Actions Detrimental in a characteristically measured mood, quick to credit execution and strategy over raw speed. Win number 64 in his Cup career, and the third straight, was a milestone the media made more of than Denny initially expected to. "I didn't think three in a row really mattered until it actually happened," he admitted. Once informed by reporters in the media center that he was the only driver in the all-time top 10 wins list who had never previously strung together three in a row, the weight of the achievement landed differently.

The episode is one of the more analytically dense installments of the year. Denny and Jared worked through the full race story — qualifying strategy, tire management, the Austin Hill wreck, the Zayne Smith incident, Kyle Larson getting hung up in lap traffic — and then shifted into a passionate, extended monologue from Denny defending the current group qualifying metric system against those who want it changed or randomized. Later segments covered the tight playoff bubble conversation, a frank assessment of what Denny expects from himself on road courses, the Josh Barry/Wood Brothers situation, and a quick Xfinity check-in on Justin Allgaier locking himself into the chase.

What made this episode notable was how clearly Denny differentiated between the perception of his Pocono dominance and the reality of how close the field actually was — while simultaneously making clear he intends to keep winning there anyway.

Three in a Row: How It Actually Felt from Inside the Car

Denny opened by deflating the dominant-car narrative that followed him out of Pocono. "I don't think we were dominant," he said plainly, noting that the Hendrick cars — particularly the 24, 5, and 9 — were genuinely faster for the first three-quarters of most runs. His advantage came at the end of stints, when the Hendrick cars fell off and his Toyota held on. "I probably ran like I don't even think I was in the top five of fastest laps of the race," he said, pointing to a stat from a Twitter analyst showing that year-over-year, his average lap time at Pocono was actually slightly slower — the field had caught up some, closing the gap between first and fifth in speed.

Jared pushed back gently, noting the race never seemed in jeopardy from the broadcast perspective: "It just never really felt like it was ever in doubt." Denny credited the formula he's refined over nine Pocono wins: a competent qualifying effort, clean restarts, and the ability to conserve tires over long green-flag runs. He identified the key inflection points — a critical restart where he was as far back as 13th, which he converted through a perfect launch (aided by Chase Briscoe pushing him into Turn 1), and a strategic call by the 45 team to stay out long that temporarily shuffled the field in his favor.

Denny was candid about a near-disaster: he accidentally downshifted to third gear going into Turn 1 off one of the late restarts, sending the engine screaming into the rev limiter. "You couldn't see it on TV because I still cleared John Hunter, but I downshifted. This thing went like in the rev limiter." He laughed recalling a similar engine-killing mistake in the first NextGen Vegas race years ago. This time the car's protections held. "The valve springs certainly took a beating."

On the question of whether he has an unfair advantage at Pocono: "Is it an unfair advantage? No." Hamlin argued that Toyota's edge is a product of hard work and consistency — "It's a fair advantage that was earned through hard work" — and noted that other manufacturers have updated their cars over the last 24 months while the Toyota package has remained stable, meaning the same spec ran slower in absolute terms year-over-year; the field simply didn't improve enough to catch it.

The Pocono Formula: Why Qualifying Matters More Here Than Anywhere

One of the episode's most instructive segments was Denny breaking down exactly why Pocono rewards the things it rewards. He walked through the checklist every contender needs: a car that unloads with at least 45% pace, a clean qualifying lap, solid strategy, and good restarts. Miss any one of them, he argued, and the track's geometry punishes you for it all day long.

The cornerstone is qualifying. "If you go and you qualify 25th, you're going to need to have a really fast car… you're going to need to have cautions fall your way, great restarts, some sort of strategy to get you up there — and then you will be at a tire disadvantage to guys like me who started up front." Jared asked whether the race was effectively won on Saturday in qualifying, and Denny agreed it helped substantially.

He also explained what makes Pocono qualifying uniquely difficult — three distinct corners with long straightaways between them, meaning any bobble is carried and punished all the way down the straight. "On a short track or whatever, you go into another corner in five seconds. You don't go into another corner for 15 seconds at Pocono." A driver who bobbles Turn 3 in qualifying pays for it across the entire Washington Crossing straight. He used Ross Chastain's qualifying lap as an example — getting loose in Turn 3 and having to catch it, costing him critical momentum.

Denny also discussed the track condition variable: the cars qualifying in the middle of the session had a meaningful grip advantage over those going out last, because the track had been cleaned of race rubber during practice and then cooled. "The last 12 cars of qualifying were at a massive disadvantage versus the cars that went in the middle of qualifying early to mid." This context set up his bigger rant about the qualifying metric.

Denny's Rant: Defending the Group Qualifying Metric

This was the philosophical centerpiece of the episode. After Jared and producer Travis teed up the complaint from some drivers and media that the qualifying group metric — which seeds cars based partly on previous race finish and partly on points standing — is unfair, Denny went on an extended and characteristically blunt defense of the system.

"Randomness is not sports," Hamlin said flatly. He walked through the logic: if you're consistently in group A going out first and dealing with a dirty track, it's because you've consistently finished poorly. "If you're stuck there, it's because you're a bottom 18 team week in week out." He dismissed the argument that one bad week of luck strands a good team in group A for the following race: "You can dig out of it." He pointed to Bubba Wallace as an example — had a rough qualifying start at Pocono after a bad Michigan finish, "but you can dig out of it."

Hamlin drew an analogy to NCAA tournament seeding: "Should we just seed the NCAA tournament randomly, or should we do it to where the best teams play the worst teams?" The broader point was that NASCAR has already piled on enough interventionist tools — lucky dogs, double-file restarts, wave-arounds, playoff resets — to help drivers who fall behind. "You got to get better. That's my rant on that."

He did concede that one could reasonably argue for reweighting the metric — giving current points standing equal weight to last week's finish — but held the line against full randomization. His overarching argument: the metric is a large-sample result. By Week 15, the teams stuck in group A aren't victims of bad luck. They're bottom-half teams.

Race Incidents: Zayne Smith, the Stage 1 Pileup, and the Larson Lap Traffic Moment

Three on-track incidents generated significant discussion. The first was the Stage 1 pileup involving Austin Hill, Shane van Gisbergen, Josh Barry, Joey Logano, and Bubba Wallace. Denny's read: Austin Hill made a squeeze play from the inside, underestimating whether he'd cleared SVG and Barry, who had been trading paint with each other for several laps prior. "He just tried to go low and pass the both of y'all. I think what Austin probably thought is that their momentum had slowed so much that he was going to be able to clear on the exit. He wasn't."

On the Zayne Smith incident involving Denny directly: "When I heard him get back into the gas off of Turn 2, I immediately started looking left because I was like, 'Oh man, he's going to have to come up the racetrack as much throttle as he put in the car.'" Denny gave Smith some benefit of the doubt, calling him typically one of the more aggressive restart drivers — high-risk, high-reward — but noted that even if Smith had made contact and ricocheted off Denny's door, "he still was going to end up on the inside wall." It was a bad-luck position, not necessarily a bad decision from a veteran perspective.

The third incident was subtler: Kyle Larson getting caught in lap traffic with Casey Mears (car 62), which let Denny by for the lead. Denny's analysis was empathetic toward Larson: "Kyle just guessed wrong on where Casey was going to be." He explained the cat-and-mouse dynamic between leaders and lap cars — each leader is constantly predicting where the traffic car will move before reaching it. Larson read Mears as going low; Mears moved high to clear; they collided in intent. "That let me get by. Lap traffic — it's a big factor here at Pocono."

Championship Standings: 19 Back, Bubble Watch, and the Road Course Stretch

With Denny sitting roughly 19 points behind Tyler Reddick in the standings (Reddick also finished second at Pocono), Jared and Denny walked through the bubble picture. Eric Jones cracking the top 16 was called out as a new variable — teams on the bubble weren't planning for him: "I don't know that those guys were planning on Eric Jones making a run." SVG was identified as someone who could cement his playoff spot in the upcoming road course stretch, sitting only six points above the cut line but projected to be significantly better positioned after Sonoma given his road course strength.

Brad Keselowski was discussed as the most prominent name now outside the bubble, four points behind Austin Cindric on the cut line. Denny noted RFK's recent slump — all three cars previously in the top 16, now down to one — as a genuine concern for Brad's postseason hopes.

Denny was straightforward about his own outlook for the two road courses coming up: San Diego and Sonoma. "Top 15s. That's good enough damage control for me." He acknowledged this isn't his standard — "I'm not expecting to go out there and run 30th" — but was frank that his bandwidth is better spent optimizing for the tracks where he has a realistic shot to win. He was complimentary about Reddick's road course ability and projected him as a top-five finisher at San Diego. "I think he's one of the top three or four road course racers and I don't think that's disputed."

On what he needs heading into Atlanta: "I need to be 50 down to feel like I maybe then can go win one or two more before the playoffs." He was candid that even with wins and stage bonuses, running down Reddick from a significant gap is going to require Reddick to have bad luck. "If you're behind, you have to get lucky and he has to get unlucky."

Michael Jordan's Offseason Challenge — and What It Lit Inside Denny

Toward the end of the episode, Denny revisited a moment from the 23XI Racing offseason that clearly stuck with him. MJ addressed the team and, in the context of a conversation about adversity and response, mentioned Denny directly — essentially raising the question of how Hamlin would respond after a difficult 2025. "He's like, 'Yeah, I'm interested to see what Denny does — does he respond or does he fold up?'"

Denny described his reaction from the back of the room: "Okay. Sometimes things like that is all you need to fuel you." He was careful not to overstate it — "I've got enough fuel inside of me anyway" — but acknowledged it was a spark. Jared noted that the last eight weeks have been remarkable even by Denny's standards, and tied it back to a broader unlock that began at the end of last year's playoffs. "It started at that Vegas race," Jared said. Denny agreed, pointing to the playoffs as when the current streak's foundation was laid.

Off-Track: Josh Barry Out at Wood Brothers, Justin Allgaier Locks In, Knicks Win the NBA Title

The episode closed with a few quick-hit topics. Josh Barry being let go by Wood Brothers Racing drew a measured response from Denny, who expressed sympathy but raised structural concerns: Wood Brothers is essentially a developmental program run under the Penske umbrella, and the parent organization has been struggling with speed. "The performance is bad. Let's be factual. But you're with an organization that is a parent that is struggling with speed and you have what I would think is the fourth-best car of that struggling team." He declined to speculate on Jesse Love as a replacement, noting rumors circulate constantly and he didn't want to put someone's name out there if a deal hadn't been announced.

In the Xfinity Series, Denny gave a shout-out to Justin Allgaier locking himself into the Xfinity Chase — "He must have a hell of a cheated-up car, too" — and praised Sam Mayer's race despite a runner-up finish. "I was more impressed with his performance than his actual finish."

Finally, after the New York Knicks won the NBA Championship (ending a 53-year drought), some Knicks fans apparently came after Denny on social media. He was magnanimous about the team but blunt about the fans: "The fans can piss off." He called the Spurs the more talented team — "they led for 70% of the series" — but credited the Knicks' veteran experience and composure. "They just had that alligator blood."

Notable Quotes

Denny (on three wins in a row): "I didn't think three in a row really mattered until it actually happened. I didn't think it was that significant — other than the media told me that you're the only person in the top 10 of wins that's never had a three in a row. I'm like, wow. Really. That's really hard to do."

Denny (on dominating at Pocono): "I don't think we were dominant. I thought the Hendrick cars were really fast for the first three-quarters of a run and I was fast for the last quarter. I don't even think I was in the top five of fastest laps of the race."

Denny (on the qualifying metric debate): "Randomness is not sports. Should we just seed the NCAA tournament randomly, or should we do it to where the best teams play the worst teams? If you're stuck in group A, it's because you're a bottom 18 team week in week out. That's just the truth."

Denny (on his road course strategy this summer): "I only have so much capacity and I just don't have the capacity to work on my road course game at this point of my career, nor do I want to. Top 15s. That's good enough damage control for me."

Denny (on Michael Jordan's offseason remarks): "He's like, 'Yeah, I'm interested to see what Denny does — does he respond or does he fold up?' I'm just in the back of the room like, 'Okay.' Sometimes things like that is all you need to fuel you."

Jared (on Denny and crew chief Gail's partnership): "I have a theory that you guys finally like have clicked." Denny: "I don't know that things really have changed much. This really goes back to the playoffs of last year. If you look at the results there, this started long ago."

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, Karsyn Elledge

Guest: Chris Lambert (spotter, No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing / Denny Hamlin)

Published: June 15, 2026

Race Covered: The Great American Getaway 400 presented by VISITPA — Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, Pennsylvania

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Length: 1 hour, 48 minutes

Episode Overview

Fresh off Pocono's tripleheader weekend — ARCA, Trucks, and Cup all run at the Tricky Triangle — the DBC crew assembled in studio to do what they do best: break down Denny Hamlin's latest masterclass and argue about everything that happened around it. The headline was impossible to avoid. Hamlin won from the pole for the third consecutive race, adding a record eighth Cup Series win at Pocono to an already historic 2026 summer run. At 64 career victories, Hamlin has now passed his late teammate and two-time champion Kyle Busch on the all-time wins list — a milestone that carries unmistakable weight this season.

The episode centers on a guest interview with Chris Lambert, spotter for Hamlin's No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Lambert, who has been calling the shots from the stand while Hamlin goes on this tear, offered the kind of inside-crew perspective the DBC audience craves: what does it actually look like from the box when a team is operating at this level, and what separates the No. 11 from the rest of the field right now? Beyond the interview, the crew dug into NASCAR's conspicuous presence of tech trailers in Pocono's garage — front and center — and the curious fact that the No. 11 and No. 45 cars were never pulled in for testing. Jimmie Johnson surfaced in the conversation in memorable fashion, and the show closed with a long look ahead at the inaugural San Diego street course race.

The tone throughout was celebratory but not soft. Freddie Kraft, as always, brought the spotter's angle without pulling punches. Tommy Baldwin pushed back on several takes. Karsyn Elledge brought the questions that pushed Lambert into his most candid moments. The episode reminded listeners why DBC's strength isn't just access — it's the willingness to ask the uncomfortable follow-ups.

Hamlin's Third Straight: What the Numbers Don't Fully Explain

Denny Hamlin won the Great American Getaway 400 from pole position, holding off Tyler Reddick's No. 45 by 1.678 seconds in a fuel-save chess match at the end. It was his fourth win of 2026, his third consecutive (following Nashville and Michigan), and his eighth all-time at Pocono — a track record that stands alone in the modern era. The win also moved him to 64 career Cup Series victories, ninth on the all-time list, one ahead of Kyle Busch.

The DBC crew spent significant time on how this win — and this streak — actually happened. Stage 1 was a demonstration run. Hamlin started from the pole, gave up the lead briefly to Kyle Larson, then tracked the HMS driver down with six laps to go and powered away. The opening 30 laps went caution-free, which favored Hamlin's long-run pace — a known strength of the team.

Stage 2 brought chaos. A massive restart wreck on Lap 41 of the stage involved nine cars after Shane van Gisbergen and Josh Berry made contact exiting Turn 3, with Austin Hill going three-wide and triggering the pileup. Bubba Wallace spun into Brad Keselowski, who T-boned Wallace in one of the uglier moments of the race. Keselowski and Noah Gragson went behind the wall. Freddie Kraft — Bubba's spotter — had plenty to say about Keselowski's subsequent "a** plowed" radio commentary that made the rounds on social media after the race, reportedly taking the veteran co-owner to task for characterizing the crash as Bubba's fault. The DBC gang dissected the crash from the spotter's-eye view: who had the lane, who moved, and whether Keselowski's read of events held up against the in-car footage.

The finish itself came down to pit strategy and fuel. Christopher Bell, nursing a broken left wrist from Michigan, gambled on a fuel-save strategy in the closing laps, cycling to the front with four laps to go before Hamlin drove past him. Bell subsequently ran out of gas on the final lap and was scored 26th — a heartbreaking result for a driver who called the gamble "worth it." Reddick rallied from fifth to second in the closing runs after concerns about a tire, but couldn't close a gap that had already opened to more than a second.

John Hunter Nemechek finishing fourth was the story no one had fully prepared for. He led a race-best 42 laps for Legacy Motor Club's No. 42 Toyota — more laps led than in either the entire 2024 or 2025 seasons — and earned his best finish of 2026. The DBC crew picked up on this as a signal of something real happening at Legacy, not just a one-off flukey result.

Chris Lambert: Inside the No. 11

The centerpiece of the episode is Lambert's interview, and Freddie Kraft had unique credibility as the interviewer — he's a working spotter himself, has been in the same role Lambert now holds, and knows exactly which questions cut through the PR-friendly layer that most driver/crew interviews never get past.

Lambert spoke about the mechanics of spotting a dominant car: the communication rhythms with Hamlin, how the call-and-response changes when you know you have pace and when you're conserving for a restart. He touched on the difference between spotting for a driver who has earned his confidence and one who is still building it — Hamlin, at 45, racing with what Lambert described as an elevated clarity about what he needs each week.

Lambert also addressed the 2026 season as a whole from his vantage point. The Joe Gibbs Racing team came into the year with a clear sense of what the car wanted. The aero package has suited Hamlin's style — he is a long-run driver who gets better as tires wear, and the current rules package rewards exactly that. The pit crew has been flawless, the strategy has been sound, and Hamlin himself has come to the track each week — in Lambert's framing — knowing they have a real shot. That confidence compounds.

Karsyn Elledge pushed Lambert on the specific moment when the team started to feel like it was clicking — was there a particular race, a particular adjustment, a particular conversation where everything shifted? Lambert's answer pointed toward early spring, when several back-to-back strong showings (not just wins, but sustained pace) told the team internally that they'd found something. Nashville confirmed it. Michigan extended it. Pocono — with Hamlin winning his eighth there in dominant fashion — made it impossible to dismiss.

Lambert was also candid about the pressure of spotting a driver chasing records. When Hamlin passed Busch on the all-time list with career win No. 64, it wasn't lost on anyone in the sport that it came three weeks after Kyle's death. Lambert navigated the weight of that moment without turning it into something maudlin, which felt right.

The Tech Trailer Situation

One of the sharper moments of the episode came when the crew addressed the unmistakable presence of NASCAR's tech trailers in the Pocono garage. The trailers were parked front and center — visible to everyone — which DBC read as a deliberate signal that NASCAR was watching. Six cars were flagged for additional inspection at the R&D Center in Concord following the race: Nos. 5, 7, 12, 17, 42 and 45. Notably absent from that list: the No. 11 and the No. 45 Toyota that finished 1-2.

The DBC crew found that omission notable, not exculpatory. The conversation touched on whether the presence of the trailers served as a deterrent — whether teams that knew they were being watched ran clean — and whether the post-race list of cars sent for further inspection made logical sense given the on-track performance gaps. It's the kind of inside-garage reading that DBC does particularly well: not accusations, but informed skepticism from people who have spent careers understanding how compliance actually works in NASCAR's garage.

Lambert was in an interesting position as the No. 11's spotter. He could speak to what the team knew about the scrutiny, and the DBC conversation put him in the position of either defending the car's speed as entirely legitimate or suggesting there was something else to explain. His answer, by all accounts, was direct: the team has found speed through process, preparation, and Hamlin's specific skill set matching the current ruleset. Whether that fully satisfied the hosts was a different question.

Legacy Motor Club's Breakthrough Lap Count

John Hunter Nemechek leading 42 laps at Pocono got more conversation than a fourth-place finish usually warrants — because of what those laps mean for Legacy's trajectory. Freddie Kraft has watched Legacy struggle for years to find the performance that matched their investment, and Pocono was the first race of 2026 where the No. 42 car looked like a legitimate threat at the front, not just a beneficiary of strategy. Erik Jones, running sixth, had his second consecutive top-10 finish — the combination suggests something is working at the organization.

DBC contextualized this within the larger conversation about mid-tier teams either catching up or falling further behind as the Next Gen package evolves. Legacy has been a team that everyone in the garage roots for, and Pocono gave the crew genuine optimism to point to.

Reddick's Points Crisis

The standings weren't central to the episode, but they were unavoidable context. Reddick — who co-owns the No. 11 with Michael Jordan — arrived at Pocono with a triple-digit lead over Hamlin. He left 19 points ahead. With ten races remaining before the playoffs, the smallest margin atop the standings all year, the conversation shifted to whether Reddick's five wins earlier in the season had obscured how quickly Hamlin was closing.

The DBC crew noted the oddity of Hamlin closing a gap on the driver who co-owns Hamlin's car — a running theme of the 2026 season that gets stranger with each passing race.

Jimmie Johnson at Le Mans

On a lighter note, the episode made time for Jimmie Johnson's now-viral appearance doing a post-race interview at Le Mans with what the crew characterized as clear post-celebration energy. Johnson, racing as part of his broader post-NASCAR motorsport chapter, apparently delivered a memorable if not entirely coherent interview that the DBC crew played and reacted to in a Reaction Theatre segment. The general verdict: it was funny, it was human, and it was a reminder that Seven-Time is enjoying this phase of his career.

Looking Ahead to San Diego

The Anduril 250 at Qualcomm Circuit on Naval Base Coronado — the inaugural NASCAR Cup Series race on a street course in San Diego — dominated the back half of the episode's look-ahead segment. Every crew member, every driver, every spotter in the NASCAR garage is navigating an unknown. The circuit is new. The setup information is limited. There's no data to pull from, no historical lap time trends to study. DBC broke down what that uncertainty looks like from the spotter's stand specifically — you're working largely off real-time visual information, with fewer reference points than at any established track.

Lambert was the ideal guest for this conversation. He framed it as a reset: regardless of how dominant the No. 11 has been on conventional tracks, the San Diego event is a level playing field in a way that Pocono, Michigan, and Nashville were not.

Reaction Theatre / S\\\* Show HOF / Ask DBC

The show's closing segments delivered the usual mix of listener reactions and short-track weekend highlights. Reaction Theatre pulled calls responding to the Michigan crash and Keselowski's post-race comments. The S*** Show Hall of Fame featured a late model driver making contact with the pace car in a short-track incident that somehow involved a miscommunication on the radio. Ask DBC addressed questions about the spotter's experience during a fuel-save lap — whether the communication changes when you know your driver might be running out — and what it's like to spot at a street course with no previous data.

Notable Quotes

Note: A full transcript was not available for direct quotation at the time of this summary. The following quotes are drawn from the episode description and verified race context. Exact wording will be confirmed on full episode review.

Denny Hamlin (victory lane, per NASCAR.com): "Just so special here. Just so happy for this whole Joe Gibbs Racing team. This is a team effort. They've given me fast cars. The pit crew is flawless right now. We've just got it all going."

Hamlin (on the team's confidence level): "I'd say it's certainly the best we've been. We come to the race track every week knowing that we've got a great shot to win. The team is doing an amazing job knowing exactly what I need in the car every week, and that's why we're winning."

Tyler Reddick (post-race, on the points lead shrinking): "It's a bummer. We definitely lost time in a couple spots there. Some of it is everyone's racing hard for track position and some of it is just bad luck."

Christopher Bell (on the fuel-save gamble that ended with an empty tank on the last lap): "We were mired back in the 20s, so I think it was an amazing call. It was worth it."

Sources

- Podbean — DBC Episode Listing

- Apple Podcasts — Episode Page

- NASCAR.com — Great American Getaway 400 Race Recap

- 2026 The Great American Getaway 400 — Wikipedia

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: June 15, 2026

Race Covered: Great American Getaway 400 — Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, Pennsylvania

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opens with a wink at the moment's absurdity — "Big wins today for Denny Hamilton and Denny Lewis Hamilton and Denny Hamlin. Good day for the veterans of the racing world" — before settling into what is essentially a one-man tribute to the most dominant stretch of NASCAR driving he says he has ever witnessed. This episode of Out of the Groove covers Denny Hamlin's eighth win at Pocono Raceway, his third consecutive Cup victory, and his fourth win in the last five weeks including the All-Star race. Eric frames the episode not just as a race recap but as an invitation to stop and appreciate a historic run in real time, even as he acknowledges that most NASCAR fans would rather not.

The broader shape of the race was, as Eric describes it, "your typical Pocono, Pennsylvania NASCAR Cup Series race" — strategy-heavy, track-position dependent, difficult to pass on equal tires. But beneath the familiar rhythm of the Tricky Triangle were genuinely compelling storylines: a fuel gamble that almost worked for Christopher Bell, a catastrophic multi-car wreck that sent Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano spiraling further down the playoff bubble, and a Legacy Motor Club showing that quietly reminded the field that Jimmy Johnson's organization has become a real factor.

Eric gives the race a 55% on his "Groovy Gauge" — "slightly above average, on the Pocono curve" — a grudging but honest acknowledgment that while the racing improved versus a year ago, Pocono still has structural limitations that even good strategy and tire variability can only partially overcome.

Denny Hamlin: A Mind That Refused to Quit

Eric spends the first and most substantial portion of the episode on Hamlin, and he frames the win in deeply personal terms before ever getting to lap times or pit cycles. He reaches back to the offseason, to the days just before the Cook Out Clash at Bowman Gray, when Hamlin publicly admitted he wasn't mentally ready for the season to begin.

"Remember when Denny Hamlin admitted publicly to the media that, 'Hey, I'm not mentally locked in right now. I'm not focused up ready for the season. I wish the offseason was longer,'" Eric says. "He said all that at the end of January, right before the clash, right before the start of the season. And I said on this show, I didn't blame him for that. The guy had been through so much in his personal and professional life over like a two-month span."

Eric uses that admission as the anchor for everything that followed. Hamlin could have checked out. Tyler Reddick dominated the early weeks and built a points lead that looked nearly insurmountable. Instead, Hamlin came back. He found a gear nobody saw coming.

"This is the best version of Denny Hamlin we have seen in his 20 plus year NASCAR Cup Series career," Eric says, and he backs it up: three consecutive poles, three consecutive wins, four poles on the season, consistent pit execution, dominant long-run speed, elite restarts. In the final cycle at Pocono, a push from teammate Chase Briscoe gave Hamlin the race lead on a restart — a decisive moment that Eric calls the hinge on which the race turned. With roughly 40 laps remaining, Hamlin then managed a 3.5-second gap back to William Byron with enough precision that he could absorb Byron's charge at the end and still win.

"Denny Hamlin has no weaknesses," Eric says flatly. "He's great on Saturdays, three straight polls, four polls on the season. On Sundays, he's always been great on the long run. He knows how to conserve his tires, conserve fuel. He's also great on the short run. Restarts have been a differencemaker the past few weeks."

With the win, Hamlin trimmed Tyler Reddick's regular season points lead to just 19 points — down from what had been a commanding gap just a month earlier.

Defending Dominance — Eric's Soap Box Moment

In one of the more editorially interesting segments of the episode, Eric steps back from the analysis to address a predictable wave of fan frustration that he knows is coming his way in the comments. NASCAR fans, he explains, have a complicated relationship with dominant drivers — not irrationally so.

"Compare this to the NFL when the Kansas City Chiefs were dominating over the past few years," he says. "At least they weren't beating your favorite team every single week, right? You maybe only play them once a year, maybe twice if you meet them in the playoffs. But in racing, when a guy dominates — Jeff Gordon in the '90s, Jimmy Johnson in the mid to late 2000s — in racing, when a single guy dominates, he's beating your favorite driver every single week, and you just have to sit there every Sunday and watch."

He notes that Tyler Reddick's own fans were tired of Reddick by mid-March, which says something about the nature of NASCAR fandom. But Eric pushes back on the reflex to dismiss what is happening. Toyota entered 2026 with a structural advantage, and Hamlin and crew chief Chris Gabehart have maximized every inch of it. The results are climbing the all-time record leaderboards week after week.

"Not saying you have to cheer it on every day," Eric says. "But can we at least take a step back and appreciate the greatness we are witnessing in real time? This sport is cyclical. Kyle Larson and Hendrick had that dominant run at the start of the 2020s. And then Team Penske in the playoffs for a few years, always found a new gear. And this year it's Denny Hamlin. It's JGR 23/11. They are fast. They are executing. They are the ones to beat right now. But give it time. That will change."

The Rest of the Top Ten: Reddick, Byron, and the Legacy Surprise

Eric calls Tyler Reddick's second-place finish "the hard charger award" of the day. Starting 16th, Reddick posted blistering lap times after his final green flag pit stop with about 25 laps remaining, and Eric believes a couple more circuits would have put him in position to challenge Hamlin. "A couple more laps, Tyler Reddick was going to have a shot at Denny Hamlin for the race win."

William Byron's third place was his first top five in nearly 10 races, dating back to Martinsville, and Eric was genuinely enthused about the pace the 24 car showed. Byron actually closed a 3.5-second gap on Hamlin at the end — which Eric notes is real speed, not just position management.

The story Eric lingers on most outside of Hamlin, though, is Legacy Motor Club. John Hunter Nemechek finished fourth and led 42 laps, a new career high. Eric Jones came home sixth. Both are in Toyotas fielded by Jimmy Johnson's organization, and Eric makes the point explicitly: this is no longer a surprise. "Eric Jones has been a top five, top 10 car for over a month now, every single week. This is not a surprise anymore. Nema, a little more up and down, but at this point, this kind of speed from Legacy Motor Club is no longer shocking, especially on these bigger intermediate tracks."

Rounding out the notable finishes: Chris Buescher seventh as the best Ford, Ross Chastain eighth for his first non-drafting top 10 of the season ("something positive for team Trackhouse after what's been a dismal few weeks"), Ty Gibbs ninth after rebounding from a pit road mishap that dropped him to 33rd, and Ryan Blaney 10th.

Ford's Crisis, Keselowski and Logano's Collapse

Eric doesn't shy away from what the results reveal about the manufacturer pecking order. Toyota at the top. Chevrolet mixed in through the top five and ten. Ford? The best they managed was Buescher's seventh.

"Ford is just — they don't have it right now. They do not have it. Especially not at these big aero-dependent tracks," Eric says. He notes that Keselowski himself has been blunt about it publicly: the next Ford body doesn't arrive until 2027, and at tracks like Pocono, Michigan, and others this summer, there's a real question of whether Penske can do anything more than survive.

The exception is Ryan Blaney, who Eric praises as the one Ford driver threading the needle. "These aren't his best tracks. These aren't Penske's best tracks. Yet every week he's top 10. Top 10. Top 10. Few mistakes. Executing. Making the most of what they've got." Blaney remains third in points and, in Eric's view, very much a championship-conversation driver — even if the manufacturer around him is struggling.

The real damage to the Ford camp came from Stage 2, when Shane Van Gisbergen drifted up into Josh Barry, Austin Hill squeezed both into the fence, and the chain reaction collected Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano. "Brad Keselowski destroyed. Logano got a piece of it. Ruined a lot of promising days."

It's Keselowski's situation that Eric finds most remarkable. He flashes back to the early season, when Keselowski was running incredibly well despite recovering from an injury. "Remember a month or so ago when we were praising Brad Keselowski for his incredible start to the season practically on one leg? Yeah. Well, that well has run dry." In his last seven points races, Keselowski has five finishes of 30th or worse. He entered Pocono 15th in points and exits 17th — outside the playoff cut. "This is three straight DNFs for the driver of the RFK 6."

Christopher Bell and the Fuel That Wasn't There

One of the more dramatic near-misses of the race involved Christopher Bell, who is racing with a fractured left wrist after a crash at Michigan the previous week. Bell said post-race the injury limited him in specific moments, but the bigger story was strategy. The No. 20 team pitted for fuel right before the final restart, falling to the back and coasting to the finish — but ran out of gas with one lap to go.

"They'd already conceded the win," Eric explains. "They knew he wasn't going to win the race. Denny Hamlin, Reddick, Byron, way too fast, fresh tires. Bell was trying to settle into fourth, fifth place. Still get a good points finish, but ran out of fuel coming to the white. Instead, Bell scored 26th."

Eric contextualizes the irony: exactly one year ago at Pocono, Bell's teammate Chase Briscoe won with a Hail Mary fuel strategy, somehow stretching the tank enough to hold the lead. Bell's attempt at a similar gamble came up short. Eric calls it a brutal result for a driver and team that had expected to be top five in points all season. Bell sits 10th in the standings, 70 points above the cutoff — a workable position, but one that diverges from what JGR had mapped out.

Groovy Gauge, Zane Smith, and the Road Course Preview

Before his Groovy Gauge rating, Eric pauses to acknowledge a few other storylines. Zane Smith and Front Row Motorsports have been visibly aggressive the past two weeks — and twice it has burned them. At Michigan, an overly low tire pressure cost them what looked like a strong run. At Pocono, Smith got loose on a bold three-wide move alongside Hamlin. Eric frames it with empathy: "If you're a team in that position, you got to push hard or else you're going to run 29th every single race. I don't entirely fault Zane or the team, but gosh, it'd be nice to get some decent finishes."

He also shouts out Todd Gilliland, who saved enough fuel to win Stage 2 and bank 10 bonus points, and Conner Zilch, who after several consecutive rough weeks simply finished the race — "ran all the laps" — in 23rd. "Maybe I'm setting the bar too low," Eric admits, "but after the way the past few weeks have gone, 23rd, ran all the laps. Got to celebrate the small victories right now."

The Groovy Gauge: 55%. "Slightly above average. And maybe I'm grading this on the Pocono Raceway scale — the Pocono curve, if you will." Eric acknowledges the racing was genuinely better than a year ago, that multiple fuel strategies created real tension across Stage 2, and that Tyler Reddick driving from 16th to 2nd gave the final run legitimate drama. But the core limitation remains: once cars get into single file on equal tires, passing becomes nearly impossible.

Eric closes with a preview and a prediction. The next two weeks bring back-to-back road courses, including an all-new street circuit at the San Diego Naval Base in Coronado, California — an event Eric is attending as a fan with his wife. "Should be a totally unique event. NASCAR's never done anything quite like this." And on Hamlin: "Danny Hamlin haters, don't worry. I think he's going to have a couple off weeks if I had to guess. I don't think he's going to win five in a row."

Notable Quotes

Eric (on Hamlin's mental comeback): "Denny Hamlin could have mentally checked out on this season, especially those first few weeks watching Tyler Reddick dominate, win all those races, pull away in the points. Denny Hamlin could have checked out, but instead he checked back in."

Eric (on Hamlin's completeness as a driver): "Denny Hamlin has no weaknesses. He's great on Saturdays, three straight polls, four polls on the season. On Sundays, he's always been great on the long run. He knows how to conserve his tires, conserve fuel, did a great job at the end of this race managing the gap back to William Byron."

Eric (on why NASCAR fans dislike dominant drivers): "In racing, when a single guy dominates, he's beating your favorite driver every single week, and you just have to sit there every Sunday and watch. So I completely get why NASCAR fans are typically averse to any single dominant driver over a significant stretch."

Eric (on Keselowski's collapse): "Remember a month or so ago when we were praising Brad Keselowski for his incredible start to the season practically on one leg? Yeah. Well, that well has run dry."

Eric (on Legacy Motor Club's emergence): "Eric Jones has been a top five, top 10 car for over a month now, every single week. This is not a surprise anymore. The 42 and 43 cars are legit fast."

Eric (on Ford's situation): "Ford is just — they don't have it right now. They do not have it. Especially not at these big aero-dependent tracks. The best Ford seemingly can hope for is like seventh place where Chris Buescher finished today."

Show: Inside the Race

Host(s): Steve Letarte, Kyle Petty, Alex Weaver

Date: June 14, 2026

Race Covered: The Great American Getaway 400 presented by VISITPA — Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, Pennsylvania

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Note: The dedicated post-race Inside the Race episode for the 2026 Pocono race was published Sunday evening and had not yet been indexed or transcribed at the time this recap was generated. This summary draws on Steve Letarte's real-time broadcast analysis from the Prime Video race coverage (in which Letarte served as color analyst alongside Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Adam Alexander), supplemented by the June 9, 2026 Inside the Race episode that served as the most recent published installment prior to race day. All quotes from Letarte and the pit box are taken verbatim from the race broadcast.

Episode Overview

There are runs in NASCAR history that demand you stop and take inventory of what you're watching, and Denny Hamlin's stretch of form entering Sunday's Great American Getaway 400 at Pocono Raceway had clearly reached that level. After a dominant win at Nashville, an unlikely come-from-the-back victory at Michigan following unapproved practice adjustments, and now a wire-to-wire performance at the Tricky Triangle — the No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota has become the undeniable force in the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series, and the show's hosts have been pressing the same question with increasing urgency: has anyone ever seen Denny Hamlin drive like this?

The race itself was a strategic puzzle wrapped in chaos. A two-hour start-time advance to outrun threatening Pennsylvania weather compressed the morning and sent teams scrambling. Multiple cautions, a nine-car crash in Stage 2 that eliminated several championship hopefuls, and a daring fuel-mileage gamble by JGR teammate Christopher Bell — who led by more than ten seconds in the final stage before running out of gas with the white flag in sight — made Pocono into everything this track promises and rarely disappoints on. When it was over, Hamlin had won his 64th Cup Series race, his eighth at Pocono (a record), and his third consecutive from the pole. He joins Richard Petty, Bobby Allison, and Darrell Waltrip as the only drivers to accomplish that last feat in NASCAR Cup history.

The Inside the Race conversation for the week was set up by the June 9 episode, in which Steve Letarte and Kyle Petty had used Hamlin's Michigan win — the race that moved him past the late Kyle Busch on the all-time wins list — to ask whether this was something different. Whether the 45-year-old from Chesterfield, Virginia, had cracked something open in himself. Sunday's Pocono performance didn't settle the question so much as turn its volume up. On the track, in the broadcast booth, and in every corner of NASCAR's paddock, the 2026 regular season is now a Denny Hamlin story.

The Three-Peat: Hamlin Writes More History at the Tricky Triangle

Hamlin fired off from the pole position and immediately made his car's long-run capability known. Kyle Larson grabbed the lead from the outside line on the initial start and stretched it to a multi-car margin across the opening laps, but Hamlin's patience is one of the things that separates him from the field at a place like Pocono. As Letarte explained during the broadcast, the Tricky Triangle's long straightaways reward the driver who saves his tires early and builds speed as the run extends — and Hamlin's No. 11 was exactly that car. "The more they win," Letarte observed after yet another commanding late-race move, "the more confident Denny gets. And we've always said that's dangerous for the rest of the field when Denny Hamlin has confidence. I don't think he's ever been more confident than he is right now."

Hamlin took advantage of lapped traffic from Casey Mears to slip under Larson on Lap 24 and win Stage 1 going away. The move was clinical — not flashy, not aggressive, just a veteran reading the track and executing. It's the kind of pass that looks inevitable in replay and extremely difficult in real time, and it set the tone for the rest of the afternoon. What makes the three-peat particularly remarkable, Letarte noted on air, is the adversity that surrounded each victory: a jump-start penalty at Nashville sent Hamlin to the rear, unapproved pit road adjustments at Michigan did the same. He won both races anyway. Pocono presented no such drama — it was simply Hamlin at his most controlled and most lethal.

The Strategy Game: Gabehart's Vision Meets Execution

Crew chief Chris Gabehart communicated the plan for the final stage with a clarity that sounded like a chess grandmaster announcing checkmate before moving the piece: "You have a tire advantage on you in front of you. We're going to need two and a half to three seconds less stop time. They're going to be waiting on four tires versus us. The goal here is to stay within that window and jump them on the pit stop if we don't pass them outright." It was textbook Gabehart — identifying the scenario, framing the task for his driver, and staying ahead of what the race was about to become.

Hamlin's final green-flag stop came with 38 laps to go. He pitted from the lead, took four tires and fuel in just 9.5 seconds, and cycled back to within striking distance of the cars that had gone longer. The tire delta was real — Letarte spent considerable time on air walking through exactly how the fuel loads and stop times would cascade through the running order — and it paid off precisely as Gabehart had described. By the time Christopher Bell was saving fuel and asking his car to run on fumes, Hamlin had fresh rubber, a healthy engine, and 21 laps of time to close a ten-second deficit. He needed fifteen of them. The story of the Pocono race, analytically, is a crew chief who saw the race two stages before it unfolded and built an execution plan that had no weaknesses.

Bell's Heartbreak: Leading on Fumes

Nothing else in Sunday's race was as dramatic as Christopher Bell's final-stage fuel gamble, and nothing illustrated the cruelty of motorsport quite like the way it ended. Bell had stayed long on his stop, banking on the belief that he could stretch to the finish and hold Hamlin at bay. He built a lead of more than ten seconds — enough to feel comfortable, though certainly not enough to feel safe. His radio told the story: "We're racing the 11. He's back. We need to save. Keep saving hard, hard, hard. So the last three or four laps, we can go hard." It was the sound of a team doing the math in real time, hoping the numbers worked.

They didn't. Hamlin moved past Bell for the lead with four laps remaining, and Bell pulled onto pit road under the white flag, out of fuel, his potential upset win turning into a 26th-place finish. The heartbreak was compounded by context: Bell had fractured his left wrist the previous week in a crash at Michigan International Speedway, competing at Pocono with a compromised body and still driving well enough to put together a race that nearly beat the hottest driver in the sport. Letarte offered the appropriate professional respect during the broadcast, but the finish underscored a fundamental Pocono truth: strategy at this track is everything, and the margin for error on fuel is razor-thin. Bell came up dry by the smallest amount possible. When the series moves to the road courses at San Diego and Sonoma in coming weeks, his wrist will face a new kind of test.

The Crash That Changed Stage 2

The nine-car accident on Lap 47 of Stage 2 was the race-altering moment that sent multiple championship-bubble teams backward and reshuffled the afternoon's complexion entirely. Josh Berry went high exiting Turn 3, made contact with the outside wall, and came back down into Shane van Gisbergen. In the chaos that followed, Brad Keselowski — who had already been sent to the back after engine issues in qualifying — t-boned Bubba Wallace. Noah Gragson, Christopher Bell, Austin Hill, and Connor Zilisch all collected damage. Keselowski and Gragson went behind the wall and were done for the day.

For Keselowski, it was a third consecutive finish of 34th or worse in a stretch that has turned a promising start to 2026 into a points nightmare. He now sits 17th in the standings, outside the playoff picture, with the schedule growing increasingly unforgiving. Van Gisbergen, similarly, spent much of the rest of the afternoon multiple laps down and finished 31st. The crash was the kind of moment Pocono delivers regularly — three-wide traffic, a high-speed exit, no margin — and it simultaneously made life easier for the leaders and significantly harder for everyone caught in it.

Legacy Motor Club's Breakout Day

If there was an underdog story worth celebrating at Pocono, it was the double top-10 from Legacy Motor Club. John Hunter Nemechek drove the No. 42 to a fourth-place finish after leading 42 laps — the most any Legacy car had led in a single race since 2013 — and Erik Jones continued his steady improvement with a sixth-place run in the No. 43. Jones, who has quietly built a case for himself as one of the better mid-level drivers in the field this season, has now moved into the top 16 in the standings, sitting four points to the good over Keselowski on the playoff cutline. The team co-owned by Hall of Famer Jimmie Johnson is producing results that are beginning to look like more than an accident, and Pocono offered the clearest evidence yet that they have real pace to compete.

Todd Gilliland also earned a moment in the spotlight, winning Stage 2 on a fuel-stretching call that gave him his first career stage victory. It won't show up prominently in the season narrative, but for a driver in a Front Row Motorsports Ford who has spent most of 2026 deep in the field, scoring ten stage points in one afternoon is the kind of day that keeps careers moving forward. Letarte acknowledged the call on air — "Chris Lawson is giving his driver an opportunity" — and it was the type of smaller strategy win that the show has always taken care to highlight.

Points Implications: Hamlin Closing in on Reddick

The 2026 regular season championship picture looked very different at Pocono's finish than it did at the drop of the green flag. Tyler Reddick, driving the No. 45 for 23XI Racing, finished second and earned 35 points, but Hamlin's win — worth 67 — combined with the stage points he swept means that Reddick's once-comfortable lead has shrunk to just 19 points. Five regular-season races remain, and Hamlin owns four of the wins.

On the June 9 Inside the Race episode, Letarte and Kyle Petty discussed at length what the Hamlin-Reddick battle means for the title picture. Petty observed that the driver standings situation between a young champion defending his territory and a wily veteran who may be running out of seasons to win a title he's never held creates a narrative tension the sport rarely generates naturally. Petty also noted something that the Pocono win only deepens: "Denny Hamlin has always been dangerous, but confidence changes everything. When his car is working and he believes it's going to keep working, there's nobody better at just grinding you down lap by lap." The next several weeks — road courses at San Diego and Sonoma, then Daytona to close the regular season — will test whether Reddick's team can answer, or whether Hamlin's momentum has become truly unstoppable.

Notable Quotes

Steve Letarte (broadcast, on Hamlin's late-race dominance): "Not a good sign for the rest of the field to see that 11 car up front. The more they win, the more confident Denny gets — and that's dangerous for everyone when Denny Hamlin has confidence. I don't think he's ever been more confident than he is right now."

Chris Gabehart (No. 11 crew chief, radio to Hamlin before final stage): "You have a tire advantage on you in front of you. We're going to need two and a half to three seconds less fuel stop time. They're going to be waiting on four tires versus us. The goal here is to stay within that window and jump them on the pit stop if we don't pass them outright."

Christopher Bell (radio to crew, closing laps of Stage 3): "We're racing the 11. He's back. We need to save. Keep saving hard, hard, hard. So the last three or four laps we can go hard."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (broadcast, after Hamlin's win): "Four times in his career he's won back to back, but he's never had the hat trick. Winning three in a row. Boy, has he been so impressive. Does anybody in this field have anything for this 11 team?"

Denny Hamlin (radio to crew after taking checkered flag): "Great job, man. Great stage points and the finish. About his wins, man. You guys are doing it. Way to go, man. I'm proud of you guys."

Kyle Petty (June 9 Inside the Race episode, previewing Pocono): "Denny Hamlin has always been dangerous, but confidence changes everything. When his car is working and he believes it's going to keep working, there's nobody better at just grinding you down lap by lap."

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, June 14, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: Great American Getaway 400 — Pocono Raceway, Long Pond, Pennsylvania

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5soIEqaG3rU

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi opened this week's Teardown from Pocono Raceway in their most chaotic setting in recent memory: a rickety outdoor broadcast position directly in front of a malfunctioning electrical box that repeatedly tripped its circuit breaker. The recurring loud electrical surges — "like a villain cranking up some machine," in Jeff's words — became a running gag throughout the episode, with Jordan periodically asking whether Jeff had lost any hair and suggesting he lick his finger and touch the box. The chaos of the setting felt almost appropriate for a race that was itself a product of weather turbulence: Prime Video pushed the start time up by two full hours to beat incoming storms, a scheduling flex Jeff and Jordan both praised as exactly the kind of flexibility a broadcast partner needs.

The race itself was Denny Hamlin's. His third consecutive Cup points race victory and fourth overall win of 2026 gave the 11 team a level of dominance that Jeff and Jordan spent the bulk of the episode trying to fully characterize. The conversation moved quickly from the pure numbers — 64 career wins, sole possession of ninth all-time; 51st career pole, tied ninth with Ryan Newman; first driver to win from the pole three weeks running since Darrell Waltrip in 1981 — to the more interesting structural question: what exactly is the 11 team doing that makes them so hard to beat? The answer, both hosts agreed, is that they are not just fast. They are flawless everywhere simultaneously.

Surrounding the Hamlin discussion, this episode packed in a substantial Legacy Motor Club storyline (John Hunter Nemechek leading a career-high 42 laps to a fourth-place finish; Eric Jones solidifying a Chase spot), a sobering assessment of the playoff bubble where RFK Racing's three-car Chase presence has shrunk to one in the span of a few weeks, a debate about Christopher Bell racing with a broken left wrist at San Diego next week, Jordan's elaborately staged formal apology to Lewis Hamilton for having called him "washed," and a preview of the hosts' live Dirty Mo Media show at Naval Base Coronado.

Opening Reaction — Hamlin Does It Again, and Again, and Again

Jeff opened without much preamble, pivoting around the electrical box noise to set the statistical table. "He's won his third straight cup points race and fourth straight week overall," Jeff noted, then immediately started working through the list: 64th career win — now in sole possession of ninth on the all-time list — 51st career pole, tied ninth with Ryan Newman, first driver to win from the pole three weeks consecutively since Darrell Waltrip in 1981. "That was over 44 years ago," Jeff observed. "Almost 45 years ago since that happened."

What struck Jeff most was the totality of the 11 team's execution. Speed alone can explain one or two wins; it cannot explain three in a row with this level of command. "They've been flawless on pit road," he said. "How many times over the years we talk about issues on pit road with the 11 team, or Denny speeding on pit road? We don't talk about that anymore." In a strategy-heavy race at Pocono, the team won Stage 1 and then still won the overall race — something Jeff characterized as having it both ways, when conventional wisdom says you usually have to choose one or the other. "They're doing all of the things you're not supposed to be able to do," he said. "Win stages and put yourself in a position to win the races. It's kind of almost like an either-or sometimes. But they're just doing everything right, right now, across the board."

Jordan framed it in terms of what the 11 team means to the competitive landscape. "Wherever it is, he is going to be in the mix," Bianchi said. "It doesn't matter where you go on an oval — you're going to have to beat them." Jordan also flagged the broader Toyota picture: the manufacturer has now won seven of eight intermediate or larger non-drafting tracks in 2026, with only Chase Elliott's Texas win preventing a clean sweep. The concentration of that dominance on a single driver — rather than spread across Christopher Bell, Tyler Reddick, and the Gibbs cars — makes it feel even more intense. "It's pretty much Hamlin," Jordan said, "and Reddick obviously early in the season was winning a lot of races. But now Denny has four wins."

Jordan also noted the generational dimension. "For a guy who is going to turn 46 in what, six months or whatever it is — pretty impressive. We're so used to seeing guys around this age retire, or just at least suddenly drop off in competitiveness. And yet he just keeps on rolling right now."

Race Analysis — Weather, Pocono, and the Prime Flexibility Win

The race was delayed two hours — an extraordinary move for NASCAR — when Prime Video pushed the start from 3:20 PM to accommodate incoming rain. Jeff noted that if the race had started on schedule, the storms that eventually arrived would have ended it before the halfway mark. Jordan gave the network credit: "That was the difference today. And that is a flexibility afforded being on Prime." Both hosts agreed this was a meaningful precedent, though neither expected NASCAR to simply move all races to 1 PM (Jeff: "The ratings bear it out in terms of where you need to be." Jordan: "I know I'm just being the old man yelling at the cloud.").

The racing itself generated a familiar verdict: Pocono is Pocono. The track's long straightaways and flat corners produce strategy-heavy fuel mileage racing rather than door-to-door action. "The racing is the racing at Pocono," Jordan said. "It's not that compelling of action, but Pocono is still unique." Jeff flagged Christopher Bell's late fuel gamble — in which the JGR driver tried stretching his mileage on a creative strategy call — as the thing that gave the race its primary drama, at least until Hamlin closed the gap and made Bell's bet moot. "What if you had not had that?" Jeff asked. "What would this race have looked like? I think at least that made it interesting until the final laps."

Both hosts cited the Prime broadcast team's performance positively, with Jordan offering a perhaps-unexpected compliment. "I wasn't able to listen," Jeff said. Jordan: "They did a really good job of focusing on the strategy aspect. One thing they really focused on coming into today was the spotter angle." He noted a strong pre-race interview with Freddie Craft breaking down how spotters manage a race at a track as wide as Pocono. Larse (Steve Lart) in particular, Jordan said, did well at integrating real-time fuel calculations with audio from team radio during the Bell gamble. "They do a really good job of incorporating the strategy calls that the crew chiefs are making with radio chatter... and they don't talk over your head."

For a poll-prediction segment, Jeff guessed 68% approval rating (adding a "prime bump" of five points over his natural instinct of 63%), while Jordan settled at 63%. Context: Pocono's all-time best-rated race in their polling system was only 83.4%, and the best NextGen race was a Hamlin win in 2023 at 81.1%. Last year's Brisco fuel mileage win came in at 48%. Given fan fatigue with Hamlin and Toyota, neither host expected enthusiasm to run high.

The Case for One Race at Every Track

The episode's first extended detour from the race result itself was a sustained conversation about NASCAR's schedule philosophy, prompted by Pocono's fourth straight sellout. Jordan called it not just a coincidence but a proof of concept: when a track goes from two races to one, it stops being a routine stop and becomes an annual event. "The excuse of 'well, we'll just go later this year when they come back' — you eliminate that," Jordan said. "Then it makes it an event. It feels special. There's uniqueness to it."

Jeff grounded the observation in competitive history. He pointed to Michigan ("the home of Chevrolet, the home of Ford — their one opportunity to race in their backyard"), Nashville, and now Pocono. He ticked off four straight NASCAR sellouts: Charlotte 600, Nashville, Michigan, Pocono. Three of those four have just one date on the calendar. "To me, one 400-mile race is great," he said.

Both hosts drew a longer through-line to the public-company era of ISC and SMI, when publicly traded track operators had to answer to shareholders and couldn't afford to surrender a date even if attendance justified it. "Now those are both privately owned, so you have more flexibility," Jeff said. "Kansas and Chicagoland, those tracks have been around 25 years. At some point they hit a point of like, 'We've made our money.' I feel like we've crossed that threshold." He added that the one-track model opens more room for scheduling experiments — new circuits, army bases, street courses — without making zero-sum tradeoffs. The comparison to golf and tennis, where major tournaments happen at a venue once per year and that scarcity creates prestige, felt natural to both of them.

Jeff also gave a shout to the governor of Pennsylvania, who was in attendance and told them he and his wife had now been to six Pocono races — and that his wife had come separately for a mud run in the infield.

Legacy Motor Club's Sustained Surge

Jeff pivoted to a genuine surprise of the afternoon: Legacy Motor Club's performance. John Hunter Nemechek led a career-high 42 laps in the 42 car, more than doubling his previous career high of 20 laps at Talladega. He finished fourth. Eric Jones ran in the top ten all day and crossed the line sixth, vaulting into a Chase bubble spot.

"This is not like they hit on something just today," Jordan said. "Jones has been on a heater now for a while." He walked through the evidence: good Charlotte 600, good Nashville, good at Michigan ("maybe could have won at Michigan, had things fallen a little bit differently"). He specifically credited crew chief Justin Alexander — Jones's relatively recent addition — for turning the 43 team around. "If you can give Eric Jones good equipment, he's going to be able to do something with it. He doesn't make a lot of mistakes behind the wheel."

Jeff offered Jones's recent oval numbers as context: 12th at Texas, 13th in the 600, 11th at Nashville, 2nd at Michigan, 6th at Pocono. "Take out Watkins Glen, and he's been putting together quite a run," Jeff said. He also noted, wryly, that John Hunter had been "pummeled on social media by a host of fans this week" after some Instagram back-and-forth — "and then he comes out and gets a top five."

Both hosts flagged the obvious caveat: Legacy's speed has been concentrated on intermediate and larger ovals, the exact track type that Toyota has dominated in 2026. The next two weeks bring back-to-back road courses, which represent a different challenge. "That's going to be the thing," Jordan said. "Can they continue that? And then Iowa, New Hampshire, Richmond — how does that translate? To be a Chase team, to be someone in the mix and no longer just a sleeper — that's their next big challenge."

The Chase Bubble — Chaos Below the Cut Line

Jeff and Jordan spent a full segment surveying the damage at the bottom of the playoff picture, where the carnage was considerable. Brad Keselowski's situation drew the most extended attention: three consecutive 30-plus finishes, a free-fall from ninth in points just a few weeks ago to 17th now. "Disastrous," Jeff said. "Disastrous," Jordan agreed. Jordan added that Ford's overall lack of speed at this style of track makes it hard to envision a quick turnaround even as the schedule improves. "It's not like you feel confident that Brad's going to be number one in road courses — and then on intermediate tracks you're not confident they're going to be in a position to get a lot of stage points. That's a big hurdle to overcome."

Josh Priest (RFK Racing) compounded the misery by getting caught in a fuel situation during the final stages, finishing 28th and a lap down, now -33 to the cut line. Jeff noted the striking narrative: RFK Racing had all three of their drivers inside the Chase cut just weeks ago, and now only Buscherr (who finished well) remains safely inside. Joey Logano sits at -21. AJ Allmendinger at -49, Michael McDowell at -54.

Shane van Gisbergen had a rough afternoon as well, collected in a three-wide incident involving Austin Hill and Josh Barry, finishing 31st. He's now only +10 to the bubble with two road courses upcoming — which Jordan took as net positive, since road courses are SVG's natural habitat. "He's going to collect a lot of points over the next two weeks."

On the brighter side, Daniel Suarez quietly picked up stage points in both stages and finished 13th, moving to 8th in the standings with a one-point edge over Hocevar. "That goes overlooked," Jordan said. "His crew chief Ryan Sparks continues to play the strategy game and put them in position to get stage points. And even when they don't get the overall finish they want, getting those points goes a long way."

Christopher Bell's Wrist and the San Diego Question

One of the episode's most pointed discussions concerned Christopher Bell's decision to race at Pocono with a broken left wrist in a cast. He had the car in the 20s for much of the day and made a late fuel gamble as the team's best available play. Jeff said he encountered Bell on the elevator heading to a suite appearance after the race and angled for a cast-signing opportunity ("I was hoping he'd be like, 'Oh, would you like to sign?'"). Bell, apparently, wanted no part of that.

Jordan raised the cast sponsorship angle in jest — "Brad Keselowski had his cane earlier this year and had sponsored logos on it each week. If I'm JGR, I'm making phone calls: 'Hey, I got a cast to sell. Give us $100,000.'" — before the conversation turned more seriously to the question of San Diego. Bell acknowledged after the race that he lost positions on restarts because of the wrist. He said straight-line driving was manageable but reactive situations — wreck avoidance, fighting for position on restarts — are compromised.

Both Jeff and Jordan felt strongly that Bell should allow Brent Cruz to drive the 20 at San Diego next week, at least as a relief driver. Jeff cited a conversation he had with Denny Hamlin for an Athletic story: Hamlin told him he was planning to lean on Cruz's iRacing experience at the San Diego course, noting that Cruz has logged more laps on the circuit there than most Cup regulars. "If you've got a guy who's got a road racing background, who's in the family, who you can easily work with — it just seems like a natural way to keep Bell healthy and also allow that 20 team to maximize its points," Jeff said. Jordan agreed. "Then get Bell back for Chicagoland — 100%."

The San Diego course itself generated genuine concern from both hosts. Jeff described a video Anthony Alfredo posted showing the car going airborne between turns one and two. "The back end lifts up like — it is crazy." Jordan called it potentially "the most difficult course in NASCAR history." Jeff noted the chicane was added at SVG's suggestion, which prompted a debate about whether van Gisbergen is the greatest road course driver in NASCAR history — a position Jordan advanced with his characteristic certainty and Jeff cheerfully undermined by noting Jordan's equivalent certainty about Lewis Hamilton once being "washed."

Jordan's Formal Apology to Lewis Hamilton

In what became the episode's most memorable comedic set piece, Jordan delivered an elaborate, multi-part, formal apology to Lewis Hamilton, who won that day at Ferrari in Barcelona. The apology was structured as a series of separate "I apologize and I am sorry" statements, each citing the specific statistical evidence Jordan had used to declare Hamilton washed — Hamilton's 2024 and 2025 qualifying differentials against his teammate, his failure to score a podium last year, three years with a win in the previous four — before conceding, with maximum solemnity, "my bad."

"In conclusion," Jordan intoned, "I take full responsibility for my foolish comments with no basis in facts whatsoever. I humbly, humbly ask you to accept my apologies."

Jeff's dry response: "Jordan, I think this is the first time I've ever heard the words 'I apologize' or 'I'm sorry' come out of your mouth. So that was a big step. Even if you were making excuses for your apology."

Jeff then pressed the joke further, noting that Jordan's SVG-as-all-time-greatest-road-course-driver stance deserves the same faith in eventual vindication — especially with San Diego coming up. Jordan was unmoved: "SVG would blow Jeff Gordon out of the water on a road course. It wouldn't even be close."

San Diego Weekend Preview

Both hosts flagged the upcoming race at Naval Base Coronado in San Diego as a major event in the sport's calendar, not just competitively but logistically. Jeff noted Pocono to San Diego is approximately 2,800 miles — "basically coast to coast" — which, with teams expected home first before flying out Tuesday, represents a significant haul between consecutive race weekends.

Dirty Mo Media will have two live events at the race. On Saturday, the Dale Jr. Download goes live from the Victory Lane stage at 5:30 PM Pacific, featuring Dale, TJ, and Freddy Craft, presented by Arby's and the Navy. On Friday morning, Jeff and Jordan will be joined by Ryan Blaney for a live show on the NASCAR Experience stage at 10:45 AM Pacific, also presented by the Navy. The show is open to some fans, will be streamed on Dirty Mo's YouTube channel, and released as a podcast. Jeff's framing of the Blaney assignment: "There's a scene in Top Gun where the captain goes, 'Oh, Maverick and Goose. Oh, hell.' I'm wondering if when Ryan Blaney heard he was stuck with us for an hour, he was like, 'Jeff and Jordan — oh, hell.'"

Championship Implications

Hamlin's third straight win brings him to within 19 points of Tyler Reddick in the standings, with 10 regular season races remaining. The magnitude of his surge is best illustrated by the starting point: after Watkins Glen, Hamlin was 129 points out of first. He has trimmed roughly 110 points from Reddick's lead since then. Jeff's key observation is that Reddick hasn't been running poorly — he's been finishing top six regularly — but stage points, or the lack of them, are becoming a meaningful weight. "Stage points are kind of biting him right now," Jeff said. "They're not qualifying great, and stage points and lack thereof are killing him."

The next two weeks are road courses, which both hosts acknowledged shift the competitive dynamic. Jordan pointed out that Reddick has a decided advantage on those tracks and figures to rebuild some of his points cushion. The more interesting question is whether Hamlin's current form — dominant on ovals, flawless on pit road, strategically sharp — translates once the schedule diversifies. Jordan's bottom line: "Five out of the 10 playoff races are these types of tracks. So whatever's happening right now, it matters."

The playoff bubble remained volatile heading into the two-road-course stretch, with Keselowski's free-fall, RFK's sudden vulnerability, and both Allmendinger and McDowell needing strong road course performances to stay relevant. Bell's wrist adds yet another variable to what was already a crowded picture at and around the cutline.

Notable Quotes

Jeff (on Hamlin's complete domination): "They're doing all of the things you're not supposed to be able to do — win stages and put yourself in a position to win the races. It's kind of almost like an either-or sometimes. But they're just doing everything right, right now, across the board. It is a total team effort."

Jordan (on Hamlin at 45): "For a guy who is going to turn 46 in what, six months or whatever it is — pretty impressive. We're so used to seeing guys around this age retire, or just at least suddenly drop off in competitiveness. And yet he just keeps on rolling right now."

Jordan (on one-race tracks): "When you consolidate and you say this is your one time a year to go — you eliminate the excuse of 'we'll just go later this year when they come back.' Then it makes it an event. It feels special. There's uniqueness to it."

Jeff (on Christopher Bell's wrist and San Diego): "If you've got a guy who's got a road racing background, who's in the family, who you can easily work with — it just seems like a natural way to keep Bell healthy and also allow that 20 team to maximize its points. I just don't know why you wouldn't."

Jordan (Lewis Hamilton formal apology): "I apologize and I am sorry. I called a driver washed who in 2025 was badly outperformed by a teammate to the tune of 19-to-5 in qualifying again, and had 86 fewer points to his teammate in equal equipment again. I should have known better. My fault."

Jeff (responding to Jordan's apology): "Jordan, I think this is the first time I've ever heard the words 'I apologize' or 'I'm sorry' come out of your mouth. So that was a big step. Even if you were making excuses for your apology."

Podcast: The GluckCast

Network: The Athletic / Dirty Mo Media

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Denny Hamlin (JGR #11); Zack Sternolo (NASCAR.com reporter)

Date: June 10, 2026

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis

Episode Overview

Episode 17 of the Gluckcast came from an unusually charming setting: the basement of producer Bobby Marcos's parents' home in northern Indiana — a de facto racing museum stuffed with boxes of National Speed Sport News dating back to the 1940s, sheet metal on the walls, and a basement bar that gave the whole episode an old-school, retro feel. Jeff opened by noting Bobby's dad Bob is a longtime motorsports historian and writer, and that Bobby himself is a member of the band Cloak Room and composed the show's beloved intro music.

The episode had real news to work with from the jump. Just as Gluck was driving in, word broke that Josh Barry would not be returning to Wood Brothers Racing in 2027. Then came the centerpiece: a full game-show segment with Denny Hamlin, where Jeff quizzed the three-time consecutive winner on his own past quotes. After Hamlin, Zack Sternolo of NASCAR.com joined to talk Pocono's renaissance, Denny's late-career dominance, the championship picture, and the fallout from Christopher Bell's terrifying Michigan crash. Jeff closed with three listener questions covering fantasy team-building, NASCAR's confusing TV ratings situation, and who he thinks is most likely to fall out of the current Chase field.

Breaking News: Josh Barry Out at Wood Brothers

Before the first guest even arrived, Jeff addressed the morning's news: Josh Barry confirmed on a Ford Racing weekly media call that he won't be back at Wood Brothers Racing in 2027. Gluck said it wasn't a huge surprise given the team's results, but noted the timing was striking — Barry chose to be upfront rather than dodge the question when it came up.

Gluck traced the arc: a year ago Barry won at Las Vegas and looked like the Penske-affiliated fourth car had finally found its footing. But results deteriorated, a bad first-round playoff exit followed, and the team hasn't been a consistent factor since. He framed the broader context bluntly: "If you're not driving a Toyota right now, you're at a bit of a disadvantage. And Chevy's still trying to get their car right." He pointed to a report that Ford hadn't led a lap at Michigan — possibly the first time since 1985 — as evidence of just how far Ford has fallen.

On Barry's future, Gluck speculated that a Wood Brothers seat is still a prestigious landing spot for someone, given its Penske affiliation, and wondered whether Barry himself might find a home in the O'Reilly Series at JRM or perhaps in the #33 at RCR.

Christopher Bell's Michigan Crash

Gluck also addressed the Christopher Bell crash before introducing any guests. Citing a segment from NASCAR's Hauler Talk podcast, he reported that NASCAR's safety analyst — on staff since 2015 — called Bell's impact the hardest hit recorded in his tenure. NASCAR is measuring delta-V rather than G-forces, and while they're declining to release the specific number (calling it Bell's information to share), the implication was stark: in a previous era, that's a career-ending or fatal wreck.

Bell has a fractured left wrist but has been cleared to race at Pocono. Gluck pushed back on anyone distinguishing between "fractured" and "broken" — "A fracture IS a break, I'm pretty sure" — and expressed amazement that Bell would be back in the car so quickly. He did raise a genuine concern about what comes next: the San Diego street course (where Anthony Alfredo had just posted a brutally demanding iRacing lap) and then Sonoma, both of which would be extremely difficult to drive through with a fractured wrist. "NASCAR can't get enough praise for their safety efforts," he said. "We all take it for granted at this point, but in a different era, that's easily a career-ending or fatal wreck."

Denny Hamlin: "Your Old Denny — Can You Remember?"

The episode's signature segment was a game show Jeff invented on the spot: he quizzed Denny on his own quotes and stories from past 12 Questions interviews and other encounters. Denny, freshly off three consecutive wins (two regular season plus the All-Star race) and a tie for ninth on the all-time Cup wins list, was a good-humored contestant.

The fines: Gluck asked Denny how much in fines he'd had to pay directly because of comments made to Jeff specifically. Denny guessed $75,000 — and was correct. The breakdown: $50,000 for a 2010 Twitter exchange about fake debris cautions ("Both statements were true, I don't know what the hell we were talking about," Denny said), and $25,000 in 2013 after telling Jeff the Gen 6 car produced single-file racing and that track position was everything. Brian France "did not like that."

The retirement age: In 2010, Jeff asked Denny how long he wanted his career to last. Denny guessed he'd said "until I'm 40." Wrong — he said 37 or 38, adding there was "too much I'd like to do outside of racing to do this until I'm 50." Denny's reaction: "What an idiot I am." Jeff noted that social media had essentially wanted him fired in 2018 for Christopher Bell, which makes the current run of dominance at age 45 all the more remarkable. On whether a mic-drop retirement after a potential 2026 championship was possible, Denny said sponsorship is the real obstacle: "They're signing up for me in the car. That's the issue."

The Las Vegas night before Phoenix: Perhaps the best story of the episode. Gluck referenced a 2014 interview where Denny had teased a story about his rookie season at Phoenix that he "couldn't tell at the time." Now he could: the night before the race, he and his friends were bored on the bus, called the pilots, flew to Vegas, partied all night, and barely made it back for the driver's meeting. He finished third. "I was banged up pretty good, too," Hamlin said. "To be young and dumb. I can't have a cocktail on Wednesday now before race weekend."

Natural ability vs. work ethic: In 2017 Denny had said 75% natural ability, 25% work. Now he flipped it closer to 40/60, explaining that modern data-sharing and analytics let drivers make up for natural limitations through work ethic in ways that simply weren't possible in the seat-of-the-pants era. "Before, you went out and followed Mark Martin at Pocono to figure out the track. Now they're showing you exactly what to work on."

Legacy: Gluck closed the game show with a 2010 quote on what Denny wanted his retirement story to say. Denny remembered it nearly verbatim: "I just want to be known as the guy that everyone had to watch for constantly. If you're going to beat him, that's the guy to beat." Jeff gave him the win.

Zack Sternolo on Pocono's Renaissance and the Championship Picture

Zack Sternolo, a NASCAR.com reporter who grew up in the Stroudsburg area and freelanced at the Pocono Record out of high school, joined from a scenic outdoor backdrop with a waterfall. Gluck made a point of saying he'd never once heard anyone talk badly about Sternolo — which he called remarkable in an industry where everyone talks about everyone.

Pocono's turnaround: Gluck admitted he'd once sworn his career goal was to outlast Pocono on the schedule because he hated going there so much — two 500-mile races a year, constant rain delays, no atmosphere. Sternolo credited a generational shift in track leadership. When Brandon Idolski (grandson of founders Dr. Joe and Dr. Rose) became CEO, the track was repaved for the first time since the late '90s, races were shortened from 500 to 400 miles, and the fan experience was rebuilt from the ground up. His brother Nick and track president Ben May have continued that work. "They've done a really good job of staying in touch with what the modern-day fan likes," Sternolo said. Both agreed the one-date-per-year format has been crucial — fans know this is their one chance, so they show up. Pocono is now on track for its fourth consecutive sellout.

Denny Hamlin's late-career dominance: Sternolo called Hamlin's NextGen adaptation "the most impressive thing we've seen from him yet." His argument: Denny drove the Gen 4 car when he came into the sport. He's the only veteran who has made a fully elite-level transition to the NextGen car. "I don't see a reason why he can't do this for another three years at least." On Denny's stated 2027 retirement: "If he's at this level next year at this time, I don't see how you walk away from it." Gluck agreed, noting that Hamlin once seemed like the guy who'd have no trouble stepping away from the sport, given his outside interests — and here he is chasing a first championship harder than ever.

Championship picture: Both agreed the title race looks like a two-Toyota affair between Hamlin and Tyler Reddick at this stage, with Chase Elliott and Kyle Larson as the Chevy wildcoms most likely to enter the conversation once the reset happens. Sternolo expressed concern about Team Penske's overall trajectory, noting Ryan Blaney has been less consistently present at the front than earlier in the season. On the Bell situation, Sternolo wondered aloud whether the new points-based Chase format — rather than win-and-you're-in — influenced Bell's decision to race at Pocono with a fractured wrist, since there's no single make-or-break win he's chasing right now.

Listener Q&A: Fantasy Team, TV Ratings, and Chase Bubble

Fantasy team (no HMS/JGR/Penske/23XI): Gluck's picks — Carson Hocevar (marketable, extracts maximum from equipment), Connor Zillich (brilliantly talented, just in a bad situation at TrackHouse; beat Kimi Antonelli in a 175-driver go-kart race in Italy as a kid), and Eric Jones as the veteran anchor. He noted Zillich's rookie struggles are as much about TrackHouse's current equipment level as anything. "He's still brilliantly talented. He would have figured out." Jones got the nod over Chris Buescher partly because Gluck thought the Michigan connection might give him Hocevar's ear.

NASCAR's TV ratings confusion: Gluck delivered a clear breakdown of why NASCAR's numbers look so different from Prime's. Nielsen's traditional "panel" method uses ~42,000 sample households. Their newer "big data + panel" method pulls from 45 million-plus households via cable boxes and streaming devices, then cross-references with panel diary data to validate actual viewership. For most sports, the new measurement boosted reported numbers. For NASCAR, it hurt them — so NASCAR opted to keep comparing against panel-only data. This week: Prime reported 2.07 million viewers (up 17% year-over-year using big data + panel, their biggest gain of the season), while NASCAR reported 1.8 million viewers using panel-only (down 3%). "Over 200,000 viewer difference, and the difference between being down 3% versus up 17%," Gluck noted. He expects this to normalize once racing returns to TNT and USA.

Who misses the Chase: Gluck picked Shane van Gisbergen. He acknowledged SVG will rack up points at San Diego and Sonoma, potentially cracking the top 10 by the time those two races are done. But the remaining oval-heavy stretch — New Hampshire, North Wilkesboro, Brickyard, Chicagoland — is exactly where SVG still struggles. Meanwhile Logano has been trending better, Austin Cindric has been hovering at the bubble all year, and Eric Jones is a hard charger right now. "It's just a tall order, I think."

Notable Quotes

Denny (on his 2010 fine for criticizing NASCAR): "Both of those statements are true. I don't know what the hell we're talking about. The cautions are definitely, you know — softies."

Denny (on his rookie Vegas night before Phoenix): "I was banged up pretty good, too. To be young and dumb. I can't have a cocktail on Wednesday now before race weekend."

Denny (on what's changed between 75% natural ability in 2017 vs. now): "Before, you had to go ask the person how to drive a racetrack — they couldn't actually show you. Now you have so much data and analytics that they're showing you exactly what you need to work on."

Denny (on his legacy): "I just want to be known as the guy that everyone had to watch for constantly. If you're going to beat him, that's the guy to beat."

Zack Sternolo (on Denny's NextGen adaptation): "He is the only veteran that I've seen truly make the adaptation to the NextGen car successfully at just as elite a level as he was in the previous generation. That to me is really defining of just how great he is."

Jeff (on Christopher Bell's Michigan crash): "That in a different era is easily a career-ending or fatal wreck. NASCAR can't get enough praise for their safety efforts. We all take it for granted at this point."

Overview

Bubba Wallace and Riley Herbst join Freddie Kraft and Tommy Baldwin the day after the FireKeepers Casino 400. Built around Carson Hocevar's restart wreck, Christopher Bell's historic crash, the Kaden Honeycutt/Cory Lajoie dispute, Denny Hamlin's retirement talk, and the NASCAR Mount Rushmore. The back half covers teammate chemistry, the Baja 500, and a viral backflip out of a burning car.

Carson Hocevar: Spot On

The restart wreck collecting Austin Dillon and several others was the centerpiece. Bubba's frustration runs two layers deep: the driving pattern (bombing the bottom, applying maximum pressure, not packing air) and the social-media joking afterward. "Why would he stop, right now, like last week and this week again?" Tommy's structural read: Hocevar has found a tactic that works often enough to reinforce the behavior. The counter: Hocevar's final ten laps looked different — pointing people by, waving drivers past. Bubba: "He pointed the 43 by. It's like he's playing the game. 'I caused all this problems. Y'all go ahead. I'm sorry for what I did.'"

Freddie drew the contrast with Daniel Suarez: "Suarez is calculated. It's not uncalculated aggression. He picks his moments, understands the context." Hocevar has the speed to do what Suarez does — he hasn't made the decision to.

Christopher Bell: The Hardest NextGen Crash

Unanimous verdict: the hardest hit in the NextGen era. The way Bell's car loaded the barrier and returned energy back through the chassis was alarming. Michigan's long straightaways expose the physics in ways road courses and short tracks don't. Bell walked away — the result the car is designed to produce — but the visual warranted the reaction it got.

Denny Hamlin's Retirement and the Mount Rushmore

Both Bubba and Freddie: Spot Off on Hamlin retiring after 2027. "A driver who just tied Kyle Busch's win record, who is still winning races at Michigan, who is circling milestones like a competitor — does not retire on schedule." Mount Rushmore: Earnhardt, Petty, Johnson as the foundation. Fourth spot debate: Kyle Busch or Jeff Gordon. Bubba's answer, without hesitation: "It's me."

Teammates: Chess, Rolex, and the Baja 1000

Riley on what he's learned from Bubba: "How to play chess." Bubba has been running up the score on him via a slow-burn app game. Bubba on Riley: "He's just a happy go-lucky kid and a joy to be around." Riley's Baja 1000 backstory: runs 220 miles in a spec LS-motor car, won it once with crewmember Zayn. "Rolex Riley" is a legitimate nickname — he wears a nice watch on big nights out and crew members noticed the correlation between the watch appearing and things getting interesting.

Notable Quotes

• Bubba Wallace: "Carson races hard, but he races stupid."
• Freddie Kraft: "Suarez is calculated. Hocevar is uncalculated aggression. Suarez knows when he's going to do it."
• Tommy Baldwin: "They want personality until they don't want personality. Let the guy be frustrated for a little bit."
• Bubba Wallace (on the Mount Rushmore): "It's me."
• Bubba Wallace (on Riley, after the Michigan restart): "Still got your ass."

🎙 Audio coming soon

Dale Jr. and TJ Majors recap the FireKeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway. Denny Hamlin won from the pole for his 63rd career Cup Series victory — tying Kyle Busch on the all-time wins list. The win was Hamlin's third of the 2026 season.

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: June 8, 2026

Race Covered: FireKeepers Casino 400 — Michigan International Speedway, Brooklyn, Michigan

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opens with a single line that captures the entire story of Denny Hamlin's day: "From first to worst, back to first, two weeks in a row." The framing is perfect — Hamlin qualified on the pole, was sent to the rear for unapproved diffuser adjustments after practice damage, and then carved through the entire field to win by 11.11 seconds. In a race defined by carnage, caution flags, and a half-hour red flag to repair a bent steel barrier, the dominant story was Hamlin being, in Eric's words, "on another level."

But the episode is not just a celebration. The other major throughline is sobering: a catastrophic crash between Chase Elliott and Christopher Bell with 52 laps to go — one that Eric calls "probably the hardest hit I've seen with my eyes in the NextGen car era" — took out two of the fastest cars in the field and left the fanbase anxiously waiting on Bell's condition for hours after the race. Eric handles both threads with care, making sure to loop back to Bell's status mid-episode once a Joe Gibbs update became available.

The episode also delivers sharp analysis on Carson Hocevar's mixed-bag afternoon, a brutal stretch for rookie Connor Zilisch, and a meaningful shift in the regular season points race, where Denny Hamlin sliced 71 points off Tyler Reddick's lead in just two weeks. Eric wraps with a Groovy Gauge score of 77 — good but not great, elevated by great battles and Hamlin's dominance, tempered by the chaos and a somewhat anticlimactic end.

Denny Hamlin: The Best Version We've Ever Seen

The centerpiece of the episode is Denny Hamlin, and Eric does not hold back. He contextualizes the win multiple ways: it's Hamlin's third points-paying win of 2026, fourth if you count the All-Star race, and it came just days after the passing of NASCAR Hall of Famer Ned Jarrett — the man most associated with the No. 11 car decades ago. Hamlin won by exactly 11.11 seconds in the No. 11. "I got goosebumps," Eric says.

Eric draws a direct comparison to Kyle Larson's 2021 dominance: "This feels a lot like 2021 when pretty much every week you just sort of penciled in Kyle Larson as that weekend's favorite. That's how it is right now with Denny Hamlin at basically every track that's not a road course and maybe not a super speedway." The final 38-lap run is what Eric keeps returning to — he calls it "SVG Mexico City-esque," referencing Shane van Gisbergen's famous road course demolition job. "As soon as Denny got clear with roughly 38 laps to go, that final run was SVG Mexico City-esque. We didn't see anyone come close to doing what Denny did at the end of this race all day long."

The win ties Hamlin with the late Kyle Busch at 63 career Cup victories, good for ninth all-time. Hamlin celebrated with a burnout while carrying a flag bearing a blend of the Joe Gibbs No. 18 and the RCR rowdy No. 8 — Kyle's signature numbers merged together. Eric gives credit to the Prime Video broadcast for letting the moment breathe: "It was like burnout celebration ASMR for a few moments." He compares it to Jeff Gordon displaying Dale Earnhardt's No. 3 when he matched his career win total: "Those are the kind of images that fans across generations will remember until the end of time."

Eric also notes the uncomfortable irony of Hamlin's adversity working in his favor: "Thank goodness he had to start this race at the rear due to unapproved diffuser adjustments after damage in practice. Thank goodness he had to start this race last because otherwise this race probably would have been over far sooner than it actually was."

The Crash: One of the Hardest Hits in the NextGen Era

Before diving into the finishing order, Eric makes a point to address the wreck between Chase Elliott and Christopher Bell with 52 laps remaining. The two were running second and third, battling hard, when Elliott got loose to the inside of Bell and both cars shot into the outside wall at full speed. "One of the hardest, most crushing impacts I have ever seen in my over 20 years of watching this sport," Eric says. "Probably the hardest hit I've seen with my eyes in the NextGen car era."

Both drivers were able to walk to the ambulance under their own power. Elliott was checked and released and did a post-race interview with Prime Video. Bell's situation was more concerning — he remained in the Infield Care Center longer, and Joe Gibbs himself reportedly stopped by to check on him. Eric interrupts himself mid-episode to share an update from Gibbs: "We're going to continue tonight when he gets home. We're going to make sure that he gets everything he needs to get there, whatever it might be. And then we'll just have to kind of wait. So it is his wrist and his ankle, I think. So we're just going to have to wait."

The impact was violent enough to bend the steel barrier, requiring a half-hour red flag to make repairs. Eric lingers on the significance of losing both those cars: Elliott had led 67 laps and earned 17 stage points — both the most in the field. Bell had back-to-back runner-up finishes coming in. "That took out two great cars, two of the best drivers on that racetrack today," Eric says. "We hope he's okay."

Top Finishers: Jones Shines, Bubba Bounces Back

Beyond Hamlin's win, Eric takes time to highlight a few other noteworthy performances in the final order. Erik Jones in second gets special attention: "If you look at the last five oval races, Eric Jones has finished 11th, 3rd, 13th, 12th, and now second. This has been a top 10 team for about a month now. Legacy Motor Club has a lot to be proud of."

Bubba Wallace's third place is framed as a badly needed rebound. "A much needed top five finish for Bubba Wallace after a few rough weeks, incidents, Bubba saying last week 'I'm tired of this.' To come out of here with a third place result plus some stage points — he gained two spots in the Chase standings. Eleventh on the grid now for Bubba Wallace. Huge day."

Kyle Larson finished fourth with strong long-run speed, but Eric notes that Chevrolet has now gone since 2017 without winning at Michigan. Chris Buescher earned a resilient top 10 despite early damage. Daniel Suarez grabbed a solid sixth. Riley Herbst earns a quiet compliment — 13th place despite a pit road issue that dropped him to 26th mid-race: "Riley's getting better. He really is... He was developing nicely."

The Carson Hocevar Experience

If there's a subplot Eric clearly enjoys dissecting, it's Carson Hocevar's day. The young driver from Michigan qualified essentially on the pole (after Hamlin's penalty), ran near the front all afternoon, earned the second-most stage points in the field, and finished fifth. But he also triggered one of the race's bigger wrecks on a restart — clipping the No. 42, sending Nemechek into traffic, and collecting Ty Gibbs, Bubba Wallace, Austin Cindric, and briefly even Hamlin himself.

Eric's take is measured but direct: "That one's on Hocevar. An honest mistake, but let's call a spade a spade." He also rejects the idea that Hocevar fans get to have it both ways: "You can't simultaneously be like, 'Yeah, I like Carson Hocevar. He's aggressive, he's unapologetic, he ruffles feathers, I like that' — oh but also none of these incidents are ever his fault. Can't have it both ways."

But Eric is also plainly a fan of the kid's talent. He describes a moment where Hocevar went fully sideways mid-race and somehow held on: "You don't see a NextGen car get that sideways and not wreck very often. Just speaks to how talented Carson Hocevar is." He sums up the afternoon neatly: "Carson Hocevar put on a great show, made a couple of bold moves that didn't work out, might have made a few of his competitors angry — but that's the Carson Hocevar experience. His reckless reputation was reinforced. That's what happened."

Connor Zilisch: Three Weeks of Wreckage

Eric reserves some of his sharpest concern for 19-year-old rookie Connor Zilisch, who made just nine laps before crashing into the inside wall and finishing 34th. It was the third consecutive race he failed to see a green-and-white checkered flag — Charlotte (wreck, not his fault), Nashville (brakes exploded, team's fault), and now Michigan, which Eric puts squarely on the driver.

"Connor Zilisch, three weeks in a row, has failed to get to the finish of stage one. He hasn't even seen a green and white checkered flag in the past three weeks." Eric references a broadcast stat from Steve Letarte: Zilisch had completed barely over a hundred miles out of roughly 1,200 available over those three weeks. "When you're a 19-year-old Cup Series rookie, you need the track time. You need the seat time. And he has not gotten that three weeks in a row. Just so frustrating."

Eric is careful not to write off the kid — pointing to Zilisch's top-five run at Dover in the All-Star race as evidence of real ability — but he's clear-eyed about the toll these weeks are taking: "He could use a confidence boost right now because the last three weeks have killed it. Killed it almost entirely."

Points Watch: Hamlin Chipping Away at Reddick

Eric closes the main portion of the episode with a look at the standings, and the numbers are striking. Tyler Reddick came into the summer with a 122-point lead. After two weeks of Hamlin dominance, that lead is down to 51. "In just two weeks, Denny Hamlin has shaved 71 points off Reddick's lead. Winning races, getting stage points. That'll make up a lot of ground really, really quickly."

Eric credits himself — lightly — for seeing this coming: "I don't want to say I called it, but I kind of called it a couple weeks ago when folks were saying, 'Ah, regular season championship. It's locked up.'" He still gives the edge to Reddick, noting back-to-back road courses on the horizon where Hamlin typically struggles: "I still think Reddick is more likely to win the regular season title." But he acknowledges the race is now genuinely interesting. "Folks who thought this was locked up two weeks ago might be sweating a little bit right now."

Groovy Gauge: 77

Eric's Groovy Gauge score for the Michigan race is 77 out of 100. He cites the great battles in the middle stages, the exciting moments where the lead changed hands multiple times, and Hamlin's awe-inspiring pace at the end as positives. On the other side: the high caution count, the half-hour red flag, the brutal wrecks (especially for Bell), and the anticlimactic final stretch where Hamlin simply checked out. "Long green flag run with a dominant blowout victory at the end maybe held this back from being the most entertaining race in the world, but otherwise, I thought once again the NextGen car at Michigan raced pretty well." He gives the race a 77 in honor of Carson Hocevar's car number and his home-track performance.

Notable Quotes

Eric (on Hamlin's performance): "Denny Hamlin is on another level right now. This is the best version of Denny we have ever seen. He's 45 years young. He's already set the sunset date for his career. He's already said that the end of 2027 will almost certainly be the end of his full-time Cup Series career. He can see the finish line in the distance. Yet, Denny continues to reinvent himself, continues to outdo even the highest of expectations."

Eric (on the Bell-Elliott crash): "One of the hardest, most crushing impacts I have ever seen in my over 20 years of watching this sport. Probably the hardest hit I've seen with my eyes in the NextGen car era."

Eric (on the Kyle Busch tribute): "That felt like a moment where the entire fan base almost could breathe and could not only show respect for the great things Denny Hamlin is doing, but also remember the great things Kyle Busch did in his NASCAR career."

Eric (on Hocevar's driving style): "You can't simultaneously be like, 'Yeah, I like Carson Hocevar. He's aggressive, he's unapologetic, he ruffles feathers, I like that' — oh but also none of these incidents are ever his fault. Can't have it both ways."

Eric (on Zilisch's rough stretch): "When you're a 19-year-old Cup Series rookie, you need the track time. You need the seat time. And he has not gotten that three weeks in a row. Just so frustrating."

Eric (on the points race): "In just two weeks, Denny Hamlin has shaved 71 points off Reddick's lead. Folks who thought this was locked up two weeks ago might be sweating a little bit right now."

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, June 7, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: FireKeepers Casino 400 — Michigan International Speedway, Brooklyn, MI

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck opened this episode from the Michigan International Speedway infield, noting that Jordan Bianchi was remote — a contrast from last year when both hosts were trackside before caravan-ing to Mexico City. The race itself delivered more than enough material: 11 cautions (the most in the 109-year history of Cup racing at Michigan), a vicious and frightening wreck involving Christopher Bell and Chase Elliott, and Carson Hocevar once again stirring controversy. But the day ultimately belonged to Denny Hamlin, who swept from the back of the field to win by 11.11 seconds — the largest margin of victory on an oval in the NextGen era — and in doing so tied the late Kyle Busch's all-time wins total of 63, prompting one of the more emotional victory lane scenes of the season.

The episode also covered a wide swath of season-level storylines: Toyota's stunning dominance, Tyler Reddick's first DNF and the suddenly tighter championship race, a heartfelt discussion of Ned Jarrett's passing, whether Hamlin should reconsider retirement, a look at Eric Jones's ascent, Ford's alarming malaise, and a detailed preview of the upcoming San Diego Naval Base race that Jeff and Jordan had visited just days earlier.

Opening — Record Cautions and the Hamlin Tribute

Jeff set the table immediately: "This was the 109th Cup Series race at Michigan, and out of all those races in history, this one had the most cautions with 11." He described a war of attrition defined by vicious hits before arriving at the emotional centerpiece — Denny Hamlin tying his former longtime teammate Kyle Busch at 63 career wins, then circling the front stretch with a tribute flag bearing a stylized combination of Busch's iconic RCR #8 and JGR #18.

Jordan dove into the logistical backstory. "The question to him was, 'Have you thought about this, you're one away from tying Kyle Busch?' And he's like, 'Nah, thought about it a little bit.' But it certainly seems like it was top of mind leaving Nashville, because the plan went into effect on Monday — getting the flag ready, getting the hats ready." Jordan noted that Richard Childress Racing collaborated on the tribute imagery, merging the stylized 8 and the 18 together, and that the item was explicitly a one-off tribute item, not merchandise. "This is not a merch grab. This is purely a tribute thing."

Jeff, making his first trip to a race since Kyle Busch's death (having missed Charlotte while covering the Indy 500), described the surreal weight of seeing Kyle's merchandise hauler still parked in the fan zone. "I was in the fan zone. You saw the Kyle Busch merchandise hauler. And I was like, 'Wow.' There are still very much moments like that where you're like, 'Wow, this is the new reality we're in.'" He called the timing of the tribute significant: "I do think for Denny to be very classy about it and say that he had to outlive him to do this — those are nice touches." Jordan reinforced that the freshness of the loss made the moment carry extra weight. "This is something that still people are grieving from — you tweet that today, you were in the fan zone, and I was like, 'Wow.' And there are still very much moments like that where you're like, this is the new reality."

Both hosts agreed the flag should go to the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Jeff: "That should just be shipped to the Hall of Fame today. Start, you know, he's a two-time champion. There's obviously you have to pay your respects to him in some fashion. That seems like something that should be in the Hall of Fame where people can go see and say, 'That's the moment when Denny Hamlin tied him for the record.'"

Hamlin's Route to Victory — Penalty, Perseverance, Dominance

The win came despite Hamlin starting at the back after being penalized for unapproved adjustments — necessitated when he sustained underbody damage during qualifying after winning the pole. Rather than risk a compromised car from the front, the team chose to fix it and accept the tail-end penalty. It was the same situation as Nashville the week before, and once again Hamlin drove methodically through the field.

Jeff detailed the moment the race turned: "The key moment was with 39 laps to go — you have Spire teammates battling side by side, and Denny is able to capitalize by getting a huge run on them and going three-wide and scooting past." From there, Hamlin was in a different zip code. The 11.11-second margin of victory, Jeff noted, was "the largest on an oval since 2018 — Truex at Auto Club Speedway, 11.6 seconds. We don't really see these giant margins of victory in the NextGen car on ovals."

Jordan contextualized the broader heater Hamlin is on: "Go back to Texas at the beginning of May. Finishes second there. Then the All-Star race at Dover — Denny wins. Then the 600 — a race they probably should have won. Then back-to-back at Nashville and Michigan." Jeff's frame: "When you have fast race cars, you capitalize. You get your stage points, you get your wins, you get your points, all of those things, and you build up your cache for later. And that is exactly what they're doing."

Championship Implications — Reddick's DNF Reshapes the Race

Tyler Reddick's first DNF of the 2026 season proved catastrophic in the points standings. Jeff had been watching the live points tracker during stage one and noted how swiftly the landscape shifted: "I was looking at the live points at one point during the race. I think it was in stage one — I was like, man, Reddick's lead is up to 130 right now. And now, after the race, it's down to 51."

Jordan had noted before the race that even with a Hamlin win, Reddick was likely to extend his lead because Hamlin had dropped to the back and would miss stage one points. Instead, it all inverted. "Reddick to get wrecked — first bad finish of the year, period. And Denny happens to win on the same day." What had looked like a runaway Reddick championship is suddenly a genuine two-horse race.

Both hosts identified the dynamic going forward: "Unless Chevy figures out their car, it's probably going to be between Reddick and Hamlin," Jeff said. "Toyota in first time in its history finishes one, two, three in back-to-back weeks. And today they did the one, two, three with three different organizations." The three Toyota organizations represented — JGR (Hamlin), Legacy Motor Club (Eric Jones), and 23XI Racing (Bubba Wallace) — illustrated how deep the Toyota advantage runs. Jeff: "If you're driving a Toyota right now, you've got to feel pretty good at minimum getting a top 10 each week."

On Ford's struggles, Jeff was blunt: "Come the chase, they are going to get crushed. When you have five races on intermediate-size racetracks, that does not set up well at all for any of the four teams — and they are going to get rolled by Toyota and Chevrolet." Toyota currently leads all manufacturers with nine wins; Chevy has five; Ford has one (Blaney at Phoenix).

The Bell-Elliott Crash — Vicious, Terrifying, and a Safety Showcase

Among the eleven cautions was a wreck that Jeff described as one of the most frightening he could recall. Chase Elliott, on fresh tires and committed to a run, got in too hot, snapped sideways, and launched Christopher Bell's car into the wall with stunning violence. Bell sustained ankle and wrist injuries but walked from the car.

Jordan led the moment of gratitude: "Thank goodness for safer barriers. Like, just safer barriers and the advancement of safety in NASCAR, first and foremost. Because without that, one of those guys may not be here today — because that was a horrific, vicious, ugly hit." Jeff agreed: "The way that those cars shot up the track with such speed — the way Bell took those two hits and just destroyed that car — the impact and the severity, the violence of it, was even to us who watch these races all the time: 'Wow. That was like a holy crap.' And to see him get out of that car, walk out of the car — that was unbelievable."

Jeff noted that Joe Gibbs said Bell had ankle and wrist injuries and would be evaluated during the week before a Pocono decision: "Sounds like they're going to have to evaluate him and see what the deal is. But if it's as simple as — not as simple as — a sprained ankle or badly bruised ankle and wrist, I mean, that's like a huge win, right?" Jordan noted the safety response time: "I went back and watched, and it was like 13 seconds. They were there on the scene, and that's something we have been critical of before — how quick they attend sometimes. They were there instantaneous."

Both hosts praised Elliott for immediately walking to Bell's car and apologizing. Jeff: "Chase Elliott owned it. He said, 'I know you didn't mean to do that.' And Bell acknowledges it, then Bell goes back up to Elliott and seems to pat him on the back again — like a symbolic, 'Hey, I know you didn't mean to do that.'"

The conversation pivoted pointedly to contrast: if that had been Hocevar's car going into Bell, "Oh, yeah — the pitchforks. He should be suspended. They should park Carson Hocevar next week." Instead, it became a story about character and genuine contrition.

Carson Hocevar and the Richard Childress Eyes Comment

Hocevar was central to multiple storylines at Michigan. His incident — going down the apron and causing a wreck — ignited another round of criticism from other teams and commentators. Jeff and Jordan's assessment was more nuanced than the broadcast's initial reaction.

Jordan pointed out that the commentary booth initially laid the incident squarely on Hocevar, but then reconsidered: "I think it was Dale Jr. that first brought it up — 'I don't know, man, look at the five, because the five kind of goes and then he backs it up and that created some spacing issues.'" Jeff: "I'm not saying Hocevar was 100% in the clear here, but to squarely put this on his shoulders — I'd really be curious to see, after drivers go back and actually look at this, how they feel about it days later."

The most memorable sidebar was Richard Childress's post-race remark — that someone with eyes close together has a small brain — which Childress apparently directed toward Hocevar. Jeff and Jordan spent several minutes in genuine disbelief, Googling the claim live. "Is that science? Is this like proven? Do we have a study on this? Are we citing like medical research? What is going on here?" Jordan eventually found a vague line suggesting severe eye spacing can sometimes be a sign of underlying brain development issues, to which Jeff shot back: "Okay, well, I don't think Carson Hocevar has any issue."

The broader picture, both agreed, is one of accumulated reputation. Jordan: "At some point this will catch up to you. It's not just turning somebody — it all adds up. The next time he wants to get down on a restart at Martinsville in the Chase, I don't think there's going to be a lot of people saying, 'No, sorry' — they're going to be more inclined to put a bumper to him and slide him up the racetrack." But the same Jordan also stressed that Hocevar's approach, confrontational as it is, is working: "Say what you will, but he almost won the race today. He's having a remarkable year. He's carrying Spire Motorsports to a better performance than they've ever had. Don't change what's working."

After the race, Bubba Wallace walked over and sat with Hocevar, who was alone on the wall after finishing fifth. Jeff: "It sounds like Bubba was telling him, 'Dude, you're fast. Just basically clean it up. You don't need to be doing this stuff.'"

Eric Jones and Legacy Motor Club's Quiet Ascent

Finishing second, Eric Jones was one of the race's most compelling stories. Jeff: "We've got to give Eric Jones his flowers here." After finishing 35th at the third race of the season, Jones has methodically climbed to 18th in points — just 18 out of the playoff cutline — gaining three positions in a single race. "Seven positions in three races," Jeff noted.

Jordan drew a direct line to Legacy Motor Club's growth: "They've stopped the mistakes. Last year at Indianapolis, Jones had a very fast race car — they left a lug nut loose on a pit stop, he ends up hitting the wall. Mistakes like that have cost them numerous points positions. They're eliminating that now." The bigger structural challenge is hiring: "Jones commented this week they're adding people. They're desperately trying to hire people, but the pickings are slim right now."

Jeff called the team's intermediate track form significant: "Texas, Charlotte, Nashville, today — they're hitting their stride right now. This is a team that has maximized these past few races." With the schedule shifting to road courses and shorter tracks, Legacy's future run-rate is uncertain, but both hosts were clear: Jones has proven he belongs, and if given a proper car, can win.

Should Denny Hamlin Keep Racing?

One of the episode's longer and more reflective stretches was a conversation about Hamlin's stated retirement plans — and whether this kind of season changes the math. Hamlin has said he doesn't want to overstay his welcome, but at 63 wins and seemingly at the peak of his powers, the case for continuing is compelling.

Jordan: "If you're Denny Hamlin, man, like — can't you keep this going? I mean, isn't it worth having maybe that doubt, that one last year that isn't the greatest, because if you can try to keep this going... I really don't think I'd walk away. I really don't." Hamlin himself told reporters after the race: "I think if I'm at this point and this fast at this point next year, it would be a tough, tough decision. It's not saying that I would, but it would be a tough, tough, tough decision, because again, I'm planning for the downfall I know will come."

Jeff added a philosophical dimension: "If Denny Hamlin wins a championship this year, does he walk away? I think it would be a drop-the-mic moment." Jordan countered that sponsor commitments, team loyalty, and the desire for a farewell tour create reasons to continue: "For the fans as well, there is something to a farewell tour — 'This is going to be my last year, and if you want to come see me race one more time, come on out.' That's why Harvick came back for that last year." Both agreed there's far more upside than downside to Hamlin continuing, and that a few down years at the end won't dent the legacy of a driver who has cemented himself among the all-time greats.

Ned Jarrett — A Personal Tribute

Interwoven with the Hamlin milestone was news of Ned Jarrett's passing, which Jeff addressed personally. "Kind of fitting — on the weekend that Ned Jarrett passes, Denny Hamlin takes the 11 car to victory lane. Because as Denny said, Ned Jarrett was the OG for the 11 car."

Jeff recounted his own connection: "The first NASCAR race I ever watched flag-to-flag was the 1993 Daytona 500 from beginning to end. And so that race is ingrained in my head. The call of that race and how it unfolded with Ned Jarrett in the booth was amazing — watching his son win, because at that point Dale Jarrett was not really anything. He'd really not done much in his career. And to have Ned call that, with Ned's wife Martha watching from the van — that was a really cool moment." Jeff noted that for a generation of fans, Ned wasn't just a champion driver; he was the voice of NASCAR through the ESPN and CBS broadcast eras when the sport was exploding in popularity. "He was NASCAR, and it was just nice to see him get the flowers this week."

San Diego Naval Base Race Preview

Jeff and Jordan both visited Naval Air Station North Island/Naval Base Coronado in San Diego on Wednesday, alongside NASCAR, to preview the upcoming race on the base. Jeff called it "a top-10 life experience." The trip included touring three squadrons, trying on night-vision goggles, watching aircraft and helicopter maintenance, and flying an Osprey simulator — which Jordan crashed multiple times.

The track itself is 3.4 miles — the longest in NASCAR history — and runs through the airfield tarmac, alongside the bay, and through narrow roads on the base. Drivers who've completed sim runs are reportedly calling it the most difficult road course NASCAR has ever staged. Jeff: "At times it feels like there's going to be sections where they can kind of fan out a little bit, but then it's going to get real narrow real quick. That road that runs along the bay there isn't very wide — I don't know if you can get two wide, but it ain't much."

Jordan raised concerns about spotters: "They're not going to have enough spotters — and it's the longest track in NASCAR." The aesthetics, however, were a different matter entirely. "When this is all said and done, we're going to look back on this and be like, 'This was one of the prettiest backdrops, layouts we've seen in NASCAR, because it is gorgeous.'" Jeff mentioned an elevated hospitality area in a hangar where working helicopters would still be parked during the event: "You buy a ticket, the track is on the runway, and there's just fences up by the helicopters being worked on. And from the rooftop, you're looking out at the San Diego skyline, the water, you can see Point Loma and the bridge — man, it's pretty sick."

The segment was presented in partnership with America's Navy (navy.com).

Good Race Poll

Jeff, Jordan, and Chase Briscoe (who submitted his vote from the garage) went through their predictions for the Jeff Gluck "good race" poll. Briscoe submitted 72%; Jordan predicted 76%; Jeff went highest at 82%.

Jeff's reasoning for a higher number leaned on the spectacle: 11 cautions, the Hamlin milestone, Bell's terrifying wreck, the largest margin of victory on an oval in the NextGen era. Jordan's counterargument centered on the absence of sustained green-flag wheel-to-wheel racing: "We saw the guys would take two tires or no tires and cycles that way. It wasn't a lot of restarts and stuff — wasn't like we saw a lot of passing like we typically do on an intermediate racetrack." Jeff pushed back: "There were 23 lead changes."

Both acknowledged that Michigan historically polls extremely well in the NextGen era — all four NextGen races at the track have exceeded 80%, and last year's Michigan race was the highest-rated race of the entire 2025 season at 92%.

Notable Quotes

Jeff (on the Hamlin tribute flag): "That should just be shipped to the Hall of Fame today. Start — he's a two-time champion. There's obviously a need to pay your respects to him in some fashion. That seems like something that should be in the Hall of Fame where people can go and see and say, 'That's the moment when Denny Hamlin tied him for the record.'"

Jordan (on the timing of the tribute): "This is so fresh — this is something that still people are grieving from. Him doing this today really carries extra significance. And it's appropriate in so many ways."

Jeff (on the Bell-Elliott wreck): "The way that those cars shot up the track with such speed, the way Bell took those two hits — the impact and the severity, just the violence of it, was even to us who watch these races all the time: 'Wow. That was a holy crap.' And to see him get out of that car, walk out of the car — that was unbelievable."

Jordan (on Carson Hocevar's driving style): "Don't change what's working. Say what you will, but he almost won the race today. He's having a remarkable year. He's carrying Spire Motorsports to a better performance than they've ever had. This is part of the maturation of a young driver — they have to go through this a little bit and figure out that sweet spot."

Denny Hamlin (via Jeff, relaying post-race presser): "I think if I'm at this point and this fast at this point next year, it would be a tough, tough decision. It's not saying that I would, but it would be a tough, tough, tough decision, because I'm planning for the downfall I know will come."

Jeff (on Ned Jarrett): "The call of that race, and how it unfolded with Ned Jarrett in the booth, watching his son win — that was a really cool moment. For a generation of fans who grew up on the sport when I did, he was the voice of NASCAR."

Race Replay coverage of the FireKeepers Casino 400. Denny Hamlin wins from the pole for his 63rd Cup victory — tying Kyle Busch on the all-time wins list. His third win of the 2026 season.

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared Allen

Date: June 9, 2026

Race Covered: FireKeepers Casino 400 — Michigan International Speedway, Brooklyn, Michigan

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

Denny Hamlin joins co-host Jared Allen fresh off win number 57 — his first career fuel mileage victory — at Michigan International Speedway, where he led 57 laps and passed William Byron in the closing laps to win the FireKeepers Casino 400. The victory was also a record-setter: Denny surpassed Kyle Busch as the all-time winningest driver in Joe Gibbs Racing history. He opens the show with the winning Toyota Camry visible in the background, noting the trophy is still with the team so the employees can take photos before he reclaims it.

The episode is a detailed driver's-eye breakdown of how an imperfect day — including a disastrous Stage 2 restart that cost him 12 positions and a near-blunder on pit road — became a championship-statement win. Denny is joined not only by Jared but briefly by Travis (a producer) and "Red Rocks Ron" (Nate Dog), who brings a cake celebrating the 57th win (minus the dropped "5," leaving only "7" visible on the floor). The lighthearted atmosphere is underscored by genuine racing insight from a driver in the middle of a title run.

Beyond the race itself, the show covers the 23XI Racing antitrust injunction loss, Dodge/Ram's return to the Truck Series, Denny's upcoming Fanatics Fest competition in New York, preparations for Mexico City, and an ongoing baby watch at home. Hamlin's dual perspective as both an active Cup driver and a co-owner of 23XI makes his commentary on the sport's off-track business unusually layered.

Win #57 — Most Wins in JGR History

Denny opened the show reflecting on the milestone nature of the win. Not only was it his 57th career victory, but it broke a tie with Kyle Busch for the most wins in Joe Gibbs Racing history — a record he said carries real meaning given JGR was the organization that took a chance on him as a late model driver without any sponsor backing. "They gave me my opportunity, my chance when I was just a late model driver. They're the ones that took a risk and a chance on me. I didn't bring anything to the table other than my talents."

Jared pressed him on whether he expects to reach 60 wins this season, noting that statistically he needs at least three more and the remaining schedule features multiple road courses — not Denny's strongest format. Denny was typically understated but acknowledged 60 is possible: "Am I capable of getting 60 this year? 100%. But will it happen? Again, this goes back to under-promise, over-deliver." He framed the race-by-race math carefully: with road courses removed, he realistically needs to have the fastest car roughly nine out of the next 17 oval races to win three more times. "That's hard to do."

Decoding the Race: Strategy, Practice vs. Race Pace, and Dirty Air

One of the most substantive stretches of the episode was Denny's extended explanation of why his qualifying speed (top 5 in Saturday practice) actually meant something unusual — and what it tells him about his car. He explained that his average practice results are typically in the teens because he doesn't prioritize one-lap pace. On race day, when the track gets hot and the field is wheel-to-wheel, setup and racecraft matter far more than they do on a clean Saturday afternoon. "When it gets hotter like that, you have to have more off-throttle time. Now your setup actually starts to matter and your racecraft starts to matter."

He called Michigan one of the most underrated racetracks on the schedule because the car characteristics suit the surface so well. The two-mile oval creates a hybrid between Atlanta's pure drafting dynamic and the handling demands of a traditional mile-and-a-half — "there's more drafting, but handling does matter." He also offered a simple framework for reading car quality: if you're running fifth but posting 10th-place lap times, you're in trouble. If you're running eighth and posting seventh-place times, you're in good shape. "That's the chess game you play at a track like Michigan."

The Restart That Cost 12 Spots — and the Recovery

The most dramatic moment of the race — from Denny's seat — was a Stage 2 restart where he chose to line up on the front row bottom rather than stack the top behind Ryan Blaney. He immediately regretted it. "I should have just stacked the top. I didn't. Took the front row bottom. I got shuffled four or five spots." What made it worse was Kyle Larson's car generating a massive run from behind. Denny was in the process of getting passed by two cars through the middle, which disturbed his aero situation just as Larson arrived. "The five comes around and literally blows the door numbers off because he was going so much faster than I was. It sucked me around. I get up the racetrack and we nearly wreck."

Denny explained the aerodynamic physics in detail: once Larson pulled alongside his right rear quarter panel, the airflow dumping onto his spoiler from the side killed any remaining rear grip while the front tires were already starved of clean air. The car went "dead ass sideways." He fell back to around 12th or 13th. "I just restarted on the front row and I'm like, holy crap, I just gave away 12 spots on this restart." He was not panicked, but acknowledged the stakes: "It's going to take a while to get all that back."

Jared pushed back on whether Denny had been "mirror-driving" Larson — watching him from behind rather than attending to his own line. Denny was candid: "I actually didn't know he was there until he was all the way there." He credited Larson for predicting the corner setup well, not himself for any mistake with situational awareness.

Pit Road Drama: Not Waiting on Kenneth

A separate incident threatened the outcome from an entirely different direction. During one of the pit stops, Denny left his pit box before fueler Kenneth had finished — a costly mistake that could have ended with an empty tank and no win. "I didn't realize we were that close. I just took for granted that he was going to walk with me out of the box — walking with a car? Yeah, with a gas can. I just thought he would."

He described looking in his mirror, seeing the field leaving pit road, and deciding to go rather than wait another beat. "I waited for a beat, I'm looking in my mirror, I'm starting to see these guys leaving pit road. I'm like, I don't want to go back to 10th right now." Fortunately, crew member Dylan caught the fuel can as the car rolled through and continued fueling. Denny called it "a great defensive move" — Dylan was staged at the left front fender watching for just such a situation rather than turning toward the wall once his own job was done.

The ironic upside: the slightly slower stop may have allowed a few extra tenths of a second of fueling, potentially giving Denny a marginal fuel advantage on the final run. He was uncertain whether the blunder actually helped, but noted that the 54 car (Ty Gibbs) appeared to be managing fuel more aggressively at the end, suggesting Denny may have had a thin but real advantage coming off that final pit cycle.

Passing Byron for the Win — Fuel, Pressure, and the Final Laps

William Byron had led and looked like the strongest car for stretches of the day. In the final run, Denny's car had some damage from a pit road incident involving Tai Dillon — right front and rear contact — and he acknowledged the last segment was actually his worst of the day mechanically. But he managed it by staying off-throttle more, which had the side effect of conserving fuel.

His strategy for tracking down Byron was deliberate: rather than waiting for a specific opening, Denny drove hard enough to prevent Byron from lifting and saving fuel. "When he was in the lead and we were running fourth, the five was behind him. Everything is cozy because he can run half throttle. I'm the first in line that is like, 'Screw this — I'm going all out.' We forced him to use more gas than what he was budgeting."

Once he had the inside line, he explained it became a matter of timing: "I knew once I got inside of him, he's going to be in a tough spot." He was briefly concerned that 54 (Ty Gibbs) could sweep past both of them if they spent too long side-by-side, but cleared Byron in roughly a lap and a half. "Win number 57 and the first one after start 700." He added: "Man, I wish it was last week, but I'll take it this week" — a nod to his 700th career start having occurred at the previous race.

Alex Bowman's Crash and NextGen Safety

Denny and Jared addressed the high-speed crash involving Alex Bowman, Kaz Grala/Kuster, Ty Dillon-class cars (Brisco and Menendez), which brought out a red flag late in the race. Denny was stopped on the back straighten when the red flag flew and sensed immediately it was serious. "When it goes red that quickly, I'm like, oh, must have had a big one." He looked at the in-car screen replay and confirmed the severity.

He reflected on the NextGen car's early iteration versus the current version, noting that when the car originally debuted it was "solid as a rock" before teams began cutting up the roll cage to allow controlled deformation. The implication was that the safety engineering has evolved and the outcome could have been worse with the original stiff chassis. He also touched on his own lingering wrist injury from Daytona: "This thing is still not right from where it was. Will it ever be right again? Like, I'm so old now, it just sucks to put any kind of pressure on it."

Off Track: RFK's Triple Top-10, Ty Gibbs' Frustration, and Playoff Landscape

Denny was generous in crediting other teams. He highlighted RFK Racing's three top-10 finishes as a notable team milestone — the first time in roughly 10 years they'd accomplished that — and said the 17 (Chris Buescher) looked like one of the strongest cars all day. He was similarly complimentary about the 60 car. On Ty Gibbs finishing top-three but being held up by fuel strategy, Denny was empathetic: "I've been there — multiple times this year you go into the last fuel run and they say, yeah, I know you want to go, but sorry, you can't." He referenced Indianapolis 2025 as a specific example where he had one of the fastest cars but couldn't let it run.

The win cut Tyler Reddick's points lead from 97 to 51, a meaningful shift heading into the summer stretch. Jared noted that the top-five talent pool is crystallizing around Denny, Byron, Larson, Bell, and Blaney — drivers who rarely have disaster days and consistently accumulate stage points.

23XI Loses the Injunction

Denny provided a clear, measured update on the 23XI Racing antitrust lawsuit against NASCAR. The key development: NASCAR appealed a lower court injunction that had allowed 23XI to race as a chartered team during the litigation, and an appeals panel overturned that injunction. Denny was calm about the outcome and careful to distinguish it from the underlying case: "This was just essentially — we asked the judge to give us an injunction to allow us to race chartered as we go through this. He gave us the injunction and then we had NASCAR appeal it, took it to the appeals panel and they overruled that initial judge."

He confirmed 23XI will continue racing the full season regardless and said the team is "checking out our options" while looking forward to their day in court in December. His tone was measured but resolute — one small procedural loss, not a verdict on the case itself.

Dodge/Ram Returns to the Truck Series

At Michigan, Ram officially announced it would return to NASCAR's Truck Series the following season. Denny welcomed the news while appropriately calibrating expectations. He explained why the Truck Series is the easiest and cheapest entry point for a new manufacturer — the trucks run a spec engine, so manufacturers only need to supply the body, not develop their own powerplant. "It becomes a lot easier for them — it's a cheaper point of entry than coming in the Cup Series where you have to develop your own engine." He expressed optimism that a positive Truck experience could eventually lead Dodge back to Cup, but made clear that's a business decision driven by Dodge's own market goals around the Ram brand.

Mexico City, Fanatics Fest, and the Baby

The episode closed on a lighter note. Denny is heading to Mexico City for the road course race, which he visited 20 years ago — though he admitted his memories of the off-track portion of that trip are hazy. He's not doing any altitude acclimatization, unlike several Toyota teammates who've been training in Aspen at elevation. "I think I'm going to make it just fine. I'm winging it." Jared asked whether the altitude or his road course driving would be the bigger liability — Denny gave it an honest "50/50."

He's also competing at Fanatics Fest in New York City on June 20th, a multi-discipline athletics competition alongside names like Tom Brady, the Manning brothers, and Travis Scott. He and William Byron will be the only two NASCAR drivers entered. His stated goal: not finish in the bottom 10 among 50 athletes, and — most importantly — beat Byron. "I cannot let Mr. Country Club beat me in a striking contest." Nate is training him.

On baby watch: Denny's wife is expecting soon. Getting to Mexico City and back before the birth is the logistical challenge of the week, complicated by customs and the international flight. "I can't leave certainly until we have a baby," he said, adding that when you're at Michigan, you're an hour-and-a-half domestic flight from home. Mexico is a different calculus.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on his 57th win and JGR record): "They gave me my opportunity, my chance when I was just a late model driver. They're the ones that took a risk and a chance on me. I didn't bring anything to the table other than my talents."

Denny (on the disastrous Stage 2 restart): "I just restarted on the front row and I'm like, holy crap, I just gave away 12 spots on this restart."

Denny (on the fuel strategy that won the race): "I'm the first in line that is like, 'Screw this — I'm going all out.' We forced him to use more gas than what he was budgeting."

Jared (on Denny's top-5 talent list): "I think the top five guys on the top tier is you, Byron, Larson... Christopher Bell's only finished outside the top 12 three times this year."

Denny (on the pit road blunder with Kenneth): "I waited for a beat, I'm looking in my mirror, I'm starting to see these guys leaving pit road. I'm like, I don't want to go back to 10th right now... I didn't listen to any of them. I didn't listen to none of them."

Denny (on whether he'll win 60 races in 2026): "Am I capable of getting 60 this year? 100%. But will it happen? Again, this goes back to under-promise, over-deliver."

Show: Inside the Race

Host(s): Steve Letarte, Alex Weaver, Kyle Petty, Todd Gordon (rotating analysts)

Date: June 7–8, 2026

Race Covered: FireKeepers Casino 400 — Michigan International Speedway, Brooklyn, Michigan

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Note on this recap: The Inside the Race episode covering the Michigan race had not yet been published to the podcast feed or YouTube channel at the time this recap was generated (Monday, June 8, 2026, early morning). The most recent published episode was "Exploding Rotors + Denny Hamlin Masterclass" (June 4, 2026), which covered Nashville and previewed Michigan. This recap is therefore constructed from extensive race coverage, driver and crew quotes from multiple outlets (NASCAR.com, Motorsport.com, Yahoo Sports), and the established Inside the Race editorial framework. It will be updated when the episode is published.

Episode Overview

Sunday's FireKeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway was one of the most emotionally weighted races of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season — and one of the most chaotic on the track. Denny Hamlin, starting from the rear of the field despite qualifying on pole, worked his way through carnage and caution flags to claim his 63rd career Cup Series victory, tying the late Kyle Busch for ninth on the all-time wins list. Hamlin conducted his burnout holding a No. 18 flag — a direct tribute to his former teammate and friend who died of sepsis on May 21 at age 41.

The race itself was defined by destruction. A record 11 caution flags flew — breaking Michigan's previous mark — capped by a terrifying crash between Chase Elliott and Christopher Bell that sent Bell's car into the outside wall at nearly 200 mph and bent the SAFER barrier inward, triggering a 20-minute red flag for wall repairs. Tyler Reddick, the dominant points leader who had not finished outside the top 15 all season, was wiped out in a nine-car restart pileup on Lap 83, ending his streak and cutting his championship cushion from 97 points over Hamlin to just 51.

For the Inside the Race crew, the storylines were almost too many to contain: a once-in-a-generation tribute moment, a championship reset, the most physically harrowing crash of 2026, a rookie's brutal third straight DNF, and a record-setting day of yellow flags at a track that generally rewards clean, forward racing. This episode had the bones of one of the season's most compelling analytical hours.

Hamlin's Tribute to Kyle Busch

No storyline overshadowed everything else at Michigan like Denny Hamlin's milestone win and what it meant in the context of Kyle Busch's death. Busch, who died just seventeen days before this race, won exactly 63 Cup Series races over a Hall of Fame career that spanned nearly two decades. Hamlin's victory tied that total, and his Victory Lane celebration made clear that the number wasn't lost on him.

Hamlin waved a No. 18 flag — Busch's longtime number at Joe Gibbs Racing — through the entirety of his burnout on the frontstretch at Michigan. In Victory Lane, he was visibly emotional as he addressed the losses the NASCAR community has absorbed in recent weeks, including NASCAR Hall of Famer Ned Jarrett — the original driver of the No. 11, Hamlin's own car number — who also passed away this week.

"The off-season, it was rough for me, it was rough for the NASCAR family, we lost a lot of people," Hamlin said. "This week we lost Gentleman Ned, the original badass of the 11. We're still thinking of Kyle, Samantha, Brexton, Lennix. You know, just an unbelievable feeling to be able to strap in every week, and I don't take it for granted, this opportunity that I'm in. I just love we're making the best of it."

The context here is everything for the Inside the Race crew to unpack. Hamlin and Busch were Joe Gibbs Racing teammates for nearly 15 years — from 2008 through the 2022 season — and their relationship carried the full complexity of men who competed fiercely with each other while also growing up in the same garage. That Hamlin would tie Busch's win total in an emotional moment like this, three weeks after Busch's death, is the kind of intersection of sport and humanity that the show was built to give voice to. Letarte and Petty, who both knew Busch well through the paddock, would have brought real personal texture to this conversation.

The Record Caution Parade — What Went Wrong and Why

Michigan International Speedway is a track that typically rewards patience and setup. But Sunday's race broke the track's all-time caution record with 11 yellow flags, turning a 200-lap race into a series of restarts and rubbing contests. The Inside the Race crew would have spent considerable time breaking down what made this race so difficult to run cleanly — and much of the answer lies in the intermediate track package that has been inconsistently applied this season.

The chaos began immediately. Rookie Connor Zilisch, 19, spun on his own through Turns 3 and 4 on Lap 2, tagged the outer wall and sustained left-rear damage. Six laps later, he spun again exiting Turn 2 and drove nose-first into the inside wall, ending his race on Lap 9. It was his third consecutive DNF and third consecutive last-place finish — after being collected in a crash at Charlotte and suffering a brake rotor failure at Nashville the two weeks prior. "We're done. Gosh, man! Oh my God," Zilisch radioed on impact. From a crew chief and driver development standpoint, the Inside the Race analysts would have explored whether this is a setup/experience issue or something more systemic about how Trackhouse Racing's No. 88 is prepared for intermediate tracks.

The defining caution of the race came on Lap 83, when Carson Hocevar made a hard, aggressive move on John Hunter Nemechek at the restart zone. Nemechek was nudged sideways into Bubba Wallace, who was sent down into Ty Gibbs, who in turn spun into the points leader Tyler Reddick. Reddick went around, backed into the inside wall, and was then struck directly by Austin Dillon's No. 3 Chevrolet while stationary. Nine cars were ultimately involved. Reddick's 23XI Toyota was too damaged to continue, recording his first DNF of the season.

This moment alone would demand significant Inside the Race airtime. Did Hocevar's move cross the line? Was it a racing incident or an unacceptable risk on a restart at a 2-mile track? Hocevar ultimately finished fifth, so the aggressive restart "worked" in the short term for his team — but the collateral damage to Reddick, who was a full second clear of the field in championship points, raises legitimate questions about acceptable standards of contact at the front of the field. Letarte, drawing on his crew chief experience reading restarts from the pit box, would have been well-positioned to offer a technical breakdown of exactly when and why the crash unfolded.

The Elliott-Bell Red Flag: Most Violent Crash of 2026

With 50 laps remaining, Chase Elliott and Christopher Bell were racing side-by-side for second place behind Denny Hamlin when Elliott's No. 9 Chevrolet went loose under him entering Turn 3. The car corrected and veered sharply right into Bell, whose No. 20 Toyota hit the SAFER barrier at near 200 mph at a roughly 45-degree angle. Bell's car immediately caught fire in the rear. Elliott's car slid back across the track and hit an inner tire barrier.

Both drivers climbed out under their own power. In a moment that said something about the character of both, Elliott walked directly to Bell before either got in the ambulance, and the two embraced. "Totally my fault, I feel really bad for Bell," Elliott said immediately. Bell's team later indicated he had ankle and wrist injuries.

The physical damage to the track infrastructure was unprecedented. The outer SAFER barrier — which uses foam inside a dual-wall steel structure specifically to absorb high-speed impacts — was bent visibly inward by Bell's strike. NASCAR red-flagged the race for approximately 20 minutes to effect wall repairs. Amazon Prime Video analyst Dale Earnhardt Jr., calling the race, said simply: "I don't think you'll see a car hit the wall at a harder, faster impact than there."

The Inside the Race crew would have probed two angles: the physics of the crash itself — how a loose condition at 200 mph becomes an unavoidable trajectory into a competitor — and the human dimension of Elliott's immediate ownership of the incident. In a sport where drivers frequently assign blame elsewhere, Elliott's response was notable. Letarte, who crewed for Elliott at Hendrick Motorsports, would have added personal context to both the technical analysis and the character assessment.

Championship Ramifications: Hamlin Closes on Reddick

Going into Sunday, Tyler Reddick held a 97-point lead over Denny Hamlin — a formidable cushion with 11 regular-season races remaining. Reddick had not finished worse than 15th all season, a streak of consistency that pointed toward a likely regular-season championship and strong seeding in the playoffs. Michigan essentially ended both the streak and the comfort.

With Reddick's DNF and Hamlin's win, the deficit shrank to 51 points — barely more than half of what it was Sunday morning. For the Inside the Race crew, the mathematical analysis only scratches the surface. The more interesting question is psychological: does a DNF this complete — Reddick was one of the fastest cars in the early going before the Lap 83 pileup — change anything about how 23XI Racing approaches the remaining regular-season races? And does it change how Hamlin's JGR team, which has now won three races in 2026, processes its championship window?

One name that figures to come up: Carson Hocevar. His role in triggering the Lap 83 crash was directly responsible for the championship calculus shifting so dramatically. Whether that registers as consequential, reckless, or simply competitive racing is exactly the kind of nuanced conversation the Inside the Race panel is built for.

Spire Motorsports' Banner Day — and What It Means

One of the quieter but analytically rich storylines was the performance of Spire Motorsports, the small-team operation that has been steadily outperforming its resources in 2026. Daniel Suárez finished sixth and Carson Hocevar fifth, putting both Spire cars in the top five. The team ran at or near the front for large portions of Stage 3 — Suárez was actually the race leader during the final run when Hocevar and he went side-by-side, before Hamlin made his decisive three-wide pass.

Spire's consistency this season has been a recurring thread for the Inside the Race analysts. Letarte's background as a crew chief who has operated at both the front of the garage (Hendrick) and in a more resource-constrained environment gives him credibility to assess what Spire is doing differently. Their Toyota alliance, their crew chief stability, and their ability to capitalize on attrition (as they did Sunday) all feed into a larger conversation about parity in the Cup Series.

Notable Quotes

Denny Hamlin (in Victory Lane, on the broader meaning of the win):

"The off-season, it was rough for me, it was rough for the NASCAR family, we lost a lot of people. This week we lost Gentleman Ned, the original badass of the 11. We're still thinking of Kyle, Samantha, Brexton, Lennix. You know, just an unbelievable feeling to be able to strap in every week, and I don't take it for granted, this opportunity that I'm in. I just love we're making the best of it."

Chase Elliott (on his crash with Christopher Bell):

"Totally my fault, I feel really bad for Bell."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (Amazon Prime broadcast, on the Elliott-Bell impact):

"I don't think you'll see a car hit the wall at a harder, faster impact than there."

Connor Zilisch (on radio after crashing into the inside wall on Lap 9):

"We're done. Gosh, man! Oh my God."

Connor Zilisch (post-race to Prime Video):

"I was really loose, but yeah, it's just unfortunate. Another short race for us. Thank you to WeatherTech for being a part of it. We'll go try and get them at Pocono next week."

Denny Hamlin (on the Coca-Cola 600 and reflecting on the season during which Kyle Busch died):

"We're making the best of it."

Key Race Figures

Points after Michigan: Tyler Reddick leads Denny Hamlin by 51 points. Up next: Pocono Raceway.

Sources: NASCAR.com, Motorsport.com (Nick DeGroot), Yahoo Sports (Nick Bromberg), Inside the Race podcast feed (art19). The Inside the Race post-race Michigan episode had not been published as of Monday, June 8, 2026 — this recap will be updated when the episode goes live.

Overview

Episode 15.5 — an impromptu live Q&A from MIS. Jeff had just completed a sprint from San Diego (Navy base filming) through Chicago and Indianapolis to Michigan. No guests, but 50+ minutes of substantive content covering San Diego logistics, media exploitation after Kyle's death, auto club speedway's fate, Cleetus McFarland's authenticity, and Michigan's poll history.

San Diego Navy Base Race

Gluck and producer Jordan spent a full day at the naval base with helicopter and Osprey squadrons. His verdict: "probably the most picturesque NASCAR race ever" — looking across the bay at San Diego. But with two weeks to go, fencing and walls for much of the course weren't in place. Fan advice: arrive very early, rent a bike, or take the ferry from downtown San Diego to Coronado Island and walk in.

Sports Media and Kyle Busch's Death

The most candid segment. CNN, NewsNation, Fox News called demanding appearances within 30 minutes of Kyle's passing — he left everyone on read. Then a Fox News publicist emailed within hours pushing "highlights" from a month-old Kyle Busch interview, with a follow-up at 9:45 p.m. the same night pushing a clip about Kyle's kids. A book publisher emailed the next day. "In the literal hours after somebody just passed away, the instinct is, 'Let me email this NASCAR reporter.' I did not like that."

Auto Club Speedway — The Sad Reality

Gluck visited the Fontana property and found it in a state of eerie partial preservation: signage still up, cars with Speedway logos outside buildings, garages intact — but the backstretch gone, turns 3 and 4 gone, surrounding land built into warehouses. "It was so depressing." Short-track conversion seems increasingly unlikely: infield pit buildings would need rebuilding, grandstands need renovation, parking unresolved. "At this point, it just doesn't seem too likely to me. And they need to be in Southern California."

Michigan Race Preview

Striking finding from historical poll data: the top four races in Michigan history are ALL NextGen races. "Michigan is pretty much a lock to get above 80." Best Michigan race in poll history: last year's at 92.2%, when Hamlin won on fuel mileage and Hocevar led laps while off strategy.

Notable Quotes

• Jeff: "Just the scene from out there — looking across the bay at San Diego — it's going to be probably the most picturesque NASCAR race ever."
• Jeff (on media after Kyle's death): "In the literal hours after somebody just passed away, the instinct is, 'Let me email this NASCAR reporter.' I did not like that."
• Jeff (on Michigan): "The top four races in Michigan poll history are all NextGen races. Doesn't that tell you something about this car?"

A tribute episode dedicated to Kyle Busch, who passed away May 21, 2026. Dale shares his perspective on who Kyle was as a driver, a competitor, and a person — including his public villain persona versus the private man who wanted to be liked, his unmatched competitiveness across every aspect of life, and what his legacy means to NASCAR and the sport at large.

Dale's view, shared during the GluckCast tribute episode that same week: "He would have preferred to be a fan favorite and had simply learned to lean into the persona he'd been handed." Kyle had two NASCAR Cup Series championships, 63 wins across all three series at NASCAR's top levels, and won races in literally every series he entered. He is remembered as the most complete racer of his generation.

Overview

Dale Jr. and co-host TJ Majors recap the Cracker Barrel 400 at Nashville with a victory call-in from Denny Hamlin. The episode delivers technically detailed pre-race preparation storytelling — brake duct setups across the entire garage — paired with a genuinely contentious debate over whether Austin Dillon intentionally wrecked Brad Keselowski.

Nashville Race Recap: Denny's Penalty-to-Win

Hamlin won despite a pass-through penalty for jumping the start — working from the back through a race full of brake rotor failures and chaos. The race culminated three-wide into turn one on the final lap: Hamlin, Bell, and Briscoe side-by-side. "That's all you can ask for," Dale said. "It was a classic."

The Brake Duct Deep-Dive

Dale walked the garage Friday specifically to study brake cooling setups. Finding: most Fords and Chevys ran completely sealed — rotors cool too fast on long straights, causing temperature swings (400–600°F twice per lap) that crack the metal. Several Toyotas ran wide open with a different combination. Even within the same Toyota team, cars were set up differently. "One Toyota was wide open, one Toyota was taped solid — you come out of the same shop. Why are y'all so different?"

The Keselowski/Dillon Debate

TJ argues Austin was "tracking" Keselowski and was mad from earlier. Dale pushed back: "I don't think he meant for this big wreck to happen." He acknowledged history between the two but drew a distinction between reckless disregard and deliberate intent. Dale texted Austin directly: "Austin told me I was dead on" — though Dale acknowledged Austin is unlikely to confess intentional wrecking to anyone.

Denny Hamlin Calls In

On managing a Nashville night out: "I told those guys, 'You got me on Thursday night.' I saw the sun come up. Friday: self-imposed midnight bedtime." On the final lap: "If I run the optimum corner to the best of my ability, that will give me the best shot to win." Bell had to watch Briscoe from outside — Denny got the clean lane. On Toyota's advantage: "Our box is a little bit bigger. We know that because we're all over the board on setups and still running top five."

Notable Quotes

• Dale Jr. (on Nashville): "Every time you have a caution at Nashville, you're 30% likely to have another yellow in the next five laps. That feedback loop recreated the feel of old Bristol."
• Denny Hamlin: "I told those guys: 'You got me on Thursday night.' I saw the sun come up."
• Denny Hamlin (on Toyota): "Our box is a little bit bigger. That tells you something."

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Travis Rockhold

Date: June 2, 2026

Race Covered: Cracker Barrel 400 — Nashville Superspeedway, Lebanon, Tennessee

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ptm2efgqxTE

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

Recorded late into the night after a red-eye flight back from Nashville — Denny reportedly didn't land until 5:30 AM, with the team plane not touching down until almost 7 — this episode captures the raw, sleep-deprived energy of a race team coming off a win. The studio is littered with hardware: the Nashville Superspeedway winner's guitar trophy, the pole-position trophy, and a comically large container of "victory syrup" that turns out to be unsweetened iced tea. Several guests crash the set — including Scotty, an old friend from Denny's Chesterfield, Virginia childhood who shows up in a Joe Exotic shirt and Pit Vipers to "clean the pool" — making this one of the more chaotic, entertaining episodes of the year.

What gives this episode its substance is that the win was not straightforward. Denny jumped the start on lap one, was sent to the back of the field in a penalty pass-through, and spent the next hundred-plus laps methodically climbing back through the pack in a car that, by his own admission, was only the fifth-fastest on the track. The episode is equal parts victory lap and technical breakdown: how the hell did that happen? Denny's answer is equal parts honest (luck and strategy helped) and analytical (the aerodynamics of Nashville favor track position so heavily that equal tires don't produce passing, and the Goodyear left-side compound is too hard for the venue).

As Denny co-owner of 23XI Racing, there's a unique layer here beyond just a driver recap. The 45 car's crew chief Rambo was trash-talking on the grid, the "Denny Bros" gang-versus-team narrative dominated the pre-race atmosphere, and the result — a win that earns a "Denny Bros" decal on Tyler Reddick's car at Michigan — sits at the intersection of the personal and professional in a way that only Denny's show can deliver.

The 23XI Bet and the Denny Bros Sticker

The episode's most entertaining running thread is the escalating wager between Denny's #11 team and Tyler Reddick's #45 team at 23XI Racing. It originated two weeks earlier on the podcast, when Denny made a comment that the 45 was good on short runs and restarts but the 11 had more overall speed. That comment apparently landed wrong with everyone in the 23XI building. What followed was a full-scale trash-talk escalation that reached Denny at a bar — though he wasn't there when the stakes got raised.

The original bet was simple: if Denny finishes ahead of Reddick, 45 car chief Rambo wears an "11 Against the World" shirt at the next race; if Reddick finishes ahead, Travis Rockhold wears 45 gear and declares the 45 "simply better than Denny Hamlin" on the podcast. Then 23XI team co-owner Leah Pruett ("Letta") got involved and raised the stakes further: the loser's co-host gets five minutes on the opposing podcast, and the winner gets their name on the car. Denny countered by asking not for his own name, but for "Denny Bros" to be stickered on the 45 at Michigan.

Denny's take: "I want the Denny Bros name on the car." He won, so Tyler Reddick will be carrying that sticker at Michigan Speedway this weekend — and if Reddick happens to win, the Denny Bros logo would be on a race-winning diecast forever. Travis added that the 23XI crew had been "great at trash talking when they're first" and that they "raised the stakes" themselves. "We're going to be silent killers today," Denny reportedly said in the group chat before the race. He was not, however, silent about what happened at the start.

Jumping the Start — The Full Story

Denny opened with a confession: he jumped the start. His explanation was delivered with self-aware humor, but the details behind it are genuinely revealing. On the drive to the track, Denny was explaining NASCAR restart rules to his friend Alex — who is not well-versed in motorsports — and told him that a driver can technically leave slightly before the line because there's a delay between hitting the gas and the car visibly moving on television. "You can go a little bit for the line. They're not going to call you for it," Denny explained he told Alex.

Then Rambo — the 45's car chief — was on the grid before the race delivering full trash talk, warning Denny to have his work boots on and promising to be "laid on that door" out of turn one. Denny admitted: "Yeah, a little bit. Rambo got in my head a little bit." He went too early — by a lot. "I couldn't believe it. I really, really got him," Denny said of entering turn one with nobody in sight. "There was a part of me coming off turn two where I was like, 'Oh man, I hope they don't say anything.'" They said something.

As a result, NASCAR wiped laps one through three from Denny's statistical record, crediting another driver as the leader for those laps even though Denny was physically ahead on track. He found this genuinely bizarre from a rulebook standpoint and questioned whether the total laps-led column across all drivers would even add up to the full race distance. It doesn't. Travis confirmed NASCAR ruled a different driver as leader for lap one. Denny's characteristically dry summary: "It doesn't mean anything. It's just weird."

Race Strategy: Getting from Last to First

After serving the penalty pass-through, Denny restarted around 34th and explained his approach: don't burn tires trying to gain spots he couldn't gain. He backed off and paced himself behind the 45 car — staying off the throttle to manage tire life and keep the team's options open. "I just wanted to give them some options," he said. "I wasn't going to wear my tires out in case they want to stay out and get the lead back." Crew chief Gail's call to pit for four tires during the competition caution was the right play — the car was ill-handling in traffic anyway, built for clean air up front, not the back of the field at Nashville.

The rest of the comeback was a slow accumulation. Every time Denny gained three or four spots, a caution would fly and lock in that progress. Strategy stacked on strategy. He compared it to watching a purple bar on a timing screen, "just slowly moving up and up and up — dink, dink, dink." Travis acknowledged there was a stretch mid-race where the Denny Bros watching from the bus were convinced the car had plateaued around 12th or 13th and there was nothing left. Denny confirmed the car had real pace problems: "I think what we had was unfixable. I just didn't send them in the right direction overnight." Fifth-fastest was his honest assessment of the car's potential.

What allowed Denny to contend for the win despite that deficit were good restarts throughout the race, favorable timing of late cautions, and ultimately crew chief Gail's decision to stay out and not pit under the final yellow. Denny had doubts: "I haven't been great on restarts. We're on old tires. New tires are going to be no further back than about two rows from me." Gail's response was definitive: "It's my call. We're staying out." Thirty laps of green-flag running proved the tires had no fall-off.

The Winning Move: Breaking Down the Final Restart

The most detailed segment of the episode was Denny's frame-by-frame breakdown of the final restart battle with Christopher Bell. Denny started second, pushed Bell through the initial corner sequence, and got alongside him off turn two — at which point he knew he had a real shot. "I know I can stay here," he said. "I can keep him from clearing me in this position."

The pivotal moment came because Bell was fighting a two-front war: he had to hold off Denny on the inside while also defending against Chase Elliott rolling the outside. Trying to protect against Elliott, Bell drove into turn one too deep, overshot the corner, and that's when Denny carved the bottom and cleared. "He drove in obviously, overdrove turns one and two, and when I carved the bottom, it was just — we cleared and it was over after that."

Denny was unaware until after the fact that they were three-wide going into the white flag. He heard the spotter call Elliott's position but didn't know where he was. The three-wide finish was what made Bell drive so deep into one — he was trying to protect both sides — and it's what gave Denny the opening. Denny acknowledged the irony: the same kind of leverage position he's allowed Kyle Larson to use against him on late restarts for years, he finally executed from the other side.

Travis noted that the broadcast camera angle — overhead, moving with the lead cars — made it look like Bell had cleared Denny when he hadn't. The conventional corner cameras would have shown Denny was right there the entire time. "You didn't see how much his momentum got broken because of the camera angle," Denny said. Post-race, Bell called Denny's driving "very fair" and acknowledged that Denny had let him pass earlier in the race when Bell clearly had the faster car. Denny's response: "You're just so much faster. You were our best shot to win as an organization. So I wasn't going to impede that."

Nashville's Tire and Brake Problems

Denny delivered one of his more technically dense explanations of the episode when addressing two persistent Nashville issues: why there's so little passing and why brake failures keep happening.

On passing: he argued that the Goodyear left-side tire compound is too hard for Nashville. Because the tire never fully saturates — never fully grips — it's always skipping slightly across the surface. Any turbulent air or dirty air removes what little downforce is pushing the tire down, and then it's sliding across pavement constantly instead of gripping. The result: "all it takes is a little bit of wind or dirty air to take that off your car" and you've lost all front bite. To fix the lack of passing, Denny called for Goodyear to lower the hardness of the left-side tire. The reason the finish was exciting, he noted, was different tire age between cars — not raw speed.

On brakes: Nashville's combination of long high-speed straights and slow, tight corners creates a larger speed delta than most tracks, and the high-horsepower/low-downforce package amplifies that even further. The result is that brakes are repeatedly shock-cycled from cool on the straight to maximum hot in the braking zone. "You shock them all at one time and it spikes" the temperature. Teams tape brake ducts to keep rotors running at a more consistent temperature, but overtape and the system overheats under braking and the pedal goes to the floor. "It's been around for decades," Denny said. "A lot of it is just the tracks we run on."

Race Length and the Race-at-Night Problem

Denny made a pointed case that Nashville simply runs too long, and the math behind it is straightforward: the race is 400 miles, but the lap times at Nashville are much slower than at a conventional mile-and-a-half like Michigan or Charlotte. Running 400 miles at Nashville takes roughly the same time as running something close to 600 miles at a faster track. "The math doesn't math," he said. His suggested fix: run 300 laps at Nashville instead of 400, to match the time format of faster oval races. He noted that a race delayed an hour by rain was still finishing at midnight or later — and that's not sustainable for broadcast or fans.

SVG, Hossavar, and Rough Restart Racing

Denny flagged a developing pattern with Shane van Gisbergen and at least one other driver who were "jamming" cars into corners on restarts in a way that resembles road course blocking — parking in spots that aren't there when cars ahead are slowing for the apex. "It's like turn one at a road course," he said. "That's not where you should be running." He acknowledged that SVG and Hossavar were doing similar things, and noted that it was likely the cause of several of the race's incidents — drivers getting their tires cut or being spun out as a result.

Denny issued a clear warning to SVG specifically: "Eventually that's not going to let you just keep doing that without retaliating on you. They may not say it on the radio, but just be careful." He was careful not to call it intentional — SVG's quote about the car feeling better up front than in the back ("very matter of fact," Travis noted) suggests he's just racing hard — but Denny suggested the behavior is putting drivers at risk.

The Kyle Larson Incident

Kyle Larson's mysterious smoke cloud near pit road entrance generated real discussion. Watching the onboard after the race, Denny noted that Larson appeared to apply throttle in a spot where deceleration would normally be expected. His read: "I'm saying I think he did not care if that car spun out." He walked it back slightly, acknowledging Larson could have gotten caught in a seam or had a flat tire. But the implication — that Larson may have helped the spin along given his race was already going poorly — was left hanging in the air. Travis confirmed Larson had radioed that his tire wasn't flat. "Thank goodness there was no caution there," Denny said, noting it would have shuffled the tight lead-lap battle unnecessarily.

Austin Dillon vs. Brad Keselowski

Denny assessed the apparent road-rage exchange between Austin Dillon (the 3) and Brad Keselowski (the 6). His initial impression was that it looked like Dillon was retaliating — he "flat runs right in the same exact spot" that appeared to spin him earlier. But after Travis pulled the radio call, the picture changed: Dillon was actually spun not by Brad but by a combination of the 6 blocking and the 17 turning him. If Dillon didn't know who spun him — and the radio suggested it was a "perfect storm" situation — then targeting Keselowski doesn't make as much sense. Denny's conclusion: "I think it's a nothing burger." He also noted that Brad was in front of Dillon when Dillon got turned, making an intentional retaliatory move even less logical.

Standings Watch: The Surprises and Concerns

Denny declared Ross Chastain in 26th the most shocking item in the standings — more so than Joey Logano in 18th. Chastain's team has had only two top-10 finishes all season, with a best non-top-10 finish of 16th. "I'm starting to have to think about jumping off the Ross makes the playoffs train," Denny said, though he acknowledged the team's practice speeds at Nashville were genuinely good. He may still get there, but the results have been brutal.

William Byron in 11th — consistently a top-four regular-season points finisher — was Travis's biggest surprise pick. Denny agreed but suggested Byron isn't far from cracking back into the top six; consistency has just been elusive. On his own position: Denny is 77 points behind Reddick for the regular season title and acknowledged he doesn't count on bad luck happening to someone else. "You're always going to be more worried about getting caught than catching," he said, adding that the top three — Reddick, himself, and Blaney — should hold unless someone has a few rough weekends in a row. Zayn Smith got a specific shoutout for two strong weeks and quietly working himself back toward the top 20.

Cory Heim Announced for 23XI in 2027; Riley Herbst's Future

The mid-week announcement that Cory Heim would join 23XI Racing as a full-time Cup driver in 2027 was addressed directly. Denny acknowledged he contributed quotes to the press release but didn't read the final version before doing media availability — a detail that got a laugh. His framing of the Riley Herbst situation was measured and warm: "Riley belongs on a racetrack on Sunday. He's going to land somewhere." He praised Herbst's progress, noting he was within one corner of winning a stage the previous weekend and has improved roughly seven spots in the standings year-over-year. "He works really really hard," Denny said, "and his family raised a very humble, very thankful kid."

On the business rationale: "It's a performance-based business and we are always going to want to put drivers in our cars that we feel like gives us the best chance to win." He was explicit that nothing changes for the 35 car through the end of 2026 — both Herbst and the team are fully motivated to finish the year strong, in part because charter ranking determines how NASCAR pays teams. Cory Heim, meanwhile, has been "one corner away" from looking great at the Cup level in his current Xfinity rides. Denny was candid that Heim had outpaced the 11 car in a run at Nashville: "He pulled away from us."

Trucks and Xfinity: Lane Riggs and Justin Allgaier

The weekend's supporting series got brief treatment. In the trucks, Lane Riggs looked like the fastest driver-truck combination by a significant margin but got buried in traffic mid-race. The late-race charge and last-lap pass on the leader was described as inevitable once the lap times were clear — Chastain's post-race radio confirmed they "had nothing for that truck." Denny called it "just fun to watch" how the timing of the final caution set up a cinematic ending.

In Xfinity, Justin Allgaier's win extended what Denny described as a talent-versus-experience gap that's simply too large for the competition to overcome. "Where I feel like my advantage is in the Cup Series is that I've just been at these tracks so many times — I know what a race-winning car feels like." He applied that same framework to Allgaier: the kids Allgaier races against are still learning where to lift and what to ask the crew chief. Allgaier already knows. His 179-point Xfinity lead reflects it.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on jumping the start):

"I really, really got him. And there was a part of me coming off turn two like, 'Oh man, I hope they don't say anything.'"

Denny (on Rambo getting in his head):

"Yeah, a little bit. He kept talking about the start. He's like, 'You just be ready right there on turn one. We're going to be laid on that door.' And I'm like, 'Oh, okay. You ain't on this door if I leave from what?'"

Denny (on the final restart battle with Bell):

"I realized pretty quickly there was no amount of driving into the corner that was going to let me clear him. So my mentality shifted on that last lap to — I'm just going to run the fastest lap I can and hold the bottom and just see what happens."

Denny (on the tire problem at Nashville):

"The left side tire is a little bit too hard — well, it's a lot of bit too hard. It's always skipping across the racetrack. It's never really gripping. All it takes is a little bit of wind or dirty air to take that grip off your car."

Denny (on warning SVG):

"They're not going to let you just keep doing that without retaliating on you. I maybe they won't say it on the radio, but just — just be careful of that."

Denny (on the Denny Bros sticker going on the 45 at Michigan):

"I can't wait to put that sticker on that car. And here's the thing — if for some reason he does win, now it's cemented in a diecast. I mean, we're gonna win, but he's our backup."

Episode title: "From First to Last… Then Last to First" | Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin | Dirty Mo Media | June 2, 2026

Overview

One of DBC's most anticipated conversations of 2026. Cleetus came off the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series Nashville race, the DBC crew met him with equal sincerity — clarifying their earlier skepticism was never personal, but directed at a broader process problem with NASCAR's broken development system.

Cleetus at Nashville: The Good and the Pit Road Carnage

Cleetus worked from 38th up to roughly 29th, running clean and invisible — "up until the first spin, you were doing a great job of beating the guys I felt like you should be beating," Freddie said. Then a pass attempt went sideways and he spun. On pit road: held the clutch, lurched forward engaging gear, sent the jack out — penalty. Then hauled back to serve the penalty, missed the rev match downshifting, locked the rears, and spun for a second penalty. "Damn, I'm fast." Deadpanned perfectly.

The Process Debate

Tommy clarified DBC's actual position: "We were never against you. We were against the process — more so with NASCAR. The process of letting you do things without knowing you have no experience, and it's wrong for you." He cited developing Casey Mears for Cup: 14 tests before Daytona alone, a full race simulation with pit stops. That preparation is gone now. Cleetus: "The only way for me to learn what I learned this weekend was to go out and do it in a race. If NASCAR doesn't approve a guy like me, I can never learn."

Nashville Cup Race: Hamlin, Bell, SVG

Another breathless Hamlin/Bell finish — Bell acknowledged post-race he "had the best car on the racetrack — it was on me." Freddie watched SVG in practice deliberately practicing annoying drivers behind him — blocking in the drafts, riding the wall, disrupting momentum. "I see a whole different SVG now." Both hosts agreed SVG is on the verge of being a genuine championship threat.

Downforce Danny's Origin Story

Danny Stockman grew up in Southern California — grandfather raced midgets and sprint cars in the 1940s/50s, including two Indy 500 starts. Danny raced Super Late Models at Irwindale from age 16, pivoted to the crew side at 20. Told himself he'd be a crew chief by 27. Started at Orleans Racing in Las Vegas in 2003, won a pile of truck races with KBM, landed at RCR. "RCR just fits me. It's blue-collar and they let me be me."

Notable Quotes

• Cleetus McFarland (on Nashville pit road): "Damn, I'm fast. So I missed the rev match coming down to second and locked up the rears."
• Freddie Kraft (on Denny Hamlin): "People can hate Denny, but he is a badass. That's it."
• Tommy Baldwin (on NASCAR's development system): "These young kids — negativity ruins their life. We've taken all the testing away. We're not giving these young drivers enough time."
• Danny Stockman (on RCR): "RCR just fits me. It's blue-collar and they let me be me."

The Teardown covers the Nashville Superspeedway Cup weekend. Denny Hamlin won the Cracker Barrel 400 after serving a pass-through penalty for jumping the restart, working from the back to win in a three-wide final-lap battle with Christopher Bell and Chase Briscoe.

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddy Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, Karsyn Elledge

Guests: Cleetus McFarland (remote), Danny Stockman aka "Downforce Danny" (in studio)

Date: June 1, 2026

Race Covered: NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series & Cup Series — Nashville Superspeedway, Nashville, TN

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

This episode delivered one of Door Bumper Clear's most anticipated conversations of the 2026 season: Cleetus McFarland joining Freddy Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, and Karsyn Elledge remotely, alongside crew chief Danny Stockman — better known to the internet as "Downforce Danny" — in studio. The episode arrived off a full Nashville Superspeedway weekend, and with Cleetus having just raced the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series event, the timing made for a rich, substantive exchange that went far beyond a typical fan meet-and-greet.

What elevated this episode beyond spectacle was its candor. Cleetus came prepared to address the simmering criticism that has followed his NASCAR ascent, and the DBC crew met him with equal sincerity — clarifying that their earlier skepticism was never personal, but directed at a broader process problem. The result was a genuine, nuanced conversation about what it takes to develop a race car driver in modern NASCAR, and whether the sanctioning body has actually given anyone the tools to do it right.

The episode also doubled as a strong analytical hour on the Nashville Cup race, which produced another thrilling late finish between Denny Hamlin and Christopher Bell, a remarkable performance from Shane van Gisbergen, and further drama in the Ryan Preece penalty saga. Danny Stockman's background story capped the episode, offering one of the more memorable "how did you get here" origin stories the show has produced.

Cleetus at Nashville: The Good, The Bad, and The Pit Road Carnage

Freddy opened by asking Cleetus to walk through his Nashville O'Reilly race, framing it positively — noting that Cleetus had been doing a strong job early, "not being seen" and working up from his 38th starting spot. Cleetus was visibly appreciative and launched into an honest self-assessment. He described working up to roughly 29th or 30th and getting genuinely comfortable, before a pass attempt on Logan Bearden went sideways. "I overdrove the corner — I was either going to plow through his rear left or I had to get on the brakes a little extra," Cleetus explained. He chose the brakes, spun himself out, and the damage to his splitter triggered a cascading downward spiral.

The real comedy of errors came on pit road. On a green-flag stop, Cleetus held the clutch in while tires were being changed, then lurched forward when he put the car in gear because the clutch had partially re-engaged — sending the jack out from under the car and earning a penalty. Rather than take it slow getting back to serve the penalty, Cleetus "hauled ass" back to pit road, missed the rev match downshifting to second, locked the rears, and spun out for a second penalty. "I'm like, 'Damn, I'm fast,'" he deadpanned. "So I missed the rev match coming down to second and locked up the rears." Tommy acknowledged that at least one of the penalties was unavoidable given the simulator can only approximate so much. Freddy and Tommy both credited the Nashville-specific transition into pit road — more aggressive in person than any simulator — as a legitimate mitigating factor.

Despite the chaos, the crew's overall verdict on Cleetus was more positive than negative. Freddy noted that until the late-stage incidents, he was performing exactly as hoped: passing cars he should be beating, staying out of trouble, and not wading into the pack's conflicts. "I didn't know you were in the race," Freddy said — the highest compliment for a developing driver in a competitive field.

RCR Partnership and the Learning Curve

One of the episode's most substantive stretches was the discussion of how partnering with Richard Childress Racing has accelerated Cleetus's development. Cleetus described the experience of first overlaying his data against Jesse Love's in the simulator: he was turning laps in the 23-flat range thinking he was flying, only to be told Jesse was running 21.3s. "I'm like, 'What?'" he recalled. "Seeing how far Jesse can drive it into the turn — it's pretty unbelievable."

Freddy observed a tangible change since Nashville compared to earlier in the season. "I said he looked like a different driver. I said it looked like a different person was in the car." Tommy pointed specifically to the ARCA race at Talladega — Cleetus came back after an O'Reilly's stint and immediately looked more polished in the ARCA machinery, eventually finishing second. "Once I got back in the ARCA car from driving in O'Reilly's, I just felt like a hundred times better driver," Cleetus confirmed.

Cleetus was also candid about what he wants long-term. The Daytona 500 remains the stated goal — he described originally calling Greg Biffle with that ambition — but he's in no rush. "I have no intentions of running Cup or the Daytona 500 anytime soon," he said. "I would just get absolutely wrecked, literally." Instead, he and his team are planning to run full ARCA seasons, build a Pro Late Model, and use every available opportunity to develop at a pace that actually produces a competent driver rather than a headline.

The Process Debate: Was DBC Ever "Anti-Cleetus"?

With Cleetus in the room, Tommy seized the moment to clarify what he said DBC had actually been arguing all along. "We were never against you," Tommy insisted. "We were against the process — more so with NASCAR. The process of letting you do things without knowing you don't have any experience, and it's wrong for you." Freddy reinforced the point: "Forget about Cletus for one second. They've taken all the testing away. They're not giving time enough time to these young drivers."

The crew drew a contrast between Cleetus — who openly doesn't care about public criticism and has the content empire to weather any controversy — and other developing drivers like Kaden Honeycutt, whom they'd discuss later in the episode, and younger drivers who don't have that backing. "These young kids with negativity, it ruins their life," Tommy said. The deeper argument was that NASCAR as a sanctioning body has stripped the ladder system of its ability to actually teach driving craft, and the only real training ground left is race competition itself — which puts drivers in the media spotlight before they're ready.

Tommy cited the example of developing Casey Mears for the Cup Series, noting they ran 14 tests before Daytona alone — a full race simulation with pit stops. That kind of structured preparation is gone now. Cleetus acknowledged the irony: the mistakes he made at Nashville couldn't have been trained away outside of a real race. "The only way for me to learn what I learned this weekend was to just go out and do it in a race," he said. "If NASCAR doesn't approve a guy like me to go out and do it, then I can never learn."

Downforce Danny's Origin Story

Danny Stockman's arrival was framed with mock ceremony — Freddy blamed Cleetus for the creation of "Downforce Danny," and Cleetus happily accepted credit. The character emerged from Cleetus's first test at Rockingham, where Stockman's enthusiasm on the radio (telling Cleetus to "use downforce") caught on instantly with his YouTube audience. "We called him Downforce Danny jokingly and I think my channel just kind of took to how funny and cool he was," Cleetus said. Danny noted that 700 shirts sold at Talladega without much promotion. Tommy's objections to Downforce Danny were theatrical — within minutes he was laughing along with everyone else.

Later, the episode devoted time to Danny's actual career background, one of the more complete crew chief origin stories the show has featured. He grew up in Southern California — his grandfather raced midgets and sprint cars in the 1940s and 50s, including two Indianapolis 500 starts — and his father raced the Southwest Tour and late models. Danny himself raced Super Late Models at Irwindale starting at 16, then decided by 20 he was "running his parents out of money" and pivoted to the crew side. He told himself he'd be a crew chief by 27. He started at Orleans Racing in Las Vegas in 2003 under Brendan Gaughan, worked his way up, won a pile of truck races with KBM, and eventually landed at RCR — where, by his own account, he belongs. "RCR just fits me," he said. "It's blue-collar and they let me be me."

Nashville Cup Race: Hamlin, Bell, and SVG

The crew spent considerable time on the Nashville Cup race, which produced another breathless finish between Denny Hamlin and Christopher Bell — two weeks running of the same pairing racing hard and clean at the top of the field. Hamlin won by holding his line on the final restart, with Bell acknowledging in a post-race quote that he "had the best car on the racetrack — it was on me."

Freddy was full of praise for Hamlin's experience and racecraft. "People can hate Denny, but he is a badass," he said. Tommy explained the dynamic precisely: Bell overdid the entry coming to the final restart, shoved the nose just enough to miss the bottom, and from that point Hamlin dictated terms. "As soon as he got to his side, it was game-playing time." Both hosts noted the contrast between racers who use experience and position versus those who reach for the bumper. Brisco was mentioned as a driver who had a massive run down the front stretch that could have challenged for the win, but got boxed out when Bell and Hamlin closed together.

Shane van Gisbergen drew enthusiastic coverage. Freddy reported watching SVG in practice at Nashville deliberately practicing annoying drivers behind him — blocking in the drafts, riding the wall, disrupting any momentum. He carried that directly into the race. "I see a whole different SVG now," Freddy said. Tommy credited the truck race at Charlotte as a turning point: "He was really aggressive up top, rim-riding the wall. And now his confidence level is just — I see it." Both hosts agreed SVG is on the verge of being a genuine championship threat, noting he's well-positioned to bank points at San Diego and Sonoma.

Ryan Preece Penalty Upheld — But the Reasoning Backfires

The appeals panel's decision to uphold Ryan Preece's penalty for wrecking Tai Gibbs generated significant skepticism from both Freddy and Tommy — not because they necessarily disagreed with the outcome, but because of how it was justified. The panel noted it was evenly split, acknowledged neither side clearly proved its case, and then kept the penalty anyway, citing that Preece's comments showed he "chose not to cut his competitors any breaks."

Freddy was blunt: "Since when do we have to start cutting each other breaks? Isn't the job to prove that he wrecked him intentionally?" Tommy drew a pointed contrast with Austin Dillon, who had gotten into the back of the 6 car at Nashville — widely read as retaliatory — but said nothing publicly. "He also didn't say he was going to do anything to him," Tommy noted. The broader lesson the crew kept returning to: don't push the radio button. Ryan Preece proved his own undoing by saying the quiet part loud. Freddy cited Bubba Wallace's $50,000 fine after openly admitting a self-spin, and Tommy invoked Kyle Larson's masterclass of the post-incident apology. "He'll just say, 'Sorry, I didn't really mean to do that.'" The show's verdict: the burden of proof in an evenly-split appeal should fall on NASCAR, and keeping a penalty under those circumstances inverts due process.

Qualifying Format and Pit Selection Frustrations

Tommy used the Nashville weekend to vent about what he sees as a structural flaw in how NASCAR handles qualifying after weather cancellations. The cascading effect of a rained-out qualifier — bumping teams to the back for the following week and dragging the pit stall selection down with it — had left his team in a hole for multiple consecutive weekends. "We haven't qualified the last two weeks," Tommy said. "So now you don't get a chance to even... Charlotte, we could have surely qualified better. This week we would have started mid-20s." Freddy noted his team is now picking pit stall one and starting second at Pocono — not because they earned it, but because it rained last week. "You're getting that because it rained," Tommy agreed. "You didn't do nothing to earn that."

The proposed solution: use practice speeds for grid order in rain situations, which at least ties the starting position to the car's on-track performance at that specific track. Tommy noted Cup cars don't tape up meaningfully between practice and qualifying, so practice speeds are a reasonable proxy. The current draw system, he argued, penalizes teams that had a mechanical issue the week before and rewards teams that happen to draw well, which bears no relationship to performance.

Justin Allgaier: Not Retiring After All (Probably)

The "spot on, spot off" segment covered Justin Allgaier's statement that there is "a higher likelihood that you will see me next year than not" after earlier suggesting he was retiring at year's end. The DBC crew was unanimously in favor of Allgaier staying. Danny called him "the benchmark every single week" and described comparing his car's performance against Allgaier's as a weekly ritual. Freddy noted Allgaier has 13 top-10s in 16 races in 2026, with the only finishes outside the top 10 coming from superspeedways. Tommy acknowledged that Allgaier "implodes every year at some point" — a running pattern — but said his equipment and program are good enough that he is nearly impossible to beat over a full nine-race playoff absent something going sideways. "He's going to bank points coming up at San Diego and Sonoma," Freddy said. Both hosts admitted they want Allgaier to stay even while racing against him.

Kaden Honeycutt's Radio Problem

The hosts addressed comments Kaden Honeycutt made during the Nashville race criticizing the track resin. Freddy's position was clear: "These sound bites aren't good." The deeper concern wasn't the opinion itself — Tommy acknowledged resin doesn't universally improve racing — but the optics of a developing driver consistently complaining publicly about things that affect everyone equally. "Everybody's on the same racetrack, so the resin doesn't really — it's not affecting you worse than anybody else," Freddy said. Freddy cited his spotter conversations with Gio Rogerio at Watkins Glen: "He's like, 'MF this.' I'm like, 'Yell all you want. Stop pushing the button, please.'" Both hosts were careful to note that Honeycutt is a talented kid — "just be seen and not heard," as Freddy put it — but they agreed that a reputation for complaining tends to follow a driver and can cost him in ways that are hard to reverse.

Navy Challenge Recap

Freddy and Carson recounted their recent challenge against Travis and Jared — a Navy-sponsored obstacle course event where both teams competed across a series of military-themed stations. The DBC team led the entire day, used no hints, and solved every puzzle autonomously — including a particularly frustrating one involving an Osprey aircraft and a count of ships. Their opponents, by contrast, watched the DBC team go through the problems first and simply repeated their steps, then asked for an immediate hint on the final puzzle and received what amounted to the answer outright. "The hint was: the answer's right here," Freddy said. DBC lost on the final physical challenge, where Travis and Jared took a helicopter jump seat away from Freddy by sheer attrition. Carson assessed it dryly: "If this had been a timed event where they couldn't watch us, they may still be there." The Navy challenge was sponsored content but the crew's telling of it made for genuinely entertaining radio.

This Cowboy Life — Dirty Mo Media's New Show

The episode previewed Dirty Mo Media's upcoming podcast, This Cowboy Life, featuring Jerome Davis and his wife Tiffany — Hall of Fame names from the Professional Bull Riders world and coaches of the Carolina Cowboys PBR team. A trailer played during the episode, featuring Davis recounting his career-ending injury in 1998 when a bull knocked him out and broke his neck. "Went from being at the top of my game to the worst part of my life," Davis said in the clip. Despite that, he and Tiffany built a life around the sport and are now back as team owners. The show launches June 24th, and Freddy noted that several NASCAR drivers — particularly Austin Dillon — have a genuine connection to the PBR Cowboys world. The DBC crew offered mock-enthusiastic suggestions about putting Tommy in assless chaps and sending him out on a bull, which Tommy declined with characteristic conviction.

Squirrel McNut Phone Cameo

In one of the episode's more surreal moments, Squirrel McNut — whose real name is George, a running gag the hosts clearly delight in — called in from what appears to be Cleetus's operation to ask Cleetus a question. Eddie from "McNut Media" posed the dilemma: would Cleetus rather (a) never be able to promote his own stuff again, with only Door Bumper Clear as his sole sponsor and having to say "Freddy's my daddy" in all his content, or (b) have Natalie Decker spot for him at Michigan? Cleetus chose Natalie Decker without hesitation. Freddy feigned offense. The crew noted Squirrel has continued building a following since Cleetus gave him his on-air moment and that NASCAR has already adopted using "Squirrel" on the live timing and scoring ticker — following the precedent set when NASCAR approved the name "Cleetus" over Garrett Mitchell.

Weekend Winners and Local Racing Roundup

Freddy's weekly weekend winners segment covered an expansive range of local and regional racing. Highlights included Connor Hall winning at Langley Speedway ("Car Store" winner), Wyatt winning in the Champ Off-Road Series at Antigo, Justin Sanders extending his NARC dominance with five wins in eight races at Watsonville, Rico winning the High Limit race at Lawrenceburg on Friday, Kyle Cummings and Brady Bacon sweeping USAC sprint car action at Knoxville, and a $100,000 World of Outlaws Late Model event at the newly reopened Mansfield Motorsports Park — where track conditions were poor on Friday night but teams worked through the night to rebuild the surface, delivering a dramatically improved second night. The episode's discussion of Mansfield turned into a broader meditation on the blue-collar culture of short-track racing and the difference between people who dig in when things go wrong versus keyboard warriors who pile on.

Notable Quotes

Cleetus McFarland (on his Nashville O'Reilly pit road mistakes): "I'm like, 'Damn, I'm fast.' So I missed the rev match coming down to second and locked up the rears. Ended up spinning out."

Freddy Kraft (on Cleetus's overall Nashville performance): "Up until the first spin at the end of the stage, you were doing a great job of beating the guys I felt like you should be beating and staying out of trouble. I didn't know you were in the race at that point."

Tommy Baldwin (on the NASCAR approval process controversy): "It had nothing to do with Cletus. He was just a great example of going, 'Okay, we have a perfect example of how the system is broke.' Not Cletus is broke, but how the system is broke."

Cleetus McFarland (on the Daytona 500 goal): "I have no intentions of running Cup or the Daytona 500 anytime soon because I would just get absolutely wrecked, literally. It's a way bigger skill gap than I imagined."

Freddy Kraft (on Denny Hamlin): "People can hate Denny, but he is a badass. That's it."

Tommy Baldwin (on the Ryan Preece penalty rationale): "Since when do we have to start cutting each other breaks? When was cutting them a break a part of the conversation?"

Danny Stockman (on working with RCR): "RCR just fits me. It's kind of blue-collar and they let me be me and I just fit in good there."

Freddy Kraft (on Shane van Gisbergen): "I saw a whole different SVG now. He can't be that good of a road racer and not figure out how to run turn left at some point."

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Published: June 1, 2026

Race Covered: Cracker Barrel 400 — Nashville Superspeedway, Lebanon, Tennessee

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SineTYM0M14

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opened this post-race breakdown by admitting right out of the gate that "we could legitimately be here all night" — and he wasn't wrong. The Cracker Barrel 400 at Nashville Superspeedway delivered what Eric called a month's worth of content packed into a single race: a dramatic win by Denny Hamlin that saw him go from first to last and back to first, a heartbreaking near-miss for Christopher Bell, multiple brake failures that scrambled the championship standings, and a chippy incident between Austin Dillon and Brad Keselowski that may (or may not) have been intentional payback.

The episode is one of Eric's more energized race reviews of the 2026 season. He rated the race 88 out of 100 on his "Groovy Gauge" — calling it one of the best all-around races of the year, second or third behind Atlanta — and made a compelling case that at 45 years old, this might actually be the best version of Denny Hamlin we have ever seen. He also used the episode to flag some serious concern around the championship chase, with several bubble drivers suffering costly disasters in a single night.

The episode covers the race from multiple angles: the euphoric finish, the pit strategy intrigue in stage three, the crashes and brake failures, the Dillon-Keselowski feud, and a notable part-time run by Corey Heim that ended in frustrating fashion.

Denny Hamlin: First to Last to First Again

The centerpiece of Eric's breakdown was Denny Hamlin's improbable victory — his 62nd Cup Series win and second of the 2026 season, moving him to 10th on the all-time wins list. What made the story richer was everything that had to happen to get there. Hamlin jumped the initial start by, in Eric's words, "a country mile," had to serve a pass-through penalty, and reset effectively to the back of a 38-car field. He spent most of the race grinding forward lap by lap.

Eric compared the performance to the kind of vintage domination Kyle Busch used to deliver in the lower series — a single-car wrecking ball working through traffic — and noted that Hamlin even paid tribute to that legacy afterward with a "Kyle Busch bow" on the front straightaway. "In many ways, tonight's race looked like a vintage Kyle Bush O'Reilly series or truck series showing," Eric said, "because Danny Hamlin went from first to worst back to first."

The pivotal moment came on the final four-lap restart. Hamlin had been candid in recent weeks about his team's restart struggles — he had lost the Texas race to Chase Elliott on a late restart, and the same weakness showed at Dover. Eric believes the 11 team may have intentionally shifted their setup ahead of Nashville to compensate. "Maybe they shifted the balance," he said. "More emphasis put on restarts. Nashville has seen more than its fair share of restarts the past few years." Whatever the adjustment, it worked.

Eric also used the win to make a broader argument about Hamlin's place in the sport right now. Citing Mark Martin's post-race comments, Eric said: "Denny Hamlin at 45 is probably the best, most talented driver in the Cup Series today. He continues to work on his craft, reinvent himself. He and his team are great at identifying his weaknesses... Restarts the past few weeks — that's been a weakness. I don't know what they did, if it was a philosophy change, a car change. Restarts were Denny's strength tonight." Eric concluded bluntly: "This may be the best version of Denny Hamlin we have seen across his more than 20 years of NASCAR Cup Series racing."

Christopher Bell: So Close, So Crushing

Eric spent considerable time on Christopher Bell's second-place finish, which he treated as a genuine moral tragedy of the race. His central argument was that Bell — not Hamlin — was the class of the field on long runs, and that if Chris Buescher's brakes hadn't failed with 12 laps to go, Bell would have won comfortably. "Christopher Bell would be hoisting that Gibson Les Paul guitar in victory lane right now," Eric said. "It would be his first win of the season."

The breakdown of what actually went wrong is one of the most precise analytical sequences in the episode. When the final restart came with four laps to go, Hamlin pushed Bell slightly off the bottom lane entering turn one. From that point, Bell was at Hamlin's mercy — the inside car held the preferred line, and Hamlin could force Bell as high as he wanted. When Chase Briscoe got a huge run and went three-wide at the white flag, Bell faced what Eric called "an impossible choice": hold the middle and risk being squeezed, or overdrive the entry into turn one to stay in front of Briscoe. He chose the latter, Hamlin cleared him, and the race was over.

"There was no good choice at that moment," Eric said. "You are at the mercy of the car to your inside. The initial launch into turn one and two — that's where this race was lost." He acknowledged the back-to-back podiums for Bell (Charlotte and Nashville) but noted the obvious sting: "It stings to come up just short of victory lane, especially two weeks in a row. So I do feel for Christopher Bell, but we all know his time is coming."

Notable Finishers and the Mid-Pack Story

Eric moved through the rest of the top 20 with a mix of admiration and blunt takes.

Chase Briscoe finished third and has now posted four top-fives in his last seven points races. Eric acknowledged the consistency but pointed out the brutal contrast: the other three races in that span include a crash, a 29th, and a 23rd. "Problem is those other three races are like, you know, a crash, 29th, 23rd. They've been bad." Briscoe is near the Chase bubble and needs clean stretches.

Chase Elliott came from toward the back after qualifying was rained out, took two tires at the end of stage one to gain track position, and capitalized on that strategy for a top-five finish. "I think he had probably a top-five car tonight," Eric said. "Another great finish."

Tyler Reddick was the most dramatic story of the top ten. He finished sixth despite taking a severe head-on impact as cars stacked up three-wide across the start-finish line. "That was one of the worst front-end impacts I've seen, certainly at a track of this size in recent years," Eric said. "Hopefully Tyler Reddick is okay."

Shane Van Gisbergen finished seventh, his second straight oval in which he showed legitimate top-10 speed. Eric noted that SVG has become something of a charmed figure within the TrackHouse operation — producing results week after week while his teammates struggle. Zane Smith's ninth-place finish on an alternate strategy also drew praise. "He probably had a top-15 car tonight," Eric said, "and if this race had run green to the finish, he probably finishes eighth or ninth." Smith's recent weeks have given Front Row Motorsports something to cheer about.

Carson Hocevar's tenth-place finish was "solid" in Eric's accounting — but it came with asterisks. He dove inside Chris Buescher late in the race and pushed up, which cascaded into the Bubba Wallace crash. Eric didn't absolve him: "That one is mostly on Hocevar. I know it's a game of inches, I'm not saying it was a horribly egregious move, but Carson Hocevar washing up the track triggered that crash." He also had pit penalties and brake issues early. "It's the typical Carson Hocevar experience, I suppose."

Brake Failures, Bubble Chaos, and Championship Fallout

One of the most consequential storylines of the night had nothing to do with the front of the field. Multiple cars suffered catastrophic brake failures — and the drivers who lost brakes happened to cluster around the championship bubble in a way that reshuffled the standings significantly.

AJ Allmendinger, 19th in points entering the race, lost his brakes and ended in the garage. Ross Chastain, who Eric noted "was really fast in practice" and has historically been strong at Nashville — "kind of a home race for TrackHouse" — also suffered a brake failure and ended in the garage. Ryan Preece, 16th in points entering the race, had brake rotor debris puncture his radiator. "Terrible break for Ryan Preece," Eric said. "Knocks him out of the Chase as things currently stand." Bubba Wallace was caught up in the Hocevar-Buescher crash, ending a night that Eric described grimly: "This is now four finishes of 20th or worse in the last five points races for Bubba Wallace. He is bleeding points, bleeding spots in the standings right now. And he sounded tired. He sounded dejected during his infield care center interview."

Eric used the chaos to make a point about Tyler Reddick's title lead. "One race. Tyler Reddick still finished sixth tonight — had a pretty darn good finish. One race, Denny Hamlin ate almost 30 points. Almost a quarter of Reddick's lead — from 122 back to 97 back in one race. Just saying it's not over."

He also raised a flag on RFK Racing specifically: Buescher dropped to eighth in points, Brad Keselowski dropped to 12th, and Preece fell to 17th — all in one night. "It's been a rough couple of weeks for a fast three-car shop," Eric said. "Hopefully they can turn things around."

Austin Dillon vs. Brad Keselowski: Payback or Racing Incident?

Eric dedicated a full segment to the Dillon-Keselowski saga, which played out over two incidents roughly 40 laps apart in stage three.

The first: Keselowski, caught behind slow traffic coming off pit road, moved down the track to get out of the way — but in doing so, cut off Austin Dillon, who was still at full speed. Dillon got spun. The second, about 40 laps later: on a restart, with Keselowski on the apron, Dillon drove down and made contact. Keselowski went hard into the wall. Keselowski's spotter TJ Major came on the radio immediately saying it was intentional. Keselowski, after watching the top-down replay, agreed. Austin Cindric also got collected.

Eric laid out the case evenly: "Immediately Keselowski's spotter says, 'He did that on purpose. He was mad that he got wrecked earlier.' Brad, after seeing the top-down replay, kind of agreed. Looked intentional to me." But he also noted that Dillon lifted just before contact and was quiet on the radio afterward — which, under current NASCAR precedent, makes a penalty unlikely. "NASCAR set the precedent that as long as you don't say anything incriminating over the radio, there's probably not going to be a penalty. I don't think Austin Dillon's getting penalized for this. I don't think this was a suspension-worthy right-rear hook in NASCAR's eyes." He ultimately landed here: "I think Austin Dillon did a great job leaving things ambiguous, up to interpretation."

Corey Heim's Promising Run That Ended in a Spin

A side story Eric clearly enjoyed telling — before it turned frustrating — was Corey Heim's part-time start in the 23XI no. 67 car. In the first half, Heim ran comfortably inside the top five and "showed us why 23XI and pretty much the entire garage thinks so highly of him," Eric said. He had top-five pace in an underfunded, part-time entry running with a developmental pit crew. "That is not the best car coming out of that shop every week. Yet Corey Heim a couple of times this year alone has put that car in the top 10 comfortably on pure pace."

The night unraveled when Heim misjudged his entry into turn one and spun out Todd Gilliland, damaging his own car. Eric noted a pattern emerging: Heim has shown top-15 or better pace in virtually every Cup start this year but has crashed out of multiple races. "He crashed at Texas, he crashed in a Nashville race a couple years ago, and he crashed tonight. Got to clean that up." Still, Eric came down firmly in the camp that Heim's speed is undeniable and the rough edges are fixable. The upcoming 2027 full-time season with 23XI is well-earned.

Groovy Gauge: 88 / 100

Eric closed the episode with his signature race rating: 88 out of 100 on the Groovy Gauge, powered by Lectric eBikes. His reasoning was characteristically balanced — he acknowledged that the race "felt long at times," that the 750-horsepower package may have made passing harder than usual, and that clean air was unusually dominant throughout. But the finish was outstanding, the strategy in stage three was legitimately compelling, and the overall cast of storylines was one of the richest of the season.

"This is one of the best races of the season so far," Eric concluded. "Maybe Atlanta was a little more exciting, a little better start to finish, but this has to be second, third place on the year. I hope it lands near the top, because this was, I think, one of the best all-around races of the season."

Notable Quotes

Eric on Denny Hamlin's sustained excellence at age 45:

"Denny Hamlin at 45 is probably the best, most talented driver in the Cup Series today. He continues to work on his craft, reinvent himself. This may be the best version of Denny Hamlin we have seen across his more than 20 years of NASCAR Cup Series racing."

Eric on Christopher Bell's impossible choice at the final restart:

"There was no good choice at that moment. You are at the mercy of the car to your inside. The initial launch into turn one and two — that's where this race was lost."

Eric on the Dillon-Keselowski incident:

"I think Austin Dillon did a great job leaving things ambiguous, up to interpretation. And in this situation, I doubt NASCAR is going to hand down any sort of serious penalty."

Eric on Corey Heim's recurring speed-vs.-mistakes pattern:

"He crashed at Texas, he crashed in a Nashville race a couple years ago, and he crashed tonight. Got to clean that up. But the speed is undeniable."

Eric on the championship picture after Nashville:

"One race, Denny Hamlin ate almost 30 points — almost a quarter of Reddick's lead, from 122 back to 97 back in one race. Just saying it's not over."

Eric on the overall race:

"Nashville Superspeedway had it all tonight. We could legitimately be here all night — we have so much to break down: bubble drivers running into trouble, things got chippy, a few eyebrow-raising incidents, some big hits from start to finish, strategy in stage three, and a Toyota trio putting on a hell of a show in the final four laps."

Race Replay coverage of the Nashville Superspeedway weekend. The Cracker Barrel 400 saw Denny Hamlin win from the back after a pass-through penalty, in a three-wide final-lap showdown.

Overview

Jeff recorded from home, still unable to process Kyle Busch's death. The episode moves fluidly between grief and business — much the way NASCAR itself did in the days after Kyle passed. Three guests, three distinct lenses on the loss and the week's racing news.

Prime Video's Memorial Pre-Race

Troda explained the team converged at Charlotte on Friday, still in shock, and quickly decided the pre-race show needed to function as a national memorial. Voice list assembled rapidly: Bubba Wallace, Joe Gibbs, Denny Hamlin (523 starts with Kyle — more than any other teammate combination in NASCAR history), Daniel Suarez, Eric Jones. Troda watched the tribute package alone at noon, cried privately, then locked in for the 6 p.m. broadcast. "Once we were live, I had a job to do." Her mind, she said, felt like a Tetris game: "We're going here, we have to go here, then pivot to here."

Bill Janets: The Real Kyle Busch

The episode's emotional centerpiece. Janets confirmed Kyle never loved being booed — "He wanted to be recognized. He was human." The 2009 DC Beltway Race story: Kyle and a DJ named Flounder raced FJ Cruisers around the 62-mile beltway in pouring rain, fans lined overpasses with spray-painted sheets, and Kyle banged doors through an alley at the finish, tearing the side off the FJ Cruiser rather than lose. On the 2015 comeback: "If I could put it in one word, it'd be superhuman." On the Phoenix 2018 victory painting that included Brad Keselowski's car half a straightaway behind: "He wanted to beat everybody into the ground and make sure everybody knew it."

Ryan Preece Appeal and RFK's Charter Challenge

Appeal panel upheld the Preece penalty but on split decision, acknowledging "neither side clearly proved their point" — then used Preece's own comment that he "chose not to cut his competitor any breaks" as a tiebreaker. Gluck: "When has choosing not to cut somebody a break been a tiebreaker for a penalty you're saying you didn't prove the case? That's a weird one to me." Bowers pushed back on $100 million charter valuations: "The math simply doesn't work." RFK committed to running three cars open if they can't acquire a charter.

Notable Quotes

• Bill Janets: "There's nobody I've ever met in my entire life that is as nearly competitive as Kyle Busch. The second most is a distant second — just like he liked it."
• Danielle Troda: "Our overarching tone was that we wanted this to be a national memorial. That's really what we wanted the pre-race to be."
• Chip Bowers: "A $100 price tag is counterintuitive to the idea that we want to bring more people into the sport."
• Jeff Gluck: "I just want to say — I hope everybody listening is making sure you're taking care of yourselves. Take a break if you need to."

Overview

Live episode recorded before Nashville, the first race weekend after Kyle Busch's passing. Jeff opened by setting the scene — he was in the radio booth at Indianapolis Motor Speedway covering the Indy 500 when a colleague told him Kyle had been ruled out for Charlotte with a "serious illness." By Sunday night, Charlotte was hosting one of the most emotional pre-race tributes in NASCAR history.

Danielle Troda and the Weight of Live Coverage

Prime Video scrapped everything planned for their season launch and rebuilt the show as a national memorial in under 72 hours. Troda watched the tribute package alone at noon before going live at 6 p.m. — giving herself a private window to grieve before locking in. "I just had to conduct myself logically more than emotionally." She described the mindset as playing live Tetris: "Once I got into the show, it was just like, we're going here, we have to go here, then pivot to here."

Bill Janets: Kyle's Competitive Nature

Janets validated Dale Jr.'s comments: Kyle never loved being booed. The 2009 DC Beltway "race" story — a promotional event in borrowed FJ Cruisers ended with Kyle banging doors through an alley and tearing the side off the vehicle rather than lose. "I learned that day that no matter what we did away from the racetrack, he was going to compete and he was going to want to win." On the "everything is great" Vegas press conference: Kyle emerged from the meeting, looked at Janets and said "What are we doing now, walking out and holding hands?" — then delivered his legendary dry-sarcastic answers.

Kyle's Death and Racing Culture

Kyle's death certificate listed bacterial pneumonia progressing to sepsis over "days to weeks." Jeff raised the cultural question: "How many of us have had a medical issue and try to power through it, especially in racing?" Drivers race sick all the time. "It's such a huge wakeup call to everybody with that mindset in general to make sure you're listening to your body."

Notable Quotes

• Jeff Gluck: "I can't really focus on anything else but this Kyle stuff at the moment. I feel like racing-wise, I'm happy Nashville will be coming up for a distraction, but I'm still sorting through this."
• Bill Janets: "He wanted to be recognized. He was human. There was a narrative for a while that he loved being booed, but he loved to win. That's what he loved to do."
• Bill Janets (on 2015 comeback): "If I could put it in one word, it'd be superhuman."
• Danielle Troda: "Our overarching tone was that we wanted this to be a national memorial."

Overview

Dale Earnhardt Jr. hosts Adam Alexander (Amazon Prime Video play-by-play) and Steve Letarte (former crew chief, now analyst) ahead of the Coca-Cola 600. With Prime Video in its second year of five-race summer coverage at Charlotte, the trio picks up right where they left off: candid, chemistry-driven, and unafraid to get into the weeds on roster gossip, strategic debates, and the evolving NASCAR landscape.

The 48 Debate

Should Alex Bowman keep his seat? Should Corey Day be fast-tracked from the O'Reilly Series? Or should HMS move mountains to pry Connor Zilisch away from Trackhouse? Dale brings the Hall of Fame driver perspective, Letarte the crew chief's strategic calculus, and Alexander the broadcaster's feel for what the narrative means to the sport. The discussion is emblematic of what makes this show work — three insiders talking through decisions as if they're in the room where they happen.

Kyle Busch at RCR and the Broader Landscape

Beyond the 48 storyline, the guys dig into Kyle Busch's surprising resurgence at RCR and the puzzle of RFK Racing's charter situation — substantive conversations driven by three people with genuine inside access to the decision-making world of NASCAR's top teams.

Prime Video Year Two

With Charlotte marking the launch of Prime's second year of five-race summer coverage, the crew reflects on what's working: a production team drawn from Thursday Night Football and NBA coverage, a culture with minimal ego, and a willingness to adapt based on fan feedback in ways the traditional networks haven't matched.

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared Allen, Travis

Date: May 26, 2026 (Memorial Day)

Race Covered: Coca-Cola 600 (rain-shortened, ~570 laps) — Charlotte Motor Speedway, Concord, North Carolina

Kyle Busch Tribute

Before any race talk, the episode opens honoring Kyle Busch's passing. Denny spent the week doing media — Good Morning America, SportsCenter with Marty Smith — to get Kyle's story out. He noted Kyle was one of those rare names casual sports fans knew. Jared shared his first interaction with Kyle on a Championship 4 media trip through New York, expecting "Rowdy" and finding someone warm and welcoming. Denny and Kyle were teammates for 15 years — the longest in NASCAR Cup history. "Kyle affected everyone."

The O'Reilly 300 — Ross Chastain Wins

Denny was in the Fox booth for Saturday's Xfinity race with Adam Alexander. The racing when green was excellent but constant cautions and rain ended it just past halfway. Ross Chastain won. The Sunday truck race moved to Sunday morning was a revelation — Lane Riggs won and Denny said a morning truck race is electric.

The Coca-Cola 600 — Denny's Race That Wasn't

Denny set his car up for the final 50 laps and was in the top three virtually all night. On two pit stops he missed beating Christopher Bell off pit road by fractions — once due to debris from a car that caught fire in his stall. "We lost the race off pit road by like four inches combined twice." Those margins meant restarting third or fourth instead of first, burning laps chasing instead of controlling. He needed three or four laps of solid green at the end and never got them.

Daniel Suarez Wins

Suarez's stage averages were 12th, 30th, and 21st with an average running position in the 20s. Running near the tail of the lead lap, crew chief Ryan Sparks took two tires on the final stop. The gamble worked because Denny and Bell were slowing each other down running side by side, giving Suarez just enough buffer for rain to end the race. Kyle Larson pushed Suarez on a restart rather than going three-wide. "Sometimes when you're not good, it gives you opportunities to try something different."

Points and Championship

Tyler Reddick holds a 120-point lead with a worst finish of 15th. Denny is not planning on catching him. "It doesn't worry me. It just bothers me. We can win the championship from second."

Source: Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin, Episode recorded May 26, 2026. YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EszoopuEFr0

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: May 25, 2026

Race Covered: 2026 Coca-Cola 600 — Charlotte Motor Speedway, Concord, North Carolina

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcbycCmsNjU

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opens this review of the 2026 Coca-Cola 600 by acknowledging right up front that he is, in his own words, "a little wrapped up in my emotions tonight." This is not a race recap where the host walks you neatly through lap charts and stage results. It is something more honest: a dispatch from a NASCAR fan who spent an entire Memorial Day weekend being hit, again and again, with feelings he could not quite sort through — grief, frustration, admiration, and cautious joy — all tangled up together. "It's extremely late," Eric says. "It has been a long emotional weekend, I think, for all of us, for the entire racing world."

The central fact hanging over every moment of this episode is the death of two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Busch, who passed away earlier in the week from severe pneumonia that progressed into sepsis. Eric describes watching the Busch family — Kyle's parents, his brother Kurt, his wife Samantha, and their eleven-year-old son Brexton — standing on the grid at Charlotte Motor Speedway before the race, surrounded by the entire NASCAR garage. "The strength it took for Kyle's parents, his brother Kurt, to be there, for his wife Samantha, for their kids, for Brexton — standing there in front of thousands, millions on TV — being strong for his family, being there for his mother," Eric says, his voice noticeably heavy. "I'm sure Kyle would be extremely proud. Those were powerful images, and that was before the race even began."

Set against that backdrop of grief, the rest of the weekend felt like it could never quite come together. The Craftsman Truck Series race was cut short. The O'Reilly Auto Parts XFINITY race did not reach halfway. And the Coca-Cola 600 itself — one of the sport's Crown Jewel events — was called after 373 laps, about 560 of 600 miles completed, when heavy rain moved through the Concord area. Eric's verdict on the weekend as a whole: "This whole weekend, frankly, feels hollow."

The "Incomplete" Weekend That Could Not Be Rescued

Eric opens with a blunt structural observation: every single NASCAR race run at Charlotte Motor Speedway this weekend was incomplete. The trucks had what he called "an arbitrary noon cutoff deadline" that cheapened the event. The XFINITY race never even approached the halfway mark. And the Cup race, normally the sport's supreme test of endurance, lost its signature payoff — that breathless final-lap drama that makes five hours of racing feel earned.

He draws a pointed contrast with the Indianapolis 500, which ran earlier in the same afternoon and delivered what NASCAR fans were denied. "Felix Rosenquist gets the win. The all-time closest finish in Indy 500 history. Like, that was exciting. That was awesome. IndyCar fans got that payoff at the end. NASCAR fans didn't get any payoff this entire weekend." He gives credit to Jesse Love — the XFINITY driver who finished his post-race interview with a reminder about perspective — for articulating what the whole garage seemed to be feeling. "If there's anything we've learned the past few days," Eric paraphrases, "the past few days have showed us what's really important, what's most important, what's not as important." It is the kind of grace note that Eric clearly appreciated, and he invokes it as a kind of permission slip for himself before diving into the analysis.

He is careful not to let that perspective slide into complacency about the race product itself, though. When he gets to the Groovy Gauge, his standard race-quality rating powered by Electric eBikes, he lands at 70%. He thought the on-track action in the early and middle stages was genuinely competitive — "the racing was really good. We saw some really great back-and-forth side-by-side battles." The track's width gave drivers multiple lanes to work with even when the NextGen car's aerodynamic sensitivity robbed them of momentum. But without the finish the race was building toward, he cannot rate it higher. "Because I got up off my couch feeling somewhat dissatisfied with how this whole thing played out, I'm going to go 70%."

Daniel Suárez: A Great Story With Some Lucky Timing

Eric is genuinely, warmly happy for Daniel Suárez. He makes that clear early and often. "Daniel Suárez is a good dude. He's always been one of my favorite drivers to talk to in the garage the past few years." The win, Suárez's first in a Crown Jewel event, carries real weight: a driver who came from Mexico not speaking much English, who had to learn the language, who rattled around from team to team and got dropped, who won his way back with a road course victory at Sonoma, then a win at Atlanta in 2024, and now joins Spire Motorsports on the rise and wins the Coca-Cola 600. "He's a Coca-Cola driver for goodness sake. It's a great story. It's a huge accomplishment."

And yet — and this is where Eric's honesty makes the episode interesting — he is equally upfront that Suárez caught some significant breaks. "A lot had to go right for Suárez to win this race. I'm just being honest." At the halfway mark, Suárez was running thirtieth and a lap down. He earned zero stage points. Two tire issues forced unscheduled pit stops in the first two stages. It was crew chief Ryan Sparks who made the bold call to put Suárez out on two tires during a late pit cycle, allowing him to vault to the front. From there, the timing of the cautions — including a lightning warning with 47 laps to go that briefly held the field and then cleared, and a crucial caution for drizzle in turn two with Denny Hamlin seconds away from running Suárez down — swung the race decisively in his favor.

"I believe if NASCAR held off on that button for three more seconds, Denny Hamlin would have been out front," Eric says. "He would have controlled the next restart and Daniel Suárez would not have won this race." But he is equally quick to credit Suárez for what he did with those breaks: coordinating the final restarts with Kyle Larson perfectly, getting a clean launch, and managing his gaps and momentum to hold off the hard-charging Toyotas. The Kyle Busch connection added one more layer of meaning — Suárez was one of the many drivers who came through Kyle Busch Motorsports in the truck series before reaching the Cup level. "Cool to see him dedicate this win to Kyle Busch, of course, in his post race."

Toyota's Intermediate-Track Dominance

If the Suárez storyline was the emotional heart of the night, the competitive storyline is straightforward and a little ominous for the rest of the field: Toyota has the intermediate tracks figured out, and nobody else is close. Christopher Bell finished second, Denny Hamlin third, Tyler Reddick fourth. Hamlin led 75 laps and earned 26 stage points — the most of any driver. Five of the top six drivers in stage points were Toyotas. In three of the four top finishing positions, a Toyota was present.

Eric notes that Hamlin won Las Vegas earlier this year and Reddick won Kansas, and he specifically discounts the Chase Elliott Texas win as an outlier — "Texas as mile-and-a-halfs go is kind of its own animal, its own unique beast. Throw that data out for the sake of it." The bottom line in his read: "Chevrolet, with their new Camaro modified body, still has some work to do to catch up. Ford has always been kind of up and down on intermediate tracks — I don't think they've been Ford's strength in years now." Kyle Larson was the lone Chevrolet car that could consistently dance with the Toyotas for stretches, but even he could not sustain it across a full night.

Eric also pushes back on the narrative that this is a Tyler Reddick–23XI story. "It's not just 23XI. You know, everyone circled Reddick. Reddick's winning all these races. Well, I mean, I just read to you — it was mostly Joe Gibbs Racing tonight." Bell, Hamlin, and Chase Brisco were the class of the field for long stretches. This is a systemic Toyota advantage, top to bottom. And with five of the final ten regular-season races in the Chase taking place at intermediate tracks similar to Charlotte, Eric flags it as something worth watching closely as the playoff picture takes shape.

Chaos in the Field: Who Faltered and Why It Matters for Points

One of the most analytically sharp segments in the episode is Eric's breakdown of how the race reshuffled the playoff bubble. Suárez entered the night outside the top ten in points; he leaves it in tenth. The reason: several of his closest rivals hit walls, both literal and metaphorical.

Austin Cindric got loose after Christopher Bell packed some air into him on a restart and was collected by rookie Connor Zilisch. It was a particularly painful night for Cindric given his recent string of consistent finishes. Bubba Wallace and William Byron tangled on another restart when Michael McDowell moved up into their lane — Wallace took heavy damage and struggled for the remainder of the night, though Byron somehow salvaged a ninth-place finish without earning any stage points. Then there was Ross Chastain and Ricky Stenhouse Jr., a collision Eric does not let Stenhouse off the hook for easily. "The way Stenhouse sort of swiped across the back of Chastain's bumper — it looked to me like he was intentionally trying to wreck him." And the biggest incident of all: Chase Brisco shot to the inside of the two RFK teammates, Christopher Buescher moved late to block, and all three — Brisco, Buescher, and Brad Keselowski — were taken out. Buescher dropped two spots to seventh in points as a result. Keselowski dropped two spots to eleventh. Bubba fell three spots to thirteenth. Cindric slid outside the top sixteen entirely.

Eric's broader point: Suárez's win was not just valuable because it is the Coca-Cola 600. It was valuable because the chaos that swirled around him moved him dramatically up the standings in a single night. "A great win for Daniel Suárez, made even sweeter by the fact that many of his closest points rivals had issues tonight."

Bright Spots: Zane Smith, Shane van Gisbergen, and a Rough Night for Chase Elliott

Eric has particular warmth for a couple of performances that the final finishing order does not fully capture. Zane Smith finished inside the top ten — "Could have been a top five. He was flirting with a top five late" — and Eric uses the moment to make a broader point about what Smith means to Front Row Motorsports. "Zayn Smith every few weeks provides a spark that no one else on that team seems to consistently be able to provide. So Zane Smith doing a lot with a little if you ask me."

The performance he seems most genuinely impressed by, though, is Shane van Gisbergen's. The New Zealand road-course specialist — who has famously struggled on ovals since arriving in the Cup Series — led the race for a stretch with 72 laps to go, earned stage points in all three stages, and finished eleventh. "Shane van Gisbergen is leading this race. An intermediate traditional crown jewel oval. Shane van Gisbergen, the road-course guy, was leading this race legitimately." Eric calls it "in many ways his best oval performance to date," adding that doing it on this particular stage made it all the more meaningful.

On the other end of the spectrum: Chase Elliott. Eric had him circled as a legitimate contender — someone who had nearly run down Hamlin at Vegas and beaten him at Texas — and watched him spin out on his own in the first half of the race. "A rare mistake. Like Chase Elliott doesn't make those kinds of mistakes. He doesn't break loose and crash on his own like hardly ever in the Cup Series. He is Mr. Consistency." Eric is candid: "I was way off. He was my — I had Denny Hamlin as the favorite coming in and then I was like Elliott, Bell second, third. So I was way off."

Prime Video's Broadcast: Rising to a Difficult Moment

One of the more extended pieces of praise in the episode goes to Amazon Prime Video's production of the race — their second year covering NASCAR and their sixth race ever. Eric acknowledges the layers of challenge they faced: the ceremonial weight of Memorial Day weekend, the significance of the Coca-Cola 600 as a Crown Jewel event, and then the sudden, devastating task of building tributes to Kyle Busch just days after his death.

"I thought Prime Video handled all of that as classy as you could," Eric says. The pre-race packages, the tribute segments, the way they captured the moment on the grid before the opening ceremonies — "I thought all the pre-prepared stuff was phenomenal. All the in-the-moment stuff they had to react to, I thought they handled extremely gracefully." He extends the same praise to the truck and XFINITY broadcast teams: "All three broadcast teams this weekend had a huge challenge ahead of them and I think they all knocked it out of the park."

He also takes a pointed shot at Fox Sports in the process, praising Prime Video's commercial-free late-race coverage as "just such a night and day, such better coverage." Fox has made improvements — going side-by-side and largely commercial-free in the final laps — but Eric's verdict is direct: "Prime Video ran circles around the competition last year, and I think they're off to a really solid start based on what I saw tonight."

Notable Quotes

Eric (on the emotional weight of the weekend): "This whole race weekend just felt incomplete. Trucks got cut short. O'Reilly didn't even get to halfway. Weather prevented us from completing all 600 miles tonight. Incomplete on the track and incomplete off the track, with us all missing the late great Kyle Busch."

Eric (on the Busch family at Charlotte): "Seeing the Busch family at the track at Charlotte Motor Speedway today, with the entire garage surrounding them, behind them — both literally and metaphorically behind the Busch family showing them unwavering support — one of the most moving images I've ever seen on my television set."

Eric (on Daniel Suárez): "Every time fans count him out, Suárez shows up and does something to reel you back in. Whether it's that road course win at Sonoma a few years ago, to the win at Atlanta early in 2024 to make the playoffs, to now this — joining Spire Motorsports, a new team on the rise. He's been top 16 in points pretty much all season to win a Crown Jewel."

Eric (on the crucial final cautions): "I believe if NASCAR held off on that button for three more seconds, Denny Hamlin would have been out front. He would have controlled the next restart and Daniel Suárez would not have won this race."

Eric (on Toyota's dominance): "Toyota clearly has the intermediate tracks figured out. Danny Hamlin won Las Vegas. Tyler Reddick won Kansas. The other OEMs have a lot of work to do to catch Toyota. It's not just 23XI — it's that whole collaboration."

Eric (closing): "Don't forget what's truly important. Thanks for watching. I'll see you again real soon."

Race: Coca-Cola 600 — Charlotte Motor Speedway, Concord, North Carolina

Date: May 24, 2026

Winner: Daniel Suárez, #7 Freeway Insurance Chevrolet, Spire Motorsports

Source: NASCAR Official YouTube Channel — Full Race Replay | Highlights

Race Overview

The 2026 Coca-Cola 600 was one of the most emotionally charged races in NASCAR's modern era. The sport gathered at Charlotte Motor Speedway just days after the shocking death of two-time Cup Series champion Kyle Busch, who passed away on May 21, 2026, at age 41. Before the green flag dropped, the field ran a missing man formation on the pace laps, and the drivers observed a moment of silence on lap eight in honor of Busch. His wife Samantha, their son Brexton (who had just turned 11), daughter Lennix, his parents Tom and Gay, and older brother Kurt Busch were all present in the speedway to watch the race. The emotional weight of the evening was palpable from the very first lap.

Against that backdrop, the Coca-Cola 600 itself delivered 373 laps of intense, multi-groove racing on the 1.5-mile intermediate at Charlotte, with 32 lead changes among 13 drivers before a pair of rain cautions in the final stage ultimately ended the evening early. Daniel Suárez — who had previously raced in the Truck Series for Kyle Busch Motorsports early in his career — found himself in a position to win after crew chief Ryan Sparks made a bold two-tire call with 47 laps remaining, vaulting the #7 to the front. Suárez survived two restarts and a rain stoppage, holding off Christopher Bell, Denny Hamlin, Tyler Reddick, and Kyle Larson to claim a rain-shortened but fully official victory when NASCAR called the race at lap 373 — 27 laps short of its scheduled distance.

In victory lane, a visibly emotional Suárez performed Kyle Busch's signature bow celebration and then addressed a tearful tribute to his late friend: "Kyle, he was special. I was doing this for Kyle, for Samantha, for Brexton and Lennix, and for all of his family." It was Suárez's third career Cup Series victory, his first since 2024, and made him the first Mexican-born driver ever to win the Coca-Cola 600 — the longest race on NASCAR's schedule.

Stage-by-Stage Breakdown

Stage 1 (Laps 1–100) — Winner: Kyle Larson (#5, Hendrick Motorsports)

Tyler Reddick and Ty Gibbs shared the front row in a deliberate nod to Kyle Busch — the "missing man formation" with the No. 18 Toyota entry unoccupied in memory of Busch, whose family had been associated with the JGR/Gibbs dynasty for years. Reddick drove deep into Turn 3 on the opening lap to clear Gibbs and take the early lead.

The opening stage saw multiple cautions that reshuffled the field significantly. Josh Berry got loose and brushed the wall on lap 35, bringing out the first yellow. The most dramatic incident came on lap 53 when Austin Cindric and Connor Zilisch were collected in heavy contact — both suffered significant damage and fell out of contention early. Chase Elliott, who had been working his way forward, spun off Turn 2 and slammed the inside wall with about 11 laps remaining in the stage, bringing out another caution that further mixed up the running order.

On the decisive restart with five laps left in Stage 1, Ryan Preece showed early on the lead lap but couldn't hold off the charge from Kyle Larson, who drove through the field from the 18th starting position. On the final lap, Larson cleared the Toyotas ahead and took the stage victory — his seventh consecutive Hendrick Motorsports Stage 1 win in the Coca-Cola 600.

Stage 1 Top 5: 1. Kyle Larson; 2. Chase Briscoe; 3. Tyler Reddick; 4. Denny Hamlin; 5. Erik Jones

Stage 2 (Laps 101–200) — Winner: Denny Hamlin (#11, Joe Gibbs Racing)

The second stage was dominated largely by the Joe Gibbs Racing Toyotas, with Denny Hamlin showcasing the kind of veteran racecraft that has defined his career. After cycling through green-flag pit stops, Hamlin muscled his way past Chase Briscoe around lap 143 with an aggressive move inside Turn 3 and was never seriously challenged for the top spot over the final 50+ laps of the stage. Hamlin crossed the stage finish line 3.767 seconds ahead of the field — a commanding margin.

Notable during Stage 2 was the handling problems that plagued several cars on the right-front tires, particularly among the Chevrolets. Katherine Legge's No. 78 suffered ongoing issues throughout the event. The 77 car also had extended pit road trouble with a wheel nut that cost it multiple laps. Hamlin's earlier-season win at Las Vegas was echoed here as he locked in his second stage win of the year.

Stage 2 Top 5: 1. Denny Hamlin; 2. Ty Gibbs; 3. Chase Briscoe; 4. Tyler Reddick; 5. Kyle Larson

Stage 3 (Laps 201–300) — Winner: Christopher Bell (#20, Joe Gibbs Racing)

Stage 3 opened with Hamlin and Briscoe fighting door-to-door for position before Hamlin reclaimed the top spot early in the third segment. A pivotal caution came on lap 210 when Katherine Legge lost her right-front wheel, scattering debris across the apron and forcing the yellow. After the restart, Tyler Reddick made a stunning three-wide move to take the lead, going around both Hamlin and Briscoe simultaneously.

The stage had multiple breathtaking lead battles — particularly between Reddick, Hamlin, and Briscoe — with the lead changing repeatedly during multi-groove battles that exemplified the kind of racing Charlotte's 1.5-mile layout can produce at night. With five laps remaining, Christopher Bell — who had made a green-flag stop for four tires earlier in the segment — had worked from outside the top 10 back to contention. Bell used the high side of the speedway to execute an outside pass on Hamlin down the backstretch and lead into Turn 3, claiming his third stage win of the 2026 season and third stage in the Coca-Cola 600.

Stage 3 Top 5: 1. Christopher Bell; 2. Denny Hamlin; 3. Ty Gibbs; 4. Chase Briscoe; 5. Kyle Larson

Stage 4 / Final Segment (Laps 301–373) — Winner: Daniel Suárez

The final stage began with Bell and Ty Gibbs side by side, but the chaos of the final segment started almost immediately. On lap 318, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. gave a deliberate shove to Ross Chastain coming off Turn 2 — apparently in retaliation for Chastain taking a lane — sending the #1 Chevrolet spinning into the inside wall. The resulting caution completely reshuffled the field.

Shane van Gisbergen, on fresher tires, used an outside move on the restart to grab the lead from Gibbs. Bell followed through in second place. Then on lap 329, a massive multi-car crash erupted off Turn 2 when Chase Briscoe tagged the bumper of Chris Buescher, hooking Buescher across the track. Ryan Preece and Josh Berry were both collected, ending their nights with significant damage.

After another restart, Bell drove to the lead once more, with Hamlin and Reddick giving chase. With 47 laps remaining, NASCAR displayed the caution flag for lightning in the area — NASCAR's longstanding rule that the race must halt if lightning is detected within eight miles of the facility. During that stoppage, crew chief Ryan Sparks made the call of the night: two tires only on the #7 Freeway Insurance Chevrolet of Daniel Suárez, while most other top runners took four. This moved Suárez from approximately 15th to the front of the field at the restart.

Kyle Larson, lining up just behind Suárez on the restart, gave him a massive push through Turn 1 — launching Suárez clear to the lead. With rain threatening, Suárez played masterful defense as Bell, Hamlin, and Reddick — all on fresher four-tire sets — hunted him down. A second rain caution with 28 laps to go brought the field back to pit road, but Suárez again survived the restart. When rain intensified just moments later, NASCAR called the race official at lap 373, making Suárez the winner.

Key Incidents & Cautions

The Coca-Cola 600 saw 12 cautions for 75 laps — an eventful night with both racing incidents and weather interruptions.

• Lap 35 — Josh Berry: Berry got loose and brushed the wall, spinning to bring out the first caution. No significant damage.
• Lap 53 — Cindric/Zilisch: Austin Cindric made contact with Connor Zilisch, sending both cars into the wall with heavy damage. Both retired from the race.
• ~Lap 75 (Stage 1) — Bubba Wallace: Wallace was shoved into the outside wall on a restart, collecting damage on the #23 car. He continued but lost multiple positions.
• ~Lap 87 (Stage 1) — Chase Elliott: Two-time 2026 race winner Elliott lost the rear of his car exiting Turn 2 and slammed the inside wall. Heavy damage forced the two-time champion deep in the running order and eventually out of contention.
• Lap 210 — Katherine Legge: The #78 Live Fast Motorsports Chevrolet lost its right-front wheel on the track apron, scattering debris and bringing out the caution.
• Lap 318 — Ross Chastain (Stenhouse retaliation): Ricky Stenhouse Jr. gave a retaliatory shove to Ross Chastain coming off Turn 2, spinning Chastain into the inside wall. Both were involved in a contentious moment earlier.
• Lap 329 — Multi-car crash: The most destructive incident of the final stage. Chase Briscoe hooked Chris Buescher across the track off Turn 2, collecting Ryan Preece and Josh Berry. All four cars suffered race-ending damage. Preece, Berry, and Buescher all climbed out under their own power.
• Lap 353 — Lightning caution: NASCAR's lightning detection triggered the yellow flag when a storm moved within eight miles of the speedway. This caution set up the decisive two-tire call by Suárez's team.
• ~Lap 360 — Rain Caution (first): Light rain prompted a brief caution; racing resumed after a short delay.
• Lap 373 — Race called: Heavy rain moved in following the second restart. The race was declared official after 373 of 400 scheduled laps, with Suárez frozen as the race winner.

The Race Finish

With 47 laps to go and the race paused for lightning, Daniel Suárez and crew chief Ryan Sparks made the call that defined the night: two tires while the majority of the frontrunners took four. As the field lined up for the restart, Suárez found himself at the front — and with Kyle Larson tucked right behind him in the two-tire group, Suárez got a tremendous push off Turn 1 and rocketed to the race lead.

What followed was a tense final act in which Suárez, on older tires, had to manage the distance and hold off faster cars driven by Christopher Bell, Denny Hamlin, and Tyler Reddick. The first rain caution bought the leaders time to pit, but Suárez again used two tires to maintain track position. On the final restart, he once again got a push from the five car — Kyle Larson doing everything he could to be a kingmaker — and Suárez was clear heading down the backstretch.

Hamlin made a hard charge on the inside in what would have been the final laps, even making slight contact with Bell as both drivers chased Suárez. But the rain began falling harder, NASCAR waved the yellow flag for the final time with approximately 27 laps remaining, and minutes later the race was called official. Suárez slowed to a joyful halt on the frontstretch and climbed from the car to perform Kyle Busch's signature bow — a moment that brought tears to the eyes of many in the grandstands.

Top 10 Finishers

| Pos | # | Driver | Team |

|-----|---|--------|------|

| 1 | 7 | Daniel Suárez | Spire Motorsports (Chevrolet) |

| 2 | 11 | Denny Hamlin | Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota) |

| 3 | 20 | Christopher Bell | Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota) |

| 4 | 45 | Tyler Reddick | 23XI Racing (Toyota) |

| 5 | 5 | Kyle Larson | Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet) |

| 6 | 54 | Ty Gibbs | Joe Gibbs Racing (Toyota) |

| 7 | 12 | Ryan Blaney | Team Penske (Ford) |

| 8 | 22 | Joey Logano | Team Penske (Ford) |

| 9 | 24 | William Byron | Hendrick Motorsports (Chevrolet) |

| 10 | 38 | Zane Smith | Front Row Motorsports (Ford) |

Championship Implications

Tyler Reddick, who led a race-high 119 laps and finished fourth, continued his impressive 2026 season atop the Cup Series standings. Despite not winning, Reddick's points haul at Charlotte maintained his 122-point cushion over second-place Denny Hamlin. Ryan Blaney sits third, while Ty Gibbs and Chase Elliott round out the top five.

Daniel Suárez's win moved him to 10th in the standings, only 270 points behind Reddick — well within reach of the playoff picture. The victory is guaranteed to lock Suárez into the 16-car playoff field as a race winner. The cutline currently falls between Ryan Preece (16th, -317) and Austin Cindric (17th, -332) — both of whom had difficult nights at Charlotte.

Race Stats

• Laps Completed: 373 of 400 (race shortened by rain)
• Lead Changes: 32 among 13 drivers
• Cautions: 12 for 75 laps
• Stage 1 Winner: Kyle Larson (#5, Hendrick Motorsports)
• Stage 2 Winner: Denny Hamlin (#11, Joe Gibbs Racing)
• Stage 3 Winner: Christopher Bell (#20, Joe Gibbs Racing)
• Laps Led — Tyler Reddick: 119 (race high)
• Average Speed: Approximately 132 mph (rain-affected)
• Front Row: Tyler Reddick (#45) and Ty Gibbs (#54) — "missing man formation"
• Margin of Victory: Race called under caution

Summary compiled from NASCAR.com, RacingNews.co, Jayski.com, ESPN, and the official NASCAR YouTube channel race replay. Sources: NASCAR.com Race Recap | RacingNews.co Results | Jayski | ESPN | YouTube Full Replay

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, May 24, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: Coca-Cola 600 — Charlotte Motor Speedway, Concord, North Carolina

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

> ⚠️ Note on Sources: As of this automated run (Monday, May 25, 2026, early morning), the Teardown episode for the Coca-Cola 600 had not yet been published to YouTube, Dirty Mo Media, or the podcast RSS feed. The most recent episode in the feed was "Ordinary All-Star" (published May 18, 2026), covering the NASCAR All-Star Race at Dover. This recap has been assembled from race reporting at CNN, Jayski, Frontstretch, ESPN, NASCAR.com, and Yahoo Sports. It covers the major storylines Jeff and Jordan would address in the episode. Episode title is estimated; quotes in the Notable Quotes section are from drivers and team personnel, not the hosts.

Episode Overview

There is a category of NASCAR race that transcends the sport itself — events that take on a weight, a meaning, and a gravity that can't be scripted or manufactured. The 2026 Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway was unambiguously one of those races. Kyle Busch, two-time Cup Series champion and the winningest driver in NASCAR history across its three national series, had died three days earlier from complications of severe pneumonia that had progressed to sepsis. He was 41 years old.

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, Karsyn Elledge; Guest: Jordan Bianchi

Date: Recorded Thursday, May 21, 2026 | Posted May 23, 2026

Race Covered: Coca-Cola 600 — Charlotte Motor Speedway, Concord, North Carolina

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

This episode of Door Bumper Clear carried a weight that no live fan-day show is prepared to carry. Before a single joke was cracked or a question fielded from the Charlotte crowd, the podcast opened with a solemn moment of silence for Kyle Busch — "a competitor, a champion, a friend, and someone who gave everything to this sport." The tribute was added when the episode was uploaded, underscoring that the NASCAR community absorbed a profound loss in the days around Coca-Cola 600 week. The race itself, run three days after this recording, would become an emotional event: Daniel Suárez won and honored Kyle Busch in a tearful victory lane.

Recorded live on the Arby's (RB) stage at JR Motorsports Fan Day in Concord, the three regular hosts — Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, and Karsyn Elledge — were joined by Jordan Bianchi, senior reporter at The Athletic and co-host of the Teardown podcast. The crowd was large and engaged, the weather was hot, and the session mixed serious garage intelligence with fan Q&A, schedule-reform ideas, and the kind of irreverent banter that makes DBC what it is. Despite the shadow hanging over the week, the episode was substantive from start to finish, delivering genuine scoops on driver free agency, Hall of Fame politics, and technical race strategy ahead of NASCAR's longest race.

The overarching mood was one of a sport on the eve of something momentous — the 600 looming, the Hall of Fame induction fresh, driver futures in flux, and a community still processing unexpected grief.

In Memoriam: Kyle Busch

The producers' decision to open the uploaded episode with a tribute to Kyle Busch set the tone for everything that followed. Though the recording took place on Thursday and the tribute was laid in afterward, the shadow of the loss was real. Kyle Busch — two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion, winner of more races than almost anyone who has ever strapped into a stock car — was mourned by the entire paddock. Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, and the DBC team made clear their respect and condolences extended to his family, teammates, and the broader racing community. The Coca-Cola 600, run three days after this recording, became a tribute race in its own right, culminating in Daniel Suárez's emotional victory.

Alex Bowman's Future and the Hendrick Roster Puzzle

One of the most substantive topics of the episode was what happens at Hendrick Motorsports if Alex Bowman decides to step away. Jordan Bianchi reported that the decision is more Alex's than Hendrick's — the organization values Bowman, Ally Financial likes him, and he's regarded as a solid fit. But health issues have played a role in his deliberations, and nothing is settled.

The more fascinating angle was the downstream consequences. Bianchi laid out the two names circulating internally: Corey Day, who is excelling in the O'Reilly (Xfinity) Series in just his third year on pavement, and Connor Zilisch, whose contract at TrackHouse Racing is coming up. The crew agreed that Day is probably better served with another full Xfinity year — "if you put Day in that car in '27 and he does well, and Zilisch becomes available, then what do you do?" Freddie Kraft pointed out the elegance of a Bowman bridge year: it keeps both paths open, allowing Hendrick to potentially land Zilisch in 2027 and slide Day to Spire Motorsports once he's ready.

Bianchi was characteristically careful but firm on the Zilisch side: "Don't worry about Zillich. Trust me." Spire, meanwhile, was defended as a genuine ascending program — not a placeholder. "Carson Hocevar could have won three races last year. Michael McDowell was very competitive. Look at what Daniel Suárez is doing this year." The point was clear: Spire has invested serious money and serious people, and a landing there is no longer a downgrade conversation.

Chris Buescher: NASCAR's Most Underrated Free Agent

Jordan Bianchi dropped one of the episode's more striking pieces of intel: Chris Buescher is among the most sought-after free agents in the Cup garage right now. "Inside the garage, it's not a surprise, even if it is to most fans," Bianchi said, noting that two organizations have had serious interest — one Ford team (not Roush Fenway, which would narrow it significantly) and one Toyota organization. The consensus on stage was blunt: put Buescher in a Gibbs, a Hendrick, or a Penske and he will win races and contend for championships. He is that caliber of talent.

Freddie Kraft raised the structural issue facing RFK Racing: they will not have three charters next year. Hayek just signed Ricky Stenhouse Jr. With only two charters, retaining three competitive drivers becomes mathematically difficult. Bianchi confirmed that charter availability — at least one team is in conversations about selling — could reshape the landscape. The RFK prediction was that Buescher likely returns, but the window is cracked open enough that a rival organization could make a move. "You don't want to go down the road where you leave the door open," Bianchi said.

Driver Free Agency Round-Up

The episode doubled as a clearinghouse for free agency intelligence. Bianchi offered quick assessments on several names when prompted:

Josh Barry was rated 50/50 on his current seat. Noah Gragson was put at "50/50 but leaning 64 toward staying" — there is a pathway for him to remain, but he needs to step up. Eric Jones and John Hunter Nemechek at Legacy Motor Club were both assessed as very likely to return, with contractual structures in place that make changes unlikely absent something dramatic.

The most definitive call of the episode: Riley Herbs to Legacy Motor Club is essentially done. Bianchi stated he would be "shocked" if the announcement wasn't coming in the near future. And if Herbs leaves 2311 Racing, the logical successor in that car is Cory Heim going fulltime in 2027 — Freddie Kraft endorsed this outcome enthusiastically, noting the team has a strong stable of talent to draw on.

Coca-Cola 600 Race Preview: Strategy, Temperature, and Ladder Problems

With the race three days away, Tommy Baldwin walked the crowd through the strategic realities of the 600. The 400-lap distance breaks into stages, and with green-flag running those stages will require roughly two stops each — likely split 50/50 rather than thirds, since "50/50 is faster." The heat is the X factor. Charlotte is the most temperature-sensitive oval on the schedule outside of Indianapolis. "You could set your cars up 20-30% freer just to be right at night," Tommy explained. "We'd be almost spinning out during the day just praying for that sun to go down."

Freddie Kraft added a practical observation that got a laugh from the crowd: the spotter stand at Charlotte — renovated last year without consulting the spotters — leaves several crew members unable to see due to the light configuration. Kraft and several colleagues will be standing on ladders for the entire 600-mile race to see over the light banks. "OSHA violation," Freddie acknowledged. "But I don't want to get tethered anywhere."

The discussion of Charlotte's resin application — which drew social media outrage this week from fans who apparently hadn't noticed it happening for five years — prompted Tommy to explain its purpose: it helps get rubber on the racing surface early, which creates multiple grooves as teams search for fresh grip. "It's almost like searching like a dirt track. You rubber it in, start moving up, keep moving up, then come back down because the bottom rubbers in too much." The consensus was that Charlotte racing under the Next Gen car has been excellent, and the resin is part of why.

Jordan Bianchi drew laughs with his admission that the debate over whether the Coca-Cola 600 should award more points than other races irritates him deeply. "Either make it across the board for all four majors, or it should be universal. I hate this conversation."

NASCAR Hall of Fame: Voting Reform and the Harvick Debate

Kevin Harvick's induction was a given, but the episode dissected why he didn't receive a unanimous vote. Tommy Baldwin, who sits in the voting room, explained: when it's known a frontrunner will clear the threshold easily, some voters redirect their ballot to push a borderline candidate across the finish line. In Harvick's case, the spirited debate between Neil Bonnett and Jeff Burton consumed enough attention that Harvick's vote count fell short of unanimous.

"By any measure Kevin Harvick should be a unanimous Hall of Famer," Karsyn Elledge said. "He's won a championship. He's won every single Crown Jewel race. He's top 10 all time in wins." Freddie Kraft agreed but pointed out Jimmy Johnson wasn't unanimous either, and neither was Jeff Gordon. "If Jimmy wasn't, there's never going to be one."

The deeper structural critique was unanimous: the voting system needs reform. The current rules allow voters to name only two candidates per ballot. With fifteen nominees fighting for limited slots, statistically worthy names like Jeff Burton (who entered this year at just 38% of the vote) get shortchanged through vote-splitting. The proposed fix: expand the ballot to allow ten votes per voter, with a 75% threshold for induction. "Some years you'll have five go in. Other years maybe one. But people go in when they deserve to go in." Tommy specifically championed Neil Bonnett's case: "Neil got killed in a race car. For me, that puts him higher on my list — he gave his life doing what we all want to do." Harry Hyde's absence from the Hall was called "ludicrous" — a championship crew chief who was instrumental in building Hendrick Motorsports and was immortalized in Days of Thunder.

Scheduling Brainstorm: All-Star Race and the Fan Week Experience

Freddie Kraft sparked a lively sidebar with a scheduling proposal that got genuine traction from the crowd and from Jordan Bianchi. The current format — two separate weeks for the All-Star Race and the Coca-Cola 600 — costs fans money and spreads engagement thin. Kraft's idea: move the Hall of Fame induction ceremony to Wednesday of Coca-Cola 600 week, run the All-Star Race on Thursday night (at Charlotte, North Wilkesboro, Bowman Gray — somewhere in driving range), and then flow directly into Friday trucks, Saturday Xfinity, and Sunday 600.

"Wednesday, big event. Thursday, big event. We go right into the weekend," Kraft said. Bianchi noted the fan appeal: "Getting to see two iconic races in one week — that's a sporting experience you can't get anywhere else." Tommy Baldwin added that coordinating Fan Days into a rolling spotlight, "one or two teams at a time instead of five or six going on," would help fans who can't be everywhere at once and make the week feel more curated rather than chaotic.

Project 91, Max Verstappen, and the San Diego Race

A fan question about whether Max Verstappen would ever attempt a Cup oval prompted Jordan Bianchi to drop a notable update on Project 91's upcoming San Diego race entry. Social media sleuths decoded a recent teaser to suggest "Magnus" — and Bianchi confirmed: "The name I hear a lot is Kevin Magnussen. That is the name I'm hearing for San Diego. It's not Max or Staplein. I can confidently tell you that." He added the standard caveat that Verstappen doing a one-off years from now is never impossible — "We never thought Juan Pablo Montoya was going to come over here and run fulltime" — but this year's Project 91 seat appears to be Magnussen's.

Cletus McFarland: Nashville and the ARCA Path

Cletus McFarland's upcoming NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series appearance at Nashville drew warm discussion. The group agreed that the bar for success is simply finishing cleanly — "just don't be part of the story." Bianchi reported hearing genuine rumblings that a fulltime ARCA program in 2026 or 2027 is under consideration, which Tommy and Freddie endorsed enthusiastically. "The ARCA schedule is diverse — Salem, Winchester, Springfield dirt track — those races are unbelievable for his YouTube following." Freddie added: "He's doing it right now. We all want him to do good, but we want him to do it right so he doesn't turn into a problem."

Audience Q&A Highlights

The live crowd at Fan Day delivered a run of solid questions. A fan asked whether doing away with the Roval in favor of the Charlotte oval was the right call. Freddie endorsed it: "The racing on the Charlotte oval is so good now." The Roval question prompted the memorable aside that SVG (Shane van Gisbergen) kept winning it, which the team admitted was not their favorite outcome. A Logano fan asked how worried Joey's supporters should be — the panel reassured him that Paul Wolfe is too good a crew chief to let the slump continue: "Paul Wolfe is a Hall of Fame crew chief at this point. Three championships. He'll figure it out."

The most definitive fan-Q exchange: when asked whether Junior's team (JRM) would ever move into the Cup Series, Freddie deadpanned: "Dale's too cheap. He won't buy a charter." Tommy backed him up entirely. "We've got enough going on right now. We're bursting at the seams in there."

Notable Quotes

Jordan Bianchi (on Chris Buescher's free agent value):

"Inside the garage, it's not a surprise. If you put him in a Gibbs, a Hendrick, a Penske, he's going to go win races for you and contend for the championship. He is that kind of elite talent."

Tommy Baldwin (on Charlotte's temperature sensitivity):

"We'd be almost spinning out during the day just praying for that sun to go down. Whoever hits that balance right from when the sun goes down the last half of the race is going to be the winner."

Freddie Kraft (on the Hall of Fame voting system):

"It's insulting to Jeff Burton that people are going to nitpick and say he only got 38% of the vote. If you could have up to 10 names on a ballot, Burton's number is going to be higher than 75."

Jordan Bianchi (on Riley Herbs to Legacy Motor Club):

"I would be shocked if Riley Herbs was not driving for Legacy next year. Those conversations are very close to being done."

Tommy Baldwin (on spotting from a ladder for 600 miles):

"There's going to be some challenge — my fat ass trying to stay on a ladder for five hours. That's the hardest test of the 600."

Freddie Kraft (on the Hendrick driver pipeline):

"If you put Day in that car in '27 and he does well, and Zilisch becomes available — then what do you do? Because then Hendrick's in a situation where you've got Larson, Byron, and Elliott. None of those guys are going anywhere."

Podcast: The GluckCast (Episode 14)

Network: Dirty Mo Media / The Athletic

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Nate Ryan — veteran motorsports journalist, AP stringer, co-host of Holler Talk podcast, 2026 American Motorsports Media Award of Excellence recipient; Bobby Marcos — GluckCast producer, co-host of Speed Street IndyCar podcast

Date: May 21, 2026

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck opened Episode 14 of the GluckCast live from Indianapolis Motor Speedway on the Thursday of Memorial Day weekend — the biggest weekend in American motorsports — with a distinctly unscripted energy. After a week that took him from Dover to Charlotte to the NASCAR Hall of Fame voting room, then through a missed connection in Chicago before landing in Indy for the premiere of a new Kyle Larson documentary on Prime Video, Gluck arrived without his usual agenda. He was transparent about it from the first breath: "I don't have the script. So we're going to see how unprepared I actually am."

To anchor the show, Gluck called in a favor from NASCAR journalism legend Nate Ryan — a writer he credits as one of his role models and a journalist who has been inside the NASCAR Hall of Fame voting room for every single class since the inaugural discussion in 2009. Ryan, who no longer posts on X, joined for a wide-ranging 35-minute conversation covering the Hall of Fame results, the decline of Southern California as a NASCAR market, and the alarming state of motorsports media. The back half of the show belonged to producer Bobby Marcos, who offered an IndyCar insider's preview of the Indy 500.

The episode was looser and more reflective than a typical GluckCast but arguably richer for it. Without a tight script, Gluck and Ryan let threads run long, and what emerged was one of the more candid discussions of how NASCAR's Hall of Fame voting actually works — and why its results so often produce outrage.

The Hall of Fame Vote: Harvick, Burton, Biffle, and the Outrage Machine

The episode's longest segment dove into the 2026 NASCAR Hall of Fame class, which inducted Kevin Harvick and Jeff Burton from the modern era ballot and Larry Phillips via the Pioneer award. Both Gluck and Ryan were in the voting room at Charlotte earlier in the week.

Jeff opened by noting something that surprised him: for much of the discussion, Kevin Harvick's name barely came up. "It got to the point where I was like, hey, like we're all voting for Harvick, right? Like let's not make the mistake of thinking that everybody else is going to vote for him." Ryan said the situation immediately reminded him of the inaugural vote in 2009, when David Pearson — with 105 wins and three championships — went almost entirely undiscussed before being left out of the first class entirely. "I was getting Pearson vibes," Ryan said, "as we got like halfway through the discussion and Harvick's name still didn't come up."

Harvick ultimately received 92% of the vote. Both hosts acknowledged that several voters may have strategically withheld a vote from Harvick — not because they doubted his worthiness, but as a tactical move to allocate both votes toward less certain candidates. Ryan raised a broader structural concern: the NASCAR Hall of Fame has never had a unanimous selection, even for Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon. "I wonder if it's like what we see with the Baseball Hall of Fame — if there hasn't been a unanimous selection to this point, then there shouldn't be one," Ryan said. Gluck replied that he simply votes for the most worthy person regardless of symbolism.

The more explosive portion concerned the second modern-era slot. With Harvick essentially spoken for, the remaining nine nominees competed for a single open spot. Gluck explained that he ultimately voted for Jeff Burton because of Burton's totality: 21 Cup wins, three crown jewel victories, a decade-plus of television work, and two-plus decades of behind-the-scenes safety advocacy since Dale Earnhardt's death in 2001. Gluck argued: "People don't want to hear that, but the off-track stuff is the tiebreaker for me." Ryan agreed, noting he had voted for Burton three consecutive years and saw Burton's invisible labor on driver-NASCAR relations as historically significant.

Both acknowledged the anger from Greg Biffle supporters. Biffle had more Cup wins, more top fives, more top tens, and a better average finish than Burton. Gluck was careful: "A vote for Jeff Burton isn't a vote against Greg Biffle. I think all of them are worthy." Ryan added that the tragedy surrounding Biffle's family in December made the emotional temperature around his candidacy especially charged, but maintained he did not believe this was the year. "I think he will get in eventually," Ryan said.

The conversation also touched on crew chief Herb Nab appearing on the ballot for the first time — despite having 93 wins, third all-time among crew chiefs. Gluck found the moment instructive: "If I go to my future self and somebody comes back and says, 'Hey, who do you think are the Hall of Famers right now?' — I could look at somebody and be like, 'That guy's not a Hall of Famer.' And if that guy got in the Hall of Fame someday, I'd be like, man, I don't think at the time we considered them a Hall of Famer at all." Ryan nodded, noting that crew chiefs simply weren't televised or credited the way they are today.

Ryan also revisited Jordan Bianchi's Athletic column suggesting a baseball-style threshold system, where inductees get in by hitting a minimum percentage rather than finishing in the top two. Both hosts found merit in the idea while acknowledging NASCAR may not be willing to risk a class with zero inductees.

Southern California: Fontana's Limbo and the San Diego Question

Gluck pivoted to Nate Ryan's personal beat — Southern California — asking what it would take for NASCAR to find a permanent home in the region now that Auto Club Speedway has been gutted. Ryan covered Fontana from its inception in 1997 and has a singular vantage point on the track's arc from miracle project to apparent ruin.

"I feel like I — how many people get to witness a major league sporting arena from its birth to its apparent demise?" Ryan said, describing Fontana as having arisen from a Kaiser steel mill toxic waste dump through a three-year construction effort that defied California regulations. His tone was elegiac throughout.

Gluck noted that the San Diego street race returns this year but won't serve as a permanent solution given its location on a Navy base. His diagnosis for the broader problem: "It's going to be the path of least resistance. They're not going to build a brand new track somewhere." The Kern Raceway idea — associated with Kevin Harvick's Bakersfield-adjacent project — came up briefly, but Gluck dismissed it on geographic grounds. "You're not going to convince people in LA to go to Bakersfield. That's just it." Ryan agreed that the entire value proposition of Southern California as a market is proximity to the Los Angeles basin and its 20-plus million residents within two hours of Fontana. A Bakersfield facility satisfies existing NASCAR fans but doesn't expand the audience.

Gluck expressed hope that some version of a Fontana short track plan — which he said he reported on seven years ago — could still come to fruition. "The grandstands and the infield buildings are still standing for now," he noted. "But the longer that goes on, it certainly seems less likely."

The State of NASCAR Media: Newspapers, AI Search, and a Sport Without a Home Team

With the second major topic dispatched, Gluck introduced a thread that genuinely seemed to weigh on both journalists: the deteriorating state of motorsports coverage. He referenced a piece by Tom BS at Front Stretch cataloguing the grim numbers, then flagged a timely development — Google's announced overhaul of its search results page to prioritize AI-generated summaries over traditional article links.

"Obviously websites can't afford any more drop in traffic at this point," Gluck said. Ryan picked up the structural argument, noting that NASCAR coverage suffers from an absence that most professional sports don't face: there are no home teams. "The Raleigh News and Observer — they're not going to stop covering the Carolina Hurricanes. But with NASCAR, racing coverage was always viewed as a luxury for a lot of newspapers." Ryan said that when he became the full-time NASCAR beat writer for the Richmond Times-Dispatch in 2002, two to three dozen papers traveled to up to 36 races per year. Within 20 years, that number was down to one. "And now," Gluck said, "it's pretty much zero."

Ryan traced the decline to the Great Recession and the structural shift in digital publishing economics, calling it a "volatile period" that has lasted roughly 20 years without resolution. He was candid about his own pessimism: "It's tough to see how it goes back to that." Both acknowledged that the Google AI change adds a new and potentially severe pressure on top of an industry already scraping for traffic and monetization.

Gluck noted an additional bitter irony: as a working journalist himself, he now watches AI products summarize and distribute the reporting that human journalists like Ryan spent careers building. Neither host had a prescription for fixing it.

Coke 600 Preview: Stage Points Take on New Meaning

Returning to the week's immediate racing news, Gluck offered a pointed analytical observation about Sunday night's Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte. Under the current playoff format, stage points have become a genuine strategic currency — and the 600's four stages make it the single biggest points-accumulation opportunity of the season.

Gluck reported that this was the dominant conversation with drivers during the All-Star weekend. "Chase Briscoe trying to improve his playoff seed were like, we're putting huge emphasis on this. Michael McDowell trying to get back into that picture — this is huge." He argued that NASCAR's original rationale for adding a fourth stage to the 600 — breaking up the race into shorter segments for pacing purposes — has been overtaken by the playoff system's math, which now makes stage points structurally consequential in a way they weren't before. "This race means more than the typical race," Gluck said, "and now with this playoff system, it makes a difference."

He also noted the All-Star race resin experiment at Dover appears likely to have permanent downstream effects. NASCAR is reportedly applying the same resin treatment at Charlotte immediately. "Every time NASCAR goes back to Dover," Gluck said, "they will put down the resin. So I doubt for the foreseeable future we will see a points race at Dover without that resin down."

Kyle Larson vs. The Double Documentary and Katharine Legge's Attempt

Gluck shared his reaction to the Kyle Larson documentary, "Kyle Larson vs. The Double," which premiered on Prime Video Thursday morning — the same morning as the GluckCast. He had attended a private screening the previous evening at Indianapolis and had seen it once before in order to write his review for The Athletic.

Gluck called it a "sad documentary" that documents two failed double attempts — the 2024 edition plagued by rain and the waiver controversy, and the 2025 edition where Larson crashed in both races. He noted that Larson himself embraced the downbeat ending: "He says in there, 'I'm glad this is a sad documentary because it shows how hard it is what I do.'" Gluck also flagged that the documentary addresses the 2020 racial slur incident more directly than Larson has previously engaged with it publicly. "They go into it and the aftermath and fallout of that — that's in there."

On Katharine Legge's 2026 double attempt, Gluck offered a measured take. He noted that unlike Larson, Legge isn't running for points in either series, which gives her scheduling flexibility if there are delays between the two races. He acknowledged she is both the first woman and the oldest driver to attempt the double, and said he considers the attempt itself historically significant regardless of finishing position.

Indy 500 Preview with Bobby Marcos

For the final segment, Gluck brought on GluckCast producer Bobby Marcos — who also co-hosts Speed Street, an IndyCar podcast with Connor Daly — for a quick Indy 500 primer aimed at the show's primarily NASCAR audience.

Gluck asked for Marcos's honest assessment of Connor Daly's win probability. Marcos said Daly has shown genuine speed at every stage of the month — the open test, qualifying, and practice — and that the car looks legitimately fast. "He always has a chance. But this year in particular, if you watch practice, the open test, qualifying — that car is very fast." He noted that Daly leads laps nearly every year despite never having a top-tier ride, and that he is effectively the hometown hero at IMS, drawing crowd reactions that no other driver matches.

On the broader field, Marcos flagged that Penske — which dominated the Indy 500 for the past two years with McLaughlin, Newgarden, and Power — is showing signs of struggle in 2026. With David Malukas now in a Penske seat, Marcos offered that the lack of a dominant team opens the door for a first-time winner. He mentioned Alex Palou as a speed threat (while noting Palou was invisible for most of last year's race until the final 80 laps) and compared Malukas to Carson Hocevar in NASCAR: "Any day now this guy's going to win a race. He's right there."

Marcos gave a gut-level prediction: "Going with my gut, I think we'll see a first-time winner this year."

Closing Notes and Weekend Schedule

Gluck wrapped up with the weekend viewing guide: Friday night truck series at Charlotte on FS1 at 7:30 PM ET; Saturday's Xfinity race at Charlotte on The CW at 5:00 PM ET; the Indy 500 on Fox Sunday at green flag 12:45 PM ET (with Caitlin Clark calling drivers to their cars); and the Coke 600 Sunday night at 6:00 PM ET on Prime Video — the first Prime race of the season. He also flagged the Wiener Mobile 500 on Carb Day, which moves from streaming-only to live on Fox this year, and mentioned that F1's Canadian Grand Prix shifted its start time to 4:00 PM ET on Apple TV to avoid direct conflict with the Indy 500.

Gluck closed with a note about Carl Edwards, expressing disappointment that Edwards — whom he praised effusively as a broadcaster — will only appear for one race in 2026 rather than the full Prime schedule.

Notable Quotes

Jeff (on Harvick's Hall of Fame vote): "It got to the point where I was like, hey, like we're all voting for Harvick, right? Like let's not make the mistake of thinking that everybody else is going to vote for him."

Nate Ryan (on his Hall of Fame approach): "I'm going to vote on worthiness and I'm not going to necessarily think about whether it reflects a diverse swath of the garage. A vote for Jeff Burton isn't a vote against Greg Biffle."

Nate Ryan (on the unanimous selection question): "The fact that the first class — Richard Petty wasn't unanimous, Earnhardt wasn't unanimous — I think we've sort of just reached this point now where there'll probably never be a unanimous selection."

Jeff (on the future of NASCAR in Southern California): "It's going to be the path of least resistance. They're not going to build a brand new track somewhere... You're not going to convince people in LA to go to Bakersfield. That's just it."

Nate Ryan (on the collapse of NASCAR beat coverage): "When I started covering NASCAR full-time in 2002, I was the full-time beat writer for the Richmond Times-Dispatch — one of literally two to three dozen papers that traveled to anywhere from 15 to 36 races a year. Sadly, within 20 years, that number was down to one. And now it's pretty much zero."

Bobby Marcos (on Connor Daly's Indy 500 chances): "He always has a chance. But this year in particular, if you watch practice, the open test, qualifying — that car is very fast. And I think he feeds off that energy of all these people behind him."

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared Allen

Published: May 18, 2026

Race Covered: 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race — Dover Motor Speedway, Dover, Delaware

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Runtime: ~52 minutes

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MwISC93axg

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/dover-delivered-all-star-format-missed/id1666603641?i=1000768399790

> Note on cast: The task brief listed co-host as "Mike Davis," but the actual co-host of Actions Detrimental is Jared Allen. A third voice, Travis (likely producer Travis Loftin), also appears throughout the episode. Denny's daughter Molly makes a brief cameo mid-episode.

Episode Overview

Denny Hamlin recorded this episode late Sunday night in his victory celebration — two trophies and a stack of dollar bills visible on the table, the $1 million fake check temporarily misplaced somewhere on the hauler. The mood was celebratory but characteristically analytical. Denny had just won the 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race at Dover Motor Speedway, his third win at "The Monster Mile" in the NextGen era and his second career All-Star Race victory. He dominated the final 200-lap segment, making the decisive pass on JGR teammate Chase Briscoe with 29 laps remaining and pulling away to win by 0.887 seconds.

But this episode wasn't just a victory lap. Denny's win was almost incidental to the broader conversation — a launching pad into a frank, wide-ranging critique of the All-Star Race format, a deep-dive on his one admitted weakness (restarts), the new low-downforce package, and the buzzing weekend subplot of Corey Day's Xfinity dominance. The episode also featured Kyle Busch appearing at the track, seat-shuffling rumors for 2027, tire-wear advocacy aimed squarely at NASCAR and Goodyear, and a preview of the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte the following Sunday.

The recording has a raw, post-race energy that makes it one of the more entertaining episodes of the season. Denny is relaxed, willing to self-critique, and notably more candid about both NASCAR's institutional decisions and his own on-track shortcomings than he would ever be in a traditional media setting.

The Win: "Satisfying. That's About It."

The episode opened moments after the race with Denny in a reflective mood about what the All-Star win actually means to him. Despite pocketing $1 million and earning two trophies, he was measured rather than euphoric.

"Would I rather have the money, which is cool... would I rather have that or points win and then it actually count in the stat book? I would rather it count in the stat book and make far less," Denny said directly. He acknowledged the win as his third straight at Dover and fourth since 2020 — a genuine streak — but characterized it as "satisfying. That's about it." Jared pressed him on whether it counted as a repeat: "The great people of Delaware ain't seen a different winner since 2023," Denny noted with a smile, but ultimately admitted: "it doesn't feel the same."

When Jared's daughter Molly wandered into the studio mid-episode and Denny asked her what she'd do with a million dollars, she replied without hesitation: "A horse." It was a brief but charming moment before Denny redirected back to the debrief.

Qualifying Chaos and the Pit Crew Challenge

Denny opened the technical debrief with the weekend's bizarrely enjoyable qualifying session. He spun out during his qualifying lap, flat-spotting the right rear tire, and crew chief Gail told him his scuffs were unusable — he'd be down a set of tires heading into the race. Despite the shaking, damaged car, he still went fastest and won the pole.

"How do you still go top of the board?" Jared asked. Denny's answer was characteristically self-aware: his pit exit was "horrible" because he was gun-shy from the spin, but his pit road rolling speed was first in the field, and when everything was added up across NASCAR's five or six metrics, P1 was the result.

Denny had pointed critiques of the Pit Crew Challenge format. He argued that driver metrics — his entry speed into the pit box, his exit — shouldn't count against the pit crew's time. "If it's going to be a pit crew challenge, let it be the pit crew," he said. He also suggested NASCAR should display live rankings for each sub-metric as teams run their laps — similar to how Formula 1 shows sector times in real time — rather than using the ghost car system. "I'd love to see: here's his lap entry, where does it rank? So as a fan, oh boy, we're going to be close." He clarified he wasn't criticizing the format as broken, just pushing for better presentation to increase fan excitement.

The Race Format: "The Aura of the All-Star Is Just Not the Same"

This was the centerpiece of the episode and the most unfiltered section of Denny's analysis. He came armed with a clear verdict: the on-track racing at Dover was genuinely good, but the format around it was a mess, and the two things can't be separated in public perception.

"I think the on-track product was pretty good," Denny said. "It just didn't need all these gimmicks and stuff, and that kind of ruined it for most people." The specific problem he cited: all locked-in All-Star drivers ran the first two segments alongside open cars fighting to transfer into the final 200-lap race. Chase Elliott was "locked in" to the All-Star race but got wrecked early and "technically didn't race in the All-Star race" — a fundamental contradiction. Denny asked NASCAR's Jennifer in the media center exactly when the All-Star race actually started, and the answer was effectively lap 151 — meaning the race's headline event only began in the final segment.

The deeper issue: locked-in drivers could, in theory, get wrecked, have their team repair the car for 150 laps, and then start the 200-lap finale fresh. "If that car goes out there and wins the race after not running half the race — bad luck," Denny said. "Sometimes you have to do something to realize where you need to fix it. We didn't think of that, right?"

He also explained the carnage: because drivers at the back of the combined field knew they needed to finish in the top 26 to transfer and earn a good starting spot for the invert, they were racing aggressively as early as lap two. "The field is looser because it's an All-Star race, and you know every position matters now," he said. Twenty-four of 36 cars were involved in incidents before the 200-lap finale even began.

Despite all of this, Denny made a point of defending Dover and its fans: "The fans there are super passionate. The people in that area, they freaking love racing, man. They support that racetrack. They got a bad draw this year." He argued that if the event had been labeled a regular points race, it would have been considered a solid Dover race with good storylines.

The Fix: Nashville Fairgrounds, Saturday Night

Denny's prescription for the All-Star Race was specific and emphatic. He said if he were Steve O'Donnell, CEO of NASCAR, he'd be on the phone with SMI immediately: "All right, let's do whatever we got to do to run this in Nashville Fairgrounds on Saturday night next year."

His reasoning: the All-Star Race needs to be at night, on a Saturday, at a shorter track, and ideally at a new venue not currently on the Cup schedule. The Nashville Fairgrounds — a 0.596-mile oval that hosted NASCAR races from 1958 to 1984 — is his top choice. He noted SMI already has some affiliation with the venue and that Nashville as a city draws massive crowds. "We're starting to put a lot of really good pieces of the puzzle together to have a really fun weekend."

He was also thoughtful about the North Wilkesboro trade-off. NASCAR gave North Wilkesboro fans a points race this year, which meant it could no longer host the All-Star Race. Denny's concern: "Sometimes you want something and more of it is not better." He suggested that the magic of North Wilkesboro's All-Star Races came from their brief, sprint-format nature — and that a full points race there may not replicate that energy.

The New Package: Off-Throttle, On Edge

Denny spent considerable time explaining the 2026 short track package — more horsepower, less downforce than 2025 — and how it changed the driving experience at Dover. The physics: more entry speed into corners combined with reduced grip means more off-throttle braking time, and cars that are "more on edge" when racing side by side. "When we were battling at the end of some of these segments, me and everyone I was racing around was sliding all over the place," he said.

He connected this to the learning curve the field has been navigating since Darlington. "We were all panicked about Darlington — 'Oh my gosh, we're out of control.' Then we actually run it, we're like, 'Ah, the computers were all wrong on the prediction.'" His team has dialed in the setup iteratively across Darlington, Bristol, and now Dover. "After we got our setup where I wanted it, it didn't feel much different — other than you're off throttle a little bit more, using a little more brake versus what you had last year."

He was particularly bullish on the racing this package produces. Putting slower cars at the front of the field — an artifact of the All-Star format's invert — meant faster drivers were constantly navigating traffic and had to be creative about where they searched for speed on the track. "It actually allowed for more passing because you were trying to navigate: okay, these are slower cars. It challenged you. It really, really did."

Restart Woes: "The One Gaping Hole in Our Game"

One of the most candid sections of the episode was Denny's frank assessment of his restart performance. Travis flagged it in the opening, citing roughly a one-for-six success rate on restarts across the race. Denny acknowledged it directly: "It's why we didn't win Texas. It is the only gaping hole of our game right now. It's like our free throw shooting's not great."

He described losing the lead three times over the course of the race and identified at least one specific mistake — short-shifting into turn one because he was afraid to stay in fourth gear. "The minute I shifted, bam, clear. Those are the little things I've got to work on." He was also philosophical about the structural tension: a car set up to be best on a long run is inherently harder to drive perfectly on a single-lap restart. "It's almost impossible to have the fastest car for one lap on a restart and have the fastest car on the long run." His setup direction prioritizes the long run — which is why his team was dominant once Segment 3 settled in — but it comes at a cost on green-flag restarts.

When Jared asked how you actually practice restarts in NASCAR — noting that unlike a basketball player shooting free throws, there's no equivalent gym session — Denny's honest answer was: "If I knew, then I wouldn't have lost the lead three times. But I'm going to investigate it with certainty." He acknowledged simulated practice probably doesn't fully translate to race conditions, but he sounded committed to finding an answer before the playoffs.

Tire Wear and the Goodyear Advocacy

Denny made a point of singling out tire strategy as one of the genuine highlights of the race for him as a driver and competitor. Dover with this package produces roughly 60–65 laps of life on a set of tires, and the competition caution came at lap 75 — just outside that range. That meant every driver had to manage carefully, and some didn't.

"I lost the Segment 1 win because my right front was corded," Denny admitted. "I had nothing left. I pushed it too hard. I didn't, you know, I took for granted that I could just go ahead and go hard here." He blamed himself, not the tire — and turned it into a broader point about driver responsibility.

He then pivoted to a direct message about Iowa: "Give us the falloff. All the falloff." He described a recent tire test where a two-second-per-lap falloff tire was being considered but teams were worried about corded tires in race conditions. Denny's position: if the tire doesn't cord at a test, it's too hard. "Iowa want to talk about a track position race — yikes. You could not pass there. Give us the tire that actually has falloff. That's part of the driver's responsibility: keep the tires on it."

Corey Day: Ready for Cup?

Saturday's Xfinity race at Dover produced a statement performance from Corey Day — and Denny admitted that Day nearly "screwed up" what he joked was shaping up to be an old-timers' podium (Kyle Busch, Justin Allgaier, and Denny himself in the All-Star Race).

The bigger topic was the rumor mill: articles speculating about Day potentially making the jump to Cup racing as early as 2026. Denny was thoughtful rather than dismissive. "He's very young, man. The leap from Saturday to Sunday is a big one." But he also said the timing of when you struggle doesn't change the fact that you will struggle. "You either struggle now or you struggle later. But you all struggle your first year."

What impressed Denny most was not results but execution: "He's able to make moves that I know is very difficult. That's how you know the ceiling is there." He connected Day's improvement to a reported sitdown with Rick Hendrick. "Something clicked. From that point on, he's performing like somebody that's aspiring to race on Sunday and he's doing a hell of a job." Denny's prescription for the next seven months wasn't results-based — he said no single win would prove readiness — but rather developing the intangibles: managing green-white-checker restarts under pressure, knowing when being three-wide means not being the one who drives in deepest.

Kyle Busch at the Track

Denny was notably warm about seeing Kyle Busch at Dover — their JGR history clearly not a barrier to genuine appreciation. "I said you're on the Mount Rushmore of NASCAR drivers." He keyed in on Busch reverting to third-person self-reference in the media center as a sign of his confidence returning: "That's the Kyle Bush we need. That's the one we like to see."

Denny's analysis of Busch running XFINITY races was emphatic: "I truly believe to my heart's of hearts that it's not him going down there bushwacking, trying to beat up on the young kids. I think it's really good for him for the track time and for the mental state." He drew directly on their JGR teammate years to make the point — suggesting that Busch has always been this way, that track reps in the lower series actively feed his Cup performance, and that if NASCAR lets him keep doing it, it will benefit the Cup product too. "I'm for Kyle Busch running every Friday and Saturday race."

Driver Contracts, Seat Shuffling, and Ricky Stenhouse

Jared raised an article suggesting around 20 driver contracts expire after the 2026 season. Denny pared that down to roughly 10 truly meaningful moves — but agreed it would "spice things up." He flagged the existence of exclusive negotiating windows in driver contracts, noting that some of the speculation emerging publicly was surprising. "There's definitely going to be some shuffling of seats after this year."

He gave a genuine shout-out to Ricky Stenhouse Jr. for securing his Sunday ride. "An independent team if there ever was one. Doing a ton with — I don't know what they got, but they can't have much for help and resources." His one mild transparency wish: while he doesn't care about driver salary figures being public, he'd like contract lengths to be public record — except in cases involving litigation.

Looking Ahead: Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte

With the All-Star race in the rearview, Denny pivoted to the following week. The Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway is the longest race on the Cup schedule, and it falls on Sunday, May 24. Friday will feature the Strike Group Challenge — an Amazing Race–style competition pitting Actions Detrimental (Denny and Travis) against the Door Bumper Clear crew (Freddy and producer Dalton), with eight clues and physical challenges sponsored by America's Navy.

Jared also revealed he'll be broadcasting the O'Reilly race on the CW. Denny's coaching was minimal and pointed: "Don't say someone's in the Champ 4 this year." He also mounted a brief but firm defense of the broadcast booth vs. studio debate — arguing that where broadcasters are physically located does not change viewer experience, and fans should stop caring about it.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on winning the All-Star Race):

"Would I rather have the money, which is cool — would I rather have that or points win and it actually count in the stat book? I would rather it count in the stat book and make far less."

Denny (on the All-Star format's core problem):

"I asked Jennifer from NASCAR: when did the All-Star race actually start? It started at lap 151. Chase Elliott is listed as not running the All-Star race. That's that's not right."

Denny (on where the All-Star Race should go):

"It needs to be at night. I think it needs to be on a Saturday night and it needs to be on a shorter track. If I'm Steve O'Donnell right now, I'm contacting SMI and saying, 'All right, let's do whatever we got to do to run this in Nashville Fairgrounds on Saturday night next year.'"

Denny (on his restart issues):

"It is the only gaping hole of our game right now. It's like our free throw shooting's not great. Everything else is good. We just gotta get better at free throws."

Denny (on Kyle Busch's third-person media center moment):

"When I heard him talking about Kyle Busch in the third person — that's the Kyle Bush we need. That's the one we like to see. That's the guy that's got the confidence."

Denny (on Corey Day's ceiling):

"He's able to make moves that I know is very difficult. That's how you know the ceiling is there. He's doing an absolute hell of a job."

Sources used: YouTube transcript (video ID: 4MwISC93axg), Apple Podcasts episode listing, Athlon Sports race recap (May 17, 2026), Jayski 2026 race results.

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Co-Host: TJ Majors (spotter, JR Motorsports)

Episode Number: 716

Date: May 19, 2026

Race Covered: NASCAR All-Star Race — Dover Motor Speedway, Dover, Delaware

Winner: Denny Hamlin

Show Type: NASCAR race reaction, driver/insider perspective, silly season, 600 preview

Episode Overview

Episode 716 of the Dale Jr. Download arrived hot off the heels of Saturday's NASCAR All-Star Race at Dover Motor Speedway, a race that produced more carnage, chaos, and conversation than anyone expected — and left Dale Earnhardt Jr. loving nearly all of it. With TJ Majors back in the co-host chair, Dale delivered his signature Hall of Fame driver take on everything from the legitimacy of Dover as a race venue to the deep structural problems with the All-Star format, while also finding time for a full O'Reilly Series debrief, an extended silly season conversation, and a look ahead to the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte.

Throughout the episode, Dale's perspective is grounded in his dual identity: as a former driver who raced in the heat of these moments, and as a team owner with JR Motorsports whose O'Reilly Series drivers are right in the middle of the stories being discussed. TJ, speaking from the spotter stand at Dover all weekend (with no ice cooler, a subplot that became a running gag), adds a ground-level view from inside the garage. The result is one of the more substantive episodes of the 2026 season — part race autopsy, part format manifesto, part gossip session, and part heartfelt Q&A.

All-Star Race at Dover: Reaction and the Venue Question

The show opened with Dale acknowledging the elephant in the room: nobody was excited when NASCAR announced Dover as the All-Star Race venue. "When they announced that they were taking this thing to Dover, no one said hell yeah," Dale said bluntly. TJ agreed: "Nobody." But both hosts were willing to admit that the event performed better than the pessimism predicted. TJ, who was physically present all weekend, said fan turnout felt comparable to a normal race weekend, which surprised him.

Dale's read on the crowd was more cynical but revealing. He believes Dover fans showed up primarily to make a statement: they want their Cup points race back. He said he spoke with Marcus Smith (of Speedway Motorsports, which owns Dover), who confirmed the fans in attendance made that desire clear. "They all glad that we're doing this," Smith reportedly told Dale, "but they don't want to fall by the wayside unexpectedly. They want their points race back." Dale's conclusion was unambiguous: Dover deserves a points race, and the All-Star Race belongs back in Charlotte, ideally on a Wednesday night before the Coca-Cola 600.

The race itself — the on-track product — got a solid but measured review from both men. "The format was a failure," Dale said, carefully separating it from the event itself. "But the race was damn good." The chaos that unfolded early, with multiple cars wrecking in the opening laps while fans literally still had their backs turned to the track, was the kind of unpredictable spectacle Dale actively enjoys. "Those people got their backs turned to the track," he said with a laugh. "People are still trying to get to their seats — and they kept wrecking. That's what we need."

Dale's All-Star Format Manifesto: Go Back to 1987

The most pointed section of the first half of the episode was Dale's extended argument for radically simplifying the All-Star Race format. His proposal was simple: go back to something close to the 1987 format — roughly 50 laps, then 25, then a 10-lap shootout — with a small, locked-in field of recent race winners (maybe 19 drivers), plus one qualifier from the Open. Total field: 20 cars. Prize: a million dollars. No elaborate segments, no fan vote gimmicks, and definitely no 600-mile-style endurance test.

"The 87 race is legendary," Dale said emphatically. "All those formats were small and simple. You don't need to do too much." He criticized NASCAR and race promoters for trying to make both the All-Star Race and the Clash into financially scaled events with big weekends, arguing this is precisely the wrong instinct. "The Clash is an appetizer. It is the table setter. It doesn't need its own weekend." His vision for the Clash would be equally stripped down: 12 cars, the drivers who've won the most poles that season, running 20 laps with no cautions, no pit stops, and no drama — just 20 laps of flat-out racing as a curtain-raiser for Daytona 500 week.

TJ pushed back gently, noting that 20 laps can feel short, but Dale cut him off: "I would run the arc of that. You were not around when this race was 20 laps. It was badass." He also made a practical argument for Charlotte and the Wednesday slot: the teams are all already based there, travel costs are minimal, and folding it into the 600 weekend gives it built-in context and a massive audience. "You give Dover back its points race," he said, "and you have the All-Star race on Wednesday in Charlotte. It doesn't need its own weekend. It doesn't need to be this big money-making thing."

On the question of whether to eliminate the All-Star Race entirely, as some commentators have suggested, Dale was adamant: no. "For everyone who ever won it, it's a kick in the balls to get rid of it. All the history that goes with it becomes worthless." The fix isn't elimination — it's simplification.

The Carnage, the Cars, and Dover's Track Conditions

One element of the All-Star Race that got universal praise on the show was the chaos itself — the repeated wrecks, the scrambled restarts, the cars punting each other into the wall. Dale's position: the sport needs more of this. "I'm one of those people who likes the wrecks," he said. "I'm not too proud to admit it." TJ noted that the inverted restart format contributed to some of the comers-and-goers dynamic, and both agreed the race was genuinely entertaining even if it lacked the clarity of a clean points battle.

Dale traced some of the wreckage to a broader argument about car overengineering. In his view, the Next Gen car's brakes and grip levels are too good — drivers can carry too much speed too deep into corners, and the consequences, when they come, are sudden and severe. "The brakes are way too good. Everything on it is way too good. Way too overengineered." He also touched on the specific incident where Brad Keselowski was spun out early, crediting TJ's SMT data overlay and his own "eye test" of thousands of laps to conclude that Ross Chastain bore the majority of the blame. TJ noted Chastain had no public comment, which prompted Dale to joke: "His comment was — wee. Ouch. Oops."

The track surface at Dover also generated a substantive sidebar. Dale noticed that the lower-horsepower, lower-downforce package seemed to bring the rubber up faster than at a normal race, essentially compressing a lap 200 racing surface into about lap 30. He and TJ debated whether the resin treatment NASCAR applied contributed to that, with Dale arguing that if you want multi-groove racing, you should treat the parts of the track where you want drivers to run — not the groove they're already using. "If you're trying to get them off the bottom," he said, "don't treat the bottom." He acknowledged the resin moved things along faster, and ultimately credited the track and its concrete surface for producing a better racing product.

In the O'Reilly Series race, Dale praised Cory Day specifically for finding additional racetrack at Dover that nobody else went to get — running up into an unused gray strip above the groove and finding time lap after lap. "He's a searcher," Dale said. "You got to be a searcher if you're going to go find that speed."

O'Reilly Series: Raja Mejia, Jesse Love, and What It Means to Be a Team Owner

One of the most candid and emotionally rich segments of the episode came when Dale addressed the ongoing Raja Mejia-Jesse Love situation in the O'Reilly Series. Mejia, who races the JR Motorsports 88 car on a part-time basis, has now been involved in multiple incidents where Love has been the collateral damage, and the frustration on Love's side is visible.

Dale defended Mejia not by excusing the mistakes, but by contextualizing the pressure Mejia is under. "When he gets in our car, he's got the pressure of what Connor Zilisch did in this car last year," Dale said. "He feels like if I don't go out there and prove I'm a winner, I don't get next year." That pressure, Dale argued, turns every opportunity into a must-win rather than a must-finish. He drew a direct parallel to his own career: in 1999, he wrecked Matt Kenseth while both were racing for the championship, knowing full well Kenseth had the better car, because he "drove over his head." "I made that mistake. Raja made that mistake. Most drivers are going to make that mistake."

Dale said he has spoken to Mejia directly and encouraged him to collect base hits rather than swing for home runs every lap. He used his JR Motorsports Nationwide team experience — specifically, his decision to hire a young Brad Keselowski — to illustrate the value of finishing races cleanly. "Brad comes in. 14th, 12th, 16th, 10th... and we started creeping down the running order, finishing races, and now our bottom line looks good. Our money looks good." The point was not that Mejia lacks speed; it's that he hasn't yet accumulated the laps and racecraft that allow you to recognize when aggressive moves are worth the risk and when they aren't.

On Jesse Love: Dale was empathetic and genuine. "Jesse's a good dude and I hate it because he doesn't deserve it." He said Love has the tools to match anybody in the series and would expect Love to confront Mejia directly — and he supports that. "He's going to be a thorn in your side. He should and he will."

Silly Season: Kyle Busch, RCR, RFK, HMS, and the Move-Up Candidates

The back half of the first hour moved into a broad silly season conversation, with TJ and Dale working through several storylines that are simmering as the season approaches its midpoint.

Kyle Busch at RCR: Citing Jordan Bianke's reporting, Dale and TJ addressed the likelihood that Busch and Richard Childress Racing sign an extension despite Busch's inconsistent start to 2026. Dale's view: it makes sense for both sides. Busch has been running better over the past few weeks, and the alternatives — both for Busch and for RCR — aren't clearly better. "What are the other options if you wanted to go somewhere else?" was Dale's bottom line. TJ added that the sponsorship relationship with Johnny Morris (Bass Pro Shops) is tied to Austin Dillon's seat, meaning any roster move at RCR involves a complicated web of relationships.

RFK Racing's Third Car: Dale and TJ discussed whether RFK, which runs a third car without a charter, can afford to keep doing so. One figure floating on social media suggested the gap between running with and without a charter is about $5 million — which both hosts acknowledged is real money, but potentially manageable if the sponsorship is in place. Brad Keselowski has publicly said they're evaluating all options. "If they feel like they have to and there's no other option," Dale said, "I think RFK is willing to do it."

Hendrick Motorsports and the 48 Car: The most speculative stretch of the silly season talk centered on the possibility of HMS acquiring Connor Zilisch from Trackhouse. Dale made clear he thinks it's essentially a zero percent chance, citing Justin Marks's years-long investment in Zilisch's development. "If Justin Marks is naming the price, it ain't gonna be cheap. Zero chance I do that." His preferred HMS roadmap: extend Alex Bowman, develop Cory Day through additional cup starts while he finishes his O'Reilly run, and let Kyle Larson mentor Day into full-time readiness.

On Jesse Love's Cup future: both hosts agreed Love is ready — and that he might be equal to or comparable to Zilisch on ovals. "If you put Jesse and Connor in cars with no numbers, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference," Dale said. The problem is that Cup seats simply aren't opening up. "There's very few where it's like someone is just moving off and that seat's opening up." Several O'Reilly drivers — including Sammy Smith and Sheldon Creed at HMS — are said to be eager for Cup opportunities, but the market is tighter than the narrative suggests.

Ask Jr.: Speeding Tickets, the Nova, and Back to the Broadcast Booth

The live Ask Jr. segment delivered several of the episode's most memorable moments.

When asked about his first speeding ticket, Dale told a detailed and warm story about being 16, driving his black-and-silver S10 pickup past a highway patrolman on a road near the DEI farm. He knew the cop was turning around the moment he passed him and pulled over before he even saw the lights. As he sat there getting his ticket, Dale Jr. Senior — Dale Sr. — drove past without stopping. "And I was like: yep." His father's response upon arriving home: "I guess you got to get a job." Dale then got hired at a full-service Exxon station near his high school, worked afternoon shifts to pay for a lawyer to reduce the ticket to a muffler citation, and discovered Waffle House for the first time in the process. "People ain't going to believe this, but that's the way the dad was."

TJ's comparable story involved nearly getting pulled over in his own driveway, with his parents watching through the window. And James — one of the production crew — admitted to his own stop-sign ticket right in the business park where they record.

On the Nova restoration, Dale said the car is nearly finished but needs three days with a tuning specialist before it's road-ready. The issue is that the transmission is shifting too aggressively — the throttle partly engages even when you let off the gas. "If you let off the gas, it takes off," he said. Once tuned, it's headed to Junior Motorsports Fan Day on May 21st, where it'll be displayed (with ropes). Dale: "I don't want nobody touching this car ever."

When asked whether he's excited to be back in the broadcast booth for the Coca-Cola 600 on Amazon Prime, Dale was honest about his nerves. "I'm a bit reserved on my emotions right now about that, but it's just because I'm nervous." He said the amnesia effect — forgetting how fun it is until you're actually doing it — kicks in every time. His goal: replicate whatever it was that made the Amazon broadcast go over so well in 2025. "We are just going to run it back, buddy."

Dirty Mo Segment: Coca-Cola 600 Preview

Closing out the show, Dale and TJ ran their pre-race picks for the Coca-Cola 600, recording on Monday ahead of the race weekend. Their model (unnamed) had some surprises.

Dale's picks leaned toward value: Kyle Busch (running better lately), Carson Hocevar (good speed, legitimate top-10 ceiling), and Ryan Preece/Harrison Burton range — anyone who could slide in on attrition. TJ leaned toward Christopher Bell and Denny Hamlin as the likeliest winners, though he noted Bell has had a string of frustrating races where things just haven't gone right. Dale flagged Chase Elliott as a sleeper, noting that just a few months ago people were questioning Elliott's season, and now he has two wins and nobody's talking about his struggles anymore. "If he won the 600, that would be a statement."

On the physical toll of the race itself, Dale spoke from hard-won experience: "You definitely recognize when you've crossed the threshold of 500 miles. Everything about you starts to say — well, this should be over. Why are we still doing this?" He noted that on a bad night — running 17th or 20th and several laps down — those final 100 miles can be genuinely miserable. "Long. Keep looking at the scoreboard going, damn, what lap is it? Only 32."

SVG at Charlotte was briefly discussed. Both hosts noted his road course dominance isn't a factor at Charlotte Motor Speedway; last year he ran roughly in the 18th-22nd range. Dale said he'd tune in to see if SVG can find something at an oval where he's been developing. TJ noted that this race in particular rewards mental strength and consistency over outright aggression — which plays to drivers like Hamlin and Brad Keselowski.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on the All-Star Race format): "We're trying to do too much. The 87 race is legendary. All those formats were small and simple — 50 laps, 25 laps, 10. That's all it needs to be."

Dale (on loving the Dover carnage): "I like to see every now and then some cars crash. I'm not too proud to admit it. I'm here for the wrecks."

Dale (on Raja Mejia): "He feels like if I don't go out there and prove I'm a winner, I don't get next year. He can't get the base hits. He's got to go hit home runs. And I told him — that's not entirely true."

Dale (on hiring Brad Keselowski): "Brad comes in — 14th, 12th, 16th, 10th, 12th — and we started creeping down the running order and we were finishing races and now our bottom line looks good. Our money looks good. Guys in the garage are happy."

Dale (on Dover's fan message): "I believe the fans came to tell Marcus — we want our points race back. And I think with everything we saw, they should get it."

TJ (on the ice cooler situation at Dover): "There's no ice anymore. I was on the spotter stand all weekend without any new ice."

Dale (on the 600's physical toll): "Everything about you starts to say — well, this should be over. Why are we still doing this? I'm tired. I'm ready for this to be over. You have to focus harder to stay focused."

Dale (on Connor Zilisch leaving Trackhouse): "If Justin Marks is naming the price, it ain't gonna be cheap. Zero chance I do that — zero chance."

Recap produced for the week of May 20, 2026. Source episode published May 19, 2026 on Dirty Mo Media / YouTube. Episode 716 of The Dale Jr. Download.

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, Karsyn Elledge

Guest: Kenny Wallace

Date: May 18, 2026

Race Covered: NASCAR All-Star Race — Dover Motor Speedway, Dover, Delaware

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Runtime: ~105 minutes

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JG6OfvRNm1s

Episode Overview

Door Bumper Clear returned from Dover with one of its most sprawling and energetic episodes of the season, anchored by a long-awaited studio visit from NASCAR personality and short-track veteran Kenny Wallace. The DBC crew — Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, and Karsyn Elledge — had been trying to get Kenny in the building since they bonded at Texas earlier in the year, and the payoff was immediate: the episode crackled with the kind of unfiltered, stories-over-each-other energy that makes DBC appointment listening.

The show covered a genuinely loaded Dover weekend — Denny Hamlin's dominant All-Star Race win, a controversial and widely-criticized format that all four voices agreed was the worst in the event's history, Kyle Busch's very-suggestive-numbered truck win, Natalie Decker's viral radio meltdown, and a deeply emotional Hall of Fame discussion heading into Tommy's voting session the next morning. Kenny also opened with a candid assessment of where NASCAR stands as a sport in 2026, calling it a "conundrum" and defending the fan base that still shows up even as attendance has fallen.

The episode was long — Freddie himself predicted it at the top — but it earned its runtime. Kenny Wallace is the rare guest who meets the existing DBC energy and matches it, while also bringing genuine historical weight to every conversation. The result was one of the more memorable studio episodes of the season.

Kenny Wallace on the State of NASCAR: A Conundrum, Not a Catastrophe

Kenny Wallace arrived with notes — literally. He told the crew he makes himself notes on X because "every network puts everything there," and he came prepared to talk about the big picture. His take was not the usual despair-spiral, but a measured, historically-grounded assessment of a sport trying to find itself in a changed world.

"I really feel like NASCAR is in a conundrum," Kenny said. "In other words, our world has changed so much." He invoked a story about a 102-year-old woman asked what had changed since she was born: "Everything, literally everything." His point was that too many old fans are measuring NASCAR against its 200,000-attendance peak — an era defined by Dale Earnhardt Sr., Rusty Wallace, and Jeff Gordon — and refusing to accept that the sport, like everything else, has moved on. "We have so many old fans that are moaning that we're not like back in the old day," Kenny said. "They just moan from 30 years ago. Nothing is like it used to be."

That said, Kenny also offered a sharp structural critique: the sport lost its identity when teams abandoned consistent paint schemes. He recounted an executive from Toyota's motorsports division telling him years ago, "Boy, these different paint schemes are going to ruin NASCAR." The logic being that fans could say "the black three" and mean Dale Earnhardt without thinking. Now, even the most devoted viewers are hunting for their car every week. Freddie and Tommy echoed this, with Tommy adding that access has also changed the calculus — COVID wiped out multi-day practice sessions, and fans who used to show up Monday for a Sunday race now show up Saturday (if at all).

Kenny also made a pointed observation about COVID's broader cultural effect. Before the pandemic, attending a race was the only way to experience it fully. Practice sessions created drama. Long pit road battles mattered. "COVID cleaned things up so much," he said. "You mean to tell me as a driver I can show up here at Darlington and sit in my car and with my fire suit on and I can go straight to my car and we can drop the green flag and everything's fine? That destroyed us, because it used to be man and machine." Freddie and Tommy both agreed that the compressed weekend format, while it made logistics easier, gutted much of what made showing up feel essential.

Freddie's counterpoint — that the solution isn't nostalgia but gratitude — landed well. He noted that Dover drew a genuinely good crowd for this era, and that the blame-gaming on social media ("Are you cheering for us to fail?") undermines the people inside the sport who are trying. Kenny, to his credit, agreed: "I feel sorry for them. They've made a lot of mistakes, but what else do you want them to do? They just try."

The All-Star Race Format Was a Disaster

This was the most unanimous segment of the episode. All four voices at the table — including the typically more diplomatic Kenny — agreed that the 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race at Dover was the worst version of the event in its history, and the format was the primary culprit.

The event ran 350 laps, making it the longest race of the season to that point. As Freddie noted with evident frustration, "I look down at two hours in and we're halfway through and there's still another 200 laps to go." The entire concept of the open — previously a beloved feature where non-winners battled for a spot in the main event — was eliminated in favor of running all 26 cars through every segment. The consequence was immediate: a first-lap wreck took out Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, and Chase Elliott all at once. "Well, now what are we going to do?" Freddie asked.

Tommy's team was caught up in the chaos and spent much of the race in the garage. The fact that the scoring system told damaged cars to line up for segments they were clearly not going to make only added to the confusion. "They're calling guys to line up who are in the garage," Freddie said. "You don't even know what the hell's going on out here." By the final stage, seven cars that had been in the garage were back out — all of them junk. "We were seven of us that came out of the garage to start the third stage and we all were junk. None of us had any speed. So now we're just out there riding around the back while Denny's out there."

Kenny put the format problem in historical context: the magic of the event was always the night racing at Charlotte, the distinct segments, and the short, explosive final shootout. "Everything was exciting at night. Come on. You can't see sparks in the day." He noted that the last truly iconic All-Star format — "One Hot Night" — was in 1992, when Davey Allison and Kyle Petty crashed at the end. "We haven't had one of these in 30-something years," he said. Tommy's solution was clear and simple: take it back to Charlotte, restore the open format, and let the segment racing mean something again. "Let the guys that don't win every week get a shot at something," Freddie said, citing Eric Jones as a driver who put together a strong Dover weekend but had nothing to hang his hat on under the new format.

Kenny also noted that the atmosphere at Dover simply didn't feel like an All-Star event. "It felt like another weekend," he said. "It was just a regular race." The venue entertainment — described generously as including giant rubber ducks and a lumberjack competition with an audience of one — did not help. The one modification that got a positive word was NASCAR's decision to apply resin all the way to the wall, which did allow for some multi-groove racing.

Denny Hamlin, to the credit of all involved, was genuinely dominant. He lost the lead on restarts multiple times in each segment before hunting back down to retake it. "He's pretty good," Tommy said, in classic Tommy understatement. His win was his second million-dollar All-Star payday.

Kyle Busch's 69th Win and the Truck Race at Dover

Kyle Busch won the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race at Dover — his 69th career series win. The show did not let the number pass quietly. "And I'm going to go there," Kenny said, before the crew ran with the jokes about the "Rowdy Nation" fan base whose weekly updates to DBC about their private lives are now contingent on whether Kyle wins in a truck rather than a Cup car.

Beyond the humor, Freddie offered a genuine race observation: Busch was basically unchallenged and did Kyle Busch things. Tommy's son Luke Baldwin had another tough outing — he was running inside the top 20 when he got into trouble going into Turn 3, a spot that "probably 20 people" wrecked or nearly wrecked at over the weekend. Tommy was candid that it's a learning-by-doing situation, and that the hardest part of watching Luke is knowing how heavy a single bad result feels when your starts are limited. "When you're a kid, those one races is like an eternity," Kenny added. "You think your three daughters are going to starve."

A notable subplot was the RAM Reality Show trucks — Clint Boyer and Kevin Harvick both competed, and the consensus was that their performances were a humbling reminder that NASCAR is hard. "Even Dale Jr. going to Nashville. It's hard," Freddie said. Kenny pointed to Boyer's own admission: "God, you're just so wide open in these trucks, you know, just wide open." The crew saw it as a reminder to fans who scroll social media thinking it looks easy.

The O'Reilly (Xfinity) race saw Corey Day win, with a strong drive on the top lane. The crew gave him genuine credit for figuring out Dover's tricky groove — and Freddie noted that Day's consistency since a pointed conversation with JRM management earlier in the year (the white shirts and the helicopter in the grass lot) has been no coincidence. "All of a sudden now these guys are superstars," Tommy said, laughing. Connor Zilisch had a strong car before a pit road penalty knocked him off contention but still salvaged a top five.

Natalie Decker: A Polarizing Conversation

Freddie introduced the Natalie Decker discussion carefully — "I want to approach this carefully because I don't want to come across like we're making fun of this person" — and Karsyn Elledge immediately took the wheel with the most empathetic framing of the weekend.

Decker's viral radio audio from the Truck Series race at Dover had her expressing deep frustration, saying "I'm just trying to survive" and referencing the series director in terms the show's editors bleeped. Karsyn's read was nuanced: "I think you kind of start to realize at a point that you're maybe in over your head. All these emotions are coming at you — shame and pride — and then you start thinking, 'These people on social media are going to say this, or I'm letting this sponsor down.' I honestly commend her."

Kenny Wallace, who said he almost called Natalie after the race, struck a mentorship tone: "As a father figure looking at these young girls, I want to see Natalie running Hickory or Tri County every week. I want to see her grinding." He noted that she can drive — he's raced her up in Wisconsin — but that she's not getting the weekly repetitions required to compete at Dover.

Freddie was more blunt. He agreed on the scheduling concern but took exception to who Decker blamed: "She's blaming the race director. What did he do? You sped on pit road. You got out of line too soon on a restart. And you're going too slow on the racetrack. That's not the race director's fault." He noted that the penalties were safety-related, not punitive.

All four voices, though coming from different angles, landed in the same place: Dover is one of the hardest places to "hide" in NASCAR, and whoever is managing Decker's schedule needs to keep her at tracks where she can build rhythm and confidence before returning to a track as unforgiving as The Monster Mile.

Rajah Caruth: Slow Down Before You Run Out of Chances

The crew turned its attention to Rajah Caruth, who has become something of a recurring segment guest in absentia this season due to his series of hard-racing incidents with Jesse Love and others. The consensus was that Caruth is pressing too hard for a driver who already has one of the best opportunities in the sport.

"He feels like he's racing for his life right now," Freddie said, paraphrasing a Caruth interview. "And what these owners are looking for is for you to take a top five car and run in the top five with it. They're not looking for you to take a top five car and wreck with a hundred to go battling for the win because you sailed it off into Turn 3, the most dangerous and treacherous spot on the racetrack."

Kenny found the parallel in his own history: when he got into a Penske-quality car mid-career, Dick Trickle told him, "My boy, you're in a really good car now. Let the car do the work." "On my way home," Kenny recalled, "I looked at my wife and I said, 'What the hell have I been driving my whole life?'" The point applied directly to Caruth: the car will reveal his talent if he stops racing at 110%.

Tommy's advice was even simpler: "Slow down, Raja. You have everything in front of you. You do have probably one of the best opportunities out of every race car driver in the world right now to take advantage, but you're not going to be able to take advantage if you keep rushing."

The NASCAR Hall of Fame: The Sport's Hardest Argument

The Hall of Fame segment was the longest non-race discussion of the episode, and arguably the most substantive. Tommy was heading into the voting room the following morning with 40-50 industry voters to decide the 2027 class from a ballot that included Kevin Harvick, Greg Biffle, Neil Bonnett, Jeff Burton, Tim Brewer, Larry Phillips, Harry Hyde, and others.

Tommy laid out the landscape: Harvick is the likely consensus pick — champions generally get in — but Biffle is the emotionally difficult call. "The hardest decision that we're going to make tomorrow will be the emotional decision because of Biffle," Tommy said. He also noted an unwritten crew chief standard: every crew chief currently in the Hall has won three or more championships, which complicates the path for one-time winners.

Kenny made his most controversial declaration of the episode: he has a genuine problem with non-Cup Series competitors being enshrined next to Dale Earnhardt Sr. and Richard Petty. "I just cannot believe that you can have the great Dale Senior, Richard Petty, Jimmy Johnson, and then put somebody from the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series right next to him," he said. He clarified that his solution would be series-specific wings or distinctions, not exclusion — and then immediately defended Kenny Schrader as someone whose body of work across all of motorsports absolutely belongs in any NASCAR Hall.

Freddie pushed for a baseball-style system where voters can vote for multiple candidates but each must reach a 75% threshold. "If you don't get the votes, you don't get in," he said. Tommy noted that the current format forces tough binary choices that sometimes leave genuinely deserving candidates off for years simply because the math didn't work out that particular cycle.

The discussion had genuine weight coming from people who are actually inside the process. Tommy's observation that Dale Earnhardt Jr. hasn't yet spoken up in the voting room despite being present — "I can't believe he hasn't spoken up yet" — was the most intriguing behind-the-scenes detail of the episode.

Reaction Theatre and Show Hall of Fame

Reaction Theatre was sparse by DBC standards this week — the crew joked that they expected Kenny's presence to draw bigger reactions. Two callers: one with only the number "69" to contribute (re: Kyle Busch), and one who expressed strong dislike of Corey Day as "entitled," which the entire crew pushed back on immediately. "Cory Day is like Jimmy Johnson," Kenny said. "I think they grew up in trailer parks and put their time in." Freddie was similarly dismissive: "That's a pretty idiotic take."

The Show Hall of Fame entry came from Tommy himself — a dirt race at Brewington featuring a driver who was "sideways all the way to the start-finish line." The crew also discussed a police-chase video featuring a car driving off into a gully 50 feet in the air, and autonomous Waymo vehicles blocking an ambulance at a bar shooting during Circuit of the Americas weekend.

DBC Picks: Charlotte 600

With the Coca-Cola 600 coming up at Charlotte Motor Speedway, the crew laid out their fantasy picks:

• Tommy: Kyle Larson
• Kenny: Brad Keselowski (dark horse — "I wouldn't be surprised")
• Freddie: Ryan Blaney (Tyler Reddick was his first instinct before being taken)
• Karsyn: William Byron

Kenny's pick of Keselowski drew some gentle ribbing, but he stuck with it — noting that Keselowski is due for his first win of the season.

Short Track Shoutouts

The episode closed with an extensive short track winners segment, running through dozens of victories submitted by fans from tracks across the country. Highlights included: John McKenny on the NASCAR Modified Tour, Landon Huffman over Ronnie Bass at Tri County, Slate Meyers becoming the youngest winner in Bowman Gray history (and the sixth member of his family to win there), Rico Abreu at Eldora, Brandon Shepard at two separate tracks, and Slammin' Sammy Swindell winning a pavement race at age 70 at Grundy County. Kenny's brother Mike Wallace also won a local feature race — prompting Kenny to get emotional and tell a story about Mike calling their mother to come to victory lane because "it might be my last win ever."

Kenny also wrapped up his weekend: he'd raced a wedge car the previous week, had a hard wreck when a competitor's left front got into his right rear, drove six hours home, and still finished fifth at a different track the next Saturday. "Not on the press release," he confirmed.

Notable Quotes

Kenny Wallace (on NASCAR's attendance problem): "We have so many old fans that are moaning that we're not like back in the old day. We got to accept our new life. And they're so negative. Oh my god, everybody hates everybody and everything. And here I am just happy to be born."

Freddie Kraft (on the All-Star format collapse): "I look down at two hours in, we're halfway through this race, and there's still another 200 laps to go."

Karsyn Elledge (on Natalie Decker): "I think you kind of start to realize at a point that you're maybe in over your head. All these emotions are coming at you of shame and pride... For that, I honestly commend her."

Kenny Wallace (on Natalie Decker's schedule): "As a father figure looking at these young girls, I want to see Natalie running Hickory or Tri County every week. I want to see her grinding."

Freddie Kraft (on Rajah Caruth): "What these owners are looking for is for you to take a top five car and run in the top five with it. They're not looking for you to take a top five car and wreck with a hundred to go battling for the win."

Kenny Wallace (on the NASCAR Hall of Fame): "I just cannot believe that you can have the great Dale Senior, Richard Petty, Jimmy Johnson, and then put somebody from the O'Reilly Auto Parts Series right next to him."

Tommy Baldwin (on Kevin Harvick's Hall of Fame candidacy): "If someone wins a championship and you're entered into the Hall of Fame to be elected, you're going to win."

Show: NASCAR Inside the Race

Host(s): Alex Weaver, Kyle Petty

Date: May 17, 2026

Race Covered: 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race — Dover Motor Speedway, Dover, Delaware

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Alex Weaver returns from paternity leave — he and co-host Kyle Petty open the show with a warm exchange about Weaver's newborn son before diving headlong into a race that, in Petty's words, required "taking your brain out and turning it around." The 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race was the first ever held at Dover Motor Speedway, and it delivered a violent, chaotic, expensive, and ultimately exhilarating day for fans and teams alike. Denny Hamlin turned in a masterclass, winning from the pole and banking a million dollars, but the story of the day was the catastrophic opening segment and the remarkable human effort it took to piece shattered race cars back together before the green flag fell on the 200-lap main event.

The episode is a richly textured post-race breakdown. Petty and Weaver spend the first half dissecting a cascading wreck on lap one, interrogating the poor decisions that caused it, and celebrating the teams that refused to quit. The back half pivots to the broader season picture — Joey Logano's ongoing nightmare, Chase Briscoe's quiet rise, Connor Zilisch's steady emergence — before closing with an impassioned, nostalgic plea from Petty to bring the All-Star Race back to Charlotte and restore it as a full week-long celebration of the sport. Throughout, both hosts are candid, occasionally blunt, and genuinely entertaining.

Denny Hamlin's Dominant Victory

Hamlin entered Dover as the clear favorite after topping both practice and qualifying, and he validated that billing completely. Kyle Petty framed his win in terms of maturity and track-specific intelligence: Hamlin never overdrove his tires, never put himself in a bad situation, and simply bided his time knowing that a caution and a pit stop would eventually cycle him back to the front — which is precisely what happened. "He didn't overdrive his tires. He didn't put himself in a bad situation," Petty said. "He just knew he could."

Both hosts marveled at how Hamlin handled the inverted restart format, passing cars methodically through traffic and making it look almost too easy. Hamlin himself told the post-race interviewer that he loved the invert challenge — "it really challenged us to have to go through traffic" — and praised his Progressive team throughout. Petty drew a comparison to Martinsville and other rhythm tracks where Hamlin consistently excels, arguing that Denny is operating at the peak of his career. "Kevin [Harvick] said something on TV," Petty noted. "He is the best all-around race car driver on the racetrack right now. From speedways to short tracks to mid tracks."

The win marked Hamlin's second career All-Star victory, coming eleven years after his first. Petty delivered a long, affectionate, exasperated monologue about Hamlin's legacy — acknowledging that his failure to win a Cup championship doesn't diminish greatness, and likening him to Mark Martin as the measuring stick of his generation. "Let Denny be Denny," Petty said. "Don't put on him what we're projecting what we want, what we need, what we think should be."

The Lap-One Catastrophe: Ryan Preece and the Self-Cleaning Racetrack

The episode's longest and most animated segment centered on the massive wreck that effectively destroyed the opening stage. Petty, a Dover veteran who once hit the wall hard enough to wake up Monday morning with no memory of the day before, minced no words assigning blame. The crash began in turn three and unfolded across the start-finish line, and Petty said it was entirely on Ryan Preece for making a lane change across the front stretch when the field was already running three wide. "It's on you, dude. You're the one that turned left and cut across the hood and took out all those cars."

Petty acknowledged that every driver has made a mistake like this at some point, but took issue with Preece's somewhat equivocal infield care center interview, in which Preece said "if it's on me, I'm sorry." Petty's response was simple: "Just say, 'It's my fault. I'm sorry.' Because that's what it was." The hosts showed a wide-angle replay that illustrated how quickly things can go from manageable to disastrous, with five cars already riding the apron trying to avoid the initial contact. Weaver noted that Dover's reputation as "the self-cleaning racetrack" only holds when drivers are running alone — when the field is packed door-to-door, "it's a broom that sweeps up everybody."

Petty revisited his own Dover crash story — cutting a right-front tire, hitting both walls, showering, then hopping on a motorcycle and riding home, only to realize the next morning that the impact had left a blank spot in his memory — as a vivid reminder of just how punishing the concrete Monster Mile can be. "You can hit incredibly hard with those concrete walls," Weaver added. "Still softer walls don't mean a softer impact."

The Riley Herbst Decision: Old Tires, Wrong Moment

One of the sharpest analytical segments of the episode focused on the Riley Herbst crash in the middle stages and the tire strategy call that preceded it. Herbst, driving the No. 35, stayed out on old rubber during a caution in a bid for track position. The decision backfired badly, with Herbst getting loose on the restart and collecting multiple competitors. Petty placed the blame squarely on the crew chief, not the driver.

"You've got an inexperienced driver in an All-Star race," Petty said. "He stands a snowball's chance in Hades of winning this thing." The crew chief, Petty argued, put Herbst in a no-win situation — running at the front on old tires surrounded by cars with fresh rubber and far more talent — and in doing so eliminated other drivers who actually had a shot at the million dollars. "I don't want to be a 25th-place car in front of Denny Hamlin on a restart with new tires," Petty said. "What do you think I'm going to do with old tires against their new tires?"

Weaver added important context: veterans like Erik Jones and AJ Allmendinger also stayed out on older tires in various situations and made it work. Petty's response was unsparing: "Different caliber of driver. Different caliber of team. Different organization." He was careful to separate his criticism of the crew chief's judgment from any broader dismissal of Herbst's potential, noting that Herbst can absolutely develop — just not by being thrown into impossible scenarios while still learning.

The Garage as Theater: Teams Rebuilding Mid-Race

One of the most memorable subplots of the All-Star Race was the heroic repair work happening throughout the Dover garage. Kyle Larson's No. 5 and Ryan Blaney's No. 12 were both heavily damaged in the early wreck, and both teams worked furiously through the second segment to patch their cars back together for the 200-lap main event. Blaney ultimately finished 13th — remarkable given that his car was, in Petty's words, "completely destroyed" roughly an hour and a half earlier.

Larson's post-wreck interview, in which he called the frantic repairs "five-car arts and crafts," was both hosts' highlight of the weekend. "Here's a piece of metal — let's cut it in a triangle and put it right here. Here's a piece of tape — let's tape it right there," Petty said, laughing. "That's what it looked like." But both men were quick to follow the laughter with genuine admiration. These are big-time teams that could have simply loaded up and gone home. Instead, they understood their obligation to the fans in the stands and watching at home. "Nobody wants to see the All-Stars sitting in the dugout," Petty said. "They want to see them on the racetrack."

Weaver noted that the three-segment format actually helped these teams, giving them additional time during the middle segment to complete the repairs before the final race began. Still, the degree of precision required — patching cars built within thousandths of an inch — made the accomplishment all the more striking.

Joey Logano's Rough Season and the Chase Picture

With the race wrapped and the All-Star prize in Hamlin's hands, the hosts turned to the season-long playoff picture — and specifically to Joey Logano's increasingly grim 2026. Logano hit the inside wall at Dover and finished 25th in the final segment, another painful chapter in a year defined by near-misses and hard luck. Petty articulated the frustration thoughtfully: "We've seen it in a few races this year where we thought they were going to have a solid day and then somebody slams the door on them."

Petty's prognosis was simultaneously pessimistic and respectful. Sometimes a season is simply lost, he said, and the honest response is to set your sights on the following year. But he was emphatic that Logano hasn't forgotten how to drive, and that Paul Wolfe hasn't forgotten how to call a race. "Joey Logano has not forgotten how to drive a race car." History, Petty argued, shows you have to keep your foot on his neck — because the moment you let him breathe, he'll bite you. The specter of Logano's improbable 2022 championship run hovered over the entire discussion.

When Weaver posed the direct question — Chase Briscoe or Joey Logano to make the Chase? — Petty answered Logano instinctively, then immediately reversed himself. Speed, he said, is the deciding variable, and right now the 22 car simply doesn't have it at the level the 19 car does. "Speed solves everything. And it solved it today for [Briscoe]." He ultimately landed on Briscoe as his pick, while acknowledging that a Logano hot streak at the wrong moment for someone else could change everything quickly.

Weekend Winners and Letter Grade

Kyle Petty named Erik Jones as his top winner of the weekend — a driver who had a great qualifying effort, excellent long-run speed, and a clean race that suggested he could have contended in a full-length Dover event. Petty also cited the fans themselves as winners, praising the format for producing a genuinely entertaining afternoon, and gave a collective nod to the teams (Penske, Hendrick, Trackhouse) that kept their drivers in the race despite the chaos.

Weaver's weekend winner was Connor Zilisch, the young Trackhouse driver who finished fifth in his first-ever All-Star Race appearance. Coming off a heartbreaking near-miss at Watkins Glen — where he appeared to be closing in on his first Cup win before Shane van Gisbergen dominated — Zilisch showed composure, learning curve acceleration, and the kind of steady improvement that makes both hosts genuinely optimistic about his future. "He is a student of the sport," Weaver said.

Both hosts gave the overall All-Star Race a B+. Petty said he genuinely enjoyed it and would go back to watch it live, but missed the relentless pressure of the old short-segment shootout format, where "you can't waste a lap, you can't waste anything." Weaver said the one thing keeping it from an A was the absence of an All-Star Week — a full event with parties, sponsor activations, and community celebration that used to surround the race at Charlotte. Petty agreed enthusiastically and made his pitch: bring it back to Charlotte, run the race on Saturday night, hold the Hall of Fame induction ceremony on Monday, announce the next class on Tuesday, and do Charlotte qualifying on a Wednesday. "If you build it, they will come."

Notable Quotes

Kyle Petty (on Ryan Preece's crash): "It's on you, dude. You're the one that turned left and cut across the hood and took out all those cars. Just say, 'It's my fault. I'm sorry.' Because that's what it was."

Kyle Petty (on Denny Hamlin's legacy): "Mark Martin was the guy we all measured ourselves against and he never won a championship. Don't put what we're projecting on Denny. Let Denny be Denny."

Kyle Petty (on Riley Herbst's old-tire restart): "I don't want to be a 25th-place car in front of Denny Hamlin on a restart with new tires. I don't care if I'm 30th in the field or if I'm third — I want fresh tires on my race car."

Kyle Petty (on teams repairing cars in the garage): "Nobody wants to see the All-Stars sitting in the dugout. They want to see them out on the racetrack. Kudos to Penske, kudos to Hendrick, kudos to those teams for putting their drivers back out there."

Kyle Larson (on his team's mid-race repairs): "It looks like five-team arts and crafts right now. Class in session, I guess."

Alex Weaver (on what would make All-Star Week better): "I want an All-Star Week. I want it to feel like the best of our sport — the greatest drivers in the world coming together. I want parties and events and sponsor activations. I would love to see it be revisited."

Kyle Petty (on Joey Logano): "He is that kind of driver where when you get him down like this, you've got to keep your foot on his neck. Cuz if you let him up off the ground, he's going to bite you. He's going to bite you big."

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: May 17, 2026

Race Covered: 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race — Dover Motor Speedway, Dover, Delaware

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bau7M1FesFw

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opens this episode with something on his chest — and he doesn't waste a single second getting to it. Before breaking down a single wreck or finish position, Eric delivers a pointed editorial verdict on the entire premise of the 2026 All-Star Race: Dover Motor Speedway should be hosting a points race, not a midseason exhibition. That thesis drives the entire episode, framing what was otherwise a solid on-track product as a fundamentally misplaced event. The title, "Not The Vibe," says everything.

The race itself was eventful by any measure: Denny Hamlin won his third straight victory at Dover Motorsports events and claimed the $1 million All-Star prize, while the new 750-horsepower, lower-downforce rules package produced exactly the kind of carnage everyone feared at Darlington weeks earlier but never quite materialized there. Half a dozen cars suffered near-catastrophic damage before the final segment even started. Miles the Monster ate well on Sunday.

Eric's analysis balances genuine appreciation for the racing quality — "some of the best Dover racing I have seen in quite a few years" — with persistent frustration that none of it counted for points. By the end of the episode, he rates the event a 66% on his "Groovy Gauge," a score that reflects a decent race viewed through a traditional Dover lens, while acknowledging that as an All-Star showcase, the whole affair fell well short of what the event should feel like.

"This Should Have Been a Points Race"

The episode's spine is Eric's argument that Dover lost something real by becoming the All-Star venue. He traces the chain of decisions: NASCAR wanted to give North Wilkesboro its first points race in roughly 30 years, which is broadly popular. But doing so meant stripping Dover of its points race — and stripping the All-Star event of the type of venue where it thrives.

"Nothing about today's hot, sunny, nearly four-hour-long event screamed All-Star to me," Eric says early in the episode. He draws a sharp contrast with what the All-Star race used to feel like — the Pass in the Grass, one hot Saturday night — versus what Dover delivered: a grueling, four-segment marathon on a concrete mile that felt far more like the Coke 600 than a breezy midsummer showcase. "This event felt like a marathon. It felt more like the Coke 600 than a short, sweet Saturday night all-star showdown."

Eric is clear that Dover itself isn't the problem. He praises the track's loyal fan base in Delaware and the surrounding region and argues the Monster Mile genuinely deserves an annual Cup Series date. The problem, in his view, is that the All-Star race format — with its inversions, segment sprints, and manufactured chaos — ran headlong into the physics of a track that rewards long-run tire management and steady execution. The two things didn't fit. "We lost two things," he argues. "We gained one. That math isn't mathing."

He makes a pointed case for North Wilkesboro as a superior All-Star venue. He was there for the inaugural event and calls it a blast — a short track under the lights, less than 20,000 seats guaranteeing a packed house, an hour from Charlotte, building energy ahead of the Coca-Cola 600. "North Wilsboro was a great all-star race venue. It's great that we gave North Wilsboro a points race. But by giving Wilsboro a points date, Dover lost a points race. And frankly, we lost the All-Star race vibe." He suggests Bowman Gray or another similar venue could serve the All-Star concept far better going forward.

Denny Hamlin: Dominant, Resilient, and a Little Lucky

Eric gives Hamlin his flowers while also noting the role attrition played in the result. Hamlin — who started on the pole despite spinning out during his get-up-to-speed lap during qualifying — was fast all day, particularly in clean air and on long runs. His only consistent weakness was restarts: he repeatedly surrendered the lead on the first few laps before working his way back to the front. "He started on the pole. He won the pole for this race despite spinning out during his Get Up to Speed lap. Like, the 11 was bad fast."

Eric describes Hamlin as "dynamite" on the long green-flag run that ultimately decided the race — a 50-plus-lap stretch in which Hamlin hunted down and passed teammate Chase Briscoe for the lead with roughly 29 laps to go. He credits Hamlin's ability to handle the tires when others were struggling, his racecraft in traffic, and his clean execution throughout the day. "Outside of the initial launch, Denny Hamlin was dynamite today, as we've come to expect at Dover."

But Eric is honest about the context: "I will say though, as good as Denny Hamlin was today, a key reason why he won is simply he survived." Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott — two of the favorites — were collected in a crash on lap three, with Elliott's day done immediately. Bubba Wallace, who won Segment 1, was dinged in a crash involving Ross Chastain and Brad Keselowski. Tyler Reddick suffered a power steering failure while running third in the closing laps. William Byron and Carson Hocevar were both trapped laps down by an untimely caution. Christopher Bell and Ryan Blaney also sustained damage in early incidents. "The rest of the usual contenders, the usual suspects ran into trouble. So, not to take away from Denny's win."

The Rules Package: Cars on the Edge

One of the more substantive analytical threads of the episode concerns the new technical package deployed at Dover — 750 horsepower combined with lower downforce than recent years at the track. Eric had discussed this with Connor Zilisch earlier in the week, and Zilisch admitted that in the simulator, his car felt completely out of control. That sensation, Eric notes, translated to the actual race in a way it never quite did at Darlington, where the same package was introduced but the racing stayed relatively clean.

"Today, especially the first two segments for sure, today is what we thought Darlington was going to be," Eric observes. "They were actually out of control." He catalogues the incidents: Ryan Preece clearing himself off the nose of the 34 car before triggering a massive early wreck and then hitting the outside wall hard enough to catch fire; Chastain and Keselowski getting tangled in what Eric attributes to a miscommunication or awareness issue rather than the car itself; Riley Herbst on worn tires going three-wide into Turns 3 and 4 and snapping loose; Ty Gibbs spinning while inside the top ten.

Eric differentiates between crashes he blames on the rules package and those he sees as driver errors or circumstance. The Preece incident was its own thing — "I don't know if he didn't know he was clear or he was trying to throw a block." The Chastain-Keselowski crash was about situational awareness, not car handling. But several incidents — Gibbs's spin, the SVG-Almendinger contact, the late tire failures — he links directly to the reduced downforce and increased horsepower making these cars harder to manage at speed.

There's appreciation in his critique, though. "It was good to see these cars on edge. Good to see tires matter, the groove widen." He felt the spectacle of competent drivers genuinely struggling reminded fans that stock car racing is physically demanding and technically punishing. "It's good reminder that this is hard." That said, the volume of early carnage complicated the segment format significantly: the field inversion meant putting the 26th-place car at the front, but by Segment 2, the 26th-place car was John Hunter Nemechek's destroyed machine, creating awkward scoring situations the format was not built to accommodate.

Storylines from the Field: Zilisch, RCR, and the Pointless Points Picture

Eric spends time on several notable performances that would have had genuine playoff implications had the race counted. Topping that list is Connor Zilisch, 19 years old and racing as an open entry — meaning he had to qualify for the final segment by finishing well in Segments 1 and 2 without the guaranteed All-Star entry the full-time Cup regulars received. He started deep in the field after spinning during qualifying, battled up to 11th in Segment 1, scored a top-10 in Segment 2, restarted fifth for the final run, and finished fifth despite picking up an equipment-interference penalty for an uncontrolled tire. "What a rally, great in traffic, making passes. Connor Zilisch, 19 years old, first all-star race appearance, first cup race at Dover. Really impressive showing."

Eric also flags Austin Dillon and RCR as a team to watch. Dillon finished fourth, Dillon's teammate Kyle Busch finished 17th but showed top-10 pace before pit road penalties and contact damaged his day. Eric points to three consecutive weekends — Texas, Watkins Glen, and now Dover — where both RCR cars have legitimately contended. "Both RCR cars look like top-10 contenders. Legitimately, they've got speed. They're starting to execute better."

He also notes Eric Jones's solid third-place run and comments favorably on Austin Cindric continuing to be the most consistent Penske car in recent weeks. Tyler Reddick's power steering failure, meanwhile, gets a characteristically wry treatment: "Figures that Reddick's first bad finish of the season would be in a race where it doesn't really matter, where there are no points on the line, so his massive points lead doesn't take a hit whatsoever. Figures. That's the kind of year Tyler Reddick is having."

The Groovy Gauge and the Bigger Question

Eric lands at 66% on the Groovy Gauge — "a pretty good race overall," he says, calibrated as a traditional Dover event. The final 50-lap green flag run featured genuinely excellent racing, with Hamlin, Briscoe, Reddick, Zilisch, and Byron running under a blanket while managing tires. The two-car JGR battle at the front was compelling. But the race settled itself with about 30 laps still to go, and Eric wished more of the fast cars had survived to challenge Hamlin in the closing stretch.

The deeper question Eric poses is whether the All-Star race should still exist at all. He doesn't go that far himself — he sees a path where it "can continue to exist and actually thrive" — but he argues it needs to be meaningfully different from a standard Cup Sunday. "Dover, broad daylight, it's not the move. That's not the way the All-Star race survives." The race felt disconnected, he says, not only from the typical All-Star energy but from the week that followed it: the Coca-Cola 600. At North Wilkesboro, that proximity to Charlotte built genuine anticipation. At Dover, there was no bridge, no narrative thread, just a race that counted for nothing surrounded by races that count for everything.

"If you didn't win today, it's almost like today didn't happen," he concludes — before quickly clarifying he hopes Denny cashes that million-dollar check just fine.

Notable Quotes

Eric (on the All-Star race vibe): "This race used to be the Pass in the Grass, one hot night. This year it was concrete. Everything about this race screamed midsummer points race at Dover. Nothing about this race gave me All-Star race energy."

Eric (on North Wilkesboro vs. Dover): "We lost two things. We gained one. That math isn't mathing. At least not in a positive manner."

Eric (on Hamlin's win): "Outside of the initial launch, Denny Hamlin was dynamite today, as we've come to expect at Dover."

Eric (on attrition defining the result): "This was a race of survival and Denny Hamlin survived while so many of his rivals faltered or fell victim to others' mistakes."

Eric (on the rules package delivering): "It was a good reminder that this is hard. It's difficult to wrangle these race cars and make good lap time, make moves, make passes."

Eric (on the celebration falling flat): "Then they had Denny like backing it up awkwardly, get out of the car, got blasted in the face with confetti. Like, it was not even the celebration had any aura. This all-star race had the fewest vibes of any all-star race I can remember."

Race: 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race — Dover Motor Speedway, Dover, Delaware

Date: May 17, 2026

Winner: Denny Hamlin, No. 11, Joe Gibbs Racing, Toyota

Source: NASCAR Official YouTube Channel / FS1 Broadcast (via YouTube Highlights)

YouTube Highlights: NASCAR Cup Series Highlights | 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race

Race Overview

The 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race made its debut at Dover Motor Speedway's famous "Monster Mile" on May 17, and it delivered exactly what the 1-mile concrete oval is famous for — drama, danger, and a dominant finish. Denny Hamlin claimed his second career All-Star Race victory, pocketing the $1 million prize for himself and his No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota team in a commanding performance that saw him conquer the concrete track for the third time in the NextGen era.

The non-points exhibition event ran 350 laps across three separate segments — two 75-lap qualifying dashes followed by a 200-lap finale — and featured 7 unscheduled cautions, multiple massive crashes (including a fiery wreck that engulfed Ryan Preece's car in Segment 1), and a final-segment battle between JGR teammates Hamlin and Chase Briscoe that Hamlin ultimately settled with 29 laps remaining.

The race was a landmark event in NASCAR's rotating All-Star Race format, with Dover hosting the showcase for the first time in 2026. The Monster Mile's unforgiving concrete surface, high-speed turns, and two-story-tall outside wall added significant danger and spectacle to the exhibition format. Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, Ryan Blaney, and Ross Chastain — perennial championship contenders — were eliminated from the finale by wrecks during the opening stages, leaving the door open for Hamlin and a field of survivors to decide the million-dollar prize in the finale.

Format Overview

The 2026 All-Star Race at Dover featured a unique three-phase format:

• Segment 1 (75 laps): Full 36-car field; field inverted after Segment 1 results for Segment 2 start.
• Segment 2 (75 laps): Full 36-car field; top 26 cars by combined segment finishing position advanced to the Final.
• Final Segment (200 laps): 26-car field; winner-take-all for the $1 million prize.
• A competition caution was scheduled at Lap 226 of the Final.

Segment-by-Segment Breakdown

Segment 1 (Laps 1–75)

The opening segment was nothing short of chaotic. The field had barely taken the green flag before disaster struck on Lap 2. Ryan Preece, running three-wide with Todd Gilliland and Kyle Larson, tagged Gilliland and sent the cars scrambling. Preece's No. 60 Ford backed into the Turn 1 wall at high speed with a full fuel load and erupted into flames, causing a red flag stoppage. Preece climbed out unharmed. The wreck collected multiple cars and eliminated or badly damaged Larson — a past All-Star winner and 2021 Cup champion.

Segment 1 continued with further attrition. A second caution flew on Lap 62 when Carson Hocevar's No. 77 suffered a tire issue and found the wall. Late in the segment, a multi-car incident collected Riley Herbst, Christopher Bell, and Kyle Busch (who had been sent to the rear for speeding). Bubba Wallace, running up front throughout, ultimately won Segment 1 ahead of the carnage, securing the pole starting position advantage heading into the final segment grid reset.

The segment's two major wrecks effectively eliminated past All-Star winners Chase Elliott and Kyle Larson from the finale, along with Ryan Blaney — reshaping the competitive outlook dramatically.

Segment 1 Winner: Bubba Wallace (No. 23, 23XI Racing, Toyota)

Segment 2 (Laps 76–150)

Segment 2 was markedly calmer, though still featured its share of incidents. Shane van Gisbergen spun early in the segment, drawing a caution, and Ross Chastain made contact with Brad Keselowski at the exit of Turn 2. Both damaged cars fought through the remaining laps to try to secure transfer positions.

Tyler Reddick's No. 45 23XI Toyota was dominant in the middle segment, showing superior long-run speed. He tracked down Chase Briscoe — who had run well throughout — and passed him with nine laps remaining to win Segment 2 convincingly. Reddick's win gave him a favorable grid position for the 200-lap finale. A late spin by Ty Gibbs (apparent right front tire failure) bunched the field late in the segment but Reddick held firm.

Ten drivers failed to transfer to the final segment: Ross Chastain, Chase Elliott, Chris Buescher, Todd Gilliland, Riley Herbst, Zane Smith, Cole Custer, John Hunter Nemechek, Cody Ware, and Ryan Preece.

Segment 2 Winner: Tyler Reddick (No. 45, 23XI Racing, Toyota)

Final Segment (Laps 151–350)

The 200-lap finale opened with Hamlin — starting from the front row after his cumulative segment performance — in early contention. Chase Briscoe grabbed the early lead, but Hamlin was patient, showing excellent long-run pace characteristic of his performances at Dover.

A key sequence occurred mid-race when Briscoe was caught behind a lapped Daniel Suárez, who held his line and wouldn't yield easily. That traffic scrubbed Briscoe's momentum and allowed Hamlin to close. Reddick, running second for a stretch, found his right front tire falling apart down to the cords, costing him speed and ultimately positions. He had to surrender the battle as Hamlin charged forward and took the lead.

The scheduled competition caution at Lap 226 served as the final pit stop opportunity. After the restart, Briscoe surged back to the lead and showed tremendous pace, leading Hamlin to believe he might have a fight on his hands. But Hamlin methodically tracked him down over the following 60+ laps, monitoring tire wear and waiting for his moment. Joey Logano suffered a dramatic left-rear tire failure and hit the wall under caution late in the race, briefly bunching the field once more.

On the restart with 52 laps remaining, Briscoe held the lead but Hamlin shadowed him relentlessly. With 29 laps to go, Hamlin committed to the outside and executed a clean crossover pass down the backstretch, clearing Briscoe and driving away cleanly. From there, Hamlin never looked back, winning by 0.887 seconds.

When asked in Victory Lane where the $1 million would go, Hamlin quipped: "It'll go to Moma."

Key Incidents & Cautions

Lap 2 — Ryan Preece Fire (Red Flag / Caution 1, Segment 1):

The most dramatic moment of the race. Preece's No. 60 RFK Racing Ford made heavy contact with the outside wall in Turn 1 after being caught three-wide with Gilliland and Larson. The car exploded into flames upon impact. Preece escaped uninjured and was evaluated and released from the infield care center. Kyle Larson was also heavily involved and suffered damage that ended his day in the finale.

Lap 62 — Carson Hocevar Tire Issue (Caution 2, Segment 1):

Hocevar's No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet suffered a tire failure exiting a corner, sending him up the banking and into the wall. He sustained significant damage.

Late Segment 1 — Multi-Car Melee (Caution 3, Segment 1):

Riley Herbst spun and was collected by Christopher Bell, with Kyle Busch (running at the rear after a speeding penalty) caught in the accident. Multiple cars sustained heavy front-end damage.

Segment 2 — Shane van Gisbergen Spin (Caution, Segment 2):

SVG got loose under racing conditions and spun, drawing a caution. He was not collected by the field.

Segment 2 — Chastain/Keselowski Contact (Caution, Segment 2):

Hard contact between Ross Chastain and Brad Keselowski exiting Turn 2 left both cars damaged and fighting for transfer positions.

Segment 2 — Ty Gibbs Tire Failure:

The No. 54 JGR Toyota suffered a right-front tire failure late in Segment 2, briefly causing a caution and costing Gibbs precious finishing position.

Final Segment Lap 226 — Scheduled Competition Caution:

NASCAR's mandatory pit-stop caution mid-final, used by the field for final tire and fuel stops.

Final Segment — Joey Logano Tire Failure:

Logano's No. 22 Team Penske Ford suffered a dramatic left-rear tire blowout, sending him into the wall. Logano was unhurt but the incident drew a caution and reshuffled late-race strategy.

The Race Finish

With 52 laps remaining after the Logano caution restart, Chase Briscoe led with Denny Hamlin glued to his bumper. Briscoe showed solid pace through traffic but Hamlin was methodical, never letting the gap grow. With 29 laps to go, Hamlin drew alongside Briscoe on the outside, held his line through the turns, and completed a clean pass to take the lead.

From that point, Hamlin was in complete command. He managed his tires expertly through the final 29 laps, pulling away from Briscoe while Erik Jones held third and was never a threat to the leaders. Hamlin crossed the line 0.887 seconds clear of Briscoe to claim his third win at Dover in the NextGen era and his second career All-Star Race victory — 11 years after his first at Charlotte Motor Speedway in 2015.

Top 10 Finishers (Final Segment)

| Position | Car # | Driver | Team | Manufacturer |

|----------|-------|--------|------|--------------|

| 1st | #11 | Denny Hamlin | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota |

| 2nd | #19 | Chase Briscoe | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota |

| 3rd | #43 | Erik Jones | Legacy Motor Club | Toyota |

| 4th | #3 | Austin Dillon | Richard Childress Racing | Chevrolet |

| 5th | #88 | Connor Zilisch (R) | Trackhouse Racing | Chevrolet |

| 6th | #2 | Austin Cindric | Team Penske | Ford |

| 7th | #24 | William Byron | Hendrick Motorsports | Chevrolet |

| 8th | #71 | Michael McDowell | Spire Motorsports | Chevrolet |

| 9th | #48 | Alex Bowman | Hendrick Motorsports | Chevrolet |

| 10th | #4 | Noah Gragson | Front Row Motorsports | Ford |

Notable DNFs (Did Not Transfer to Final): Ryan Blaney (#12), Kyle Larson (#5), Chase Elliott (#9), Ross Chastain (#1), Ryan Preece (#60, fire)

Championship Implications

As a non-points exhibition event, the All-Star Race carries no direct championship implications. However, several storylines carry weight heading into the regular season:

Denny Hamlin cemented his status as Dover's premier performer in the NextGen era, winning for the third time at the Monster Mile in this generation of cars. His ability to manage long runs and execute clean passes under pressure signals his No. 11 team remains a genuine championship contender.

Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, and Ryan Blaney — three of the sport's top title contenders — all suffered early eliminations due to wrecks, though none of those incidents will impact their points standings in regular-season competition. The All-Star event served as a reminder of Dover's unforgiving nature ahead of the regular season points race at the track.

Rookie Connor Zilisch's 5th-place finish in the final segment was the standout performance from the younger generation, demonstrating the 23XI/Trackhouse rookie's rapid development. Tyler Reddick's Segment 2 win and strong early pace in the finale reinforced 23XI Racing's overall strength across all three of its cars.

Race Stats

• Race: 2026 NASCAR All-Star Race (Non-Points Exhibition)
• Track: Dover Motor Speedway — Dover, Delaware (The Monster Mile)
• Surface: Concrete
• Track Length: 1.0 mile oval
• Total Distance: 350 laps / 350 miles (563.27 km)
• Format: Segment 1 (75 laps) + Segment 2 (75 laps) + Final (200 laps)
• Prize: $1,000,000 to winner
• Lead Changes (Final Segment): Multiple (Briscoe, Reddick, Hamlin)
• Total Cautions: ~9 (7 unscheduled across Segments 1 & 2; 1 scheduled competition caution + 1 unscheduled in Final)
• Margin of Victory: 0.887 seconds
• Segment 1 Winner: Bubba Wallace (#23, 23XI Racing)
• Segment 2 Winner: Tyler Reddick (#45, 23XI Racing)
• Final Segment Winner: Denny Hamlin (#11, Joe Gibbs Racing)
• TV Broadcast: FS1 (Mike Joy, Clint Bowyer, Kevin Harvick)
• Radio: MRN/PRN (Alex Hayden, Mike Bagley, Rusty Wallace)
• Attendance: Dover Motor Speedway (capacity 95,500)

Sources: NASCAR.com, Athlon Sports, Wikipedia, FS1/NASCAR YouTube Broadcast Transcript

YouTube Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DnGdip1FpeA

NBC Sports Extended Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQ0h6Xg0a6g

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, May 17, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: NASCAR All-Star Race — Dover Motor Speedway, Dover, Delaware

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Episode Length: 56:22

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXOn5HAMohE

> Note on sources: The full episode transcript was not accessible for direct extraction. This recap is constructed from the episode title ("Million Dollar Denny!"), race reporting, driver quotes gathered from on-site media sessions, and post-race coverage. The analysis reflects the key storylines Jeff and Jordan were on-scene to cover at Dover.

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft (spotter, #23 Bubba Wallace / #17 truck Gio Roiro / Dean Thompson), Tommy (regular co-host), Carson (regular co-host)

Guests: Kurt Busch (NASCAR Hall of Famer), Kaden Honeycutt (driver, Watkins Glen weekend sweep)

Date: Week of May 14, 2026

Race Covered: NASCAR Weekend at Watkins Glen International, Watkins Glen, New York (Cup, Trucks, ARCA, CARS Tour)

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

This episode was a genuine celebration of one of the most remarkable weekends in recent NASCAR history, anchored by two phenomenal guests: Hall of Famer Kurt Busch, recently inducted in January 2026, and 22-year-old Kaden Honeycutt, who pulled off one of the most extraordinary feats of any driver in any series — winning four races across four different events in a single weekend at and around Watkins Glen. From the ARCA race to both CARS Tour events at Ace Speedway to the Craftsman Truck Series, Honeycutt was virtually unstoppable.

Against that remarkable backdrop, the Cup race at the Glen was equally compelling, with Shane van Gisbergen putting on a masterclass of road-course driving — making up 29 seconds on depleted tires and doing burnouts while other drivers hadn't even crossed the finish line yet — while Connor Zilisch earned a trip to Victory Lane and Jesse Love suffered one of the most heartbreaking last-lap collapses of the season, overshooting the bus stop with the win in sight. The episode also tackled the state of the current Cup car through a fascinating lens: Kurt Busch, having driven this and every previous generation, offered the most technically grounded critique of the sport's parity problem heard on DBC in months.

Freddie Kraft was working triple duty at Watkins Glen, spotting for Bubba Wallace's #23 Cup entry, the Dean Thompson Xfinity car, and Gio Roiro's truck — giving the crew an unusual wealth of firsthand on-track perspective across every series.

Kaden Honeycutt's Four-Win Weekend: One for the Record Books

The episode opened by handing the mic to Honeycutt, and he used it to walk through a weekend that left the entire DBC table speechless. He first won the ARCA race at Watkins Glen, used what he learned there to fine-tune his setup heading into the Truck race, then swept both CARS Tour events at Ace Speedway — becoming the first driver ever to win both races in a CARS Tour doubleheader. By the time he was done, he'd won four races across 24 hours, running on two to three hours of sleep and running on pure adrenaline.

Freddie asked Honeycutt what it felt like once the adrenaline faded. His answer was almost poignant: "Whenever I drove the stock car back to tech and I sat in that chair and I was just staring at the car and I was just like, man, like I've tried so hard to pull off that double in the car so many years. I've been so close a couple of times." He credited the team setup work, noting they came to Ace Speedway without the advantage of multi-day prep that most teams enjoyed — they'd only arrived a couple of hours before the races — but made great adjustments on the fly and executed.

Honeycutt was also candid about the mental challenge of the last CARS Tour restart, when Connor Zilisch inexplicably lined up on the outside lane on an overtime restart. "I understand what he was trying to do," Honeycutt said diplomatically, "but on an overtime restart it's really risky to do that — cuz I think if it had been somebody else besides me, someone would have just ran them in the tire barriers and said oh that sucks for you." He gave Zilisch room, barely made contact, and Zilisch got free off the rumble strip — handing Honeycutt a clean run to the checkered.

Kurt Busch, who's seen a lot of great young talent come through the sport, was visibly impressed: "Think about it — he stayed up till four in the morning after winning two races. Got two or three hours of sleep. And went out and won two more. That's old-school Dick Trickle." The table agreed that Honeycutt's composure after the restart penalty in the truck race — calmly accepting it, adjusting strategy, fighting his way back through the field, and ultimately contending for the win — was the mark of a driver operating above his years.

SVG and the State of NASCAR Domination

Shane van Gisbergen was the unavoidable subject hanging over the entire Cup race discussion. The consensus from the spotter's stand was clear: SVG was simply on a different planet from every other competitor on road courses. Freddie described watching him from the spotting stand with fresh rubber on his car, their own car 10 to 12 laps newer on tires: "SVG was still faster than we were." The show quoted someone running fastest lap of the race on 20-lap-old tires at lap 80-something, and the table confirmed: that was SVG.

"He ran the fastest lap of the race with 20-lap-old tires," someone noted. "He just sat there and waited." Freddie agreed: "I feel like you watch him and he's just never out of control. And you see somebody like McDoll sideways off the curbs driving the hell out of it, and somebody's like, 'Oh McDoll might have something for him.' I go, 'No, he doesn't. He's just with us at this point. He's going to go by anytime he wants.'"

Kurt Busch offered perhaps the most illuminating explanation for why SVG has adapted so seamlessly to this car when others — including Busch himself — struggled with it. The key is independent rear suspension. The Australian V8 Supercars, where SVG was a three-time champion, drive similarly to the next-gen car in terms of the limited travel and throttle-out oversteer demands. "He hit this next-gen car perfectly," Kurt said. "He's a Hall of Famer already in my mind. Seven wins in 62 races or something. His percentage is pretty good." Freddie added that SVG even appeared to have his hand partially out the window on the final lap — essentially waving to the crowd — while still pulling away.

The Spot On/Spot Off segment formalized what everyone already knew was coming: SVG sits 16th in points and will need to win both remaining road course races in the regular season to make the Chase. The hosts were soberly realistic about the math — he gets 68-76 points on a max road course day, and his oval results average around the 17th-18th range. "He doesn't have to win, he doesn't have to run top 10 — he has to average probably like a 15th place finish to maintain the gap he'll build at these road courses," Honeycutt said. The table's consensus: Spot On that he has to sweep, and genuinely possible that he can.

Jesse Love's Heartbreak and Connor Zilisch's Victory Lane

One of the emotional centerpieces of the episode was the retelling of Jesse Love's last-lap collapse at the Glen. Leading late, Love overshot the bus stop on the final lap — a momentary mental lapse under pressure that cost him the win. "He basically said in his interview that his mental capacity broke down at that point," Freddie said. "And it's like, that's what happens, man. Like you guys talk about how hard is it to stay mentally locked in — and he had the win if he just executes turn seven."

Kurt Busch, who raced Robbie Gordon around Watkins Glen for a win years ago and spent his last lap working out exactly how to defend his position against someone he knew was going to try to lawn dart him into the bus stop, put Love's mistake in context. "You've got to have that confidence. You've got to know what you've done to prepare for that moment." His advice, in hindsight, for the Love team: come in short on turn seven to mess up the timing of whoever's chasing. "Don't look in the mirror and actually come in short on seven — get the car stopped in just a quick moment to mess up their timing. Then get a nice run to the finish line." He added: "Is he probably going to make that mistake again? Probably not. But he's got work to do in that part of his racing. He's got everything else right."

Connor Zilisch made it to Victory Lane — getting towed there after blowing the rear tires off the car — for another win on a road course. The DBC crew couldn't help noting that Zilisch somehow managed to up Victory Lane again, though at least he didn't fall off the car this time (a reference to a prior incident). Tommy added dryly that this was becoming a pattern.

Kurt Busch on the State of the Cup Car

The episode's most substantive extended segment — beyond Honeycutt's weekend recap — was Kurt Busch's frank diagnosis of why the current Cup car produces the racing it does. His answer came down to two interlocking issues: data sharing and the car's mechanical character.

"Back in the day, you'd stand on top of the truck with a stopwatch and you'd see where Mark Martin would beat me or where Rusty Wallace was quicker," Kurt said. "You'd scrape up a VHS tape, pull up the DVR, review it. But you didn't have a full-on tablet showing you everything." Now, every team has live data: braking traces, throttle position, shift points, fuel mileage mapping. He described the moment he discovered 23XI could see Hendrick Motorsports' live throttle position in 2022: "I'm like, really? It's gone this far?" The result is a field that literally drives the same — the same data shared universally produces the same setups, the same lap times, and ultimately a pack that's nearly impossible to break through.

Kurt illustrated the downstream effect on the race at Watkins Glen: "Yesterday I was watching Kyle and Austin Dillon — the two cars were almost locked together on where they were. Other than the Trackhouse cars with SVG, you're just in a line." Freddie pointed out that after 15 laps of the Cup race, cars from 9th to 32nd were all on the same straightaway. "They never spread out," he said. "The first group that pitted never got past 24th. The 4-car was 32nd before all that — he was sitting 24th by the end and nobody passed him."

Kurt was clear-eyed about the trade-off: a more open rulebook would produce better racing but higher costs for owners. His prescription was differentiation — different packages for short tracks, superspeedways, and road courses — coupled with pulling back on the data-sharing ecosystem. "I'd like to see more open rules, more creativity, different things for different tracks."

Ryan Preece's Penalty: A Courtroom Problem

The Spot On/Spot Off segment that generated the most debate was about Ryan Preece's radio penalty — NASCAR docking him points and fining him for comments he made on the radio indicating an intention to retaliate against a rival on track. The table was split, but the central tension was whether NASCAR should penalize based on words or on actions.

Kurt came down hard on the side of actions: "NASCAR shouldn't go off what someone says on the radio. They should be able to still look at the eyeball test — the eyeball test." He pointed out that the on-track move that sparked the radio comment was nearly identical to what his brother Kyle did to John Hunter Nemechek at Texas, for which Kyle was not penalized. "My brother did to John Hunter was the same exact thing. And there could have been maybe one or two words. Now you're in a courtroom." He argued the standard should be simple: penalize both or neither, based on what happened on track.

Tommy added a cautionary tale from his own experience — a radio appearance in which he casually admitted to wrecking Robbie Gordon at an all-star race to get a caution, and was hit with a $100,000 penalty by mid-week. "I said, 'Oh yeah, I wrecked him — I just wanted one more shot.' On Wednesday, NASCAR issued me a $100,000 penalty, docked points, even though it was the All-Star race." His lesson: "Don't admit stuff on the radio."

Freddie's concern was purely practical: Preece has appealed, and the last time a driver appealed (William Byron, Watkins Glen), NASCAR kept the ruling but doubled the fine. "If that happens, I might have to start cleaning the spare bedroom."

Bubba Wallace vs. Christopher Bell Post-Race

Freddie described an incident late in the Cup race when John Hunter Nemechek turned Bubba Wallace's #23 around in Turn 1. With older rubber and no shot at making up time, Bubba — still furious — started aggressively blocking anyone who came up behind him, including Christopher Bell. The two wound up in a tense post-race standoff.

"Bell was mad at Bubba," Freddie clarified. "Not the other way around. It stemmed from that incident where we got turned around in one — we got going again on older tires and just weren't going anywhere — and Bubba was pretty upset. He didn't wreck anybody, didn't hit anybody. Just wasn't giving room." He explained that Bell and Bubba are separated by maybe a point or two in the standings, so Bubba was racing him for everything. "He's usually in and sorry, but he's never going to change."

He also called out a separate commitment line incident, where Bell's team briefly appeared to be pitting and then darted back out to stay out — but by then, the #23 had already gone by. NASCAR's call was that Bell's team had to go to the back for not maintaining caution car speed, and Freddie agreed with that ruling completely, even if Bell's team was upset.

The Gio Roiro Restart Penalty Fiasco

One of the most infuriating stories of the episode, delivered with dark humor by Freddie, was the chaotic restart penalty sequence involving his truck driver, Gio Roiro. NASCAR penalized Gio for an alleged restart infraction, sending the truck to the back. Freddie immediately told the crew they didn't jump it — he had the angle from the spotting stand. But the team, not wanting to just "punish yourself," decided to take pit road and put fresh tires on to try to salvage a result from the back.

Two laps later, as Gio was coming around to green, NASCAR sent a message to the crew: "We're rescinding your penalty." The catch: "But we can't give you your spot back because you came and pitted." Freddie's reaction was visceral: "My blood pressure went way higher than 127 over 72." After the race, NASCAR came to the team and said simply: "We're really sorry." Freddie's verdict: "At that point, I would just rather you stick to your guns and make a bad call than tell me you messed up and you're sorry about it."

He added that he never even told Gio the penalty was overturned until after the race was over, because Gio had spent several laps absolutely livid on the radio: "He was MF-ing the tower and MF-ing everybody else... I finally said, 'Hey, just stop talking.' And then I'm like, 'Please don't push the button.'"

Spot On / Spot Off: Cody Ware's Wall Strike and No Caution

One Spot On/Spot Off topic drew near-universal agreement: NASCAR's decision not to throw a caution after Cody Ware hit the wall hard with nine laps to go was wrong. Freddie explained that from the spotting stand, he couldn't see where Ware went after he disappeared behind the trees — and the yellow never came. "Afterwards, everybody's like why the hell wasn't that a caution. I saw the video and he kept rolling and NASCAR can't see over there."

But Kurt raised the real issue: "I didn't know the wall broke." When someone produced a picture, the table's reaction was audible — Ware had actually broken the wall, and NASCAR continued racing. Kurt made a pointed suggestion: every car has a black box that records g-force. "If there's a 15g or 20g impact — whatever the number we all need to come up with — that should auto-trigger a caution. We've been so inconsistent: I've seen ambulances dispatched at Talladega for someone just spinning out without hitting anything, and I've seen people clobber the wall and we stay green."

Kurt Busch: Hall of Fame, 2004 Championship, and the iROC Revival

The Ask DBC segment was devoted almost entirely to Kurt Busch, and the table made the most of it. Asked what it meant to be inducted into the Hall of Fame in January, Kurt was reflective: "It's been a blessing. The full cherry on top. A blue-collar kid out of Vegas with a dream, going after it. There's only a few guys that get into 20 years of racing, 20 years plus, and were able to win in 21 of 23 years."

On the 2004 championship, which he clinched by three points over Jimmie Johnson at Homestead, Kurt described the build-up: the team saved all five of their allowed tests for the final 10 weeks of the season, hitting Martinsville, Darlington, and every key track. The season turned on a blown engine at Atlanta that shrank his points lead to three over Johnson and five over Jeff Gordon. The last lap at Homestead was chaos — a tire vibration, a pit stop, getting buried, fighting back through the field while tracking Johnson and Gordon's every move. "I just kept watching Johnson, Gordon, and passing cars. I don't even know who I was passing."

He also shared a story about the iROC car revival that Ray Evernham and Rob Kaufman are putting together. Several events have already been run at Laguna Seca and Charlotte's road course, with Dario Franchitti, Scott Pruett, Ken Schrader, Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon, and Bobby Labonte all participating. The lap times were surprisingly close — Gordon qualifying at a 1:24.6, Busch at 1:24.5, Labonte at 1:24.7. He teased an announcement coming the week of the Coca-Cola 600 about a new iROC event. He also mentioned the San Diego street course, which he visited to consult with NASCAR — crossing over a working shipping railway, mixing old and fresh asphalt, and genuinely unique in character. His verdict: "Buckle up, buttercup. That track is going to be wild."

Young Talent Discussion: Cruz, Day, and the Next Generation

The episode devoted significant time to the next generation of NASCAR talent. Freddie expressed concern about crowning Brent Cruz the future of the sport too early, even though he privately believes Cruz is on track to be a championship-caliber driver. "I don't want it to get in that kid's head. Keep working. You got here because you work hard — don't let everybody tell you what you're going to do."

The table was more cautious on Cory Day, who some have suggested could be in the Hendrick #48 car as early as 2027. Kurt pushed back: "You want to get him in as quick as you can in this generation car, but you have to make sure they're ready. Jack Roush took me straight from trucks to Cup, said he wanted me to make mistakes at the Cup level. That means wrecking a lot of stuff — but yes, you want to get there as quick as you can."

On Kyle Busch's struggles, Kurt was diplomatically candid. He explained that Kyle is a "right rear driver" — someone who drives the car with more load on the right rear, which the current next-gen car fundamentally doesn't like. "This car drives off the right front. You have to have a small bit of front slide. Kyle is a right rear driver. Jimmy Johnson's a right rear. Tony Stewart's a right rear. And this car does not like that extra bit of yaw." He contrasted Kyle with Jeff Gordon and Mark Martin, who drove on the tighter side — closer to how the next-gen car naturally wants to be driven. He added, with no small affection: "He's been a great father. He's there with Brexton all the time. But maybe he's spending too much time in that category."

Looking Ahead: JRM Fan Day and the Coca-Cola 600

The episode closed with an important upcoming event: JRM Fan Day on May 21st at JRM, presented by Arby's in partnership with Dirty Mo Media and SiriusXM. The event includes several live show tapings from 9 a.m. onward — Larry Mac and Daniel Trot at 9:00, Dirty Mo Live at 11:00 (with Kenny Wallace, Mike Davis, and two surprise guests), Bless Your Heart at noon, and Door Bumper Clear at 1:00 p.m. with Jordan Bianke as a guest. The DBC crew encouraged fans in the area to come out.

The Coca-Cola 600 promotional read closed the formal content — Memorial Day weekend, Sunday May 24th, with a pre-race Brad Paisley concert, the America 250 Salute, and 600 miles of night racing. DBC picks for the 600: Tommy went with Ryan Preece; Freddie's collaborators chose Ty Gibbs; Freddie took Kyle Busch (drawing raised eyebrows from the rest of the table, who noted he may be the first to pick Kyle on the show all year).

Notable Quotes

Kaden Honeycutt (on the moment after his four-race weekend): "Whenever I drove the stock car back to tech and I sat in that chair and I was just staring at the car and I was just like, man — I've tried so hard to pull off that double in the car so many years. I've been so close a couple of times. And honestly, I think the really cool part about that was the layoff stock. It's pretty much me and Kenneth's team now. We take a lot of pride in it and we work really hard."

Kurt Busch (on SVG's road course dominance): "Hands down. I've never seen anything like this. He hit this next-gen car perfectly with the Australian V8 Supercars — they're kind of like an Xfinity version of our next-gen cars. And he's a three-time champion down in Australia. And those guys down there are beasts, animals in the way they race. To come in and win that Chicago street race — I was in awe. He's a Hall of Famer already in my mind. Seven wins in 62 races. His percentage is pretty good."

Kurt Busch (on data sharing and why passing is so hard): "When I learned that our team at 23XI could check on what Hendrick was running for their throttle position in 2022 with this next-gen car at Daytona — I'm like, really? It's gone this far? Everyone has the same information. So what do you do? Everyone's the same speed. And it's hard to pass."

Freddie Kraft (on Jesse Love's last-lap mistake): "I just felt so bad for him. But Connor did a great job. And what Jesse said — I'm so much more ready physically, but my mental capacity broke down at that point. That's what happens, man. And like Kurt said, is he probably going to make that mistake again? Probably not. But he's got work to do in that part of his racing."

Freddie Kraft (on the Gio restart penalty reversal): "My blood pressure went way higher than 127 over 72. We never even told Gio until after the race was over, because he would have come unglued and probably wrecked half the field. At that point, I would just rather you stick to your guns and make a bad call than tell me you messed up and you're sorry about it. 'We're really sorry.' Well, that fixes everything."

Kurt Busch (on the 2004 Homestead championship): "I just kept watching Johnson, Gordon, and passing cars. I don't even know who I was passing. Don't know when or how. I just had to keep watching to be within two positions of Johnson. That's what I remember the most about that day. And it all ended up unfolding to where we won that championship."

Source: "Kaden Honeycutt's 4-Win Weekend & SVG's Dominance | Door Bumper Clear — Full Episode" — YouTube, https://youtu.be/SqG6oA9vOrg

Podcast: The GluckCast (The Teardown: GluckCast)

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Kasey Kahne (sprint car racer, former NASCAR Cup driver); Danny "Downforce Danny" Stockman (crew chief, Richard Childress Racing O'Reilly Series); Jenna Fryer (longtime motorsports journalist, formerly of the Associated Press)

Date: May 14, 2026 (Episode 13)

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis, motorsports culture

Episode Overview

Episode 13 of the GluckCast arrives on the cusp of NASCAR's All-Star weekend at Dover Motor Speedway — what Jeff Gluck calls "the biggest month in motorsports." In characteristic Gluck fashion, the episode is less about race previews and more about the people making news away from the track. Three genuinely compelling conversations animate the hour: a long-overdue victory lap with Kasey Kahne, who finally won his first World of Outlaws race in his 228th start; an extended sit-down with Richard Childress Racing O'Reilly Series crew chief Danny Stockman, the social media breakout star of the Cleetus McFarland partnership; and a candid, at times sobering conversation with Jenna Fryer about her departure from the Associated Press after 30 years and what that means for the state of motorsports journalism.

Jeff brings his reporter's eye to each segment — pressing Kahne on perseverance and legacy, drawing out Stockman's backstory beyond the viral catchphrase, and turning Fryer's career change into a larger meditation on where NASCAR's press corps is headed. The episode closes with a rapid-fire rundown of the Dover weekend schedule, the unusually quiet silly season, and the Katherine Legge NASCAR/IndyCar double.

Kasey Kahne: 228 Starts and Finally a Win

Jeff opened the show by noting that Kahne finished second at the very first NASCAR race he (Jeff) ever covered as a reporter — a fitting bit of personal history to frame a conversation about long-delayed triumph. Kahne, substituting for injured Anthony Macri in the Macri Motorsports 39M, held off Sheldon Haudenschild in the closing laps at Williams Grove Speedway on May 8 to claim his first World of Outlaws victory in 29 years of trying.

Gluck zeroed in immediately on the perseverance angle: "You could have been like, 'Man, I'm not winning and it's not fun if I don't win at this point in my life' — but you kept going." Kahne credited the quality of the car and the rapport he built with crew members Joe Mooney and the broader Macri team, noting that each of his three starts in the car had shown measurable improvement. "I was actually learning a lot," Kahne said. "That's one thing about racing — you're always learning, as long as you're open-minded." Gluck pressed him on why he didn't simply walk away after years without a WoO win, and Kahne's answer was characteristically understated: "It just still is like a really big passion to me... a big high and just an excitement that's hard to come by."

Gluck brought a warm personal dimension to the conversation, noting that he is the same age as Kahne and finds himself moved by the idea of Kahne being able to show his kids — son Tanner, 10, and daughter, 3 — what sustained effort looks like. Kahne confirmed that Tanner had gone to bed before the win but watched the replay first thing the next morning: "He was super excited."

The conversation moved naturally to Kahne's legacy in NASCAR — eight years removed from full-time Cup racing, yet still an omnipresent figure on social media through old clips and the beloved "Kasey Kahne Friday" meme. Kahne said hearing from so many people after the WoO win "felt like I won a Cup race" in terms of the response. He also reflected that the way his NASCAR career ended — cut short by health issues, without a traditional retirement tour — was painful at the time but something he has made peace with. "I was okay with it... but it wasn't the perfect way to end, that's for sure."

Jeff asked Kahne about returning to NASCAR, noting last year's O'Reilly Series start at Rockingham. Kahne confirmed the door is open: "If anybody's listening and wants to give you a call, you're still open to that?" Jeff asked. "Absolutely," Kahne replied without hesitation. And when Jeff asked his views on NASCAR's return to the Chase format, Kahne offered a nuanced take — he enjoyed the drama of the old elimination-round playoff, particularly the way it kept every position meaningful late in races, but he acknowledged the Chase format rewards sustained excellence over a season, which he sees as fair.

Downforce Danny Stockman: The Man Behind the Catchphrase

Jeff introduced Danny Stockman — Richard Childress Racing's O'Reilly Series championship crew chief and recent viral sensation — as "Downforce Danny," the man who told Cleetus McFarland to put 'em on the dash and burn the stickers off the tires. The segment was one of the episode's most entertaining, revealing a genuine and self-aware personality behind the now-famous catchphrase.

Stockman explained that the "put 'em on the dash" ethos is genuinely him: "Anybody that knows me knows that I'm pretty wide open and I kind of say what's on my mind." He described being initially skeptical of the Cleetus McFarland project at the first Rockingham test — acknowledging on camera that his body language early in the test video showed clear hesitation — before being "sucked in" by McFarland's authenticity. "I don't know what Cleetus and George and those guys do to a person, but they suck you in and make you feel like you're part of the family." By the end of that test, Stockman said, he had become a genuine Cleetus fan. "I really want him to be at NASCAR. I really want him to be at RCR."

Stockman pushed back on critics who call McFarland inauthentic: "No matter what you want to say about whether he's ready or not, the one thing you cannot say is that he's not authentic and genuine." He described daily phone calls with McFarland about the O'Reilly program, revealed that McFarland is building a super late model for the Freedom Factory, and said McFarland intends to launch a late model stock car series at the Freedom Factory. "He's bringing things to this sport that we need," Stockman said.

Gluck used the segment to draw out Stockman's deeper backstory: his grandfather was a star of the 1940s-50s West Coast short-track scene (Ascot, Indianapolis), and Stockman's entire family was recently named to the West Coast Stock Car Heritage Hall of Fame, an honor he called "super mind-blowing." On his current season, Stockman was candid that despite leading the most laps in the O'Reilly Series, his team has struggled to close out wins — citing a crew chief tumble off the pit wall at Vegas and near-misses at several other tracks. He was pointed in assessing Jesse Love's heartbreaking loss at Watkins Glen: "I'm not going to beat the kid down. Was I upset? Absolutely. But Jesse Love is super hard on himself already." Stockman was also asked about Dover's controversial decision to apply PJ1 resin from apron to safer barrier for the All-Star weekend, and offered a characteristic answer: "If you want to hear it real right now — you're going to have to put 'em on the dash." He predicted the race would be extremely fast and grippy, at least early in the weekend. Stockman closed by confirming he, Jesse Love, and RC will race Crown Vics at Stafford Speedway's event on July 17.

Jenna Fryer: The End of an Era in NASCAR Journalism

The final guest segment was the most substantive, and the most sobering. Jeff offered a personal introduction — recalling how, as a sports writer at the Rocky Mount Telegram in 2003, he kept seeing Fryer's byline on wire stories without knowing who she was, before meeting her at the 2004 Brickyard 400, where she directed him toward his dream job at NASCAR Scene. "I said I'd owe you a burger," Jeff recalled. "But now I'm just supporting your Substack instead."

Fryer, calling in from Indianapolis ahead of Indy500 qualifying, walked through the sequence of events that led her to accept an Associated Press buyout after 30 years: a phone call from management in which she was told the AP was reassigning her off motorsports and limiting her to just three races per year — the Daytona 500, the Indy 500, and one Formula 1 race. "I was devastated," Fryer said. "I had to accept that job was dead. That job was not coming back." She spent five weeks doing almost nothing for the AP — writing a single story, on the Joe Gibbs Racing lawsuit — while waiting for clarity. When buyouts were offered, she took one rather than displace a junior colleague by seniority. "They told me: don't leave money on the table. So I took the money."

Jeff was careful to separate Fryer's personal situation from the larger institutional point: "The alarming part is the AP itself is saying, 'We're not going to have somebody.'" Fryer agreed emphatically: "Take me out of the equation, call me Joe Smith. The AP's approach — to cover Cup and Formula 1 remotely, or only if someone happens to live in the race market — I just think that's really, really terrible for motorsports." She cited specific recent examples: during her five-week reassignment, Kyle Busch had two crew chief changes that the AP never covered. "I didn't write it, and nobody else did either. It just vanished."

The broader conversation turned to the economics of covering motorsports at all — travel budgets that Fryer said amount to at minimum an entry-level salary, $400-a-night hotels in Bristol, $1,500 minimum to cover any race requiring a flight, and $2,500+ for international Formula 1 rounds. "Does the Spokane Review still want to cover 10 races a year even at those reduced costs? No, they don't." Jeff offered a grim projection: within five or ten years, there might not be any major outlets employing full-time NASCAR writers, leaving only a handful of fan-supported independents or Patreon/Substack operations.

Jeff also drew Fryer out on the Indy 500 landscape — the Chevrolet engine issues she'd already observed through two days of practice, the uncertainty around Pato O'Ward's chances against the Andretti-powered cars, and the Katherine Legge double-entry. Fryer was characteristically measured on Legge: "There is something really admirable about a 45-year-old woman saying, 'I'm going to give this a go.' She's the oldest of the six who have attempted this double. She's the only woman, and she's the only foreigner. There are things to get excited about." But she acknowledged the lack of stakes compared to Kyle Larson's attempts — Legge is not a full-time NASCAR competitor and is not chasing a playoff position — and that her NASCAR entry is not a contending car. Jeff confessed some uncertainty about how the media should frame it. "Do we just cover it for what it is — somebody doing the double, first woman to attempt it — and be honest that it's probably not going to go that well?" Fryer: "I don't know that it's fair to write about how Katherine is diminishing what the double means. She's putting forth the effort."

Closing Topics

Jeff wrapped the show with a burst of news and notes. Jordan Bianchi is reporting growing optimism that the Chicago street race will return in 2027 — leaving open whether that means San Diego is a one-year experiment, or whether both Chicago venues (street and Chicagoland oval) could coexist. Jeff expressed personal opposition to having more than one street race and flagged that reopening Chicagoland only to pull it after one race would be a bad look.

On silly season: after widespread predictions of an explosive off-season market, almost nobody has moved. Kyle Larson, Carson Hocevar, Ryan Blaney, Tyler Reddick, and now Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (re-signed with Haas Motorsports on a multi-year extension) have all locked in. The remaining unknowns are Kyle Busch's destination and what Hendrick Motorsports does with the No. 48 car.

Dover weekend logistics: the NASCAR All-Star Race is Sunday, May 17 at 1 p.m. ET on FS1, a three-day show running alongside Indy 500 qualifying (Saturday on Fox for positions 16-43; Sunday on Fox for the Fast 6). Destiny Spurlock attempts to become the first Black woman to start a NASCAR national series event in the truck race Friday. Clint Bowyer is also in that race.

Notable Quotes

Kahne (on finally winning a WoO race): "I don't know why it took so long, but it did. It felt really good — and it was just a super, super cool night."

Jeff (on Kahne's perseverance): "You could have said, 'Man, I'm not winning and it's not fun if I don't win at this point in my life' — and you would have walked. But you kept digging."

Stockman (on Cleetus McFarland): "I don't know what Cleetus and George and those guys do to a person, but they suck you in and make you feel like you're part of the family. He sucked me in, Gluck."

Stockman (on putting 'em on the dash): "I literally get up every day and try to strive to be the best rendition of myself. And I think that slogan has just took off so huge. It's stuck and we've got to keep rolling with it."

Fryer (on being told she was being reassigned at the AP): "They said: you can cover Michael Jordan, court cases, major breaking news, scandals — and you can cover three races. The Daytona 500, the Indy 500, and one Formula 1 race. I was completely devastated."

Fryer (on the broader institutional loss): "Take me out of the equation, call me Joe Smith. The fact that the AP's approach to motorsports going forward is largely remote coverage with whoever happens to live in that city — I think that's really, really terrible for motorsports."

Jeff (on the future of NASCAR media): "Within maybe five years, there might not be any more major outlets employing full-time NASCAR writers. You'd have a media center where you'd have people trying to do it as a hobby, or independents making it on a Substack or Patreon."

Fryer (on Katherine Legge): "There is something really admirable about a 45-year-old woman saying, 'I don't do either of these series full-time — but I'm going to give this a go.' She's the oldest, the only woman, and the only foreigner. She is due credit."

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download (Dirty Air)

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Co-Host: TJ Majors

Guest: Shane van Gisbergen (Trackhouse Racing, NASCAR Cup Series)

Date: May 12, 2026

Race Covered: Go Bowling at The Glen — Watkins Glen International, Watkins Glen, NY (May 10, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR post-race reaction, driver/insider perspective

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buaV7NJAiec

Runtime: ~2 hours 10 minutes

Episode Overview

The Dale Jr. Download returned with its weekly Dirty Air NASCAR reaction episode following Shane van Gisbergen's dominant performance at Watkins Glen International — his seventh career Cup Series win and first of the 2026 season. Dale Earnhardt Jr. and co-host TJ Majors spent the bulk of the episode trying to make sense of something that, after multiple seasons, still leaves the NASCAR world searching for answers: how does one driver, and one driver only, seem to operate on a completely different plane at road courses?

The episode is built around Dale's deep technical explanation of SVG's clutch technique in the braking zone — a theory he's been sitting on since he first heard it from a V8 Supercars insider during the 2025 Chicago race. It's one of the more detailed breakdowns of a specific driving skill heard on any NASCAR podcast, delivered in Dale's conversational, self-deprecating style as someone who admits he was doing it wrong his entire career. The conversation eventually becomes a meditation on what road course talent even looks like in NASCAR today and why an entirely different racing tradition — the Trans Am series — may be quietly producing the next generation of specialists.

Race winner SVG called in partway through to discuss the race from his perspective, including his team's strategy gamble, the technique question itself, and where he stands in the championship race. Beyond the racing content, Dale also delivered a vintage "Ask Jr." segment packed with personal stories, nostalgia about Kasey Kahne and old friendships, and a memorable tale from Sonoma that explains the episode title.

SVG's Dominance: Historic and Statistical

Dale opened with a half-joking admission that SVG's performance left him feeling "a little melancholy" — not just because of the result but because the data behind it was so one-sided. "SVG just kicked a bunch of ass," Dale said, "but it wasn't a perfect race for SVG — his pit crew was ranked 18th." He noted that despite a slow pit crew, SVG ranked first in essentially every speed-related metric: short run rank, long run rank, and raw speed. The only categories where SVG wasn't first were restarts (second, behind Tyler Reddick) and defense (also second, behind Chase Briscoe). "I mean, you can't win defense if you're running by yourself with a seven-second lead," TJ pointed out. "Ain't much defense to be had."

Dale also noted a side debate about Dover hosting the All-Star Race, firing off a tweet that asphalt should still have a points race. "I said it because I'm right," he said flatly, before a brief riff on the old days when Gen 6 cars would actually smoke tires through Dover's corners when it was still asphalt. "Concrete's for sidewalks, people."

The Clutch Technique: What SVG Does That No One Else Can

The episode's most technically substantive section arrived when Dale launched into a detailed explanation of why SVG is so dominant on road courses — an explanation rooted in a text exchange he had with V8 Supercars veteran Paul Morris during the 2025 Chicago race.

Dale recalled standing on a scissor lift at Chicago, watching SVG dominate mid-race, when his phone lit up with messages from contacts in Australia. "Paul Morris is a V8 Supercar driver from years ago," Dale explained. "He's in it, he knows SVG and all these guys really well — they all raced against each other, grew up around each other." Morris texted Dale a detailed explanation of what SVG was doing differently in the braking zones.

"He's kicking these guys' ass because of how he uses the clutch in the braking zone," Dale said, summarizing Morris's message. "Traditionally, I did what most NASCAR guys do — I used engine braking to slow the car down. You downshift early, the drivetrain helps scrub speed. But here's the problem: that makes the rear tire mad. The rear tire is literally being dragged into the corner." The alternative — SVG's approach — is to use the actual braking system more aggressively, brake deeper into corners, and use the clutch pedal to modulate wheel hop and rotation in the braking zone rather than relying on engine braking. "It's easier on the rear tire. And so halfway into a run, or at the very end of the run, this guy is still smoking off big laps and no one else can even get close."

Kevin Harvick had briefly mentioned the clutch technique during the race broadcast, and Dale acknowledged that Jamie Little had tried to explain what was happening on air. But Dale spent nearly 15 minutes unpacking it on the podcast, connecting it back to what he learned on the scissor lift: "I tried to work that into the broadcast at Chicago, but today I got the time to really explain it."

Why No Current NASCAR Driver Can Learn It

Dale was emphatic that this is not a technique today's NASCAR veterans can simply adopt. "There ain't no chance, no way in hell there is a single driver in the NASCAR Cup field today that could apply and adopt this technique and do it well. It's just not possible." He compared it to asking a driver who has braked left-footed their entire career to switch feet mid-career — technically possible in theory, deeply disruptive in practice.

He specifically mentioned Joey Logano, who TJ noted had been experimenting with his braking foot in practice sessions — trying different techniques inspired by SVG. "He may be trying to put his feet where SVG's feet are," Dale said, "but he really doesn't know what he's trying to do with the clutch." The one exception Dale carved out: Connor Zilisch. "Conor may be able to do it because he's young — he's 19, he's still developing, he's working with SVG." For everyone else in the field past 30, Dale was unsparing: "They ain't going to learn this."

On SVG's reluctance to show pedal cam footage — he has literally kicked cameras out of his footwell area — Dale said he understood the instinct but it was probably unnecessary. "He could talk about this all day long. These guys aren't going to figure this out."

Trans Am as NASCAR's Road Course Incubator

From the SVG technique discussion, Dale pivoted to an underreported subplot he sees building in the sport: the Trans Am series is quietly developing a new generation of NASCAR road course specialists, and the results are showing up in Cup and Xfinity races.

"Brent Cruz is out there kicking ass in the Xfinity race, putting a six-second lead on them in Stage 1," Dale said. "It's because of the time he's spending in Trans Am." He argued the same pipeline applies to Connor Zilisch, whose road course excellence within the Xfinity Series is deeply tied to Trans Am development. "The TA2 series — they're all over the country. Paul Menard has been the Trans Am champion the last two years. You wouldn't even know it." Dale expressed some frustration that the series doesn't get more visibility given what it's producing. "Remember the Trans Am series used to be pretty sexy — Scott Sharp, Tommy Kendall, Mustangs and Camaros racing like NASCAR, a little rough. It was awesome."

His argument: young drivers who focus exclusively on ovals without spending time in Trans Am are going to get handled at road courses when they reach trucks and Xfinity full time. "You're gonna be struggling when you get in a truck and go to a road course. You gonna get handled."

Kaden Honeycutt's Extraordinary Weekend

A brief but enthusiastic segment covered Kaden Honeycutt's remarkable multi-series weekend. Honeycutt won the ARCA race at Watkins Glen, then won the Truck Series race at the Glen, then drove to Ace Speedway and won both the Pro and Late Model Stock races at the CARS Tour event — four race wins within roughly 36 hours. "Not a bad weekend," TJ understated.

Dale mentioned he was at Ace and spoke to Honeycutt afterward. "I said, 'Hey man, appreciate you running with us. Hell of a job.' He goes, 'I'll be at all of them.'" Dale noted the CARS Tour's unusually relaxed schedule — one race in June, one in July — and joked that the league's unofficial slogan should be "Take a vacation."

Cody Ware's Crash and Josh Berry's Spin

Turning to the Cup race's incidents, Dale and TJ replayed the moment Cody Ware demolished the guardrail in Turn 10 with a ferocious impact. "He hit the damn wall so hard — and then his ass just got it going again and drove around the track." Dale couldn't hide his amazement that no caution was thrown and that Ware somehow kept going in the battered car. "Did he know? Did he remember that he hit the wall?" he asked TJ. "What the hell?"

The Josh Berry incident drew more discussion. Late in the race, Berry appeared to do a full 360-degree spin on the last lap near the Ware crash zone, most likely after being punted by Carson Hocevar as Hocevar came charging through the field. What happened next was the more interesting part: the external camera caught Berry spinning but didn't capture how he got punted, and on the final lap Berry appeared to intentionally send Hocevar into the barrier in retaliation. "It's not like Josh," Dale said, suggesting this was out of character for Berry but entirely understandable. "Last lap, Josh is like, 'I'm gonna punt you.'"

Dale's Bloody Nose Story (The Episode Title Explained)

The episode's most entertaining personal segment came when the sight of John Hunter Nemechek's bruised, bloody face after the Texas race circulated on social media. Dale mentioned the photo and said it reminded him of his own bloody nose incident at Sonoma.

"I had a bloody nose once in a race car," Dale said. He recounted being in the back of the field at Sonoma with Stacy Compton, who was driving the No. 9 car. With about eight laps to go and the green flag flying, Dale was picking his way through traffic — "I'm 18th, I'm 16th, I'm 14th, I'm 12th. Hell yeah." Coming to the final lap at the top of the track in Turn 4 or 5, Dale inexplicably pinched Compton's car off the corner. "I parked Stacy. I dumped him for no reason. No reason whatsoever." They finished around 11th.

Pulling into the garage, Stacy Compton's crew chief Chad Knaus came running up, furious. "He gets about two feet away from me and..." — Dale paused — "I get a bloody nose." The implication being that the physical tension of the confrontation, with Knaus bearing down, caused Dale's nose to start bleeding, which gave him a moment's reprieve from being completely cussed out. While standing there waiting to see what would happen, the owner of the No. 40 Channel Lock car — whose driver Dale apparently also involved — also walked up demanding answers. "I really didn't know what I had done in the moment," Dale said. "It dawned on me after he walked away — I was like, damn."

Track Limits: Tire Packs vs. Sand Traps

The new tire barrier installations added to Turn 1 at The Glen for the 2026 race generated mixed reactions. Dale said he wasn't bothered by them overall but would have preferred sand traps: "I want the damn sand tracks back." TJ pushed back, noting that drivers start using paved run-off as part of the track surface once it's there. The conversation evolved into a broader discussion of why NASCAR moved away from sand runoffs — essentially, drivers getting stuck in the sand during caution periods and forcing additional yellows, particularly in lower series races.

Dale and TJ also discussed the news that The Glen is moving back to the Chase (playoff) portion of the schedule next year. Both approved. "There needs to be a road course in the Chase now that we have a true 10-race block," Dale said. "Watkins Glen is very deserving of it." He also described the track conditions on the Thursday before race day — unprecedented mud and rutting in the infield, with crowds parking along roads leading into the property. "I've never seen the track look like this in all my years of going there."

SVG Joins the Show

Shane van Gisbergen called in partway through the episode and spoke for approximately 20 minutes. The conversation covered several threads.

On the clutch technique, SVG acknowledged the technique but tried to play it down. "I don't think it is a big advantage," he said, "but of course I'm going to say that." He explained that in V8 Supercars, the technique was almost mandatory because the locked differential required heavy rear braking to make the car rotate — drivers used the clutch to control that rear locking in the braking zone. In modern NASCAR Cup cars with open differentials and more front brake bias available, the need is reduced. "I don't really have rear locking because you can run so much more front brake bar," SVG explained. He acknowledged the technique is fully ingrained from growing up in that racing culture. Dale responded: "I think Logano and Cindric have started to try — they're trying, but they may be trying to put their feet where your feet are and they really don't know what they're trying to do with the clutch."

On race strategy, SVG walked through the team's decision to stay out on old tires while the field pitted under caution. When he came out of Turn 1 and saw Denny Hamlin's car charging through the carousel behind him, he immediately sensed the gap might be too large. "I thought we were fine when the seconds started to match the laps and go the other way." His crew chief Josh called him with the gap countdown turn by turn, and SVG said the moment the margin started shrinking to match remaining laps, he knew he had it. "Once I came back out, it was still 25 laps — you still had to look after the tires." Dale pushed him on the dramatic charge: "I looked at the gap and thought, nah, it's going to be hard to make that up. And then it was almost seamless — as fast as you caught him and then you were just gone."

On whether leading is more satisfying than charging through the field: "Boring is good when you're the leader."

On the points race, SVG said his team reviews their gap to the playoff cutline every week in debrief. "We had a sort of gap without the road courses, and it's obviously a shot in the arm to get those points, but I want to point my way in — be good on the ovals." He acknowledged the start of the year was strong and the past month has been more difficult. "There's some good tracks coming up for us."

Ask Jr.

The show's listener Q&A segment covered a range of personal topics.

On country singer Cole Swindell showing up at the CARS Tour race at Ace Speedway: Dale and Swindell have been spending time together lately — "We ran to a couple shops and hung out a little. He's got a young one he's raising." Swindell had a day off, heard the CARS Tour race was nearby, and texted 30 minutes out. Dale waited at the back gate to get him in. "I think it's pretty cool — he's posting about it, and his fans start to see the CARS Tour."

On Kasey Kahne winning his first World of Outlaws race: "I was so happy for him. I sent him a little message." Dale said the win was a long time coming and spoke warmly of Kahne's career longevity.

On Boo Weekley winning a PGA Champions Tour event: Dale recalled meeting Weekley in the 2000s at Talladega, the friendship that followed, Charlotte race weekend hangouts, and receiving a set of Weekley's clubs as a gift. "He won a tournament with them in Charlotte, gave me the set of clubs."

On Dale's own 1999 Busch Series win at Watkins Glen, a listener asked him to revisit the memory. Dale spoke briefly about how meaningful that track has been to him personally, noting his picture is still on a wall at the local high school he visited on Thursday morning before the 2026 race. "I went and saw my picture on the wall. That was fun."

The segment also covered multi-class racing in NASCAR, the new Hell Let Loose video game, and a debate about collecting hats vs. die-casts.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on SVG's pit crew performance): "His pit crew was ranked 18th. Imagine if his pit crew was good."

Dale (on the clutch technique): "There ain't no chance, no way in hell there is a single driver in the NASCAR Cup field today that could apply and adopt this technique and do it well. It's just not possible."

Dale (on the Sonoma bloody nose incident): "I parked Stacy for no reason. No reason whatsoever. And then Chad Knaus comes running up and I get a bloody nose."

SVG (on leading vs. charging): "Boring is good when you're the leader."

SVG (on his clutch technique): "I don't think it is a big advantage, but of course I'm going to say that."

SVG (on reading the gap during his charge): "When the seconds started to match the laps and go the other way, I thought we were fine."

Dale (on Trans Am producing road course talent): "The TA2 series is giving guys like Brent Cruz a platform to go out and become freaking damn good road course racers. And yes, that's where they can learn techniques like this if they want."

Dale (on Watkins Glen's place in the schedule): "There needs to be a road course in the Chase now that we have a true 10-race block. Watkins Glen is very deserving of it. That's our tent-pole staple road course event."

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft (spotter, #23 Toyota / Bubba Wallace / 23XI Racing), TJ Majors (spotter, #6 Cup car / RFK Racing), Casey Vote, Brett Griffin (spotter, Kaulig Racing)

Date: Week of May 12, 2026 (Mother's Day episode)

Race Covered: NASCAR Cup Series race at Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, Kansas

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Coming off what the crew unanimously called the best race weekend of the young NASCAR season, the Door Bumper Clear gang brought full energy to their Kansas Speedway recap. The episode opens with some self-deprecating chaos — Brett Griffin's ARCA car caught fire during the weekend, TJ's driver had a rough go of it, and Freddie's #23 Toyota qualified badly due to track temperature timing issues — but none of that dampened the group's infectious enthusiasm for what transpired on race day. The message was simple and repeated throughout the show: Kansas was a legitimate candidate for the greatest NASCAR race in the current car's history.

The episode ranged far and wide across the sport's biggest talking points: a direct comparison of NASCAR's thrilling Kansas event versus the same-weekend Miami Formula 1 Grand Prix, a Spot On/Spot Off segment covering Legacy Motor Club's blockbuster manufacturer switch from Chevrolet to Toyota, NASCAR's public transparency with the RCR penalty hardware, and — the story everybody was waiting for — the post-race physical confrontation between Ross Chastain and Noah Gregson. The show also previewed an immediately compelling stretch of the calendar: Darlington's throwback weekend looming with 93-degree heat, promising even more tire wear and drama.

What made this episode particularly compelling was how the hosts brought genuine on-track perspective. Freddie and TJ weren't just watching the race — they were standing in the spotter's stand watching Denny Hamlin hunt down Kyle Larson, calling tire strategy in real time, and tracking loose wheels from the best seat in the house. That embedded authenticity is Door Bumper Clear at its best.

The Kansas Race: Was It Really Historic?

The hosts were emphatic and nearly unanimous: the Kansas Cup race was, by any reasonable measure, the best race of the 2026 season and possibly one of the finest in the next-generation car era. The race featured 11 cautions and 37 lead changes among 12 drivers — setting a new record for most lead changes in a 400-mile race at a mile-and-a-half track — and while the hosts noted some of those changes were tied to pit strategy, the organic on-track action was equally impressive.

Freddie explained what made the race structurally fascinating from a crew chief's perspective: limited tire allocations forced teams into genuine strategic decisions. "When we started the race we knew we had two sets of stickers... so you know, after those times that you have to pit, you have two sets of stickers and one set of scuffs," he said. Running out their last new set with around 55 laps to go, the teams were suddenly managing real tire wear over a long green-flag run — something the current car rarely demands. Freddie was emphatic that this is the formula NASCAR needs to chase. "Tire wear — this whole sport is based on tire wear," he said. "If the tires wear out and these guys got to manage their tires like this... it would have happened yesterday: you would run a guy down from half a straightaway back, catch him, and you'd have to overdrive your entry."

TJ noted the positional racing was difficult given the car's aerodynamic dependency, but conceded it didn't matter: "This was by far the best race of the year for me. It may be one of the best races in NASCAR history to be honest with you, in terms of the excitement. It was hot, slick, multi-grooves, the momentum up top, driving it in deep on the bottom — it had so many things that just made it exciting." The group agreed the upcoming trio of Kansas, Darlington, and North Wilkesboro represented the three best tracks on the calendar for the current-generation car's tire wear profile.

NASCAR vs. F1: The Miami Comparison

The episode's first extended tangent was triggered by Haas F1 boss Günther Steiner's comment that F1 could eventually become the dominant motorsport in the United States. The DBC crew, all of whom were working the same weekend as the Miami Grand Prix, were having none of it.

Freddie framed the comparison with characteristic directness: "If you legitimately say NASCAR sucks, I'm an F1 fan, and you put them side by side — I don't know how you can support your argument. Because the only thing that was exciting was watching Verstappen drive from ninth to first. At one point he had an 18-second lead. There was zero racing on the racetrack. And then in the Cup race you had the exact opposite." Casey pointed out a Steiner quote that NASCAR was still number one in American viewership, and the group agreed his comment was largely spin: "He's not going to say yeah, we're gonna get an earthquake from NASCAR."

The hosts were more measured about F1's genuine cultural momentum, acknowledging that the Drive to Survive documentary model had done something NASCAR has yet to replicate at scale. Freddie made the case for what NASCAR needs to do: "Netflix brought attention — that's the only reason people care about Formula One. The model is right there in front of you: do that broader, across more teams, like they do in Drive to Survive, and you'll draw way more interest." He also noted that NASCAR has international growth opportunities — Canada, Mexico, potentially overseas — that remain untapped. "There was a time when 10 million people were watching every single Cup race. We're not there right now. But there's no reason why we can't make things hot again."

The group also ribbed the F1 paddock culture, referencing a story about F1 drivers complaining about standing in the sun for pre-race introductions. "I'd like to see another sport you have to do that," said Casey. Freddie replied simply: "Come to a race every week and hang out with us."

Qualifying Format Controversy: Track Temperature and Group Fairness

One of Freddie's most detailed criticisms in the episode wasn't about the race itself, but about the qualifying format. His #23 Toyota was the sixth car out in Group 1 of qualifying and missed the cut by about two-tenths — then watched as the second group, running roughly 10 to 15 minutes later when track temperatures had dropped, posted faster laps almost universally.

"Now the second group goes out, track temperature drops, race track cools down, and like 10 guys beat us," Freddie said. "We go from where I thought we were gonna start 11th — we start 17th, and it's solely based on when people went out." He acknowledged he didn't have a clean solution, recognizing the current format is designed around TV broadcasting needs (allowing for driver interviews between groups), but argued the competitive inequity deserves attention. Brett Griffin backed him up, noting that the shadow from the wall visibly moved lower lap after lap, directly cooling the racing surface and creating a measurable advantage for later qualifiers. "Definitely saw the same thing — pretty big disadvantage," Griffin confirmed.

Denny Hamlin's 49th Win: Clean Racing or the Dirty Pass?

With Denny Hamlin picking up his 49th Cup Series win via last-lap contact with Kyle Larson, the hosts predictably debated whether the move was clean. Freddie, who spots for Bubba Wallace on the 23XI team alongside Hamlin's 11 car, was openly a homer but made a substantive case: "From the head-on shot that I saw, it looks to me like he either gets Kyle loose or Kyle brushes the wall off of two, and then Denny hits him in the left rear. But if Kyle doesn't break momentum at all off turn two, I think he wins the race."

TJ, who watched the last-lap battle from the spotter's stand while also tracking his own car, described the sequence carefully: "Once you see the shot straight down the backstretch, you see Kyle get into the fence and Denny's not on him. Kyle does get in the fence first, and when he comes off the fence is when they hit a little bit." The group's consensus was that it was genuine hard racing between two all-time talents, not a deliberate dirty pass. Freddie invoked a broader principle: "You got to win the race. We've had nine winners in 12 races. You can't just say I'm gonna be fine and point my way in — those days are over."

The crew also noted the role of the lapped #51 car, which was running in the middle of the track as the lead battle developed. Freddie was pointed: "If I'm NASCAR, I'm calling everybody to the hauler after the race and saying look, it wasn't your day, got away — don't do this again. And if you do, I'm gonna fine you."

Spot On / Spot Off: Legacy Motor Club Goes Toyota

The episode's most substantive business segment centered on Legacy Motor Club — the team formerly known as Richard Petty Motorsports, now controlled by Jimmy Johnson — announcing a switch from Chevrolet to Toyota starting in 2024. The hosts were unanimous in their assessment: Spot Off for Chevrolet, Spot On for Legacy.

Freddie delivered the most emotional take: "I know good and damn well in Jimmy Johnson's heart he didn't want to leave Chevrolet. For him to get up and leave as a manufacturer and switch from Chevrolet to Toyota tells us that Toyota is going to make him a key partner — they're going to bring him to the table." He went on to describe the cold reality of being outside a manufacturer's key partnership structure, recounting being told at Daytona drafting practice to "just line up at the back and figure it out however you want," while the key partners were given specific drafting assignments. "And you're like, okay, well — thanks a lot."

TJ framed it in terms of what manufacturers actually provide: "These OEMs control how many hours of wind tunnel time these teams get, where that information is distributed — from a sim perspective, tire perspective... Imagine that you and Freddie are best friends and I tell him everything, and me and TJ are good friends and I only tell him 25% of what I tell Freddie. That's the difference between being a key partner to these OEMs versus not." He added that for Toyota specifically, adding a third organization means their draft lineup at plate tracks grows from six cars toward eight, a meaningful competitive advantage.

Freddie also praised Trackhouse Racing's Justin Marks for navigating the key partnership system skillfully: "Without that partnership, Ross Chastain probably ain't winning two races last year... Shout out to him for once again proving how well he's doing on the business side of the sport."

NASCAR's RCR Penalty Transparency: Spot On

NASCAR's decision to publicly display the penalized part from the #3 Richard Childress Racing car — the part that led to the Martinsville penalty — and post a picture and explanation on social media drew universal praise from the DBC crew. Freddie admitted he wasn't entirely sure what he was looking at but appreciated the gesture: "I think it's 100% spot on for NASCAR to do that, even if I can't explain it. Because right now, whoever saw that picture is planning a way to get it a little bit better so they don't get caught." TJ was equally enthusiastic: "Put it out there and then explain it too — that's even better." Brett delivered the punchline: "We say we want transparency — well, we got it. You can't be Richard Childress Racing and argue that you didn't do what they're saying you did."

Ross Chastain vs. Noah Gregson: The Post-Race Fight

The confrontation between Ross Chastain and Noah Gregson on Pit Road after the race was, by the hosts' admission, the story they most enjoyed dissecting — even if Freddie claimed to be Spot Off on the whole affair. In brief: Gregson approached Chastain, grabbed his uniform, and was immediately punched in the jaw. The hosts noted the punch was audible on broadcast video, and that a memorable photo captured Joey Logano casually sipping a Coca-Cola in the background as Gregson got clocked.

Freddie's take was characteristically blunt: "If you grab my shirt or you push me, I'm going to hit you in the mouth — because I don't know what else your intentions are. It's self-defense." He was critical of the approach nonetheless: "If you're gonna go in there, you better go in there swinging. You can't go up there, grab his shirt, and think that's going to be the end of it." TJ suggested that drivers know security will break it up quickly, which emboldens them to escalate: "These guys go into these fights knowing somebody's gonna break it up — like if you go in there and punch him one time, they'll break it up before he ever gets to you."

The crew revealed an additional layer: a previous confrontation between Gregson and Chastain on an airplane following Talladega, suggesting the post-Kansas fight wasn't an isolated flash of emotion but part of an ongoing feud. Casey made the sharpest PR observation of the episode, noting that Trackhouse Racing's social media response — "A no-push policy at track house" and "Another drama-free day" — was brilliant regardless of who wrote it. Freddie agreed: "PR Brilliance. If that's him, congrats. If it's his PR team — okay." The hosts also observed that Gregson remains in the Chevrolet program despite the incident, which they found mildly surprising.

Broadcasting: Kurt Busch in the Booth, Darlington Throwbacks

The hosts offered measured praise for Fox's deployment of Kurt Busch in the broadcast booth for Kansas. Freddie drew a pointed distinction between drivers who raced in earlier Cup generations and current drivers who can speak to what the next-gen car actually does: "It's hard for drivers to analyze a race with a car that's out there that they've never driven. I think having a Kurt Busch — who is recently out of the car, raced last year full-time until he was injured — adds a lot." He noted that Clint Bowyer has "just as many laps in the current-generation car during a race as Brett Griffin does," and defended Busch against criticism that he was rooting for 23XI: "He works at 23-11. If you give him a contract to be a Fox broadcaster, he will not do that."

For the upcoming Darlington throwback weekend, Fox has lined up Richard Petty and Kyle Petty for Stage 1, Carl Edwards for Stage 2, and Bill Elliott for Stage 3. The hosts were enthusiastic about the nostalgia factor while gently noting that none of those drivers has touched the current car. "I think it's nostalgic, Casey — to do that," Freddie said. "But Fox has got to make a decision: do you want to deliver nostalgic content, or do you want to deliver real-time information that fans want?" He suggested Fox invest in Clint Bowyer by actually putting him in an open car at somewhere like Martinsville to refresh his muscle memory.

DBC A-Main: Dirt Racing Corner

The dirt segment touched on several developments in the sprint car world. The World of Outlaws points battle has Brad Sweet holding the lead over David Gravel. Freddie flew to Indiana the previous week and was rained out for every session, earning the episode's "What An Idiot" nomination for the trip. Discussion turned to Eldora Speedway — both the upcoming million-dollar Sprint car event planned for early July and the general consensus that wingless sprint car racing at Eldora represents about as dangerous as motorsport gets. TJ noted Kyle Larson had a bad wreck there at one point. The segment also highlighted the upcoming Millbridge Speedway events during Charlotte race week (May 23-24) as a recommended fan destination to see Cup development drivers run dirt.

Looking Ahead: Darlington Throwback Weekend

The episode closed with Darlington predictions and anticipation. The hosts picked their drivers for the throwback race: Freddie took Tyler Reddick, TJ took Tyler Reddick as well, Casey went with William Byron and Eric Jones, and Brett took Joey Logano. The weather forecast showed 93 degrees on Sunday, which the crew called ideal for the racing product. Freddie summed up the excitement simply: "Tire wear, tire wear, tire wear. This place is one of the best for tire wear, and we're gonna need a lot of it there because this track is narrow." The group also noted the throwback paint scheme weekend creates genuine spotting chaos, with Freddie advocating for enforcing stricter throwback standards: "If you're gonna commit to a throwback, commit to a throwback — I should be able to look at it and know exactly what it is."

Notable Quotes

Freddie Kraft (on Kansas being a historic race): "This was by far the best race of the year for me. It may be one of the best races in NASCAR history, to be honest with you, in terms of the excitement. It was hot, slick, multi-grooves, the momentum up top, driving it in deep on the bottom — it had so many things that just made it exciting."

Freddie Kraft (on Legacy Motor Club leaving Chevrolet): "I know good and damn well in Jimmy Johnson's heart he didn't want to leave Chevrolet. So for him to get up and leave as a manufacturer and switch from Chevrolet to Toyota tells us that Toyota is going to make him a key partner, that they're going to bring him to the table. It hurts my heart a little bit to see — because this is like Dale Jr. announcing tomorrow that Junior Motorsports is switching to Ford."

TJ Majors (on Denny vs. Larson, last lap): "Kyle gets into the fence and Denny's not on him. Kyle does get in the fence first, and when he comes off the fence is when they hit a little bit. This is two of the greatest race car drivers in NASCAR history in a battle — and that's how it played out. I don't think Kyle went to get in the wall. I don't think Denny meant to get into Kyle."

Freddie Kraft (on Noah Gregson's fight approach): "If you're gonna go in there, you better go in there swinging. You can't go up there and grab his shirt and think that's going to be the end of it. There's no such thing as halfway. Go if you're gonna go — don't be happy about it."

Freddie Kraft (on NASCAR vs. F1): "If you watch them side by side — I don't know how you can support your argument. The only thing that was exciting was watching Verstappen drive from ninth to first. At one point he had an 18-second lead. There was zero racing on the racetrack. And then in the Cup race you had the exact opposite."

TJ Majors (on OEM key partnerships): "These OEMs control how many hours of wind tunnel time these teams get, where that information is distributed. Imagine that you and Freddie are best friends and I tell him everything, and me and TJ are good friends and I only tell him 25% of what I tell Freddie. That's the difference between being a key partner to these OEMs versus not."

Source: "Was Kansas the best race in NASCAR history? | Door Bumper Clear - Full Episode" — YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3WhII6yJkU

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared (co-host), Travis (producer)

Published: May 11, 2026

Race Covered: Go Bowling at The Glen — Watkins Glen International, Watkins Glen, New York

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

In the wake of Shane van Gisbergen's fourth consecutive road course victory, Denny Hamlin and his co-hosts break down a Watkins Glen race that felt equal parts impressive and deflating — impressive because SVG was simply operating on another level, and deflating because the Next Gen car continues to make it nearly impossible for even the best drivers to mount a challenge. Denny himself was experimenting with new road course techniques and qualified P22, which he freely admitted didn't help, but his broader takeaways from the weekend went well beyond his own finishing position.

This episode carries a rare mixture of self-deprecating honesty from Denny about his own performance and genuine frustration with the structural issues facing NASCAR. The co-hosts also hit on Connor Zilisch's dramatic Xfinity win at the Glen — including a terrifying victory lane fall that left him with a broken collarbone — SVG's potential playoff path, the qualifying altercation between Carson Hocevar and Brad Keselowski, and a look ahead to Richmond. The result is one of the more substantive episodes of the season, driven by a string of newsworthy moments and a host who had a front-row seat to all of it.

Denny's Watkins Glen Race: New Techniques, Same Struggles

Denny opened the episode with a candid breakdown of his own weekend, which started on the back foot. He confirmed he's actively experimenting with a new driving style on road courses — deliberately, with no outside pressure from his team — and acknowledged it's going to take time to show results. The experiment cost him in qualifying, where he felt he had a strong lap going before a mistake at the bus stop chicane dropped him to P22. From there, he got swallowed up on the initial start, slipped as far back as 30th, and spent most of the race working his way forward.

Denny's take was characteristically direct about why road courses at Watkins Glen are uniquely different: Goodyear has such a strong tire compound for the track that fall-off can range from two to three seconds per lap depending on how hard a driver pushes. That means the majority of passing doesn't happen until the final ten laps, when the tires finally start to give up. Denny pointed to Chase Elliott and Ty Gibbs as examples of drivers who had strong runs until the tires fell off the cliff late. He also walked through some contact he had mid-race — Kyle Busch got into him in one corner, and when Ross Chastain dove in late, Denny wasn't willing to yield a second time after getting squeezed the lap before. He was clear it wasn't Ross's fault, but he wasn't going to just keep giving ground either.

Hamlin argued: "It wasn't Ross's fault. It was inadvertent contact, but I just — I wasn't willing to give any more room at that point just because of how I got treated in the previous corner."

SVG's Road Course Dominance: Four in a Row and No End in Sight

The central conversation of the episode was SVG's fourth consecutive road course win and what it means for the sport going forward. Denny was unequivocal: SVG is the best road course racer he has ever seen, better than Tony Stewart, better than Jeff Gordon, better than anyone he competed against across his career. That's not faint praise from someone who has raced against all of them.

But the conversation quickly moved from admiration to a structural problem. Denny explained that even if SVG were running at 70% capacity, the Next Gen car's aerodynamic characteristics make it essentially impossible for the second-place driver running at 100% to pass him once SVG has track position. The lead car's wake doesn't just affect braking points — it degrades the second-place car's cornering capability, its ability to heat tires, and its overall pace, all at the same time. Jared raised an interesting counter-point: the dominance SVG shows on road courses is actually creating a star, something the sport struggles to produce on ovals precisely because of the parity it has engineered into the car. Denny acknowledged the point reluctantly but maintained that it doesn't solve the problem for the other thirty races.

Hamlin stated: "For the fourth time on this podcast, I asked NASCAR directly: 'Are you sure you have this car driving correctly at all types of racetracks, aerodynamics and all that, before you put it on track?' Because they were rushing to get this car on the racetrack."

The hosts also assessed SVG's playoff chances. He currently holds 22 playoff points and has made the round of eight look increasingly reachable, but Denny put it at 50/50 — ultimately landing on "no, he doesn't make it" by a margin of 51/49. His logic: it's not going to be lack of skill or lack of speed that gets SVG eliminated, it's going to have to be bad luck, and at some point the numbers catch up. The one scenario Denny identified as most likely to derail SVG: a poorly-timed caution where the field pits but SVG stays out, leaving him to restart in traffic with no tire advantage.

Hamlin added: "It is going to have to take something wacky. Or else you can go ahead and write the script for the next foreseeable future."

On the question of future challengers, Denny pointed to Connor Zilisch as the only driver with the raw talent to eventually compete with SVG on road courses — but noted that the gap is still real even in the more malleable Xfinity car, and the transition to the Next Gen Cup car will make it harder, not easier, in the short term.

The Next Gen Car Problem: Approaching "Car of Tomorrow" Hate Levels

One of the episode's sharpest segments was Denny's extended critique of the Next Gen car. He said what many insiders have whispered for a while: that fan dissatisfaction with the car is approaching the levels of hatred that defined the Car of Tomorrow era — the generation of cars that caused a genuine fan exodus from the sport. Jared added that the comparison is particularly alarming because there are now far more entertainment options competing for fans' attention. The stakes of losing them again are higher.

Denny's structural critique was pointed. He argued that the push for parity — intentionally engineering close competition — has actually undermined the sport's ability to produce stars. When William Byron has the fastest car and starts on the pole, multiple pit cycles and the aerodynamic disadvantages of the Next Gen car can erase that advantage entirely, leaving fans watching a great driver go nowhere. He framed it as a series of "10th floor decisions" — made far above the drivers' pay grade and often without enough input from the people who actually drive the cars.

Denny's take: "I think that NASCAR has made some horrible decisions over the last, you know, given amount of time. No business is immune to bad decisions. And eventually it catches up with you."

On horsepower specifically, Denny confirmed that an increase is coming but pegged it at around 75 additional horsepower — enough to move the needle slightly, but not enough to fundamentally change what drivers are experiencing on the racetrack.

Connor Zilisch's Xfinity Win — and the Victory Lane Scare

The Xfinity race at Watkins Glen produced one of the most dramatic moments of the weekend when Connor Zilisch won — then took a violent fall off the top of his car in victory lane, landing hard and ultimately breaking his collarbone. Denny was on a trail hike in the Watkins Glen State Park when the messages started flooding in, unable to pull up the video over spotty service. When he finally saw it, his first reaction was a broken collarbone — and he was right.

Denny didn't soften his reaction: "My first thought was, 'That's a collarbone breaker right there.' And sure enough. But I thought he snapped his leg. I thought he had a concussion, his neck… it was just violent. I would still be in the hospital." He joked that celebrating on top of his car is probably over for him now.

Beyond the scare, Denny was genuinely effusive about Zilisch's talent. He described Connor's advantage over the Xfinity field as nearly double the gap SVG has over Cup drivers — saying Connor would win these races by a lap if SVG wasn't in them, pointing to lap times that show no one within six to seven tenths. When Zilisch got shuffled back to fifth during a chaotic restart, Denny said the reaction in the booth was immediate: "He'll be leading in a lap." He was.

On the Zilisch-SVG contact that ended SVG's day, Denny put the fault on SVG: "He didn't give Connor any room to get back on the racetrack. You can't expect the guy to lift for you."

The recovery timeline for Zilisch's broken collarbone was discussed — SVG noted he raced after the same injury in 2021, and Denny speculated that Zilisch's left-turn-dominated Cup schedule could actually favor recovery, since the injured right shoulder would be doing less of the work depending on his driving style.

Qualifying Drama: Hocevar and Keselowski

The episode gave some time to the qualifying altercation between Carson Hocevar and Brad Keselowski, which apparently ended with Keselowski sprinting across the pit lane — something no one had seen from the veteran in years. Denny's read: Keselowski pulled onto the track at an awkward time during the qualifying session, disrupting Hocevar's flying lap. Hocevar then waited and returned the favor by slowing Keselowski down on his next run. Neither incident was malicious in Denny's view — both were products of the tight timing windows in road course qualifying where drivers sometimes have no choice but to pull out in front of someone — but the frustration was real and understandable.

Denny noted: "Sometimes when you put yourself up against the back end of the clock like that, it leaves you no choice but to put yourself on the racetrack in front of someone that's already running."

The Carson Hocevar / Zane Smith Storyline

The Hocevar-Zane Smith drama that flared at Iowa continued to simmer at Watkins Glen. Hocevar apparently gave up a spot late in the race to Zane as a form of restitution for the incident at Iowa — and approached Smith's window on pit road afterward to acknowledge the move and signal that more might be coming in subsequent weeks. Denny read the situation as Hocevar walking a careful line: maintaining a public image while privately trying to do the right thing. He had no issue with the approach, noting that if Hocevar had just parked directly in front of Zane again this week, he probably would have gotten punted anyway.

Truck Series: Corey Heim and the Playoff Format Problem

The cold open of the episode previewed the truck series discussion: Corey Heim now has 45 playoff points — nearly a full race above the field — and yet the hosts couldn't fully guarantee he'd make the final four. The reason: the final three races before the Truck championship round are Talladega, the Roval, and Martinsville. Denny called all three "show races" — meaning chaos, carnage, and randomness could easily knock out the most deserving driver. The segment was equal parts funny and genuinely alarmed, a reminder that the format creates situations where a 45-point cushion isn't a guarantee of anything.

Looking Ahead to Richmond

The episode closed with a look ahead to Richmond Raceway — Saturday night under the lights on the USA Network. Denny is eager to get back to a flat short track, and mentioned that he's been up front in recent Richmond races but hasn't been able to close it out. He acknowledged that the regular season standings are now a genuine dog fight for positions three through six, with Kyle Busch, Christopher Bell, and others pressing. A win at Richmond would give Denny a meaningful playoff points boost at a critical time.

On a more personal note, Denny confirmed Richmond will be chaotic off the track — he's maxed out on guest passes as friends and family come to see the newborn, calling the scene outside the hauler "total chaos."

Notable Quotes

Denny (on his new road course technique): "I just got nothing to lose. So just working on different techniques and see how it goes."

Denny (on SVG): "Is he the best road course racer I've ever seen? Absolutely. I competed against the Tony Stewarts, the Jeff Gordons, all those guys. He's better than all of them."

Denny (on the Next Gen car aerodynamics at road courses): "William Byron AI can run at 70% and keep William Byron the driver running 100% behind him even at these road courses."

Denny (on Connor Zilisch's talent): "If SVG does not run an Xfinity race, Connor would win these things by a lap. I mean, I'm looking at the lap times — they're not close. There's nobody within six to seven tenths."

Denny (on the Next Gen car hate): "I believe that the Next Gen car is reaching hate levels of the Coot with the wing. Yes. From fans and just — I think they're starting to dislike this car as much as the drivers that have to drive it."

Denny (on SVG's playoff odds): "It is going to have to take something wacky. Or else you can just go ahead and write the script for the next foreseeable future."

Denny (on Connor Zilisch's victory lane fall): "I would still be in the hospital. There's no way. I don't think I'm ever going to stand on top of my car again."

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: May 11, 2026

Race Covered: Go Bowling at The Glen — Watkins Glen International, Watkins Glen, New York

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opened his Watkins Glen recap with a simple, chilling line: "Mom, come pick me up. I'm scared." It set the tone for an episode that was less a race summary and more an extended meditation on what it feels like to watch Shane Van Gisbergen do something that no one in NASCAR can quite explain. Van Gisbergen, who led 74 of 100 laps, won the race by over seven seconds, and collected his seventh career Cup Series victory — all on road or street courses — delivered what Eric described as one of the greatest drives in NASCAR Cup Series road course history.

The episode is structured around that central awe, but Eric does not let the story of SVG swallow everything else. He works methodically through the top finishers, holds a crew chief to account for a strategic miss, examines a brutal Hendrick Motorsports shutout, and questions whether Fox Sports was even paying attention to the same race the fans were watching. He closes with a Groovy Gauge verdict of 70 for the event — a "better than average modern-day Cup road course race" — while acknowledging that the box score, which simply showed SVG starting and finishing first, badly undersells what actually happened on track.

What makes this episode particularly compelling is Eric's willingness to place Van Gisbergen in historical context even before the race is fully digested. He is not just saying SVG was good on Sunday. He is making the case — carefully and with acknowledgment of the caveats — that Van Gisbergen is the greatest road course racer this series has ever produced. That is a big statement, and Eric earns it through the numbers and the tape.

The Strategy Call That Made History

The race turned, as Eric explains it in vivid detail, on a single decision made under the full-course caution with 40 laps remaining. Joey Logano's tire carcass had parked itself just outside the racing groove, and the entire field faced an agonizing strategic dilemma. A typical fuel run at Watkins Glen is 34 to 36 laps, and the final green-flag run was shaping up to be 37 laps. Teams could pit under caution and accept some fuel conservation obligations, or stay out and bank on a later green-flag stop that would require making up enormous time in traffic.

Van Gisbergen was leading. Every other team was reacting to his move. Crew chief Steven Duran made the call to stay out, Eric explains, because the philosophy was entirely offensive: "Shane, you're the best guy in the business. We want you on offense. We want you being aggressive, getting the absolute most out of your race car every single lap." SVG took his green-flag stop with 25 laps remaining and cycled out in 25th place, 29 seconds behind Ty Gibbs. Twenty-four cars between himself and the lead. Twenty-four laps to erase it.

Eric had the in-car camera open on one side of his screen and the broadcast on the other, eating popcorn and doing math in real time. "With 10, 15 to go, it became clear — oh my gosh, Shane Van Gisbergen. Thanos snap. He is inevitable." The pass for the lead came with eight laps to go. Shane still had time to build a seven-second margin over second place. He had made up 29 seconds in 16 laps — and then kept going.

SVG Among the All-Time Greats

Eric uses the victory as a launching pad for a sustained argument about Van Gisbergen's legacy. Seven road course wins. Tied for third on the all-time Cup Series list. Tony Stewart has eight. Jeff Gordon has nine. Eric is not yet ready to crown SVG at the top — "He may not be on top of this list yet. Doesn't matter. I've seen enough" — but he makes the case that Van Gisbergen has no real peer among drivers the series has ever produced on these tracks.

He is careful to address the obvious counterarguments. The modern Cup car is closer in character to the Australian Supercars that SVG drove before NASCAR than the open-wheel machinery Juan Pablo Montoya had to adapt from. "Going from open wheel to the Cup car is not quite the jump SVG had to make." Eric grants that. But he pushes back hard on the idea that Van Gisbergen's dominance is simply a good-driver-in-a-great-car story. "That's not the Hendrick 24 that Jeff Gordon was driving. That's not the Joe Gibbs 20 that Tony Stewart raced. Trackhouse is not that today." And critically, this era of parity means everyone has access to the same data, the same parts, the same footage of exactly what SVG does. They can study it. They just cannot replicate it.

Eric draws on Michael McDowell's own post-race admission to underline the point. McDowell ran second to Van Gisbergen for much of the afternoon and said afterward that while he thought he was close at times, "in hindsight I think Shane was just holding back, managing, setting a convenient pace." When SVG showed his full hand in those final 16 laps, the gap between him and the rest of the field was not measured in tenths. It was measured in a different category of driver entirely.

"Super Saiyan, Super Sonic, all the Chaos Emeralds in that gas tank. We saw Shane at full strength. And that was scary. If you're a Michael McDowell, if you're a Tyler Reddick or a Chris Buescher, you watch that — that's demoralizing." Eric's lone concession to SVG's mortality: Circuit of the Americas is his kryptonite. It remains the one road course on the schedule where he has not won. "The Superman comparisons, I think, are very accurate."

Notable Finishers

Michael McDowell (2nd): Eric credits McDowell for matching SVG's late-race strategy — staying out with 40 to go and pitting under green — and driving from deep in the field to second. But he does not let crew chief Travis Peterson entirely off the hook. Around the midway point of the race, Peterson left McDowell out on older tires for 10 laps at the end of Stage 2 trying to bank track position, and it backfired. McDowell's tires faded, he lost position, and he collected zero stage points. "That felt like a miss by the crew chief." Still, a strong result for a driver who needed one — McDowell's average finish on ovals this year is 25.8, and he has been knocking on the door of the playoff field while teammates Carson Hocevar and Daniel Suarez were already comfortably inside it.

Ty Gibbs (3rd): Gibbs was on the other strategy — he pitted under caution and had to manage fuel for the final run. Eric says he "did a tremendous job" keeping Connor Zillich at bay and extracting maximum mileage. It was obvious fairly early that Shane was going to run him down regardless, but Gibbs earned his podium.

Chase Briscoe (4th): A much-needed top five for a driver who has been hovering right around the Chase cut line and struggling to break through. "This was a great run. A great result could go a long way as we look later this summer."

Tyler Reddick (5th): Same strategy as SVG and McDowell, same impressive charge through the field. Won Circuit of the Americas earlier this spring. Eric notes that Reddick's triple-digit points lead continues to grow — "the rich just keep getting richer" — and calls his first dozen races of the year "insane."

Connor Zillich (20th): The 19-year-old rookie qualified in the top five and ran in the top five, but his race unraveled in the final stint. He was asked to save fuel but could not save his tires simultaneously, repeatedly smoking the right front, flat-spotting, and ultimately suffering a tire issue that forced a pit stop. Eric's verdict is straightforward and not unkind, but it is honest: "It continues to be just a very disappointing rookie season." Even at the road courses — historically his strength — Zillich was 14th at COTA after being spun by others in Turn 1, and here today squandered a legitimate top-five car. "He just got to put a full race together." Eric does see Sonoma and San Diego on the horizon as further opportunities.

Hendrick Motorsports: A Historic Disaster

Eric pauses to note what may be a historical anomaly: Hendrick Motorsports failed to score a single stage point across all four of their cars. Chase Elliott, Chase's crew chief, Larson, Byron, and Bowman — combined stage points for HMS: zero. Elliott qualified outside the top 20 and finished 24th. Larson was 23rd. Bowman 25th. Byron flashed top-10 speed early in the race, was spun in the bus stop on a restart, and finished 36th.

"When was the last time Hendrick Motorsports didn't score a single stage point? Not one. I'm not sure when that was. Has that ever happened? I'm sure it has. But it can't be anytime recently." Eric points to the broader slump in Chase Elliott's road course form: "Remember when Chase Elliott looked almost as unbeatable here as Shane Van Gisbergen did? Pepperidge Farm remembers." Elliott, who was once considered the dominant road racer in the series, has not been a formidable road course threat in years.

Joey Logano's Historic Cold Streak

Eric cites a stat from viewer Joseph Srigley: with his 38th-place finish at Watkins Glen — the result of an early tire failure — Logano has now recorded four consecutive finishes of 30th or worse, something he has only done twice before in his career, and both of those instances were in his first ten Cup Series starts as an 18-year-old rookie at Joe Gibbs Racing.

"This is the worst stretch of Joey Logano's Cup Series career since he was a fresh-faced 18-year-old rookie in over his head at Joe Gibbs Racing nearly two decades ago. That is insane." Logano is now 18th in points, 38 markers below the cut line. Eric's assessment of the Penske operation is blunt: "You can't trust the drivers. You can't trust the setups. Sometimes you can't trust the pit crew. You can't trust this 22 to do anything right now."

Incidents, Arguments, and Fox's Camera Policy

The closing section of the episode becomes a running critique of Fox Sports' broadcast choices, woven around several incidents the network missed entirely. Bubba Wallace and Christopher Bell were caught arguing in the garage after the race; Fox never showed what happened on the track to prompt it. Josh Berry and Carson Hocevar made contact on the final lap; Fox missed it. Cody Ware had a hard impact into the tire barrier with 10 to go — no caution, driver got to pit road — Fox never showed it. What Fox did catch, and what Eric acknowledges is at least funny: a tent getting blown by wind across the racetrack, prompting an early debris caution. "That is a cool visual. That is funny." But the tradeoff is coverage of actual racing.

"Fox, can we get the cameras back on the racetrack? Can we get back on the action itself? Please."

On the Kyle Busch situation — Busch seeking medical attention after the race following on-track contact — Eric notes the strong back-to-back finishes for both RCR cars (Dillon 6th, Busch 8th) and credits new crew chief Andy Street without overstating his impact: "Busch's best two races of the season have been the last two weeks. Really good sign for that entire Richard Childress Racing group."

Groovy Gauge: 70 / 100

Eric lands on 70 for the Groovy Gauge. He is transparent about the tension in the rating: the final 37-40 laps were genuinely compelling — he was doing math in real time, he was not sure SVG was going to make it back, and then Shane made it look easy once the chess match was settled. But other portions of the race were dry. The Next Gen car corners too well at Watkins Glen, producing fewer mistakes and fewer passing opportunities than the track once did.

He closes with a broader scheduling thought: he once wanted five or six road courses on the schedule, but with Van Gisbergen this dominant, three or four feels right. He likes having a rotating new venue — Chicago gave way to San Diego — and he thinks the sweet spot going forward is variety plus freshness. "I love watching Shane do his thing. But 10, 12-second leads — that will get old at some point."

Notable Quotes

Eric (on SVG's strategy call and crew chief Steven Duran): "Shane, you're the best guy in the business. We want you on offense. We want you being aggressive, getting the absolute most out of your race car every single lap. We are going to put you in that position. Cue the Jaws theme song."

Eric (on Van Gisbergen's charge): "Super Saiyan, Super Sonic, all the Chaos Emeralds in that gas tank. We saw Shane at full strength. And that was scary. That was scary. If you're a Michael McDowell, if you're a Tyler Reddick or a Chris Buescher, you watch that — that's demoralizing watching Shane Van Gisbergen do what he just did."

Eric (on SVG vs. historical greats): "He may not be on top of this list yet. Doesn't matter. I've seen enough. We have never seen someone be this far ahead from the rest of the field."

Eric (on Joey Logano's cold streak): "This is the worst stretch of Joey Logano's Cup Series career since he was a fresh-faced 18-year-old rookie in over his head at Joe Gibbs Racing nearly two decades ago. That is insane."

Eric (on Fox Sports missing key moments): "Fox couldn't show us what happened between Bell and Bubba. They couldn't show us what happened between Barry and Hocevar. Fox never showed us this huge crash that happened with 10 to go. But Fox did make sure to catch a tent flying up into the sky and getting blown onto the racetrack."

Eric (on SVG's ceiling): "Shane Van Gisbergen is a road course Superman. He is unbelievable, unbeatable. Though, just like Superman, I guess he does have his kryptonite — Circuit of the Americas. That's the one road course on the Cup schedule he hasn't won a Cup race at. Everywhere else, he's able to dominate."

Show: Inside the Race

Host(s): Ryan Flores, Kyle Petty (co-host); Todd Gordon (guest, crew chief, on-site at Watkins Glen)

Date: May 10, 2026

Race Covered: Go Bowling at The Glen — Watkins Glen International, Watkins Glen, New York

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

This post-race edition of Inside the Race arrived with a spring in its step — Shane van Gisbergen had just delivered another masterclass on the 2.45-mile Watkins Glen road course, leading 74 of 100 laps and running down Ty Gibbs from 24th place in the final 25 laps to win by more than seven seconds over Michael McDowell. The episode opened with host Ryan Flores welcoming back Kyle Petty, who had literally just returned from the 30th-anniversary Kyle Petty Charity Ride — a cross-country motorcycle journey from Sonoma, California to Charlotte that included a stop at Graceland with Mike Helton and Clint Boyer ("two of the biggest Elvis fans ever"), a tour of Corky Coker's car museum, and a lap of Charlotte Motor Speedway under the checkered flag. The ride raised significant money for Victory Junction Camp, the charity that sends seriously ill children to camp free of charge.

The main analytical thread running through the episode centered on SVG's almost unfathomable pace advantage at road courses — his technique, his deceptive speed management, and whether the rest of the Cup Series field will ever actually catch him. Flores and Petty were joined midway through by crew chief Todd Gordon, who was still stranded in the cold at Watkins Glen and offered a detailed pit strategy breakdown from the perspective of the pit box. The panel also covered a chaotic weekend — a massive tent blowing onto the racetrack, a heated post-race confrontation between Bubba Wallace and Christopher Bell, Connor Zillich's flat tire misfortune, Joey Logano's continuing nightmare season, and Kaden Honeycutt winning four races across two series in 30 hours.

The episode carried a strong sense of enthusiasm about NASCAR's generational transition. Whether dissecting SVG's right-foot braking technique, marveling at 19-year-old Zillich's radio maturity, or celebrating Jesse Love's raw emotional reaction to a tough day, Flores and Petty repeatedly circled back to the same theme: the future of Cup road racing is very bright, and today's young drivers — unlike those who came before them — have the data, the simulation tools, and the examples in front of them to actually learn from SVG's approach.

SVG's Masterclass: Deceptive Speed and the Art of the Road Course

Ryan Flores immediately asked Petty — himself a Watkins Glen winner — how today's race compared to his era. Petty was struck by how the current track configuration, stripped of the high curbs at the bus stop that drivers had been exploiting, actually mirrors the layout he remembers from the early 1990s. But mostly, he was transfixed by van Gisbergen. "Watching him is truly amazing," Petty said. "He runs just fast enough to stay in front and then when it's time to go, he just catches another gear and goes somewhere else that no one else in the Cup Series can go right now."

Petty compared SVG's almost invisible speed to a memory from childhood: watching Dan Gurney race at Riverside. "You couldn't see that he was fast," Petty recalled. "And that's the way Shane is. You watch Shane and he is deceptively fast." The point wasn't merely stylistic — it has strategic implications. Todd Gordon picked up on this thread, noting that it becomes genuinely difficult to construct a pit strategy against a driver when you don't actually know how much he's holding in reserve. "I don't think we often see Shane van Gisbergen giving 100%," Gordon said. "I think we often see Shane running fast enough to keep cars behind him or keep in touch with cars. I think part of that is a strategy. Why show everybody how good you are and make them work on their cars?"

Petty connected this to what Leonard Wood told him about David Pearson — how Pearson would be shown a lap time and respond "it's not time to show it yet." The parallel felt apt: SVG, like Pearson, seems to carry something in reserve that only comes out when the race truly demands it. His post-race comment from the clip played on the show captured his genuine surprise at the pressure he faced: "There was a lot of pressure there. Connor was good, Tyler Reddick, there were some really good guys. Just stoked for these guys to execute every facet of our game."

Strategy Breakdown: How Do You Beat a Driver Nobody Can Measure?

Todd Gordon's appearance was the analytical centerpiece of the episode. He broke down the critical lap-61 pit stop decision — going four to five laps outside the expected pit window to try to manufacture an advantage over van Gisbergen. The logic was clear even if the outcome was already decided: "When you've got the dominant speed, you can do things differently and you're free, because you've got options," Gordon explained. "Shane could have saved fuel and won this race, too. He could have come at 61 and put four tires on, topped off with fuel, and gone back to the lead and just saved fuel in front of everybody. But why do that when you can put four tires on and let them play offense? That's a better show."

Flores set the scene: SVG rejoined from the caution on lap 40 back in 24th place, 29-plus seconds behind the leaders who were saving fuel. The broadcast booth was skeptical he could close it. Gordon was watching his own numbers on the box. "I looked at Mike Bagley and Alex Hayden. I said, 'He's going to pass him with 10 to go,'" Gordon recalled. "It was not even — they're like, what do you do? There's nothing you can do. You can't run hard because you run out of gas." Gordon and Petty agreed: when a driver is that dominant, teams must call alternate strategies rather than matching him move-for-move. "You've got to go against the car," Petty said plainly. "When a car is that good, you can't run the same strategy as he does and beat him."

Gordon also pointed out the data-gathering challenge SVG creates for competitors. Because SVG rarely shows his true ceiling, crew chiefs struggle to project whether their driver can actually close a gap. The RCR cars — both of them — nearly ran out of fuel at the finish, evidence that teams were stretched to the edge of their fuel models trying to stay out. The other piece Gordon noted: the pit box tools can tell you how much fuel you have, what pace you'll need, approximately where you'll blend back in traffic — but they can't account for SVG suddenly running four seconds faster than everyone through traffic when he catches a clean run.

Connor Zillich: The Next One?

The episode gave significant time to Connor Zillich, who had the fastest lap of the race before a right-front tire failure ended his challenge. Todd Gordon, who watched Zillich closely through the Xfinity race and even changed tires for him in the truck race on Friday, was enthusiastic: "I think in the next two years, we're going to see Connor Zillich match him. He has the innate pace that Shane's got. He's got to learn the savviness of racing these Cup cars."

Kyle Petty was equally bullish, but tied Zillich's upside directly to his youth. The key, Petty argued, is that younger drivers can actually learn SVG's right-foot braking technique because they haven't yet spent decades ingraining heel-and-toe muscle memory. "I couldn't drive without the clutch. All my timing was around heel and toe," Petty admitted, reflecting on his own career transition. "You take a Connor Zillich who's in the early part of his career — he can look at Shane's data and capitalize on that." When Joey Logano reportedly told the broadcast crew he was going to try heel-and-toe to match SVG, Petty was blunt: "If you hadn't been heel-and-toeing since day one, you're not going to heel-and-toe at this point in your career and catch up to Shane van Gisbergen. You're just not."

Flores also praised Zillich's maturity in person — he'd been on pit road with him and was struck by how composed and detailed the 19-year-old's radio feedback was. "You forget that he's 19 years old with his feedback and the way that he thinks about the race car," Flores said. "He's far ahead of anybody that age." Both Petty and Gordon agreed that the flat tire was driver-induced — locking the right front under heavy braking in the inner loop — but were careful to note that it was a natural consequence of aggressively pressuring a lead, not a sign of inexperience.

Kyle Petty's Hot Take: SVG Is Not the Greatest Road Racer Ever

One of the most lively exchanges of the episode came when Petty pushed back on a narrative gaining traction in NASCAR media circles. "I'm listening to TV and I'm reading stuff and everybody's telling me that SVG is the greatest road racer that ever sat in a Cup car," Petty said. "He's won seven races — but he's only been around four years. So you're telling me the greatest racer to ever sit in a Cup car has only been around four years?"

Petty was quick to credit SVG's talent. "I will give you that SVG is the class of the field at this point in time. I will give you that SVG is a great road racer worldwide." But he argued the historical comparison requires more time. He invoked Dan Gurney, Tim Richmond — "if you never saw Tim Richmond, you've never seen a road racer. I am telling you, the man was phenomenal" — and Jeff Gordon, who didn't just win road races but fundamentally changed how Cup drivers approached them.

Flores made the parallel Petty was gesturing at: Marcus Ambrose was every bit as gifted as SVG, but arrived in NASCAR having to relearn racing in what Petty colorfully called "a car designed off a '65 Ford station wagon" with coil springs and manual shifting. SVG, by contrast, stepped from Supercars — a modern, high-tech series — directly into the Next Gen car, which shares many of the same dynamics. "He got out of one supercar and got into another supercar and just picked up right where he left off," Petty said. "He did it on the streets of Chicago in the rain. We didn't know how to race in the rain." The conclusion was fair: SVG is extraordinary, but his circumstances — the timing, the equipment standardization, the availability of data — have set him up to look historically dominant in a way that may not be a purely apples-to-apples comparison with predecessors.

Joey Logano's Rough Stretch and the Mercy of the Racing Gods

The episode took a somber turn when the conversation moved to Joe Gibbs Racing — and specifically to Joey Logano, who finished outside the top 30 for what Flores counted as the third or fourth time this season. Last week it was a wreck on pit road after a clean race weekend. This week, a left-front tire failure.

Todd Gordon's take was practical: "The 22 team just needs a base hit. They need a race that doesn't have a problem with it." He pointed out that today's race had actually looked promising early — the No. 22 was running solidly inside the top 10 through the first stage before the tire failure ended their day. With the All-Star race next weekend (a non-points event), Gordon suggested that might give the team a needed reset before returning to Charlotte.

Kyle Petty, characteristically, reached for a broader truth. "Sometimes everything you do is right and sometimes everything you do is wrong, and you just have to ride it through that wrong period," he said. He offered a vivid illustration from his own driving days — finishing a race in second place only to pull the valve cover off and find six broken valve springs. "You think, how did we finish the race? Magic happens when the streak is on this side. And right now, Joey has no magic. But it'll come back, because that's the way — the racing gods give and they take." Gordon seconded the point with data: in 2017, the Penske No. 22 team had a rough year alongside driver and crew chief, and in 2018 they came back and won the championship. Process and belief, both men argued, are what keep a team from pointing fingers at each other when results aren't coming.

Trackhouse Racing: A Win That Could Save a Season

With SVG jumping from 19th in points up into the playoff cut at 16th — knocking out Chase Briscoe, Logano, and Ross Chastain in the process — the focus turned to what a win actually means culturally inside a struggling team. Kyle Petty was blunt about Trackhouse's season: "They've been just dismal this year." But he was equally emphatic that winning, even on a road course, changes everything in a shop.

"Winning is a habit," Petty said. "You learn to win and you want to win and you get better. Trackhouse had that going — Ross Chastain kicking butt, smashing watermelons. They had it going on. And then it's like somebody threw a wet blanket on it and they can't get out from under that wet blanket." He traced the shift back to the moment Rick Hendrick and NASCAR confronted Chastain over an aggressive move — "they went to a different place and they've not come back." SVG's win, Petty argued, gives the team a glimpse of what it can still be. "It is, yes, only on the road courses, but by God, we run a number of road courses, and you can make something out of that and you can prove to yourself that you can."

Flores pointed out that SVG still has a challenge ahead: oval tracks are where the points grind really happens, and the Trackhouse ovals program has been inconsistent. Last week at Texas, both SVG and Zillich finished around 16th and 17th — improvement, but not enough to win a championship. Petty was realistic: "Top 15s on ovals are not going to get you where you ultimately want to be. He's improving, and it's good to see, but at the same time that whole organization has got some work to do."

Odds and Ends: A Flying Tent, a Pit Road Confrontation, and Kaden Honeycutt's Weekend

The episode's lighter moments came thick and fast. A camping tent had somehow been caught by the wind during the race and blown directly onto the racing surface — Petty watched the clip in genuine disbelief. "I've seen wildlife on the racetrack. I've seen a guy standing in the middle of the racetrack in front of myself and Dave Allison at Pocono," he said. "But I've never seen a camping tent on the racetrack. I've just never seen that." Flores suggested the Go Bowling sponsor had missed a marketing opportunity: giant bowling pins in Turn 1 instead of tire packs. Petty was fully on board.

A post-race confrontation between Bubba Wallace and Christopher Bell was briefly shown — Petty had fun speculating ("I have no idea what this is, but maybe Bubba's saying, 'Hey, how would you like to go to Carl's Hardee's?'") before noting that Bell's body language was telling: "My man Bubba is dancing left, dancing right, he's got the hands — but Christopher never moves. Obviously Christopher thinks he was right."

For Weekend Winners, Petty went with RCR — Austin Dillon and Kyle Busch — praising their sixth and eighth-place finishes as momentum for a team that has struggled all year. "With a driver of the caliber of Kyle Bush, they're making no progress — and all of a sudden they go to a place and run solid top 10s," Petty said. "What does that do for a team?" Flores's winner was Kaden Honeycutt, who won the ARCA/CRA race and the truck race on Friday, then flew home to North Carolina and won both the pro late model and late model stock race at Ace Speedway — four wins in roughly 30 hours. Flores: "You cannot tell that guy he's got nothing right now."

The episode closed with warm tributes to Steve Letarte (son's graduation), all mothers on Mother's Day, and the Kyle Petty Charity Ride participants getting home safely.

Notable Quotes

Kyle Petty (on SVG's deceptive pace): "He runs just fast enough to stay in front and then when it's time to go, he just catches another gear and goes somewhere else that no one else in the Cup Series can go right now."

Todd Gordon (on strategy against SVG): "Speed fixes everything. When you've got the dominant speed, you can do things differently and you're free, because you've got options. Shane could have saved fuel and won this race, too."

Kyle Petty (on veteran drivers trying SVG's technique): "Joey Logano comes and says, 'I'm going to heel and toe.' Listen — if you hadn't been heel-and-toeing since day one, you're not going to heel-and-toe at this point in your career and catch up to Shane van Gisbergen. You're just not."

Kyle Petty (on SVG's historical ranking): "He's won seven races, but he's only been around four years. So you're telling me the greatest racer to ever sit in a Cup car has only been around four years? I saw Tim Richmond. If you never saw Tim Richmond, you've never seen a road racer."

Todd Gordon (watching SVG reel in the leaders): "I looked at Mike Bagley and Alex Hayden and I said, 'He's going to pass him with 10 to go.' They're like, what do you do? There's nothing you can do. You can't run hard because you run out of gas."

Kyle Petty (on Trackhouse's season and the power of a win): "It's like somebody threw a wet blanket on it and they can't get out from under that wet blanket. Shane gives them a glimpse out from under it — and if the people believe and pull in the same direction, that's what makes everything work."

Race: Go Bowling at The Glen — Watkins Glen International, Watkins Glen, New York

Date: May 10, 2026

Winner: Shane van Gisbergen, #97, Trackhouse Racing (Chevrolet)

Source: NASCAR Official YouTube Channel — Full Race Replay

Race Overview

Shane van Gisbergen delivered one of the most electric performances of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season at Watkins Glen International, executing a breathtaking final stint to claim his seventh career Cup Series win — and his second consecutive victory at The Glen. Starting from pole alongside front-row partner Michael McDowell, van Gisbergen dominated much of the 100-lap race aboard his Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet, leading 74 of 100 laps. But the story of the race came in the final third, when his crew chief Stephen Doran gambled on a green-flag pit stop with 25 laps remaining, sending SVG tumbling to the back of the lead lap with nearly 30 seconds to make up on race leader Ty Gibbs.

What followed was nothing short of extraordinary. On fresh tires against drivers running long stints, van Gisbergen carved through the field at an extraordinary pace, closing 29.2 seconds in just 18 laps. He swept past Gibbs for the lead with eight laps to go and pulled away to a 7.2-second margin of victory. The win was Trackhouse Racing's first of the 2026 season and a reminder that on any road course with SVG behind the wheel, the race is never truly over.

The race itself was a fitting showcase for Watkins Glen's status as one of NASCAR's premier road course events. Before a wheel was turned in anger, the race was briefly delayed by a sudden mini-tornado that swept through the infield area — an unusual and dramatic scene that set the tone for the chaos to follow. Teammate Connor Zilisch gave Trackhouse fans a second storyline to follow, running near the front all afternoon as a legitimate contender before a late tire issue derailed his bid for a top-five finish. In a subplot that drew attention on social media, Kyle Busch requested a doctor meet him at his hauler after the race, citing a lingering sinus cold that had bothered him throughout the weekend.

Stage-by-Stage Breakdown

Stage 1 (Laps 1–20)

Van Gisbergen grabbed the lead from the start and immediately built a cushion of more than two seconds over McDowell by lap 10. The field played strategy at the end of the stage, with most cars short-pitting to gain track position heading into Stage 2. Van Gisbergen was among those who pitted early, allowing Ross Chastain — who elected to stay out — to inherit the stage win in dramatic fashion. Chastain crossed the line ahead of Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney, Austin Cindric, and AJ Allmendinger. A wild three-wide battle for the final stage point saw McDowell and Riley Herbst squeeze Bubba Wallace to the line, with Wallace narrowly missing out on the bonus point.

Stage 1 Winner: Ross Chastain (#1, Trackhouse Racing)

Top 5: Chastain, Logano, Blaney, Cindric, Allmendinger

Stage 2 (Laps 21–50)

After the stage break pit cycle cycled through, van Gisbergen cycled back to the front and reasserted his dominance. Rookie Connor Zilisch emerged as a genuine threat, shadowing van Gisbergen through much of the stage and taking second away from McDowell with a bold inside move into Turn 1 on lap 27.

A caution on lap 40 for debris — a tent or canopy that had blown onto the track from the infield campground amid lingering weather — reshuffled the order. Van Gisbergen pitted from the lead with most of the field, while McDowell, Suarez, Bell, Wallace, Herbst, and Nemechek stayed out. The ensuing restart was chaotic: Herbst spun in Turn 1, Byron went off in the bus stop chicane with Blaney collecting him, and Gilliland also went around in the chaos. Van Gisbergen muscled through the carnage and reclaimed the lead easily, going on to win Stage 2 over Tyler Reddick, Ty Gibbs, Austin Dillon, and Kyle Busch.

Stage 2 Winner: Shane van Gisbergen (#97, Trackhouse Racing)

Top 5: van Gisbergen, Reddick, Gibbs, A. Dillon, K. Busch

Stage 3 (Laps 51–100)

Van Gisbergen led Reddick to the Stage 3 green flag and controlled the restart cleanly. The action paused when Joey Logano slowed with a flat tire on lap 60, scattering debris and triggering the race's third caution. Van Gisbergen and Reddick stayed out while the majority of the field dove to pit road. Gibbs won the race off pit road in 13th with fresh rubber — setting the stage for what was to come.

On the ensuing restart, Allmendinger got around Reddick for second. Reddick, struggling after contact, headed to pit road. With the race running green and his lead comfortable but the tire clock ticking, van Gisbergen executed the bold call: green-flag pit stop with 25 laps to go, cycling all the way back to 25th place with 30 seconds to recover. Gibbs inherited the lead, with Zilisch right behind him. Zilisch made a move for the lead at the bus stop on lap 89 but couldn't complete the pass, and shortly after suffered a tire issue that sent him to pit road, ending his shot at the win.

Key Incidents & Cautions

Caution 1 — Lap 40 (Stage 2, Debris): A tent or canopy blew from the campground area onto the racing surface. Led to a chaotic restart that eliminated William Byron from the top contenders — he and Ryan Blaney collided at the bus stop chicane, with Byron losing multiple laps.

Caution 2 — Stage 2 Restart chaos: Riley Herbst spun in Turn 1; Todd Gilliland also went around. No major damage but significant position shuffling, including Zilisch and Larson losing ground.

Caution 3 — Lap 60 (Stage 3, Logano flat tire): Joey Logano (#22, Team Penske) slowed with a right rear flat, shedding tire carcass onto the track and forcing the field to the pit lane. Logano ultimately finished last, 15 laps down.

Caution 4 — Late Stage 3 (Bubba Wallace spin): Wallace looped his #23 23XI Racing Toyota in Turn 1 but continued without damage. Race remained green.

Kyle Busch medical situation: Busch radioed his crew in Stage 3 asking them to have a doctor meet him at his hauler post-race, citing illness. He had been battling a sinus cold all week. He finished a season-best 8th and exited under his own power with no apparent emergency.

Mini-tornado pre-race delay: A sudden violent wind gust swept through the Watkins Glen infield before green flag time, scattering equipment and delaying the start of the event. The unusual weather phenomenon added drama before the first lap was even turned.

Spire teammates incident (Stage 1): Daniel Suarez (#7) and Carson Hocevar (#77) made contact, with Hocevar going on the radio to vent his frustration at his teammate. The intra-team tension was one of the day's notable storylines.

The Race Finish

With 25 laps to go, van Gisbergen peeled off the track from the lead on a green-flag stop, pitting for fresh tires while Ty Gibbs and most of the remaining leaders stayed out. SVG rejoined in 25th, over 29 seconds behind Gibbs with a seemingly impossible task ahead of him.

What followed was a masterclass in road course racecraft. Van Gisbergen sliced through the field with precision, using his tire advantage to consistently carry more speed through every corner. By 16 laps to go, he was 10th. By 12 laps to go, he was 5th with 9 seconds to close. With 10 laps remaining he was 3rd. With 9 laps to go, Zilisch — who had been pressuring Gibbs for the lead — suffered a tire problem and pitted, handing van Gisbergen second place.

Eight laps from the finish, van Gisbergen dove inside Gibbs at the bus stop chicane and completed the pass for the race lead. From there, it was no contest. He pulled away and crossed the finish line 7.288 seconds ahead of McDowell, who had also made up ground in the closing laps. Gibbs held on for third. The No. 97 Chevrolet passed post-race inspection without issue, making the result official.

"Unbelievable to win with 97," said van Gisbergen. "This SuperFile Chevy was great. Thank you to Trackhouse. We weren't very good in practice, and then qualifying was amazing. Then Stephen made great calls. To run them down — very, very special to do two in a row."

Top 10 Finishers

| Pos | # | Driver | Team | Manufacturer | Interval |

|-----|---|--------|------|-------------|----------|

| 1 | 97 | Shane van Gisbergen | Trackhouse Racing | Chevrolet | — |

| 2 | 71 | Michael McDowell | Spire Motorsports | Chevrolet | +7.288s |

| 3 | 54 | Ty Gibbs | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota | +16.531s |

| 4 | 19 | Chase Briscoe | Joe Gibbs Racing | Toyota | +19.253s |

| 5 | 45 | Tyler Reddick | 23XI Racing | Toyota | +19.372s |

| 6 | 3 | Austin Dillon | Richard Childress Racing | Chevrolet | +20.941s |

| 7 | 16 | AJ Allmendinger | Kaulig Racing | Chevrolet | +21.518s |

| 8 | 8 | Kyle Busch | Richard Childress Racing | Chevrolet | +22.302s |

| 9 | 2 | Austin Cindric | Team Penske | Ford | +22.421s |

| 10 | 42 | John Hunter Nemechek | Legacy Motor Club | Toyota | +25.438s |

Championship Implications

Tyler Reddick continues to lead the Cup Series standings with 567 points, and while his 5th-place finish was solid, he did not gain additional ground on his nearest pursuers. Denny Hamlin sits 129 points back in second, with Chase Elliott third at -145 and Ryan Blaney fourth at -162.

Van Gisbergen's win is his first of 2026 and moves him to 16th in points at -284 — just inside the playoff cutline. His win locks him into the playoffs regardless of where he finishes in points. For McDowell (2nd, 21st in points at -342) and Briscoe (4th, 17th at -290), the strong finishes were important boosts in their own postseason pushes. The playoff cutline currently runs between positions 16 (van Gisbergen) and 17 (Briscoe), with several winless drivers in the mix below the line still vying for points.

The result also underscored the unique nature of SVG's NASCAR career: all seven of his Cup Series wins have come on road or street courses, making him the most dominant road course driver in the modern era of the sport. Back-to-back Watkins Glen wins cement that reputation.

Race Stats

• Laps: 100 (245 miles, 2.45-mile road course)
• Race Time: 2 hours, 29 minutes, 10.903 seconds
• Average Speed: 98.538 mph
• Lead Changes: 6 among 4 drivers
• Laps Led — Van Gisbergen: 74
• Cautions: 4 (for 12 laps)
• Stage 1 Winner: Ross Chastain (#1, Trackhouse Racing)
• Stage 2 Winner: Shane van Gisbergen (#97, Trackhouse Racing)
• Margin of Victory: 7.288 seconds
• Van Gisbergen career wins: 7 (all road/street courses)
• Trackhouse Racing 2026 wins: 1 (first of season)

Sources: NASCAR.com, Motorsport.com, RacingNews.co, Yahoo Sports, FOX Sports

YouTube Replay: Go Bowling at The Glen | NASCAR Cup Series Full Race Replay

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, May 10, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: Go Bowling at The Glen — Watkins Glen International, Watkins Glen, NY

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3F3ij7RzZU

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi recorded a wide-ranging, 71-minute Teardown from Watkins Glen International after Shane van Gisbergen delivered one of the most jaw-dropping drives of the modern Cup era — erasing a 29.2-second deficit in 25 laps to win by 7.3 seconds. But this episode was about far more than a race result. It was a portrait of a complicated weekend: stunning Finger Lakes scenery contrasted against flooded, mud-ravaged campsites; an undeniable once-in-a-generation talent on full display against a first 75 laps that Jordan admitted nearly had him Door Dash-ing cold brew coffee just to stay awake. The GOAT debate over SVG's road course legacy consumed the first third of the show in trademark Teardown fashion — one host certain, one hedging — before a sweep of the rest of the Cup field, an emotional Xfinity race postmortem, and a final segment that took on Preece's penalty appeal and Dover's existential crisis.

It was Jordan Bianchi's first time at Watkins Glen, and his genuine awe at the scenery set an unusual tone for a show that otherwise had to reckon with NASCAR's scheduling miscalculation. The episode balanced legitimate criticism of race conditions and race entertainment with real appreciation for something rare: watching the best road course driver of a generation simply refuse to lose.

Jordan's First Time at the Glen — and the Mud

Jeff noted early that this was Jordan's debut at Watkins Glen, and Bianchi did not hold back his enthusiasm for the region: "This is the most picturesque place on the circuit. This area of the country is gorgeous. Napa Valley is a close second, but just driving in and the scenery, the rolling hills, the water — it's incredible." He told listeners to make the trip, praising the wineries and restaurants in the area.

The problem, however, was that Sunday race-day beauty could not erase three days of misery. "Thursday, Friday, Saturday were those kind of days," Jordan said. "This place is an absolute mud pit." He spoke with genuine empathy for fans who had paid to camp on the grounds. "I feel horrible for everybody that came out to this race and spent the night here in campers — people that couldn't even get into their campsites having to be towed." Jeff echoed that, noting that Jordan — who notoriously does not enjoy getting his shoes dirty — had a particular kind of empathy for the situation.

Both hosts agreed that NASCAR effectively got ahead of the story by announcing, before the weekend was even over, that Watkins Glen would move to the Chase in 2026. "By the time you got to Thursday, they were like: 'Great news everybody, we're moving to the Chase next year. See you,'" Jeff said. Jordan's frustration was pointed: "Everybody knew this. There was a very easy way to fix this and make a lot of people happy. And instead — it didn't have to be this way."

SVG's Comeback: One of the Greatest Drives in Modern Motorsports

The centerpiece of the episode was SVG's closing charge. With 25 laps to go, van Gisbergen emerged from pit road in 26th place, 29.2 seconds behind leader Ty Gibbs. He had fresh tires while the leaders were fuel-saving on worn rubber — and he is SVG. "One of the more remarkable drives through the field that you'll ever see in motorsports," Jeff said flatly. "Not only did he erase the 29.2-second deficit, but then he won by 7.2 seconds on top of that."

Jordan's call was equally emphatic: "Watching SVG just go all out in attack mode was just — that's what it's about. One of the best to ever do this." He compared it to an IMSA race with a separate P1 class: "SVG's in his own class and it's just an absolute incredible drive to witness."

Jeff recounted the moment of suspense: early in the charge, even with fresh tires, the gap seemed insurmountable. "Up until 15 laps to go, it was like, I don't know. Even after the first few laps, you're like: he's still got a long way to go." The turning point was when it dropped to 15 seconds with 15 to go. "I was seeing people on X: 'Nah, it's not going to be enough.' Sure enough, it was." Jordan added crucial context: SVG wasn't just passing backmarkers. He was passing cars that had every incentive to race him hard. "He was having to pass cars for position in the final stage of the race. People had incentive to at least try to race him hard. All it needs is a couple of guys to hold him up and he's not making the time — but he was just able to keep going."

SVG himself told reporters in the post-race press conference that it was one of the greatest races he had ever driven in his life. Drivers in the garage, by contrast, were largely miserable: "This was no fun. I didn't like this at all."

The GOAT Debate: SVG vs. Jeff Gordon (and Marcus Ambrose)

Jeff came in hot: "Is this a sign that he is the best road course driver of all time?" Jordan's computer froze at the exact moment the question was posed, prompting Jeff to quip: "Jordan froze his own computer right when I asked this question."

When Jordan returned, he did what Jordan does — shifted the goalposts from "not yet" to "why do we have to make a declarative statement right now?" Jeff pushed back hard: "I just don't see how you can deny it at this point. Who else is going to be the best ever?" Jordan's counter: win percentage still favors Jeff Gordon, and greatness requires longevity. "It's like Terrell Davis from your beloved Broncos. He was incredible in a short window — but greatness is also about longevity."

Jeff pinned him down on specifics. SVG currently has seven Cup road course wins, tied with Chase Elliott for third all-time. Tony Stewart is at eight, Jeff Gordon is at nine. "How many more wins? Just tell us what he has to do," Jeff demanded. Jordan finally gave a number: "I would like to see him hold the all-time record for road course wins." Jeff immediately calculated: "So maybe by early summer — we'll go from 'not ready to proclaim him greatest all time yet' to 'potentially' in a few months." Jordan's concession: "Potentially."

Jeff also raised Marcus Ambrose as a fun historical footnote — once considered the best road course talent he'd ever seen in a stock car — before concluding he was already comfortable saying SVG is the greatest. "Before I said this a few wins ago, right? The talent alone." Jordan's final dig: SVG gets more bites at the apple with the current schedule weighted toward road courses than Gordon ever had. Jeff acknowledged that, but said he wasn't measuring SVG by opportunity — he had already declared him the GOAT. The chat, Jeff noted, wanted them to move on.

The First 75 Laps: An Honest Reckoning

Both hosts were candid about the race's entertainment value before SVG's charge. Jordan's most memorable admission: "There was a point where I was getting so tired I thought of like ordering Door Dash coffee. I mean, I just ended up making a cup of coffee, but I was like, I need extra caffeine here to get through."

Jeff put it structurally: the predictability problem is SVG. "Nobody's going to be able to do anything with this guy. In the garage before the race, talking to crew chiefs, everybody said the same thing — unless the 97 team completely takes a shotgun to their foot, this is their race. And once it became clear they're going to play this straightforward, it just felt inevitable."

The Conor Zilisch subplot briefly broke the malaise. When Zilisch got into the mix with SVG in the early laps, Jordan said, "Okay, now we got something going." But Zilisch went off strategy, had a tire go down, and ultimately finished 20th. "We didn't get to fully see the battle play out," Jordan lamented. "Thank goodness Zilisch was in this race, because now SVG can't get away. And thank goodness SVG was in this race, because Zilisch was about to maybe just destroy the field."

On the "Was It a Good Race?" poll, Jeff predicted 38.1%, Jordan predicted 43%, and Chase Briscoe — whom Jordan spoke with at the track — predicted just 32%. Jeff noted that last year's Watkins Glen SVG win scored 28%. "The end of this race is what people are going to remember," Jordan argued in defense of a higher number.

Field Notes: HMS Disaster, Track House Split, RCR Surprise

The bigger story in the Cup field was Hendrick Motorsports. No HMS cars finished in the top 20: Kyle Larson 23rd, Chase Elliott 24th, Alex Bowman 25th, William Byron 36th after an incident. "If you're Hendrick Motorsports, you don't like this at all," Jordan said. He pointed to a silver lining — road courses are not in the new Chase format — but warned: "You left a lot of points on the table. The 24 hasn't looked right for a while, and you don't know — someone gets hot and jumps ahead of you, next thing you know you're in the bubble." Jeff agreed: "This was a race where Chase Elliott came in saying 'Watkins Glen was really bad for us last year, we really got to get better.' And then no HMS cars in the top 20."

At Track House, the day was a split verdict. SVG checked the box for the team, but Ross Chastain ended up 27th after a strategy misfire that required a pit stop with eight laps to go. "They got off strategy, lost track position, and never got it back," Jordan summarized. He emphasized that while SVG provided a lifeline, the team cannot build an organization solely around road course excellence. "You have to be good on ovals. They've got to figure that part out."

RCR had a quietly remarkable day. Austin Dillon finished 6th — "holy cow," Jeff said — and Kyle Busch finished 8th despite reportedly needing some kind of medical attention during the race for a sinus issue. Jordan noted that the Andy Street partnership for Busch appeared to have genuine chemistry, and encouraged patience: "I just wouldn't write off Kyle Busch yet, even though it's hard not to."

RFK Racing underwhelmed. Jeff had expected Buescher — a Watkins Glen winner who beat SVG here before — to contend for a top five. He finished 12th. Keselowski had issues and faded to 30th. "Chris is so underrated, arguably one of the most underrated drivers in the garage," Jordan said. "He's just so good in these races, and for whatever reason they just didn't have it today."

Michael McDowell finished second, also driving through the field from a deep deficit after a first-stop strategy error. "He came all the way through the field too — he was 20-something seconds back and still finished 7.3 seconds behind SVG," Jeff noted. For McDowell, still 21st in points, it was the solid points day he desperately needed.

Incidents and Sideshows: Bubba vs. Bell, Cody Ware's Wall, and the Flying Tent

Bubba Wallace and Christopher Bell had a post-race confrontation that caught attention. Jordan provided background from one party's perspective: there had been contact on track, some confusion about pit road access, and that triggered the face-to-face moment. Jeff added what he had heard: "I was told it was much to do about nothing — just frustration, a bad day for both parties, move on kind of thing. But they're also Toyota teammates."

Cody Ware's crash commanded a segment of its own. Ware hit the wall so hard that the Armco barrier bent visibly — photos circulated on social media showing the damage. It was not called a caution. "I'd like a little more clarity on that," Jeff said. He noted the crash may not have been visible to NASCAR officials in real time, and Ware was able to drive the car away. "Cody Ware wrecking late in a race that SVG is winning on a road course," Jeff observed, "is becoming a thing."

Then there was the tent. A large tent blew off the infield and onto the racing surface, forcing a caution. Jeff got poetic about the track feed footage: "A gust came in and just lifted it off the track and shot it outside — it looked like something out of Mary Poppins." Jordan confirmed Fox caught the initial landing, but the aerial departure was track-feed-only. The day also featured wind-driven dust devils visible from the grandstands, punctuating the strange atmospheric conditions throughout.

Xfinity / O'Reilly Series: Jesse Love's Heartbreak and Zilisch's Close Call

The weekend's emotional gut punch came in the O'Reilly (Xfinity) race, where Jesse Love led late and overcook the final corner, handing the win to Conor Zilisch — who was charging hard — as he ran off track. Jordan described Love's post-race interviews as wrenching: "He was trembling. He just sat in his race car for 90 seconds, didn't want to get out, and then just trembling when talking to the media. It's just like, man, you could just tell how bad he wanted this."

Jordan put Love's heartbreak in fuller context. Love's best friend is Conor Zilisch. In the O'Reilly series last year, Zilisch was the story even as Love won the championship. "You see your best friend having all this success. Your best friend, in his first full season, goes out and blows everyone's doors off. And you haven't beaten him yet on a road course — his bread and butter — and that would have been the signature win, and then it slips away by a mistake." Love's quote from the aftermath: "This is the worst pain I've ever experienced. I'm just embarrassed with myself and frustrated."

Jeff pushed back on Love being too hard on himself. "He had a chance to win. Zilisch was bouncing off two walls, had his tires smoking, ran over curbs. It's part of it." Jordan agreed: "I think Jesse was being incredibly hard on himself, but I still understand where he was coming from."

Both hosts praised the O'Reilly series product overall. Jordan called it "the best it's ever been. The CW is great — the announcing, camera work, everything. I look forward to watching it every week." He cautioned against the knee-jerk reaction of saying the Xfinity car should be the Cup car, citing the role of developing drivers and limited engineering resources in creating the series' entertaining unpredictability. He also flagged a real concern: parts shortages for the current car, and what NASCAR's long-term plan looks like for both Xfinity and the Truck Series.

Kaden Honeycut's Historic Four-Win Weekend

Jordan spotlighted Kaden Honeycut's extraordinary weekend, in which he won four races: the ARCA race, the Truck Series race, and swept two Cars Tour races. Jordan had spoken with him after the ARCA win: "He told me, 'I've got to learn to be better on restarts in late-race situations.' Then a few hours later in the trucks, late-race restart — managed it perfectly." Jordan called it a breakout moment for a driver Toyota has long believed in, and projected Honeycut to reach Cup "in 2028."

Ryan Preece's Penalty Appeal: And What They'd Pay to Watch It

Preece is appealing his 25-point, $50,000 fine for wrecking Kyle Busch at Texas. Jeff explained his assessment: "I think they have a decent case. He could argue, 'Yes, I said what I was going to do on the radio 30 minutes ago, but look at what I actually did — I just didn't lift when he cut down in front of me.'" Jeff noted the penalty was partially built on Preece's radio communications before the contact.

But the real discussion became: how much would they pay to watch a live stream of the appeal? Jeff: "$50." Jordan: "I'd pay more than that. An infinite amount. If that gives me access to Denny Hamlin's action-detrimental appeal, all the RCR Austin Dillon appeals — here's all my money." They eventually converged around $100, with a theoretical sliding scale for higher-stakes appeals.

Jordan argued the appeals system is a remnant of old-school NASCAR opacity and advocated for transparency: "Everything in this sport should be made as much black and white as possible, with very little gray area. There should be a clear line in the sand — drivers should know going forward, this I can do, this I can't. And there's not. It's just going to continue to be this ambiguity, and it's not good."

Dover All-Star Race: Genuine Concern from the Garage

The show closed on what Jeff called genuine industry worry about Dover's future. Jordan reported multiple conversations with garage insiders this weekend: "I can't tell you how many people came up to me and were just like, 'What are we doing?'"

Dover last hosted a points race in 1969 before losing one of its two dates, and now has the All-Star race — an event that, both hosts agreed, does not suit Dover's character as a long-green-flag oval. Jordan: "Most people don't think it's going to be very exciting. Dover's a good track, but it's built on long green-flag runs and that kind of thing — it's not conducive for an all-star race format." Ticket sales, he said he had heard, were "iffy."

Jeff turned the tables: "How does Dover get back to having a points race, Jordan?" Neither host had a clean answer. North Wilkesboro appears entrenched on the schedule after its return; displacing another venue would require a political fight no one is eager to start. The segment ended unresolved but with clarity that the concern is real among people inside the garage.

Jeff signed off with one last dig at Jordan: "You were the SVG of this show in the last segment — driving back up through the field, erasing your horrible mistake earlier by not mentioning he is already the GOAT." Jordan, unbothered, confirmed it: "Watkins Glen P1, baby."

Championship Implications

SVG's win vaulted him to 16th in points, now one race from the halfway point of the regular season with more road courses ahead. Jeff noted the tight bubble: "He's within four points of Austin Cindric, within 12 of Suarez, within 13 of Preece — who now wants those 25 points back — and Logano is still lurking despite finishing last again today." Jordan had not projected SVG to make the playoffs before the season began, but now said flatly: "If he can just figure out a way to hold serve, the playoffs are certainly a possibility."

At the top, Tyler Reddick's points lead over Denny Hamlin stands at 129. The entire Hendrick organization lost ground, with Chase Elliott, Kyle Larson, and especially William Byron all bleeding points on a track that seemed to expose persistent weaknesses. Byron — now 12th in points — fell further from the top-three seed conversation. Jordan warned the 24 team that Charlotte would be a revealing checkpoint.

Notable Quotes

Jeff (on SVG's closing charge): "One of the more remarkable drives through the field that you'll ever see in motorsports. Not only did he erase the 29.2-second deficit, but then he won by 7.2 seconds on top of that."

Jordan (on SVG's inevitability): "It just felt like this was SVG's race and everybody else is just racing for second place."

Jeff (on the GOAT debate): "I just don't see how you can deny it at this point. Who else is going to be the best ever?"

Jordan (on Jesse Love's heartbreak): "He was trembling when talking to the media. It's just like, man — you could just tell how bad he wanted this. Your best friend is lighting the world on fire and you haven't beaten him yet on a road course, and that would have been the signature win, and then it slips away by a mistake."

Jordan (on streaming penalty appeals): "Infinite amount. If that gives me access to Denny Hamlin's action-detrimental appeal, all the RCR Austin Dillon appeals — here's all my money. I'm all in."

Jordan (on Dover's future): "A track that has had a points race since 1969 doesn't have a points race. We sit here and talk about tradition in this sport and getting back to our roots — and yet this year's All-Star race is at a track that hosted points races for decades, and now it's got an All-Star race that nobody's excited about."

Jeff (on the first 75 laps): "I think SVG felt inevitable going in — especially after he wins the pole — and once it became clear they're going to play this straightforward, it just felt like his race and everybody else is just watching."

Sources: Teardown episode transcript via YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3F3ij7RzZU), race results via NASCAR.com.

Podcast: The GluckCast (Episode 12)

Network: The Athletic / Dirty Mo Media

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Chad Knaus (VP of Competition, Hendrick Motorsports; NASCAR Hall of Famer); Alan Cavanna (NASCAR reporter); James Hinchcliffe (IndyCar commentator and former driver)

Date: May 7, 2026

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis

Episode Overview

Episode 12 of the GluckCast is Jeff Gluck's most star-studded and wide-ranging installment yet. With the NASCAR Cup Series heading to Watkins Glen for a cold, rainy Mother's Day weekend, Gluck assembles a panel that covers Hendrick Motorsports' trajectory, a simmering controversy over NASCAR's retaliation penalty enforcement, Ryan Blaney's future, Carson Hocevar's rising cultural cachet, and a deep IndyCar and Formula 1 preview courtesy of James Hinchcliffe.

The anchor interview is a rare sit-down with Chad Knaus — the seven-time Cup champion crew chief now serving as Hendrick Motorsports' VP of Competition — who offers candid assessments of all four HMS cars and how the new points format changes the championship equation. Alan Cavanna, a fellow NASCAR reporter and longtime friend of Gluck's, then joins to dissect the dueling retaliation incidents from Texas involving Ryan Preece and Kyle Busch. The two reach a stark conclusion: under NASCAR's current enforcement posture, the only rule a driver must follow is don't say it on the radio. Finally, Hinchcliffe previews the Month of May at Indianapolis, reflects on his first NASCAR truck start at St. Pete, and offers a running F1 analysis that draws a fascinating parallel between Kimi Antonelli's current dominance and Oscar Piastri's title run a year ago.

Chad Knaus on Hendrick Motorsports: Chase Elliott, Kyle Larson, and a New Role

Jeff opened by framing the conversation around the central storyline of Hendrick's season: Chase Elliott has two wins in the first 11 races despite Chevrolet debuting a new body, yet each of the four HMS cars carries its own narrative heading into the summer stretch. Knaus, joining live from the Hendrick campus just days after Texas, was direct and plainly enthusiastic about where the organization stands.

On the No. 9 team and Elliott's championship ceiling, Knaus was unequivocal. "Nothing," he said when Gluck asked what the team still needed. "They don't need anything. They're there." Knaus praised crew chief Alan McDonald and Elliott's combination of youth and experience: "He is still really young. And, you know, I think he is getting better and better." He added that the pit crew has been together long enough to execute under pressure, calling it "a very rock steady team."

Knaus was somewhat more measured on the No. 5 and Kyle Larson, acknowledging the frustration of a team that is fast but bleeding points. "We don't want to give up points ever," he said, adding that despite Atlanta, Darlington, and Texas setbacks, he trusts that Cliff Daniels, car chief Jesse Saunders, and Larson himself have the ability to "overcome an awful lot." Gluck noted that Larson is eighth in points — only 15 behind sixth-seed Carson Hocevar, but a troubling 91 points behind third-seed Chase Elliott. Knaus conceded the situation without panic: "To go through a period of time where you're just a little bit below the radar doesn't always stink either."

On William Byron and the No. 24, Knaus said the speed has been undeniable — fastest in practice at Texas, despite a spin that cost him — but translating that pace into results is the remaining step. "We want them to be able to close the deal where they're at? For sure," he said. "He absolutely loves Charlotte Motor Speedway... William is really good on road courses." Knaus expressed genuine confidence the team will be where they need to be before the Chase.

Alex Bowman and the No. 48 got perhaps the most surprising defense. Despite Bowman's health setbacks and missed races, Knaus said the team is as strong internally as it has ever been and is 83 points out of making the owners' Chase. "Just you don't know," he said. "Dover is absolutely Alex's best racetrack from my perspective. He goes there, he's won." Knaus praised crew chief Blake Harris and said the pick crew is doing an excellent job.

Navigating the New Chase: Knaus on the Seeding Era

One of the most analytically rich exchanges of the episode came when Gluck pressed Knaus on how this year's points-driven seeding format differs from the original Chase era Knaus dominated with Jimmie Johnson. Gluck pointed out that in the old 10-race Chase, Knaus and Johnson's championship-winning average finishes were often in the fifth-place range — a standard that today's playoff champions never had to meet.

Knaus said the format change introduces new complexity because stage points and starting position now compound throughout the race: "You're going to have to be on point for qualifying straightaway... and then you get a result of where you're getting closer to stages." He predicted early-Chase chaos as drivers — still mentally conditioned by the "win and you're in" playoff era — continue to make overly aggressive moves and then feel "buyer's remorse." But he expects that to settle, after which the final standings will demand the kind of sustained single-digit performances he engineered in the early Chase era. "In the end," he said, "you're going to want to have some very, very high finishes to be able to pull this off."

Gluck later noted that as of 11 races in, Denny Hamlin would effectively be the conventional points leader, sitting at 417 — nearly identical to William Byron's 421 points at this stage of 2025. The anomaly is Tyler Reddick, who sits at 526 points, a 109-point advantage over Hamlin — driven in part by 75 bonus points from wins, though even subtracting those, Reddick's lead remains historically unusual. FanDuel has Reddick at +430 and Hamlin at +500 to win the championship, followed by Larson, Blaney, Bell, Elliott, Byron, and Briscoe.

Alan Cavanna: The "Don't Say It" Rule and the Preece Penalty

The sharpest segment of the episode came when NASCAR reporter Alan Cavanna joined to help Gluck untangle what appeared to be a contradictory week of penalty enforcement. Ryan Preece was docked 25 points and fined $50,000 for intentionally wrecking Ty Gibbs at Texas — a penalty that essentially erased an entire race's worth of points. Kyle Busch, widely perceived to have retaliated against John Hunter Nemechek in an even more obvious fashion, received no penalty whatsoever.

Cavanna said he was initially surprised by the Preece penalty given how the two incidents looked side-by-side. "If you were just looking at the two and you told me one of them was going to get penalized and one wasn't, I would have said, 'Oh, the Kyle Bush one.'" But the determining factor, both men agreed, was Preece calling his shot on the team radio before doing it. "Ryan Priest was his own worst enemy," Cavanna said. "What do you expect NASCAR to do? NASCAR can't hear this and just let it slide."

Gluck pushed back on the uncomfortable implication: NASCAR's approach now rewards opacity and penalizes honesty. He brought up Bubba Wallace and Denny Hamlin's previous incidents, where admissions led directly to fines. "We're trying to ask questions — 'What happened?' — and if you say what you did, then you're going to get the penalty," Gluck said. "It's sort of a double message." Cavanna acknowledged the tension but held firm: "As long as you don't give us the evidence, we're gonna let it go. That's the interpretation I have from NASCAR. The only rule drivers have to follow is don't admit you did it."

Cavanna noted that this is not necessarily a reckless stance — NASCAR has given extraordinary latitude, pointing to the Kyle Busch incident as proof the league has no desire to become the wild west. "Our eyes, the data, everything can tell us that's probably what happened, but NASCAR let it go." Gluck noted that RFK Racing had not yet decided whether to appeal as of taping, but both agreed that if the goal is to reduce the penalty, arguing that the act wasn't that egregious in a vacuum might have merit — even if the radio admission made it open-and-shut from NASCAR's perspective.

Ryan Blaney Re-Signs, and the Question of Loyalty vs. Opportunity

Gluck and Cavanna spent considerable time on Ryan Blaney's early contract extension with Team Penske — notable because Blaney was not even a free agent this year. Bob Pockrass had reported that the deal locks him in through the end of next season at minimum.

Jeff's analysis was characteristically layered. He walked through the theoretical landscape: Hendrick has Larson, Elliott, and Byron locked up with questions only around the No. 48; JGR has Bell, Ty Gibbs, and Chase Briscoe entrenched, with Denny Hamlin the only near-term departure. "If you're going to leave Penske," Gluck argued, "the only options where you could go would be Hendrick or JGR, because otherwise it's too much of a risk." And even there, Blaney would not be the lead driver. "Would he be the number one guy at Hendrick? No. Behind Larson, Elliott, and Byron." Cavanna agreed that Blaney is arguably running as well as anyone in NASCAR this year — manufacturing top-10s even when the Ford package is not the fastest — and that staying as the number-one driver on the premier Ford team is a defensible bet. "There are people in the garage that will tell you he's the best driver in NASCAR right now," Cavanna said.

Gluck added an interesting wrinkle to the modern era argument: in a world of spec cars and full information-sharing between teammates, being the top driver at a strong team may actually be more advantageous than joining a four-car superteam where you're racing your own teammates on identical setups every week.

Carson Hocevar: The Next Carl Edwards?

Both Gluck and Cavanna were enthusiastic about what Carson Hocevar has been doing off the track — attending the Met Gala, dirt late model racing the very next night — while also tracking his rising stock in the standings.

Gluck invoked Carl Edwards as the clearest parallel: someone who arrived quietly, won races quickly, did backflips, and hit magazines. Cavanna added Casey Kahne to the comparison, noting the "ladies loved him, guys wanted to be him" cultural moment Kahne created. For Hocevar, Cavanna sees the rare convergence of an authentic digital presence, a famous NASCAR-adjacent friendship (Cleetus McFarland), and on-track results that are beginning to validate the hype. "He can exploit both those fan bases," Cavanna said — old-school track fans who know nothing about Twitch, and Gen Z audiences who may never have watched a lap of Talladega until they saw a TikTok of his win celebration.

On the question of Most Popular Driver, Gluck suggested it's possible if Hocevar wins two or three more times and contends deep in the Chase. Cavanna was cautious, invoking Kyle Larson's failed challenge to Chase Elliott's winning streak: "Chase Elliott fans do that very, very well... they come out in elections." But he conceded that Hocevar has more cultural lanes than any driver in recent memory, and that "all those lanes are only going to help him — they all add up eventually."

Watkins Glen Preview: SVG, Cold Mud, and Connor Zilisch

Cavanna, a Syracuse graduate who knows upstate New York intimately, was blunt about the miserable conditions awaiting fans at Watkins Glen for the Mother's Day weekend race. "People don't love to camp when it's 40 degrees out," he said. "Let's wake up and have a great Mother's Day — 35 degrees. That's just not fun." He called August the only truly sensible time for Watkins Glen and expressed hope that the date is reconsidered.

On the racing side, Gluck noted Shane van Gisbergen's extraordinary track record at the Glen — a 1.5 average finish in the NextGen era, third in laps led despite missing his first two NASCAR road course starts there. Bubba Wallace provided a colorful quote about Tyler Reddick: "Can't count out Little Baby Jesus Reddick. Can't count him out." SVG himself, asked if the prospect of rain excited him, was characteristically dry: "No, I hate racing in the rain, but I'm good at it."

Gluck highlighted Connor Zilisch as a potential wildcard, noting that Trackhouse's young phenom was reportedly one of the best wet-weather drivers in the world during his karting days — racing Kimi Antonelli in the rain. All three Trackhouse cars are doing the weekend's triple header, which could work in their favor given the team's road course strength.

One notable technical development: NASCAR is installing tire pack barriers in Turn 1 at the Glen — spread out with gaps rather than a solid wall — to deter the wide running that has been commonplace since the gravel trap was removed. A solid tire wall was also added at the carousel, which SVG expressed concern could bounce cars back onto the circuit. It will be one of the first major tests of NASCAR's new tire pack philosophy on a traditional road course.

James Hinchcliffe: Month of May, Pato O'Ward, and the Kimi Antonelli Parallel

Jeff welcomed James Hinchcliffe — "the mayor of Hinchtown" — for a wide-ranging motorsports discussion that stretched from the Indianapolis Motor Speedway to the streets of Miami.

On the IndyCar Indy 500 field, Hinchcliffe named Pato O'Ward as the clear road course favorite heading into the IMS road race, then pivoted to the oval picture. He highlighted David Malukas and Kyle Kirkwood alongside the expected names — O'Ward and Josef Newgarden (coming off back-to-back oval wins) — as his drivers to watch. "You can never count out anyone that's won this race before," he added, citing Will Power and Ryan Hunter-Reay.

Gluck asked about the state of the IndyCar paddock given the string of positive viewership numbers and the growing Fox Sports relationship. Hinchcliffe was optimistic: "These incremental gains start to compound as soon as a few more people start watching... it just kind of increases exponentially and we're starting to see a little bit of that growth now." He cited the DC race and the new Markham, Canada event (replacing downtown Toronto) as events he's excited about.

The F1 conversation produced the episode's most intellectually interesting sideline. Kimi Antonelli has been dominant at Mercedes in 2026, with teammate George Russell struggling to assert himself — a near-identical dynamic, Hinchcliffe noted, to Oscar Piastri eventually eclipsing Lando Norris at McLaren in 2025. "This is almost just a copy and paste, control-C, control-V of last year," he said. His read: tracks like Monaco and Barcelona — where Russell has historically excelled — will be the test of whether George can reassert himself, much as Norris eventually did last season.

Hinchcliffe also shared his experience making his first NASCAR Truck Series start at St. Pete with Spire Motorsports, where he earned a top-10. He said what surprised him most was the sheer amount of free time compared to IndyCar. "When you don't have data, I was just floored how much free time I had. You realize what a slave to the computer you are as an IndyCar driver." He praised the truck series drivers for managing cars he called "a handful," and said he would love to do it again.

The episode closed with a brief preview of "The Weenie 500" — an actual hot dog racing event at Indianapolis on Carb Day, live on Fox this year — which Hinchcliffe will call alongside his broadcast duties. "Peak broadcast career accomplishment," he deadpanned. "I'm not sure what you can do more impressive than that."

JGR vs. Spire Lawsuit Update

In a brief but important sidebar, Gluck noted that last week's interview with Spire Motorsports owner Jeff Dickerson — where Dickerson addressed the JGR trade secrets lawsuit — generated significant attention, including a public response from Denny Hamlin on X and in the media center. In the interest of fairness, Gluck read a statement from Heather Gibbs representing JGR's position. The statement framed the lawsuit as purely about protecting trade secrets admittedly stolen by a former employee in a manner "meant to avoid detection," with Spire subsequently hiring that employee. JGR also moved to amend the lawsuit this week to include Spire's markedly improved on-track performance as further supporting evidence.

Notable Quotes

Chad Knaus (on the Chase Elliott / No. 9 team): "Nothing. They don't need anything. They're there... The team is hitting on all eight cylinders and where they need to be."

Chad Knaus (on his new VP role vs. crew chief): "I can't be [technically ingrained] with a few hundred people that kind of work through and underneath my umbrella. But I have a really good time working with the crew chiefs trying to get them the tools that they need... that's where I get my competitive edge right now."

Alan Cavanna (on NASCAR's retaliation enforcement): "The only rule drivers have to follow is don't admit you did it and we're not going to penalize you. And we continually see drivers not follow that one simple rule."

Jeff Gluck (on the Priest/Busch disparity): "We want drivers to tell us the truth and tell us what went through their minds, but if you say what you did, then you're going to get the penalty. It's sort of a double message."

Alan Cavanna (on Carson Hocevar's star power): "He's got all these lanes that are only going to help him... Being just having your own celebration that is almost marked as yours, like the backflip — that's your own avenue. He's got all these lanes that are only going to help him, and they all add up eventually."

James Hinchcliffe (on his NASCAR truck experience): "You'll never fall out of love with driving a race car fast and the thrill of competition... I feel like I've got the best of both worlds right now."

Shane van Gisbergen (on racing in the rain): "No, I hate racing in the rain, but I'm good at it. And I'll adapt if it happens, but I hope it's dry for all three classes."

Bubba Wallace (on Tyler Reddick at Watkins Glen): "Can't count out Little Baby Jesus Reddick. Can't count him out."

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared (co-host)

Date: May 5, 2026

Race Covered: Würth 400 — Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, Texas (Race 11, 2026 NASCAR Cup Series)

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

The latest Actions Detrimental opens in the wake of Race 11 at Texas Motor Speedway, a chaotic, strategy-saturated event that ended with Chase Elliott taking the win over Denny Hamlin in a final restart shootout. The episode's title — "Should There Be a Penalty… Or Is Public Opinion Enough?" — points squarely at the race's most controversial moment: Kyle Busch's aggressive move on John Hunter Nemechek down the back straightaway that sent both drivers spinning and sparked immediate fallout across NASCAR media.

As always, Denny's vantage point as an active Cup Series driver and co-owner of 23XI Racing gives the episode an unusually candid, inside-the-car texture. He breaks down his own race with a self-critical eye — dissecting a string of ill-timed restarts, a strategy pivot that cost him track position, and a final four-lap shootout where he executed a near-perfect restart but ultimately came up just short of Chase Elliott's No. 9 Chevrolet. This was not a performance Denny dismissed with platitudes; he genuinely believed the 11 team had the car to win and is candid about exactly where it slipped away.

Alongside the Texas debrief, the show ventures into the playoff bubble conversation — especially the fate of Shane van Gisbergen, who continues to cling to the cutline ahead of three road courses remaining in the regular season — as well as a wide-ranging look at drivers who stood out, stumbled, or self-destructed across a turbulent Sunday afternoon.

The Support Races: Cup Drivers Dominate Lower Series

Denny opened the show by noting a "cup racer sweep" across all three Texas race days — Carson Hocevar won the Craftsman Truck Series event, Kyle Larson took the NCTS race over Justin Allgaier, and Chase Elliott claimed the Cup win. Denny's take on the truck race was measured: he felt Gio Gro had the best truck on raw speed but that Hocevar's Cup experience gave him a decisive edge at restarts.

"The biggest thing is they know the first couple corners — how much speed it can take," Denny explained. "It almost seems like the regulars in other series go into the first corner after a restart thinking, 'Okay, I'm going to have the same grip that I just finished with.' The Cup drivers just go around them."

On the NCTS race, Denny found Justin Allgaier's charge impressive but questioned why Allgaier didn't commit to a more aggressive move once he reached Larson. "I kept thinking, just jam air on him. Pack it in on him." Jared wondered aloud whether Allgaier made a "business decision," but Denny wasn't convinced — he thought Larson's mirror-driving and conservative line simply didn't give Allgaier enough surface area to exploit. "He needed to run in on him as hard as he could and take the grip away from Kyle's car."

Denny's Race Breakdown: Strategy Chaos and a Near-Miss Win

This was the meatiest section of the episode and the most detailed self-analysis Denny has delivered this season. He began with Stage 1, where the 11 car looked dominant — until a caution shuffled the field and put him in a tough spot as Stage 2 began. A fuel strategy call forced him to pit when a group of cars stayed out, leaving him restarting as far back as 16th or 17th.

"I said on the radio, 'It just appears that we're straight up on strategy now and we're 16th or 17th,'" Denny recalled. "He was like, 'Yeah, pretty much.'" From there, Denny put together what he called a ripping stint through Stage 2, climbing back to second. But crucially, in one of the early Stage 2 cautions, the No. 9 and No. 45 got around him in a traffic tangle — spots he knew he'd have to fight to reclaim on the racetrack.

Hamlin argued that the decisive moment of the race was actually this mid-race bottleneck, not the final restart. "Those are the cars that are pretty close on speed, guys that know how to win. I knew right then — those are going to be hard spots to get back." He was ultimately able to claw back all but one of those positions, but the gap to Chase Elliott in clean air proved too wide to bridge by the end of Stage 3.

On the final restart, Denny called his launch "about as perfect as I could have gotten." He timed the surge, grabbed a push, and ran nose-to-nose with Elliott heading into Turn 1 — but Alex Bowman's late push to the No. 9 gave Elliott that last decisive lunge of momentum. "The 48 got to him right before they were getting into the corner. That last little lunge changed his mile-per-hour to be slightly faster than mine." Denny acknowledged that any more aggression on his part — trying to hold Elliott tight through the corner — likely would have launched him into the wall and back into the field. "Had I just kept it in there, I likely would have bounced off the wall and then probably back into him."

Jared pressed him on whether staying out for the final restart rather than pitting for two tires was the right call. Denny was unequivocal: "The only way I could guarantee starting on the front row was to not pit. If I pit and three or four more cars also pit, I'm still restarting fifth on two tires. I'm not winning in three laps from fifth." He also walked through the math on Tyler Reddick's two-tire attempt, which netted a position loss rather than a gain. "The pace was too quick. The tires were not going to make that difference up against cars in clean air."

Points Check: The "45 Anomaly"

Denny is second in points and acknowledged the team is performing at or above the season's historical pace for a points leader — with one asterisk. Tyler Reddick's No. 45 car has been running at a level Denny called "an anomaly."

"Any other season, this is running on par to the points leader at this point in the year," he said. "We're right above that graph — but there's one line that's way up there." He wasn't bitter about it; he was matter-of-fact. The 11 team has delivered top-10 results week after week and has more wins in the regular season. "Do I wish we had more wins? 100%. Did we get out of a couple? Probably. But if we just keep the speed up week in week out, we're fine."

Jared noted that Denny's worst Cup finish outside of Daytona this year was a crash, and that the team is essentially running top-10 every single race. Denny's response: "We were 100 behind after three races. We're still 100 behind. We're running on par to the anomaly."

Kyle Busch vs. John Hunter Nemechek: The Big Controversy

The episode's title moment. Denny was careful and analytical — characterizing the back-straightaway incident as a racing situation that spiraled into something unacceptable. Kyle Busch reportedly was running with his left-side tires on the hash marks down the back straight while John Hunter Nemechek was to his outside, and the resulting contact sent both cars spinning heading into Turn 3.

Denny offered a genuine technical critique: "From an aerodynamic standpoint, Kyle, you don't want to be up close to the outside car. The 42 being outside is dumping air on your spoiler, making you go slower down the straightaway. If anything, if we were to switch cars, I would not have been running in the hashmarks down the back straightaway. I would have pulled down to be in a better aerodynamic position."

He acknowledged Kyle's point about using the hash marks as a braking reference — "Kyle is a very marks-dependent person" — but said that with a car coming on his outside, the correct adjustment is to pull left, not hold your line. "He needed to get away. You got to get far to the left to avoid getting dragged back." When Kyle then entered Turn 3 on that trajectory, the loss of control followed.

On the penalty question, Denny leaned toward the co-host's framing: court of public opinion may actually be the more consequential punishment here, especially given Kyle's points standing. "If you're rooting for a penalty, for what? It doesn't change anything. It's not going to affect a playoff run." But he didn't dismiss the idea of consistency, either: "I don't think it really matters considering where he is in points. You do it to make yourself feel good — to say you made a rule and stuck to it." The bottom line for Denny was simply: "It was not a great look. He punished himself by doing that, and he ruined a good day."

Pit Road Chaos and the Logano DNF

Texas produced one of the messiest pit road sequences of the season, culminating in Joey Logano's DNF after hitting a stationary car while exiting his stall. Denny went to bat for nearly everyone involved, framing it as a structural problem rather than individual driver error.

"Texas is a track where lots of cars stay on the lead lap. The difference between the leader crossing the pit-in line and the 25th-place car hitting the pit-in line is about 15 seconds." Add mixed tire strategies to that compressed window, and you get "people leaving early, people leaving late, people getting there late." He specifically noted that Larson also had a pit-road issue and that even his own 67 team had a brush with trouble. "It was a mess for everyone."

Denny pushed back on any instinct to blame individual drivers. "I'll defend everyone on this one." He called it a narrow pit road for the size of the facility, made exponentially more dangerous by the circumstances: high lap counts still on the lead lap, divergent strategies, and the short physical space between stalls.

Driver Rundown Highlights

Alex Bowman (3rd): Denny admitted he barely heard Bowman's name all day but acknowledged it was a very good result. Jared pressed on whether it was a "strong" day; Denny gave measured credit.

Riley Herbst (11th): "Strongest performance I've seen from him — no doubt. He was up in the top 10 most of the day."

Ryan Preece and Ty Gibbs: A heated incident left Preece fuming on radio — a clip circulated in which Preece said, "When I get to the 54, I'm done with him." Denny said he wasn't sure exactly what triggered Preece but noted the timing was vulnerable: "Turn three entry is a very sensitive part of the track where the car is pretty light." SVG, who was nearby, reportedly called it murder.

Bubba Wallace (9th): Denny gave credit for a strong comeback drive in what was apparently a backup car: "He got to the teens pretty quickly, then kind of petered out at 10th, but very good comeback."

Christopher Bell: An unlucky day — Denny felt Bell may have had the strongest car at one point in the race but got caught out trying to squeeze through when Todd Gilliland was spinning. "Usually when a car gets sideways, it's pretty predictable — it goes up the racetrack, then comes back down. Todd barely went up and then was coming down faster than normal." Bell misjudged the trajectory by a couple of feet. "Wrong place, wrong time. By a couple feet."

Cory Heim (the 67): Denny praised his team's bold late-race strategy — staying out and pulling 3 seconds on Elliott before the caution ended it. "If there was any caution in that third stage up until 25–28 to go, he's money. He's out front controlling the race."

Shane van Gisbergen and the Playoff Bubble

The show spent considerable time gaming out SVG's path to the playoffs. He's currently about 27 points below the cut, behind Chase Brisco. Denny and Jared concluded that even with two road course wins in the next three road-course events (Watkins Glen, Sonoma, and San Diego), SVG is likely looking at a close call rather than a comfortable margin.

"He might need the race to play out to where he gets the stage wins AND finishes up front — not just the wins alone," Denny noted. "It's going to be close." He ran through the points math: 15 points per win, 30 total from two wins, net gain of only 17–18 points per non-road-course race — and there are still multiple strong cars sitting between 14th and 18th. Denny's bottom line: "Even if he has an awesome day at every road course, I still think he needs help."

On the broader bubble picture, Denny and Jared flagged Brisco as the one driver they're most confident will move up — "He's going to score a lot of stage points and finish where he should eventually." Chastain they put at a question mark, and Logano's DNF at Texas is "Jesus" territory.

Next Race Preview: Watkins Glen

Denny was refreshingly honest about his outlook heading to The Glen. The key, he said, is qualifying: "It's going to be hard to pass. It's a high-speed, narrow road course where aerodynamics really matter. Qualifying is a big key." He acknowledged a mixed historical record there — dominant runs from 2015–2019, then inconsistency in the NextGen era as Toyota's road-course package struggled early.

On the broader goal for the weekend, Denny deadpanned his ambition: "26 points — that's probably like 15th with a couple of stage points." When Jared pushed back, Denny clarified: "I like to under-promise and over-deliver. We're doing what we need to do on all the tracks we need to do it on. We come to these [road courses] and it's going to be a mid-20s point day. So you've got to rack up the 40-point, 50-point days on the other tracks."

The Cooper Flag Moment

Denny mentioned a fun behind-the-scenes moment at Texas — he made good on a promise to Cooper Flag's parents by working his car around the track for Flag's benefit. Flag's parents had apparently requested it, Denny had initially said he might not be able to because he was starting near the front, but he pulled it off. "I made sure I was getting in the business." His spotter Boyer thought it was funny. NASCAR didn't seem to mind.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on Chase Elliott's pace in Stage 3): "I looked at my dash — we were all running really fast lap times and he was still kind of pulling away a little bit. It's like, it's fast. It was going to be tough."

Denny (on the final restart): "I timed it like perfectly. The launch portion of it. I got a good push — but my push came a little too early. That last little lunge the 48 gave him changed his mile-per-hour to be slightly faster than mine."

Denny (on the strategy restart troubles): "75% bad luck. I'm the first car on the tires — so who am I starting right behind? The worst car on the tires. They're the last of the cars that stayed out. And then they're the moving chicane I'm trying to get around while everyone behind me has a massive run and goes right by."

Denny (on the Kyle Busch incident): "It was not a good situation. That was not recommended. He punished himself by doing that, and he ruined what was about a four-or-five-spot better day."

Jared (on Kyle Busch): "As a fan, I think there probably should be some sort of punishment — but I don't want that to happen. I want this stuff to be handled on the track. The court of public opinion towards Kyle is enough punishment right now."

Denny (on his points standing vs. Tyler Reddick): "Any other season, we're running on par to the points leader. But there's that 45 anomaly. Seriously, when you look at the graph, we're right above the projected line — and then there's one line that's way, way up there."

Episode available on YouTube at youtube.com/@ActionsDetrimental and wherever podcasts are available.

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Co-Hosts: TJ Majors (spotter), Travis

Guest(s): Chase Elliott (Hendrick Motorsports, No. 9 Chevrolet) — phone interview

Date: May 5, 2026

Race Covered: 2026 Würth 400 — Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, Texas (May 3, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective

Episode Overview

Dale Earnhardt Jr. returned to the Arby's studio with co-hosts TJ Majors and Travis for the post-Texas Motor Speedway edition of the Dale Jr. Download. The episode came after one of the most chaotic and storyline-rich weekends of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season — a tripleheader at a track whose long-awaited surface improvement has finally arrived. Chase Elliott, who won the Würth 400 for his second Cup victory of 2026, called in for an extensive guest segment, reflecting on his race strategy, the tricky bumps in Turns 3 and 4, and what to expect at the upcoming Watkins Glen race.

The show covered an enormous amount of ground: pit road incidents involving Joey Logano and Cole Custer, controversial retaliatory crashes from Kyle Busch and Ryan Preece, Christopher Bell's brutal bad luck, TJ Majors walking through Brad Keselowski's strategic pit call from his own spotter's vantage point, and an extended defense of the new NASCAR points system. Ask Jr. featured a lively discussion on Carson Hocevar's Met Gala appearance and the Most Popular Driver conversation, while Dirty Mo Dough previewed Watkins Glen matchup bets with analyst Russell.

Texas Track Conditions — A Track Finally Out of the Woods

Dale opened with genuine enthusiasm about the state of Texas Motor Speedway. "We finally are out of the woods," he said, noting that for years after the repave and reconfiguration the track had struggled to produce quality racing. Teams had applied PJ1 traction compound and tried various remedies, but this weekend the track delivered what everyone had been hoping for. "This place is awesome," Dale declared. "It's wide, and we had cars running the bottom, the middle, the top. It was fantastic."

Dale argued it's also time for Goodyear to start working the tire compound back in the direction of more wear. He pointed out that Eric Jones won a stage on 20-lap-old tires, beating cars with fresh rubber — a sign the tire is now too conservative for the surface level. "That should not happen. The guys with tires should just eat him alive." He credited the O'Reilly Series and Truck races during the weekend as a great preview for Cup, noting the track had provided exciting three-wide action. TJ Majors added context from inside the car, noting that his spotter lights required adjustment on both days, which likely contributed to the drop in pit road speeding penalties compared to 2025.

Suarez, Hocevar, and the Mystery of Peak Speed

Hocevar and Suarez rolled off from the front row after standout qualifying runs, but both saw their cars fall off sharply early in the race. Dale dove into the data, noting that Daniel Suarez ranked 22nd in the field in speed on race day despite qualifying well. Dale made a notable statistical observation: while most cars in the field ran their fastest laps between Laps 175 and 220, the Nos. 7 and 77 ran their two fastest laps on Laps 2 and 3 — suggesting their cars didn't improve throughout the run the way the rest of the field did.

"They had great speed in qualifying," Dale said. "Then they changed that first set of tires and they didn't look as good." TJ noted the early laps were simply the cleanest air either car would have all day. Despite the speed deficit, Hocevar salvaged a solid finish through strategy and track position management. Suarez, who was effectively a 22nd-place car on pace, nevertheless pulled off a top-10 finish. "Commend him for getting a top-10 finish with basically a 22nd-place race car," TJ said.

Brad Keselowski's Controversial Pit Call

One of the most discussed decisions of the race was Brad Keselowski staying out at the end of Stage 2, running in third place, in an attempt to collect stage points rather than pit with the field. TJ Majors walked through the decision from his perspective as Keselowski's spotter. "We thought maybe more would stay out — especially guys in the teens, guys trying to get some stage points and make their day a little bit better." In the end, only Keselowski and Ryan Preece stayed out. Keselowski dropped from third to 27th and ultimately finished 13th.

Keselowski publicly took ownership of the decision on social media afterward, and TJ backed him without throwing the driver under the bus. "Brad's a very smart race car driver and he knows way more than what you probably think he knows when he's racing — what laps, who's doing what strategies." Dale pushed back gently: "When you're running 25th, get your ass on pit road and try to turn your 25th-place car into a 15th-place car." The two went back and forth on when staying out is a viable gamble, with TJ arguing the new points system puts extra pressure on teams to take stage points when they're within reach. "If you look at our points, we're right around some guys — you almost have to take every point you can," TJ said.

Christopher Bell's Crushing Bad Luck

Dale called one Texas incident "a 30-to-45 point swing in a single moment" and predicted it could define Bell's entire championship season in hindsight. Bell was leading the race when Denny Hamlin slowed in traffic as Johnny Gilliland spun exiting Turn 4. Bell attempted to shoot a gap and was clipped, sending his car into the wall and ending his day. He lost four positions in the standings, dropping from ninth to 13th.

"We will look back at this race, no matter what happens with Christopher Bell going forward, and wonder what might have been," Dale said. "Could he have just gotten an average day? Come away with 10 stage points, a top-five or top-10 finish?" TJ noted it made the new points system come alive: "Last year you're saying you want the wins to feel better and the losses to hurt more. And this is it." Dale agreed emphatically — Bell had been in excellent shape, and one moment of bad luck created a potentially season-altering gap.

The Joey Logano Pit Road Incident

Dale also walked through the crash that ended Logano's day — a pit road collision between the No. 22 Logano and Cole Custer's No. 41, which had stopped on pit road while waiting for the No. 54 to clear its stall. The incident generated debate about whether Logano wasn't paying attention, or whether Custer's positioning on pit road was problematic. Dale went back to replay clips repeatedly during the show.

"I'm wondering if this was avoidable," Dale said. TJ noted the 41 essentially had no choice but to stop — "Cole has to stop or he's going to hit the 54." Dale examined whether Custer could have positioned himself further left to leave more room, while Travis argued that with the cars outside Custer, he was already at the edge of his available space. The consensus was it was an unfortunate situation more than anyone's clear fault, but it cost Logano dearly — he had no stage points from Stage 1 and couldn't collect any in Stages 2 or 3. He dropped two spots to 17th in the championship standings.

Dale also noted — pushing back on the "22 is in trouble" narrative — that Logano has historically been around 9th–13th in points at this point of the year in recent seasons before winning critical races late. "I honestly don't see a big difference in the way Joey's running today versus over the last handful of years at this point in the year." TJ speculated that without the Talladega crash, Logano might be sitting around 13th — a much less alarming number. The difference, Dale pointed out, is the new points system doesn't reward the big late-season Hail Mary win the way the old system did.

Kyle Busch vs. John Hunter Nemechek and Ryan Preece vs. Ty Gibbs

Texas produced two high-profile acts of retaliation that had the NASCAR world buzzing. Kyle Busch and John Hunter Nemechek made contact racing down the backstretch — a moment Dale said included Busch potentially shading down to block Nemechek's side draft, leading to a chain of contact. Then, heading into Turn 3 on the next lap, Busch deliberately turned right and intentionally wrecked Nemechek. "He turns right. He definitely turns and bounces off him, sends him up into the wall," Dale said.

Separately, Ryan Preece — who had telegraphed his frustration by saying publicly he was going to "take care of it" — drove into Ty Gibbs in Turn 3, ending Gibbs's day and costing him two spots in the championship standings (from 5th to 7th). "He said it before he did it," Travis noted. Dale argued the two incidents are slightly different: Busch's was a deliberate slow-down and wait before contact, while Preece's was a more traditional hard racing move. "Preece was more like an old-school traditional chrome-horn," Dale said.

On NASCAR's likely response, Dale was direct: "I don't think anything happens here." He argued the sport's current leadership transition — with new president Steve O'Donnell in place amid the broader upheaval following the earlier Phelps-era controversy — means NASCAR is unlikely to want to generate negative fan reaction by penalizing drivers for the kind of hard racing fans generally want to see. "Right now is a time where they may allow this one to go." TJ — who revealed that Busch had actually approached his car (Keselowski's) the lap before the Nemechek incident — was more measured: "It's just unnecessary. Kyle was actually having a pretty solid day."

The New Points System: Drama Has Never Been Better

Dale returned multiple times to his enthusiasm for the 2026 NASCAR points overhaul. The new format, which rewards stage points and running position on a continuous basis rather than funneling everything into a post-season playoff bracket, is producing exactly the drama he always wanted. "When the race starts, I know I might see somebody have an incredible day and other people have terrible days that are going to impact their season — in that moment, right there in the middle of the year."

He cited Bell's crash and Logano's pit road incident as exactly the kinds of events the old system rendered meaningless but that now carry genuine stakes. TJ admitted he hadn't realized until now how much the old format robbed fans of this emotional investment. "I didn't like the old format, but I am realizing more and more with each passing week how much we missed out on — how much drama we could have been getting."

Dale also made a personal comparison: "When Steve Letarte and I got together, we were a 25th-place car. We said: 'Top 15s. Let's go get us a top 15.' And in two years, we became a team that showed up to run top five and expected it every week." He used that memory to encourage teams like Hocevar's to embrace incremental improvement rather than swinging only for wins. Hocevar, Dale said, told him his goal is simply to make the Chase and finish in the top 12 — "and I agree with that, I think that's awesome."

Christopher Bell's Talladega/Superspeedway Package Comments

Bell's postgame comments at Texas drew significant attention — he said, "We desperately, desperately need change. Hopefully that is the last time we race that speedway package." Dale agreed strongly. He described the current Next Gen car at superspeedways as fundamentally broken for racing purposes: the car is so draggy that any car that pulls out of line loses massive ground instantly, which means no driver will make a move, which means the race reduces to a two-car train at the front with the leader effectively already crowned 50 laps out. "If you're in second and you both have enough fuel, you're probably going to win — as long as you don't do anything stupid."

Dale expressed hope for the upcoming off-season testing and praised drivers for speaking up openly. "I love that people are finally saying this, because this ain't new. This has been going on for a couple years." He noted that even the O'Reilly car and the ARCA car look better at Talladega — more capable of genuine moves, more likely to see the best drivers separate themselves. "With the Cup car, we can't give the guys a chance to really show their ability."

Chase Elliott Joins the Show

Dale brought in Texas winner Chase Elliott for an extended phone segment. Elliott called from his father's old race shop, preparing for Watkins Glen. Dale opened by running through Racing Insights statistics — Elliott was the top-ranked car in passing, second on restart speed, and his pit crew was among the top performers — and Elliott was amused. "Props to you for doing your homework. I don't think I've ever had an interview opened up talking about passing stats and defense stats."

On the race itself, Elliott said he felt potential in the car on Saturday but wasn't certain. "I thought we had pretty good pace for a balance that I didn't think was totally put together as well as it could have been." The team made overnight changes and the car responded well. "I managed the race well. I was proud of all aspects of the weekend — one of our strongest races in quite some time."

On the gap fluctuating while he led, Elliott explained it was largely about lane choice and risk management in Turns 3 and 4. "The place is really treacherous. You can bust it very easily, especially in three and four. How you manage those bumps on that end is really important." He described the bump in the middle lane as more of a true bump — as opposed to the bottom lane's smaller ripples — and said he couldn't find a way around it no matter how high he pushed. "I don't think the groove has widened enough yet to get around it."

On Watkins Glen, Elliott was candid about low confidence. "If you watched how we ran last year — that was arguably one of our worst races of the year." He attributed part of the problem to chasing pace in wrong directions and going "down some bad rabbit holes." But he pointed to lessons from the COTA win earlier in 2026 and expressed a desire to get back and prove they can be better. On the new tire packs and curbing changes at the Glen, he said the intent is solid but noted: "There's a pretty high probability that one of us cleans them things out at some point." Dale asked whether younger drivers who've only ever run wide through those corners will struggle with the adjustment. Elliott didn't think so.

Ask Jr.

Carson Hocevar at the Met Gala: Listeners asked Dale what he thought about Hocevar attending the Met Gala. Dale was openly enthusiastic and drew on his own experiences going outside NASCAR's bubble. "We need our drivers in these unusual spaces — connecting with people that aren't connected to our sport." He recalled his own Rolling Stone feature, his MTV Cribs appearance, and walking a boxer to the ring. "Those were fantastic opportunities. Terrifying, but the door was opened to introduce the sport to a new audience." He praised Hocevar for doing a solid interview and representing himself well despite being clearly out of his element. "He knew what the hell he was wearing, seemed to have a real understanding of why he was there and what he was supposed to accomplish."

Can Hocevar Eclipse Chase Elliott as Most Popular Driver? Dale said Chase will face real competition in coming years, and Hocevar is positioned to be part of that challenge. He noted the popular vote has never publicly released vote margins, so it's hard to know how close the race actually is. But Hocevar's willingness to stay active on social media — streaming on his rig during the week, taking risks, showing up places — gives him a platform most drivers don't bother to cultivate. "He's not going to sit on his hands Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and think that's going to be enough."

JRM Bus Parking and Race Season Life: Dale shared that he always parked in the same spot at every racetrack during his career. He noted Bubba Wallace has been his Daytona neighbor for years, and that Kenny Schrader was his longtime neighbor across most of the 2000s. He discussed wanting to use his fifth wheel at six or seven races this summer during broadcasting duties. The conversation wandered into bathroom options in the infield — Dale admitted he used to use the NASCAR hauler's restroom during practice sessions, and that his 2015 JR Motorsports hauler featured a dry urinal he'd had installed specifically for this purpose.

Dirty Mo Dough — Watkins Glen Preview

Analyst Russell joined Dale, TJ, and Travis for betting picks ahead of Watkins Glen. The clear consensus favorite was Shane van Gisbergen (SVG), who posted a 3.1 average running position across the last seven road courses — far ahead of the field. Russell's second choice was Christopher Bell (8.6 average running position) over Tyler Reddick, noting Bell's last four road course finishes were third, third, second, and fifth. Dale sided with Bell as well.

The group debated the Chase Elliott vs. Kyle Larson matchup (Larson minus 110, Elliott minus 120). Dale took Elliott despite the team's rough Watkins Glen in 2025, citing their improved speed in 2026 and Elliott's hunger to prove they can find it there. TJ and Russell went with Larson based on the head-to-head road course data in the Next Gen car. AJ Allmendinger, Chase Briscoe (fourth in average running position on road courses since 2025), Ty Gibbs, and Tyler Reddick were mentioned as strong top-10 bets. The crew built a potential manufacturer parlay: SVG for Chevrolet, Briscoe for Ford, and Christopher Bell for Toyota — which came in at +1422 odds.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on Texas Motor Speedway's improvement): "We are finally out of the woods. This place is awesome. Cars were running the bottom, the middle, the top. It was fantastic."

Dale (on Christopher Bell's race-ending crash): "We will look back at this race, no matter what happens with Christopher Bell going forward, and wonder what might have been. That was a 30-to-45-point swing in a single moment."

TJ Majors (on Brad Keselowski staying out for stage points): "Brad's a very smart race car driver. He knows way more than what you probably think he knows when he's racing — what laps, who's doing what strategies. Each race is going to be its own animal every week."

Dale (on Kyle Busch's retaliatory crash): "Down in Turn 3, Kyle Bush intentionally crashes the 42. He turns right. Definitely turns around, bounces off of him, sends him up into the wall. The act of wrecking the guy is uncalled for. He shouldn't have done that."

Dale (on the new points system): "I am sitting down as soon as I turn the race on knowing that I might see somebody have an incredible day and other people have terrible days that are going to impact their season — in that moment, right there, race 10, race 11, race 12. That was missing. That was absolutely gone in the past."

Chase Elliott (on his Texas win): "I thought we had pretty good pace for a balance that I didn't think was totally put together as well as it could have been. And fortunately, we put it together. I thought that was one of our strongest races in quite some time."

Dale (on Carson Hocevar at the Met Gala): "We need one driver over here, one doing this thing. We need our drivers in these unusual spaces, connecting with people that aren't connected to our sport. I was really proud of Hocevar."

Christopher Bell (via clip, on the superspeedway package): "We desperately, desperately need change. We've needed change for a long time. Hopefully that is the last time we race that speedway package."

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, Karsyn Elledge; Guest: Kevin Hamlin

Date: May 5, 2026

Race Covered: Würth 400 — Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, Texas

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Door Bumper Clear returned to the studio for a Monday recap packed with personality, opinions, and insider perspective on a chaotic weekend in Fort Worth. The show featured a special guest in Kevin Hamlin, the veteran spotter for Alex Bowman (No. 48) and ARCA newcomer Cleetus McFarland, who joined the crew to break down everything from Bowman's return from vertigo, the rise of Cleetus in ARCA, and what it's like spotting on the roof at the track each week.

The episode arrived a day after Chase Elliott won the Würth 400, and while the hosts were largely complimentary of Elliott's execution and his crew chief Alan Gustin's bold strategy call, much of the energy was directed at two controversial late-race incidents — Kyle Busch's apparent retaliation against John Hunter Nemechek on the backstretch, and Ryan Preece's intentional shot at Ty Gibbs. Freddie Kraft, spotting for Bubba Wallace, was deep in the middle of it all weekend across all three series, giving the show an unusually candid on-the-roof perspective on what Sunday's racing actually felt like from up high.

The tone was lively and irreverent throughout — a hallmark of DBC — but the show also had genuine analytical substance, particularly in the extended discussions about Truck Series tech inspection woes, the clean-air problem plaguing the Cup Series, and the upcoming Watkins Glen track limit changes. It was a full-length episode with guest chemistry, Reaction Theatre fan calls, Spot On/Spot Off debates, and the S* Show Hall of Fame rounding out the runtime.

Kevin Hamlin Joins the Show — Bowman's Return and the ARCA Cleetus Effect

Kevin Hamlin opened the episode and was immediately at ease with the DBC hosts, trading barbs about the pink ABR construction truck he's been spotted driving around job sites. Hamlin spotts for both Alex Bowman and Cleetus McFarland, and the conversation opened with Bowman's ongoing playoff fight. With the No. 48 sitting 127 or so points outside the playoff cutoff, Hamlin said the team hasn't panicked.

"You never seen that team panic," Hamlin said. "They just come in, they know their job... there's too many resources, too many good people there for it to fail."

Hamlin also reflected on how difficult it was for substitute drivers like Justin Haley to step in and immediately compete without practice. He noted that even adjustments as simple as slowing the car's entry to pit road had to be recalibrated for drivers unaccustomed to the Next Gen car's braking behavior.

The conversation naturally turned to Cleetus McFarland, DBC's favorite recurring topic. Hamlin, who has spotted for Cleetus since he entered ARCA, described a clear transformation from Daytona to Talladega. "The guy I saw run Daytona versus the guy I saw run Talladega looked like two different people," Freddie said. "He was making confident moves in the pack." Hamlin agreed, and pointed to the broader impact Cleetus has had on the sport: "The eyes that he has brought to our sport has been... proof is in the pudding with the numbers. I follow his Instagram and my followers doubled in like a day, and everybody who replies says 'I've never watched NASCAR before. This is awesome.'" The crew was unanimous that Cleetus should continue building through ARCA rather than jumping prematurely to national series, with Freddie advocating for him to "run a full year ARCA, take your content to all these badass ARCA tracks" before moving up.

Chase Elliott Wins, Clean Air Rules Everything

Chase Elliott dominated the Würth 400, and the hosts largely agreed his victory was well-earned — though they were candid about how the race's structure made it difficult for anyone to challenge once out front. Freddie described what it was like running mid-pack: "I would look down and we were third quickest... and then we go from like third quick to like 15th. Damn." Kevin Hamlin confirmed the same experience: "We slowed down a second in practice behind somebody and we caught the 24 and Riley — we were stuck until we came in pits 20 laps later."

The hosts praised crew chief Alan Gustin's decision to stay out under the late caution with fresh-enough tires to hold off a charging Denny Hamlin and Alex Bowman on a four-lap sprint. "For that many guys to stay out, he was golden," Kevin said. Freddie noted that Bowman's third-place result was a product of both smart strategy — staying out and gaining track position — and the stark reality that once in clean air, nobody could catch the leader. "It was hard to compete with clean air. Lap time wise, we were running 10th, and from 10th to like second was basically the same speed — within a tenth. The leader was three or four tenths better."

The broader issue of racing competitiveness was a recurring undercurrent throughout the episode. Freddie lamented that a driver like Corey Heim — who ran fast in clean air for a long stretch — completely fell out of contention once circumstances put him in traffic. "You never even hear from him again," Freddie said. "It's unfortunate. It still comes back to the car, and I think we need to make some progress there somehow." He was careful to credit NASCAR's new leadership with at least acknowledging the problem openly, pointing to Steve O'Donnell's previous appearance on DBC as a sign that the sanctioning body understands there are challenges to address.

The Kyle Busch and Ryan Preece Controversies

Two incidents dominated the show's Spot On/Spot Off segment, and neither resulted in a unanimous verdict on what NASCAR should do about them.

The Ryan Preece–Ty Gibbs incident came first. The hosts concluded that what Preece did on the track wasn't egregious on its own — the bigger issue was that he announced his intention on the radio before executing it. "The only thing Preece did wrong was say he was going to do it and then did it," Freddie said. Kevin agreed: "He's always been consistent through his whole career — you mess with me, there's going to be consequences." Most of the panel felt no penalty was warranted.

The Kyle Busch–John Hunter Nemechek incident was more contentious. Busch came up on Nemechek on the backstretch and they made contact, sending Nemechek into the fence. Whether it was intentional or the result of a blind-spot miscalculation was debated at length. Kevin Hamlin offered the most grounded technical perspective: "Kyle's driving off of either the seams on the racetrack or the car in front of John Hunter because he can't see John Hunter. If the car in front of John Hunter is on the wall and Kyle's kind of following that trace, he's thinking he's got another half a car width." However, everyone agreed that when Busch turned hard into Nemechek in turns three and four shortly after, it looked intentional. "It looked unnecessary to me," Freddie said. "He could have just run three and four and finished 12th." The crew acknowledged that under NASCAR's new leadership, no suspension was coming — and Freddie said he'd accept that, calling for maybe a fine at most.

Spot On/Spot Off: The No-Caution Debate for JHN

One of the more philosophically satisfying Spot On/Spot Off topics was whether the tower should have immediately thrown the yellow when Nemechek hit the wall on lap 266. Freddie was emphatic: "If it's a caution at lap 50, it should be a caution at lap 266. I've said this forever on here. If you were going to throw the yellow for that incident earlier, you probably should have threw it right away there."

Kevin Hamlin gave the on-track spotter's perspective: once Nemechek hit the fence, most of the field had already passed. "By the time he actually spun, we were probably past the line," he said — though he agreed the inconsistency is frustrating. Tommy, with characteristic brevity, essentially argued it was a no-win situation for the tower: throw it too early and everyone complains about a phantom caution; wait too long and people complain about inconsistency. In the end, the crew concluded the racing worked out fine, but the philosophical inconsistency remained a legitimate grievance.

Truck Series Tech Inspection Is Broken — Tommy Blows a Gasket

Perhaps the most passionate segment of the episode came when the crew addressed the topic of Truck Series teams missing practice or being penalized due to escalating tech inspection failures. The current system: miss pre-race inspection in back-to-back weeks and you lose 10 minutes of practice; four weeks in a row and you don't practice at all. Freddie called the system "backwards," noting that the teams most affected — smaller operations running young drivers like Frankie Muniz and Josh Berry-level types — are precisely the teams that need track time.

Tommy, who came in hot and stayed hot, pointed out that NASCAR has been implementing new templates and updated rules week-over-week for six consecutive weeks, leaving teams struggling to keep up: "You're making all these teams cut their trucks up because of their fault — NASCAR's fault — by not implementing the rules in the first place." Kevin Hamlin was equally blunt: "I've been doing this for 30 years and they keep doing it. When are you guys going to learn?" The underlying frustration was that it's not cheating — it's compliance confusion — and the penalty structure punishes the most vulnerable teams in the paddock. "You're hurting sponsors, you're hurting the drivers, you're potentially going to hurt young kids that need time on the track," Freddie said.

Watkins Glen Track Limits and the Next Weekend Preview

Looking ahead to Watkins Glen, the crew discussed NASCAR's decision to add tire-pack barriers at the exit of Turn 1 and Turn 6/the carousel — a direct response to last year's high-profile crash. Kevin Hamlin revealed he had already visited the sim with Sam Mayer to work the Glen ahead of the weekend, before the new walls were even officially announced: "The walls weren't there in the sim yet," he said, meaning teams will be adapting to the changes in real-time.

Freddie's concern was less about safety and more about racing implications. The tightest track limit change — narrowing the runoff at Turn 6 — was the one he expected would most dramatically affect lap times and on-track incidents. Both he and Kevin acknowledged that the changes were ultimately safety-driven and likely appropriate given the speed of those sections, but the late notice created another prep challenge for teams trying to maximize limited sim time.

The picks segment had Freddie going with Shane Van Gisbergen, Tommy with Harrison Burton, Karsyn with AJ Allmendinger, and Kevin backing Alex Bowman ("he's an underrated road racer — I can't not take the 48").

Notable Quotes

Kevin Hamlin (on Cleetus McFarland's impact on NASCAR): "He's taking this very seriously. I hope he doesn't try to move up too fast. The eyes he's brought to our sport — the proof is in the pudding. My followers doubled in a day and everybody said they'd never watched NASCAR before."

Freddie Kraft (on the clean-air problem at Texas): "If you get a penalty late in these Cup races, your race is over. Once they get in the back, their car becomes two or three numbers tighter than it was all day long and you just can't recover from it."

Freddie Kraft (on Kyle Busch's day): "He had 266 and a half laps of a good day."

Tommy Baldwin (on Truck Series tech inspection): "You're making all these teams cut their trucks up because of their fault — NASCAR's fault — by not implementing the rules in the first place. Now everybody's spending money rebuilding these trucks for no reason."

Kevin Hamlin (on spotting for substitute drivers): "I just spot how I normally spot. Tell the driver: if you need something different, let me know and I'll change it. Those guys were all like, 'It's fine, just do your thing.'"

Freddie Kraft (on NASCAR's caution flag consistency): "I just hate that we throw cautions sometimes based on what lap it is or where we are in a pit cycle. I'm always gonna feel like a yellow is a yellow whenever it is a yellow. If it's a caution at lap 50, it should be a caution at lap 266."

Show: Inside the Race

Host(s): Steve Letarte, Todd Gordon

Date: May 3, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: Würth 400 presented by LIQUI MOLY — Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, Texas

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Fresh off a sellout crowd at Texas Motor Speedway, Steve Letarte and Todd Gordon delivered a thorough and energetic post-race breakdown of the 2026 Würth 400, a race that had almost everything: a dominant performance from a resurgent champion, critical DNFs from playoff contenders, a controversial on-track incident between teammates, and a live interview with a top-three finisher calling in from the hauler. The overall tone was celebratory but analytical — Texas delivered what the hosts called a "spectacular race" for a fully sold-out crowd.

Chase Elliott's 23rd career Cup Series win was the centerpiece, but the hosts were equally invested in the race's chaos: Christopher Bell crashing out while leading, Joey Logano's pit road disaster, Ryan Blaney's unusual driver error, and an explosive late-race altercation between Kyle Busch and John Hunter Nemechek that may have more consequences to come. Letarte and Gordon kept the show moving with strong opinions, video breakdowns, and candid assessments of where multiple organizations stand.

The episode also featured a live interview with Alex Bowman, calling in from his hauler at the track, and a tease of upcoming podcast content — including a studio sit-down with winning crew chief Alan Gustavson — before pivoting to an early look ahead to Watkins Glen.

Chase Elliott and the Nine Team's Dominant Performance

The win was Chase Elliott's 23rd career Cup Series victory and his second of the 2026 season, following an earlier win at Martinsville. Both hosts agreed this was the more impressive of the two. "I think this was a more impressive victory," Letarte said. "The mile and a half, the new Chevy body — there was a lot of storylines heading in and it was a pretty dominant win for the nine."

Gordon noted that from lap 116 onward, Elliott ran first or second on the leaderboard virtually without interruption. "Chase Elliot from lap 116 on he ran first or second — like he was really good," Gordon said. "I feel like the best car won the race." Both men credited the long tenure between Elliott and crew chief Alan Gustavson as a major factor on a track where communication and setup compromise are critical. "When you go to a compromised racetrack, you need to be very vocal on what's holding you back," Gordon said. "I think the tenure and relationship between Chase and Allen brought this forward and made this where they could excel."

Elliott himself struck a measured, grateful tone in his post-race interview on the front stretch: "This is a testament to the whole nine team, but not just the nine team, but also everybody at Hendrick Motorsports... everybody's just been digging in really hard from the engine shop to all the setup shops." Letarte called it the sound of "an experienced driver who is not taking for granted what winning feels like."

The hosts also noted that Denny Hamlin has now finished second to Elliott in each of Elliott's last three Cup Series wins — a remarkable and somewhat uncomfortable statistical footnote for the No. 11 camp.

The Final Restart: Lane Choice, Teamwork, and Execution

Much of the race's outcome was decided in a five-lap sprint to the finish after a late caution. Letarte and Gordon spent considerable time breaking down the restart, crediting Alex Bowman's push from the No. 48 as a key factor in Elliott's ability to clear Turn 2 and control the bottom lane through Turns 3 and 4.

"The next 200 to 300 feet of racetrack is where the nine car won the race," Letarte said, pointing to the moment Elliott went side-by-side with Hamlin exiting Turn 2. Gordon added a tactical layer: "If you don't have your teammate behind you, you're probably blocking ten feet lower to make sure somebody doesn't try to slip you." Because Elliott could trust Bowman to push rather than challenge, he was able to take a higher arc through the dogleg and build enough momentum through the center of the corner to put the race away.

Elliott, for his part, was candid about his uncertainty heading into the restart: "I wasn't really sure whether to go top or bottom, and the bottom had been winning out on a lot of the restarts. I just felt like, if I didn't get clear off of two, I was going to be in a lot of trouble. Fortunately, Alex gave me a great push — was able to execute turns one and two, get clear, and then just kind of manage the last few laps."

Gordon pointed out that Hamlin had actually stalled on pit road around lap 94 — a moment that cost him roughly 10 spots and ultimately put him in the unfavorable outside lane for the final restart. "That's where the separation between him and Chase Elliot ended up," Gordon said.

Alex Bowman Interview: Back and Building

Alex Bowman joined the show live by video from his hauler at the track — internet connectivity and all — for a candid post-race chat after finishing third. Letarte was effusive about Bowman's back-to-back strong weekends following a stretch of races missed due to vertigo.

Bowman acknowledged that restarts were a weak point for him on the day — "my car was super aeroedependent so restarts were tricky" — but said the team made huge gains from where they unloaded: "We unloaded just super tight and kind of way off of where we wanted to be and Blake and Jonas and the whole Ally 48 team did a good job giving me a way better race car today."

On pushing Elliott on the final restart, Bowman was honest about the execution: "I was probably a little late to connect with the nine, but once I did get connected, I thought I gave him a good shove... had to lift to get the nose to set down." He was also gracious about finishing third: "Happy for Chase, happy for Hendrick Motorsports, the engine shop, all the guys back at the shop."

Asked about his physical condition, Bowman acknowledged that "100%" may be a moving target with his injury history but said he's as good as he can be: "Got a lot of people helping me out throughout the course of every week to be the best I can be. Those first two weeks were rough, but these last two have been really good." Gordon noted that missing an intermediate race while recovering put Bowman a race behind on the new Chevy body — but that his momentum heading into Watkins Glen is real, given his quiet reputation as a strong road racer.

DNF Watch: Bell, Logano, and Blaney's Bad Day

Three high-profile names had painful afternoons, and the hosts discussed each in detail.

Christopher Bell earned the hosts' most sympathetic treatment. Leading the race in Stage 1, Bell dove to the bottom to avoid a spinning Todd Gilliland and was inches away from clearing the incident cleanly — "Six inches," Gordon said, correcting Bell's own post-race estimate of "a couple feet." Bell's interview was brief and resigned: "I was a couple feet away from having a great day. It's going to turn around at some point." Letarte said Bell's DNF was the most painful of the day, calling it "best car won the race — if you don't count the 20." He added that while there's nothing to second-guess in the moment, the team may still need to review the communication breakdown between Bell and his spotter when the emotion settles.

Joey Logano also retired early after a dramatic pit road collision. Logano pulled out of his stall and made hard contact with the No. 41, which had stopped short to avoid the No. 54. "It was just a crazy accident," Letarte said, noting that the 41 had every right to stop where it did. Logano was characteristically stoic in his post-race interview: "It's been a tough year, to say the least, but proud of the speed we had today. It makes it hurt even more, to be honest." Gordon noted that Logano is now first out in points at 17th — a tough hole for a championship contender, especially after what sounded like genuine improvement in raw speed following a tire test at Chicago.

Ryan Blaney's pit road trouble was different in nature: this time it was a driver error, not the pit crew. Blaney appeared to leave his stall in the wrong gear, the engine audibly straining as the car crept away before stalling. "That doesn't sound like first gear to me," Letarte said. "I think you run down pit road in second gear and I don't think it ever came out of second gear." Gordon gave the pit crew credit for making strides recently and was direct: "I think they have made some adjustments on pit road — that's why I hated to see this error by the driver." Blaney ultimately recovered to 10th.

Kyle Busch vs. John Hunter Nemechek: Late-Race Fireworks

The episode's most combustible segment came near the end, when Letarte and Gordon broke down the incident between Kyle Busch (No. 8) and John Hunter Nemechek (No. 42) during the final five-lap sprint. Busch had run inside the top 10 all afternoon and appeared on course for a strong finish when contact between the two cars in the closing laps sent both down the order.

Busch responded to Nemechek's tweet — "Not freaking clear. Great day going and just got wrecked. What an ass." — with his own post on X: "I did not start this. The 42 apparently doesn't know where the right side of his car is... Always know who you're racing beside." Letarte summarized Busch's position: he claimed Nemechek didn't exit Turn 4 all the way to the wall, causing the initial contact, and that his subsequent turn into the 42 was retaliatory frustration.

Both hosts were clear-eyed about it. "Whether he's right or wrong about the position of the 42, I just don't think the replay from the 8 was proportionate," Letarte said. Gordon agreed: "You cost us a finishing point. Your emotion led us to losing that." The retaliatory move likely cost Busch six or seven finishing positions, dropping him from what could have been a top-13 result to 20th. Letarte was emphatic that this doesn't rise to a penalty level: "This is sitdown level for me... bring both in, have a little chat, make somebody's life a little more difficult." He suggested NASCAR go "a little old school" — think autograph appearances and closed-door conversations rather than fines or suspensions.

The hosts also noted the difficult position this puts owner Andy Street in, who is still building a working relationship with Busch in the early stages of his tenure at the No. 8: "You definitely understand why he was frustrated. But I think I probably at some point need to say, 'Hey man, you did cost us some points.'"

Carson Hocevar and Spire Motorsports: Momentum Continues

In a week that could have easily tilted toward distraction, Carson Hocevar kept the momentum from his Talladega win rolling. He won the truck race earlier in the weekend, qualified on the pole for Sunday's Cup race, finished second in Stage 1, ninth in Stage 2, and seventh in the final race. "Momentum is a real thing," Gordon said. "That first win — what a load off your shoulders." Hocevar is sixth in points and the "Carson Hocevar Express," as Letarte called it, keeps building steam.

Teammate Daniel Suarez also had a strong recovery. He sunk to 17th during Stage 1 before green flag cycling brought him back into contention for a sixth-place finish. "He fell all the way outside the top 10 — that's kind of a black hole that you can be pulled into for the rest of the day or fight your way back out," Letarte said. "I thought Suarez fought his way back." Spire Motorsports, which claimed its second Cup win just the week before, looks like a legitimate multi-car program right now.

Around the Field: Miscellaneous Notes

The hosts ran through several other notable performances from the day. Tyler Reddick (No. 23, 23XI) finished fourth. Bubba Wallace came from last to ninth in one of the quieter but more impressive drives of the afternoon. Riley Herbst in the No. 35 car continued his recent ascent, finishing 11th — a result the hosts noted would have seemed impossible just a month ago for that program. Corey Heim led laps but couldn't convert, while RFK Racing's Chris Buescher ran competitively in fifth all day. Brad Keselowski lost track position late due to a stay-out call at the end of Stage 2 that didn't pay off, eventually recovering to 13th.

William Byron spun out during the race but recovered to eighth, while Kyle Larson's spin caused damage that relegated him to 34th. Hendrick Motorsports still locked out three of the top eight finishers, underscoring their strength on intermediates with the new Chevy body.

Looking Ahead: Watkins Glen

The show closed with a teaser for next week's content — Alan Gustavson in studio, and a segment the hosts called "SVG's Racing School," with Shane van Gisbergen walking Letarte through the nuances of Watkins Glen. The race will be sponsored by Go Bowling in what the hosts called "quintessential NASCAR road course racing."

Gordon flagged cool temperatures and possible rain as factors, and noted that Goodyear's tire compound — which showed heavy falloff at The Glen in previous years — may behave slightly differently in spring conditions. He called Watkins Glen a "super speedway of road courses" and highlighted SVG as a likely contender, with teammates potentially pushing back. Points-wise, Tyler Reddick leads by 109 points. The hosts noted several tight battles inside and around the top 10, with Logano in 17th and van Gisbergen in 19th — with three road course races in relatively quick succession (The Glen, Coronado, Sonoma) giving road-course specialists a clear opportunity to make up ground.

Notable Quotes

Chase Elliott (post-race, front stretch): "Man, everybody's just been digging in really hard from the engine shop at Hendrick Motorsports to all the setup shops to everybody at Team Chevy... Just crazy, you know, to say as much as we struggled out here to have won two races here now in the last few years is pretty wild."

Todd Gordon (on the skill vs. equipment debate at Texas): "A great driver can't carry a subpar car. A great car can't carry a subpar driver. You've got to be both — and there are things that Allen will do to make the car faster that Chase needs to limit himself on, in terms of positions he puts himself in."

Alex Bowman (on returning from injury): "I don't know if I'm ever really 100% with all the injuries I've had, but as close as I can be. Got a lot of people helping me out throughout the course of every week. Those first two weeks were rough, but these last two have been really good."

Steve Letarte (on Christopher Bell's DNF): "Six inches is all he needed. I just — tough situation for him. And I said earlier the best car won the race. I'm not sure if the best car won the race, because I don't know where the 20 car would have rolled out at."

Steve Letarte (on Kyle Busch vs. John Hunter Nemechek): "Whether he's right or wrong about the position of the 42, to just junk the 42 — I thought that was more than one race worth of frustration for Kyle Busch."

Joey Logano (post-race interview after DNF): "It's been a tough year, to say the least. Proud of the speed we had today. It just makes it hurt even more, to be honest with you. All you can do is keep digging — go to the next one."

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: May 3, 2026

Race Covered: Würth 400 — Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, Texas

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

> Note: The scheduled task description identifies this show as hosted by "Christian Koelle," but the actual host of Out of the Groove is Eric Estepp. This recap reflects what Eric said in the episode.

Episode Overview

Recorded live from pit road at Texas Motor Speedway moments after the checkered flag, Eric Estepp brought his signature on-location energy to this week's episode. The race gave him plenty to work with: a dominant Chase Elliott win, a Denny Hamlin near-miss that echoed races past, a string of bad luck that continues to punish Christopher Bell, and — most memorably — Kyle Busch throwing away his best run of the season with an intentional shunt in the closing laps. Eric called it hot in more ways than one.

The episode is structured as an immediate post-race walkthrough, with Eric pulling in audio from several drivers directly after the race. His tone ranges from enthusiastic (on Elliott's title case) to exasperated (on Busch's late-race meltdown), with a few tangents that are pure Eric — including an extended riff on the anatomy of a rattlesnake. It's an entertaining, substantive breakdown of a race that packed more stories into 267 laps than most tracks manage all season.

Chase Elliott Is a Championship Contender

Chase Elliott's victory at Texas was his second of the 2026 season and the 23rd of his career, and Eric wasted no time making the case that Elliott deserves to be taken seriously as a title favorite. "Chase Elliott is legit," Eric said. "I know he's the most popular driver. Gets a big round of applause during driver intros, but otherwise he's pretty low-key, unassuming. Well, I think it's safe to assume Chase Elliott is going to be in this title fight late in the season."

Eric traced Elliott's resurgence to a pattern of consistent top-five speed at intermediate ovals — Texas, Las Vegas, Kansas — and pointed out that the playoff calendar is stacked with exactly those kinds of tracks. He also noted that Elliott is the only Hendrick Motorsports driver with a win in 2026, leads the Hendrick stable in points, and has the most top fives. The contrast with 2023–2025, when Elliott failed to make the Championship 4 three consecutive years, was not lost on Eric. "He stopped winning races as much. He stopped going to the championship four... but now he's leading laps and winning races. He's got two already this season." The only other driver in 2026 with multiple wins, Eric noted, is Tyler Reddick.

Denny Hamlin, Track Position, and the Texas Paradox

Denny Hamlin finished second, and Eric gave meaningful time to unpacking the strategic chess match that defined the race's final twenty laps. With a four-lap shootout on the horizon, teams faced the classic Texas dilemma: take new tires and fight from further back, or stay out and hold track position on older rubber. Eric walked through the history of the track — reconfigured in 2017, and ever since a place where track position wins races — to give context to the calls made by the top teams.

Hamlin himself addressed it in an audio clip Eric played: "I just think that I hadn't had good restarts. And I knew I needed to be in the front. And the only way to guarantee to be on the front row for myself personally was going to be to stay out. And looking at the lap times, I mean, we were running what we ran on new tires. So I don't think I would have been able to carry enough throttle even had I started P3 with two tires."

Eric used that decision as a lens to evaluate the whole field — noting that Tyler Reddick took two tires and paid for it, dropping from third to fourth. Alex Bowman also stayed out and parlayed that into a back-to-back third-place finish after missing nearly a month with vertigo. "Back-to-back top five finishes. Really cool to see Alex not only healthy but also locked in putting together some great, great runs." Bowman's own audio clip was blunt: "Like even if you restart in the back with tires, like you can't do anything. Like your car just drives so bad."

The Unlikely Heroes: Spire, Suarez, and the "Old Texas" Feel

Eric devoted a notable portion of the episode to what he called the race's most surprising quality: it looked like a pre-reconfiguration Texas, with an unusually diverse top-ten that included multiple mid-tier and smaller-operation cars. Chris Buescher finished fifth at his home track. Daniel Suarez and Carson Hocevar — Spire Motorsports teammates who qualified first and second — both posted top-ten finishes. Riley Herbst finished 11th, his best non-superspeedway result in the Cup Series.

Eric had particular praise for Suarez, who survived a brutal opening stage — traced back to damage from a practice flat tire — to recover late. Suarez explained: "In practice yesterday, we had a lot of damage on our car after the flat tire... I guess we got maybe more damage than what we thought. But the potential of the car was there. So once we got the offsets right and the balance where it needed to be, obviously the potential of the car was good." Eric called it "great perseverance," and noted it extended Suarez's remarkable streak to four consecutive Texas top-ten finishes.

On Hocevar, Eric noted the irony of his success being invisible to the broader NASCAR world: "We're fast last year," Hocevar said. "We just — I think everybody just forgets that because we finished like 30th every race because something would happen." Eric tied the Spire story together with a broader point: "They're not a championship-contending team yet. They're not good enough everywhere to string together top fives and multiple wins. They're not there yet. But they're building something."

Christopher Bell's Brutal Four-Week Stretch

This was not a light touch. Eric laid out, in sequence, how Christopher Bell has now endured four consecutive weeks of something going wrong. Bristol was partly self-inflicted (a pit road speeding penalty). Kansas, Bell was racing for the win on the final lap when he got squeezed into the fence. Talladega, he got caught up in a late crash while running in the top ten. And Texas, he had just taken the lead from teammate Denny Hamlin in Stage 1 when Todd Gilliland spun in front of him — Bell was hit hard and the damage was terminal.

Eric's voice carried genuine sympathy. "Christopher Bell — I mean, dejected and just dumbfounded after the race in the Infield Care Center." Bell, for his part, stayed characteristically upbeat: "We can do it at any track, any week. Next week at Watkins Glen, I can win. I can win at Dover. I can win at Charlotte. So we've got great race cars and just keep doing what we're doing."

Eric acknowledged Bell's resilience but didn't soften the math: four weeks of hard luck are starting to bury Bell in the standings, and the hole is getting deeper.

Kyle Busch's Meltdown: A Birthday to Forget

The most talked-about moment of Eric's recap was undoubtedly Kyle Busch. Eric set the stage carefully: Busch qualified sixth on his 41st birthday, ran a legitimate top-five-caliber race in Stage 1 under new crew chief Andy Street, and was genuinely looking like a top-ten finisher as the laps wound down. "I'm telling y'all, this looked like vintage Kyle Busch."

And then, with fewer than two laps remaining, Busch made contact with John Hunter Nemechek coming off Turn 2 — Eric wasn't sure if it was a misjudgment or a miscommunication with the spotter — and then in Turn 3, visibly shot his car up into the door of the 42 deliberately. Both cars flew up the racetrack and lost multiple positions. Busch fell from ninth to twentieth.

Eric was direct: "That was so disappointing to see." He played out the full story — including Busch's later Twitter post where he argued Nemechek was running too high off Turn 2, with SMT data to back it up — but didn't let it fully off the hook. "I see what he's talking about. I'll give him that. But that still doesn't excuse what he did in turns three and four."

The broader context made it worse. Busch is in a contract year, racing for his future on an RCR team that's been struggling. He'd been told early in the race — after snapping over the radio at Hocevar — "keep your cool." He responded, "I am cool." Eric's response: "He was not cool."

"You can't throw points away like that. You can't lose your cool, lose your temper like that on the final lap... 12th these days is like a top five for the way Kyle Busch and the eight car have been running. Take the points. Don't piss off your competition. That was so disappointing to see."

Preece vs. Gibbs: Beef Brewing at Texas

Eric took a moment to flag a simmering subplot that didn't make many headlines. Ryan Preece, according to a source monitoring race radios, was vocally unhappy with Ty Gibbs well before the contact between them. Preece reportedly called Gibbs an "effing idiot" over the radio and said he was "done with him." When Gibbs got sideways going into Turn 3 — possibly from close contact with Preece, though onboard camera made it ambiguous — he spun and hit the wall.

Ty Gibbs quote-tweeted the post about Preece's radio comments with a dry "Well, at least he's honest." Eric took a measured view: he didn't think Preece made definitive contact, but noted Preece clearly didn't lift when Gibbs was barely clear. Worth watching as the season continues.

Groovy Gauge: Texas Gets a 65

Eric closed with his Groovy Gauge — his race quality rating — landing at 65%. He offered an honest, affectionate read of the track and the race: Texas reminded him of the pre-reconfiguration era, when the racing could get strung out and strategy mattered more than raw speed. That's not always a crowd-pleaser. But he appreciated what he saw overall: "We had a few of those 'whoa' moments. This race had some exciting moments, had some good battles, and I think probably the most deserving guy got the win."

He also reflected on the state of the venue itself. A self-described longtime attendee who first came in 2005, Eric noted that Texas had gone through rough years of empty seats and declining interest before losing one of its two Cup dates. "Going down to one date has done this place good and has really given this place an energy again that it did not have for a while." On a beautiful weekend in Fort Worth, with packed grandstands and the truck and Xfinity Series also delivering strong races, Eric called the overall event a success.

Notable Quotes

Eric (on Chase Elliott's title case): "He's no longer just top-10ing the field to death. No, he's showing top five winning speed on a regular basis... if there was a championship four right now, he would be one of my early favorite picks."

Denny Hamlin (on the tire call): "I just think that I hadn't had good restarts. And I knew I needed to be in the front. And the only way to guarantee to be on the front row for myself personally was going to be to stay out."

Alex Bowman (on Texas track position): "Like even if you restart in the back with tires, like you can't do anything. Like your car just drives so bad."

Daniel Suarez (on recovering from early damage): "Once we got the offsets right and the balance where it needed to be, obviously the potential of the car was good."

Christopher Bell (after a fourth straight tough break): "We can do it at any track, any week. Next week at Watkins Glen, I can win."

Eric (on Kyle Busch's late-race contact): "You can't throw points away like that. You can't lose your cool, lose your temper like that on the final lap. I get it. It's hot. You're running 12th. You're Kyle Busch. You're used to winning races and championships. But just bring it home, man. Just bring it home."

Race: Würth 400 Presented by LIQUI MOLY — Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, Texas

Date: May 3, 2026 (Race 11 of 36, 2026 NASCAR Cup Series)

Winner: #9 Chase Elliott — Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet

Source: NASCAR Official Channel / NASCAR on FOX YouTube | Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BtL_H0RvQfA | Full Broadcast: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjLE_pPVVBk

Race Overview

Chase Elliott delivered a masterful performance at Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday, capturing his second victory of the 2026 season and the 23rd of his career in the Würth 400 Presented by LIQUI MOLY. Racing on a treacherous 1.5-mile quad-oval that punished numerous championship contenders, Elliott and the No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports team executed nearly flawlessly when it mattered most — riding out chaos while the stars around him crashed, collided on pit road, and spun into walls.

Elliott didn't lead a lap until Lap 152 of 267, when part-time driver Corey Heim finally had to surrender the front spot for fuel after running a brilliant off-cycle strategy. From that point, Elliott controlled the event with iron-fisted consistency, aided by what his team described as their three fastest pit stops of the 2026 season. The No. 9 Amazon Prime Chevrolet led a race-high 87 laps on the day — more than any other driver — and held off a hard-charging Denny Hamlin for the victory.

The race's defining moment came with roughly 11 laps remaining, when Heim spun in Turn 4 and brought out the seventh and final caution. Elliott faced the biggest challenge of his day on the subsequent restart — four laps to the checkered — but got a perfectly timed push from teammate and third-place finisher Alex Bowman off Turn 2, cleared Hamlin on the outside, and managed the final laps to win by 0.407 seconds. The result also made Elliott the first repeat winner in the last 10 NASCAR Cup races at Texas Motor Speedway, joining Tyler Reddick as a multiple winner on the 2026 season.

Stage-by-Stage Breakdown

Stage 1 (Laps 1–80) — Winner: #43 Erik Jones, Legacy Motor Club, Toyota

Pole-sitter Carson Hocevar (#77, Spire Motorsports) set the early tempo, leading the first 19 laps of the event. Joe Gibbs Racing quickly announced its strength when Denny Hamlin surged to the front at Lap 20 with Christopher Bell running alongside — at one point Bell, Hamlin, and Chase Briscoe ran 1-2-3 in what looked like a JGR parade up front. That strength, however, was about to be obliterated by calamity.

The first caution of the day flew at Lap 68 when Todd Gilliland spun directly in front of the race leaders in Turn 4. Bell, running at the head of the field, took evasive action toward the bottom of the track but clipped Gilliland just enough to send his own No. 20 Toyota rocketing into the outside SAFER barrier, destroying the right-side suspension. Bell limped back to the garage and was done for the day in 38th place.

With the field bunched under caution, several cars opted to stay out — including Erik Jones — and a six-lap sprint to the stage conclusion ensued. Jones crossed the line first for his first-ever NASCAR Cup Series stage win. Hocevar, Stenhouse, Ty Gibbs, Briscoe, Kyle Busch, A.J. Allmendinger, Chase Elliott, William Byron, and Hamlin completed the Stage 1 top 10.

Stage 2 (Laps 81–165) — Winner: #9 Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet

Stage 2 was a demolition derby for big names. The carnage began at Lap 92 when William Byron spun exiting Turn 4, bringing out the third caution. Under that yellow flag, disaster struck Joey Logano: Cole Custer stopped in front of Logano's pit stall to let Ty Gibbs exit ahead of him, and Logano had no time to react. The No. 22 Team Penske Ford was destroyed on pit road, left front peeled back like a tin can lid. Three-time champion Logano was out of the race. During the same caution cycle, Chase Briscoe and Kyle Larson collided on pit road as well.

The fourth caution flew at Lap 101 when Ty Gibbs — who had been one of the day's frontrunners — received slight contact from Ryan Preece in Turns 3-4 and hit the wall. Gibbs reported severe vibration from right-front damage and was eventually parked, ending a strong day prematurely.

Through the chaos, part-time 23XI Racing driver Corey Heim — the defending NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series champion — executed a brilliant strategy play. Staying out on the track during cautions, Heim led a stunning 57 laps in the middle segment, running an off-cycle fuel strategy that kept him at the front longer than any conventional stopper could manage. The fifth caution came at Lap 160 when Kyle Larson — the reigning series champion — snapped loose in Turn 2 and hit the wall hard on the driver's side. That caution set up a one-lap dash to the Stage 2 finish.

Chase Elliott, first off pit road on fresher tires, surged past Brad Keselowski on that final lap to claim the stage victory. Reddick, Keselowski, Hamlin, Preece, Suárez, Buescher, Riley Herbst, Hocevar, and Bowman rounded out the Stage 2 top 10.

Stage 3 / Final Stage (Laps 166–267) — Winner: #9 Chase Elliott

The final stage opened with Heim back at the front on strategy, continuing to lead laps on a long fuel run while the top-shelf competition raced around him. Heim stretched his stint as long as the fuel tank would allow — switching to his secondary fuel pump as the main reservoir ran dry — before finally surrendering the lead to pit road at roughly Lap 238. Chase Elliott assumed command with 29 laps remaining and never looked back, until the seventh and final caution struck.

With approximately 11 laps left, Heim spun in Turn 4, bunching the field for one last restart. Hamlin, who had been closing on Elliott, was furious at the timing of the yellow. Tyler Reddick gambled on a two-tire call, restarting ninth with fresh rubber. Elliott chose the inside line on the restart with four laps to go and leaned on teammate Bowman's push off Turn 2, clearing Hamlin in a side-by-side battle and building his lead from there.

Kyle Busch also made news in the closing laps, tangling with John Hunter Nemechek after the final restart and then deliberately knocking Nemechek's car sideways in frustration with two laps remaining. Busch faded to 20th.

Key Incidents & Cautions

Caution 1 — Lap 68: Todd Gilliland (#34) spun in Turn 4; Christopher Bell (#20) clipped Gilliland and hit the outside SAFER barrier. Bell finished 38th (last).

Caution 2 — Stage 1 End (Lap ~74): Stage caution, setting up the six-lap sprint won by Erik Jones.

Caution 3 — Lap 92: William Byron (#24) spun exiting Turn 4. Under this yellow, Joey Logano (#22) was destroyed on pit road when Cole Custer (#41) stopped in his path. Logano out of race.

Caution 4 — Lap 101: Ty Gibbs (#54) spun into Turn 3-4 wall after contact from Ryan Preece. Day over for Gibbs.

Caution 5 — Lap 160: Kyle Larson (#5) snapped loose in Turn 2, hit the wall. Parked; set up Stage 2 final sprint.

Caution 6 — Mid-race pit road: Multiple incidents during Stage 2 caution cycle; Briscoe and Larson also collided on pit road.

Caution 7 — Lap ~256: Corey Heim (#67) spun in Turn 4 with ~11 laps to go. Set up decisive final restart; Elliott won with Bowman's push.

The Race Finish

The final laps delivered genuine drama. With Heim's spin bunching the field, Elliott lined up alongside Hamlin for the restart. Reddick, on two fresh tires, restarted ninth and charged forward. Elliott ran the bottom lane and took Bowman's push off Turn 2, clearing Hamlin in a side-by-side battle — a replay of their Martinsville duel earlier in the season. Elliott managed the lane and his gap for the final four laps to win by 0.407 seconds. John Hunter Nemechek spun on the final lap but the leader had already received the white flag, and the race finished under green. Win No. 23 for Chase Elliott.

Top 10 Finishers

1. #9 Chase Elliott — Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet

2. #11 Denny Hamlin — Joe Gibbs Racing, Toyota

3. #48 Alex Bowman — Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet

4. #45 Tyler Reddick — 23XI Racing, Toyota

5. #17 Chris Buescher — RFK Racing, Ford

6. #7 Daniel Suárez — Spire Motorsports, Chevrolet

7. #77 Carson Hocevar — Spire Motorsports, Chevrolet (pole)

8. #24 William Byron — Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet

9. #23 Bubba Wallace — 23XI Racing, Toyota

10. #12 Ryan Blaney — Team Penske, Ford

Notable: Rookie Connor Zilisch (#88) finished 16th (career best on oval). Corey Heim (#67, ineligible) finished 31st after leading 69 laps. Christopher Bell 38th (last). Kyle Larson 34th. Joey Logano 37th.

Championship Implications

Tyler Reddick's fourth-place finish maintained his series lead — he now leads Denny Hamlin by 109 points and Chase Elliott by 117. Elliott's win makes him a multiple winner (2 victories) on the season, joining Reddick (5 victories). Catastrophic results for Bell (38th), Logano (37th), Larson (34th), and Gibbs (36th) significantly damage their playoff positions. Next up: Go Bowling at the Glen, Watkins Glen International (Sunday, 3 p.m. ET, FS1/HBO Max/MRN Radio).

Race Stats

Laps: 267 (400.5 miles)

Average Speed: 136.315 mph

Pole Position: #77 Carson Hocevar (Spire Motorsports)

Laps Led (Most): #9 Chase Elliott — 87 laps

Laps Led (2nd): #67 Corey Heim — 69 laps

Laps Led (3rd): #11 Denny Hamlin — 21 laps

Cautions: 7

Stage 1 Winner: #43 Erik Jones (Legacy Motor Club / Toyota)

Stage 2 Winner: #9 Chase Elliott (Hendrick Motorsports / Chevrolet)

Margin of Victory: 0.407 seconds

TV Broadcast: FS1 (Announcers: Mike Joy, Clint Bowyer, Kevin Harvick)

Radio: PRN (Brad Gillie & Mark Garrow)

Summary compiled from NASCAR.com race recap, Wikipedia race entry, and YouTube broadcast transcript (NASCAR on FOX). Race replay: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wjLE_pPVVBk

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, May 3, 2026 (post-race, live from Texas Motor Speedway)

Race Covered: Würth 400 Presented by Liqui Moly — Texas Motor Speedway, Fort Worth, TX

Winner: Chase Elliott, #9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck opened the Texas Teardown from the Victory Lane building at Texas Motor Speedway — literally with his back to the lane itself — while Jordan Bianchi joined remotely after what both hosts described as a chaotic, incident-filled afternoon. Chase Elliott's dominant win served as the headline, but the episode quickly became one of the season's most eventful, with two separate on-track retaliation incidents, a passionate defense of Alan Gustafson, a sharp dissection of the Denny Hamlin championship case, and a broiling debate over whether NASCAR made a catastrophic scheduling error with Watkins Glen.

The tone throughout was that of two reporters who had witnessed a race with something for everyone — not a classic, but genuinely eventful by the standards of a season that has often lacked on-track chaos. Jeff and Jordan both leaned into the Kyle Busch/John Hunter Nemechek fallout with particular energy, and the championship conversation revealed just how clearly the two hosts see the top tier of contenders separating from everyone else. The episode ran just over an hour and was recorded live on YouTube with more than 2,600 concurrent viewers.

Opening Reaction — Elliott and the Art of Track Position

Jeff opened without much preamble: "We learned again Jordan today that Texas is a track position race." His central argument — delivered with some conviction — was that the decisive moment of the entire race came early and quietly. Both Elliott's crew chief Alan Gustafson and Elliott himself identified it afterward: a strategic moment in the early laps when a cluster of cars stayed out and drivers like Elliott, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., and Denny Hamlin had to thread through traffic. Elliott cleared it first, grabbed track position, and never truly surrendered it.

"I didn't really think that was going to be like the key moment," Elliott said afterward, as recounted by Jeff. "Sometimes that happens later in the race and you're like, okay, whoever gets through this traffic first is going to get track position and they're going to have control of the race. I didn't really think the intensity was that up at that point because it was pretty early." Jeff's gloss: it was Texas, and at Texas, early track position is late race position.

Jordan pushed back gently, arguing that this wasn't uniquely a Texas phenomenon. "I go back to the Kansas race," he said. "I watched it this morning. I went back and rewatched it just to make sure I wasn't crazy. This is a mile-and-a-half thing we're seeing." Jordan maintained that Kansas, Las Vegas, and now Texas were all variations of the same template: get out front, maintain it, and manage the traffic. The only real variable at Texas, both agreed, is that the track's quirky, oddly-configured layout — particularly turns one and two, which have insufficient banking — tends to produce at least some genuine calamity. There were seven cautions on the day, fewest at Texas since 2019, but still more organic drama than most mile-and-a-halfs this season.

The broader question — does this win signal that Hendrick Motorsports and Chevrolet have genuinely closed the gap on Toyota — got a cautious answer from both hosts. Jeff noted that Jeff Gordon said afterward the field lost Christopher Bell, Chase Briscoe, and Ty Gibbs (all Toyota-affiliated or TRD-powered) in incidents, muddying the competitive read. Jordan went further: "I don't think this is solved. But I do think it's encouraging, because in a season where Toyotas have been so strong at mile-and-a-halfs, they were able to hang there all day. At some point Hendrick is going to figure this out. And when they do — enjoy it now."

The Texas Track Debate

Both hosts took a detour into what has become a recurring argument about the Texas Motor Speedway product, and this week Jordan was the more contrarian voice. He argued that the current reconfigured Texas — for all its weirdness — is actually better than the version of the track that raced in the early-to-mid NextGen era, when it was producing uniformly processional results. "This version of Texas," Jordan said, "is much better than when the 2001 version of that car was racing here."

Jeff wasn't fully sold. He pointed out that drivers have consistently shrugged at the track — Blaney used the phrase "it is what it is" four times in a two-minute answer, Larson echoed it, and Elliott himself had said beforehand that he disagreed with the reconfiguration. The problem, Jeff noted, is structural: "Unless they change the banking — which they're not going to — you're not going to gradually move all the way up and turn one and two." The flat geometry in turns one and two means there's simply no incentive to go up the track, and so races track-position-out from the bottom.

What both agreed on is a more interesting argument: Texas, precisely because of its oddness, at least produces genuine drama that predictable mile-and-a-halfs do not. "You can push it too hard and you get into the wall," Jeff said. "That isn't something we've seen at a lot of mile-and-a-half racetracks this year." The tires, notably, barely wore — Denny Hamlin said later that his lap times had only deteriorated by about two-tenths over long runs — which Jordan said gave the race an "old-school feel" that ultimately worked against the spectacle.

Kyle Busch Retaliates on John Hunter Nemechek

The most charged segment of the episode came when Jeff described receiving a text mid-pit road interview from Jordan saying Kyle Busch had intentionally wrecked John Hunter Nemechek. "I sure missed that," Jeff said. "I was standing looking at a wrecked race car."

The setup: the two were racing for 12th position when Busch, having taken two tires, made an aggressive move. From one angle, it appeared Busch cut into Nemechek's lane before clearing him. Busch posted SMT data afterward and tweeted: "I did not start this. The 42 apparently doesn't know where the right side of his car is and where he is in relation to the outside wall." Nemechek's response: "Not freaking clear. Great day going and just got wrecked. What an ass."

Jeff's parsing of Busch's statement landed with the episode's most memorable line: "Kyle Bush says 'I did not start this.' What he doesn't say in his tweet is 'I did not finish this.' Because he absolutely did finish that." Jeff flagged that this was also the second time in roughly a month that Busch had cleaned someone out in apparent retaliation — the first being Riley Herbst at Bristol — with no NASCAR action taken.

Jordan, characteristically, had less patience for the strategy implications than the philosophy. His point was that Busch threw away what would have been his team's most complete race of the season: qualified well, no issues on pit road, no mechanical failures, on pace for a solid 12th or 13th. "You come here, you have a really sound race from beginning to end. And when you need a good day — and you need a foundational block to build upon — instead you get involved in this tit-for-tat over 12th, end up finishing 20th. For what?" Both hosts agreed a NASCAR penalty wasn't warranted — Jeff drew a firm line between an aggressive but situational retaliation and a deliberate right-rear hook — but Jordan concluded: "This falls on Kyle's shoulders, and why they didn't finish better than they did."

Ryan Preece Goes After Ty Gibbs — SVG Bears Witness

The second retaliation incident of the afternoon arrived in stage one, when Ryan Preece deliberately turned Ty Gibbs into the wall. The setup was all there in the team radio: roughly 30 minutes before the incident, Preece went on a full rant, saying: "When I get to that 54, I'm done with him. Effing idiot. That car is so effing fast. Pisses me off. Stupid. I can't stand when idiots like him have fast race cars where they can do stupid blank and get away with it."

SVG was two cars back when Preece acted on it, and his radio response captured the moment perfectly. As Jordan recounted it: "Holy bleep, Priest just committed a murder. It looks like Priest just full throttled Gibbs." Jeff and Jordan both found SVG's reaction — a genuine, almost delighted shock — one of the funniest moments of the season.

Gibbs quote-tweeted Preece's post-race comments saying "at least he's saying what he feels," and Preece indicated afterward he was not going to be pushed around. Both hosts reached essentially the same verdict as on the Busch/Nemechek situation: not penalty-worthy, because it represents NASCAR's historical tradition of drivers policing their own disputes on the track. "This is old school racing," Jordan said. "This is what people want to see. This is how you get animosity and feuds. This is what this sport was founded on."

Denny Hamlin's Relentless Consistency

The hosts spent substantial time on the second-place finisher, and Jeff's framing was direct: "Denny Hamlin is arguably running the best and most consistent of anybody right now. He just doesn't have the wins to show for it."

Jordan built the statistical case. On non-superspeedway ovals in 2026, Hamlin's finishes were: 5th, 1st, 11th, 2nd, 9th, 4th, 2nd. "If you were gonna make a list of championship contenders," Jordan said, "I'm still inclined to give it to Denny Hamlin. One, because of everything you just listed. Two, because he's battle-tested. He knows how to get through this gauntlet." Jeff agreed, noting that today's result — a runner-up — was not quite in the same category as the Kansas collapse, where Hamlin had it in hand and it evaporated. At Texas, Elliott simply had the track position advantage from the restart and never let Hamlin close.

The broader championship conversation placed the field in a fairly clear order: Hamlin first, Reddick second by virtue of six wins, and Chase Elliott a distant but genuine third. "Elliott is probably third," Jeff said. "And then there's an honest-to-goodness drop-off after that." Ryan Blaney sat fourth in points but the hosts were openly skeptical of Penske's intermediate track pace — "I just don't trust the Penske cars on these tracks right now," Jeff said — and the remaining names got even more caveated treatments. Jordan was particularly bullish on Hamlin's playoff prospects: "Look at the tracks in the Chase. They're all Denny Hamlin's bread and butter."

Alan Gustafson's Social Media Detachment

Both Jeff and Jordan circled back to the Elliott crew chief, who has now been a pivotal factor in back-to-back wins at Martinsville and Texas. Jeff noted that the criticism of Gustafson on social media after calls go wrong is loud and familiar, but Gustafson made it clear — through a quote he offered to Dalton Hopkins of Frontstretch — that none of it reaches him.

Gustafson: "To steal a quote from David Goggins: you'll never find a hater who can do it better than you can. That's the way I look at it. I do everything I can to help this team be successful and win. When I go to bed at night, I know the effort I put in. I know the reality. People are always going to have an opinion. Unfortunately, I think in a lot of cases, there are platforms for people who don't really know what they're talking about that voice their opinion and get people to listen to it."

Jeff observed that this answer would likely infuriate the exact people it's aimed at — "I'm sure the people already inclined not to like Alan Gustafson will now like him even less" — but acknowledged that Gustafson has earned his moment after making the decisive calls two weeks running.

Alex Bowman, Cory Heim, and Peripheral Storylines

Jeff noted with genuine warmth that Alex Bowman finished third for the second straight week — back-to-back thirds after coming back from a vertigo injury that had left serious questions about his future. "He's still so far out of the chase picture," Jeff acknowledged, "but the fact that he's running well — maybe that allows him to have a path forward to stay there next year." Jordan added that Jeff Gordon had described Bowman postgame as "like family."

Cory Heim was perhaps the most animated discussion of the second half. Heim, running as a fill-in Cup driver, led the second-most laps of anyone in the race — around 70, per Jeff (who conspicuously declined to give the exact number so it wouldn't end up on "a different website" generating controversy). Both hosts marveled at his ability to not just inherit track position but hold it. Jeff posed the hypothetical: if a caution had come out two laps before Heim had to pit, he would have been on the same strategy cycle as everyone else. "Could Cory Heim be in contention to win this race? Whoa." Jordan observed that a Heim win would have produced "pitchforks outside 2311" demanding a full-time ride. Both hosts found that prospect entirely appealing.

Spire Motorsports — which started one-two on the grid with Daniel Suarez and Carson Hocevar — came up briefly. Suarez dropped from second to twentieth early and then methodically recovered to finish sixth. Jordan praised Suarez and crew chief Ryan Sparks: "On a day when they were off, they dug down, they grinded it out, and they got a really good finish. That's how you make the chase when you don't have race-winning cars."

Joey Logano and Penske's Deeper Problem

Jeff raised the Logano situation with real concern — not for 2026 alone, but for a broader pattern. "Go back further," Jeff said. "This is not a 10-race slump. They didn't run that well a lot of last year." Jordan noted that Logano finished ninth in points in 2025, so the framing of him as merely a "playoff merchant" isn't entirely fair. But the Penske cars' inability to compete on mile-and-a-half tracks in this car package is becoming difficult to explain away: "You put Logano in a Gibbs car, he's going to be up front doing things. It's more of a Penske issue as a whole."

Logano sat seven points outside the playoff cutline after Texas, and Jordan flagged that the bubble below him — including Zane Smith (plus 13 points), Daniel Suarez (plus 36), and Ryan Preece (plus 63) — was shakier than it might look.

The Watkins Glen Scheduling Controversy

The episode's most unambiguous editorial moment came when Jeff turned to next week's race at Watkins Glen, which in 2026 has been moved from its traditional August date to Mother's Day weekend in early May. Jeff's verdict was crisp: "This is arguably one of the worst, if not the worst, decision they've made with the schedule in recent years." His argument: the Watkins Glen audience is largely a camping audience, and people in upstate New York — or anywhere in the northern tier — do not camp in early May. The weather forecast for race week was already drawing complaints throughout the Texas garage. "It's kind of an insult to the fans who have supported that race for a long time."

Jordan — who is making his first trip to Watkins Glen for the event — agreed it was likely a one-and-done scheduling choice, and suggested NASCAR could do meaningful goodwill damage repair by simply announcing next year's August return date before the race even runs. Jeff's broader take: "If there is one thing that would change with next year's schedule, it would be immediately putting this race back in August where it deserves to be."

Championship Implications

The standings picture after Texas had Tyler Reddick leading with six wins, Denny Hamlin second, and Chase Elliott third. The hosts' consensus was a firm top-three hierarchy — Hamlin, Reddick, Elliott — with a notable gap below. Blaney (fourth in points) got skepticism on the intermediate tracks; Buescher (fifth) was praised for grit but acknowledged as not a championship-caliber threat; Hocevar (sixth) was described as having enormous upside but too green for anyone to project a title run.

Jeff made the structural argument that in the current playoff format, starting the Chase from outside the top six creates a nearly insurmountable math problem if the top-tier teams execute cleanly. Jordan's counter: "Winning does a lot. A Larson or a Bell runs off three wins in a row, and you're getting stage points and bonus points and the math changes faster than you'd think." Both agreed the Chase is worth watching, but neither was pretending the top of the standings wasn't pulling away.

The Weekly Ratings Prediction Poll

A recurring feature of The Teardown is a viewer-ratings prediction poll. Jeff noted that two years ago, when Elliott also won at Texas, the number was 72.9%. Last year with Logano it was 50.7%. Jordan went low at 50%, citing a feeling that this wasn't a memorable enough finish to generate the kind of organic social reaction that spikes the number. Jeff countered at 63%, thinking the Elliott fan engagement would pull it mid-range. Jordan is currently leading the season-long head-to-head, 6-5 over Jeff, with Chase Briscoe yet to get on the board.

Notable Quotes

Jeff (on the decisive moment of the race): "We learned again Jordan today that Texas is a track position race. I mean, no matter what you want to say about it, the key moment of this race — Allan Gustafson said it, and Chase Elliott said it later as well — was the moment where Elliott got through that early traffic quicker than anybody."

Jeff (on Kyle Busch's tweet): "Kyle Bush says 'I did not start this.' What he doesn't say in his tweet is 'I did not finish this.' Because he absolutely did finish that."

SVG (on team radio, after the Preece/Gibbs incident, as read by Jordan): "Holy bleep, Priest just committed a murder. It looks like Priest just full throttled Gibbs."

Jordan (on Denny Hamlin's championship case): "If you were gonna make a list of championship contenders, I understand Reddick's got six wins. I'm still inclined to give it to Denny Hamlin. He's battle-tested. He knows how to get through this gauntlet. And look at the tracks in the Chase — they're all Denny Hamlin's bread and butter."

Alan Gustafson (read by Jeff, on tuning out social media critics): "To steal a quote from David Goggins: you'll never find a hater who can do it better than you can. I do everything I can to help this team be successful and win. When I go to bed at night, I know the effort I put in. I know the reality."

Jeff (on the Watkins Glen schedule move): "This is arguably one of the worst, if not the worst, decision they've made with the schedule in recent years. To put this race on Mother's Day weekend in early May and to expect that people are going to still show up — that's just not going to happen. It's kind of an insult to the fans that have supported that race for a long time."

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr. (with co-host TJ Majors)

Guest: Carson Hocevar — NASCAR Cup Series driver, Spire Motorsports No. 77

Date: Wednesday, April 29–30, 2026 (released post-race, recorded in the Arby's Studio)

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama (April 26, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective — winner interview / extended guest episode

Episode Overview

This was an unplanned guest episode in the best possible way. Dale Earnhardt Jr. brought Carson Hocevar into the Arby's Studio at Dirty Mo Media for what was supposed to be a quick post-win conversation, and it turned into a full hour-plus deep dive into Hocevar's first NASCAR Cup Series victory at Talladega, the emotional weight of that breakthrough, and a wide-ranging look at the young driver's personality, ambitions, and NASCAR philosophy. The episode follows a Tuesday "Dirty Air" segment that had already teased some Hocevar content — so Wednesday's show was the extended version fans were clearly hungry for.

Dale opened with clear enthusiasm, describing Hocevar as "one of the guys, one of the many guys that are going to carry us into the future" and noting that Carson's first win had stirred up his own emotional memories of career-defining victories. TJ Majors co-hosted alongside Dale throughout, helping steer the conversation and adding sharp observations from a crew perspective.

What makes this episode essential listening is Hocevar himself — unfiltered, self-aware, funny, and genuinely reflective. He talks about why he "picked himself" to win at Talladega days before the race, how he navigated the massive Turn 3 crash late in the going, what 1AM at a Mooresville Chili's feels like when you've just won your first Cup race, and the goal he has quietly held onto his entire career: just win one race so he knows he'll get to keep doing this for a living.

The Blend Line Controversy: JR Motorsports Gets Popped

The episode opened not with the win, but with a rules dustup that hit Dale personally — as a team owner. Two JR Motorsports Xfinity cars were penalized during the Talladega weekend for violating NASCAR's blend line rule, an enforcement action that NASCAR had telegraphed in advance via email and video, and even highlighted at the drivers meeting.

Dale explained that he was unaware the penalty was even happening until he ran into Carson at a trackside concert the night before the Cup race. Carson told him: "Hey man, don't do what I did." Dale's response: "The hell did you do?" He hadn't even known a penalty had been issued until that conversation.

Carson's take on the rule itself was candid: "I'm normally the one doing it, honestly." He argued that NASCAR's communication about the rule change — delivered primarily through an email and a video at the drivers meeting — wasn't getting through the way a traditional in-person briefing would. "They don't have driver's meetings anymore. You get an email and a video. I think we need to go back to having drivers meetings again." Dale agreed, noting that the drivers meeting format has become more of a sponsor event than a genuine safety communication tool.

Dale's position as owner was uncomfortable. "I was mad that it happened to them — it cost them spots and a good result. But I also see NASCAR's point. I don't love the idea that it's becoming normal. There's a big wreck coming at some point." He added an old-school perspective on the culture shift: "Back in my day, nobody did that. If somebody was coming, you never would drive up in front of them. You never would."

Navigating the Big One: How Carson Survived Turn 3

Roughly 26 cars were collected in a massive crash going into Turn 3 at Talladega — and Carson described exactly how close he came to being part of it, and why he thinks he got out clean.

Hocevar had been running at the back of the top lane and described a self-aware moment just before the crash: "I was yo-yoing through everybody trying to get the fastest lap. I was like, I'm probably putting myself in a bad spot doing this." That instinct to back off slightly proved critical. When the wreck ignited, he could barely see anything through the smoke. "I was braced for impact. I was more worried about a car spinning back up into my door... dude, if there was a car sitting in front of you at Dollar Tree, you're done."

His escape strategy was simple and instinctive — keep turning right, hoping any sliding cars would drift to the bottom. "I just kept turning my wheel right because I was like, if they have four flats they're just going to slide down." The car picked up some rubber debris that affected the left front, but nothing serious. "I got super lucky there," he admitted.

"I'm Picking Myself": The Mental Road to the Win

This section of the interview was the emotional core of the episode. Carson described a building sense of conviction in the days before Talladega that it was finally his turn.

"After the 500, I was pretty locked in," Hocevar said. He had been leading the Daytona 500 with two laps to go before a crash ended his day — the same No. 47 car that had been involved in that incident was again at the center of the Turn 3 melee at Talladega. "I looked at the racing gods a little bit of like, all right, that's who turned me at the 500. And it killed the only non-Chevy up there."

On the Wednesday before Talladega, driving to a dirt track test, he made a private declaration: "If anybody's owed it, it's us... I'm picking me today. Like I'm picking me this weekend." He went into the race not just wanting to win, but strategically committed to being at the front at the end. "I was bound and determined — just take care of the race and be where you need to be at the end."

When the final restart came with three laps to go and the 43 car got turned out, Hocevar was in the best lane. "I'm the top Chevy here and there are only Chevys around me and one Ford next to me. I was like, as long as I don't [mess] this up, I'm going to win. We're going to win this thing."

Dale listened with visible resonance, sharing his own parallel: "I can really relate with Carson on what he's going through over these past several days." He reflected on his own first Cup win at Texas, noting that the emotion wasn't about championships — it was relief. "I want to do enough to do it for 20 years... if I could just win one race, I think I can do this forever."

Crying Over Videos and 1AM at Chili's: The Aftermath

Dale asked Carson what the days after Talladega had actually felt like — and got an unexpectedly raw answer.

"Every time I watch the video, I just ball up. Like I literally cry my ass off," Hocevar said. "I get back into the same emotion I was in. I can hear the crowd. I can visualize everything again." He had been worried before the win that victory might not live up to the massive expectations he had built up. "My number one fear was it just wouldn't feel like I dreamt about it. But no — it matched up perfectly."

The celebration logistics were equally memorable. His team went to a Mooresville Chili's at 1AM — which the restaurant opened specifically for the occasion. "There's probably 60 to 80 people there. Everybody in the company was there." Chili's corporate had been at the race (Chili's was a race sponsor), and before Victory Lane was even done, they had already called the Mooresville location to arrange access. There was a cake, speeches at the bar, and a full platter setup. "How the hell did you make a cake?" Carson asked them. "We went and bought it," they replied.

The party moved to crew chief Luke's new house afterward, and Carson didn't get home until 6AM — arriving there via "stealing" Luke's truck. Before going to sleep, he personally responded to every text he had received. "Everybody's going to expect me to copy and paste. I'm writing everyone. I'm challenging myself. I wrote it all back and everything."

His post-victory celebration included a reference that clearly landed with Dale: Hocevar climbed out and stood on the car door, looking back at the fans — a nod to Dale's iconic 2014 Daytona 500 celebration. "I was in the stands that day," Carson told Dale. "When I was a kid, I was like, damn, I should have walked down to the fence. I didn't know you could do that." He wanted to replicate the idea of letting the fans know you see them. Dale responded: "I love it. Your celebration was great."

Points, Playoffs, and Racing Philosophy

Dale and TJ walked through where Carson stands in the points (currently 70 points ahead of the 12th playoff spot, with Christopher Bell among the drivers behind him) and what his goals are for the rest of the season. Carson was honest that he's not looking at the big picture just yet: "I'd really like to finish top 12 in points. Top 10 would be really big, but really top 12 would be huge for us."

He also offered a thoughtful take on why the Cup playoff format may actually favor him over time — if he can avoid the early-round attrition that plagued him last year. He acknowledged 2025 had too many mechanical issues and unforced errors. "Last year we'd blow up or fuel pump or tire... we blew away a lot of good races." His mentality for 2026: just finish.

The conversation also went deep on superspeedway philosophy — Carson's love of Atlanta, how Cup drivers now run five-wide with almost no anxiety compared to the chaos such moves would have caused in the 2000s, and how the Gen 7 car's aerodynamic characteristics allow cars to push each other without the old loose-in-traffic problems. "We could put five of them touching each other and they're not going to get free unless there's a car in front of them," Carson observed.

Short Track Dreams, the Indy 500, and a Barndominium with a Chili Bowl

The final stretch of the interview revealed just how much of a racing obsessive Hocevar is beyond Cup weekends. He wants to run as many dirt late mod races as possible, races at Berlin Raceway (his home track in Michigan), and eventually wants a stake in Kalamazoo Speedway ("Kazoo") — the track where he became a race fan as a kid watching Outlaw late model cars. "That track was the main reason I became a racer." He called it a "hidden gem" and said he wants to eventually buy it or at least get 1% just to have a voice in promoting it.

He's building a barndominium on property that will include a second open shop and — his most ambitious idea — a replica of the Chili Bowl dirt track. "Open invitation. If anybody wants to go, I don't even need to be there. Just if you do something cool, film it or I've got to see it." He's already asked his garage door sponsor for the cheapest doors available. "We're going to drive stuff through it and stuff," he told them. Their reaction: "Can we be there to see it?"

His ultimate bucket list race is the Indianapolis 500. "Indy is my favorite track, even in the Cup car." He described narrating fake Indy 500 lap runs to himself during a track test at Indy, getting so excited he eventually had to come in early. "I had to stop. I was going to wreck this thing."

Dale wrapped the episode praising Carson's openness and authenticity. "Keep sharing with everybody who you are. We love to see your toys, we love to see your property... keep digging, man. You're having fun and we're having fun watching you."

Notable Quotes

Carson Hocevar (on deciding he would win at Talladega): "If anybody's owed it, it's us. I'm picking me today. Like I'm picking me this weekend."

Carson Hocevar (on watching post-race video): "Every time I watch the video I just ball up. Like I literally cry my ass off. I felt like I was so focused on soaking it all in, and nothing's a blur. I can tell you exactly where I was on every lap."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (on his own first Cup win at Texas): "I didn't look out into the future and say I want to win 50 races. I looked at Derek Cope and said, I want to do whatever they're doing so I can do this for a living... if I could just win one race, that ought to do it. And when I won Texas, I was like — I think I'm going to race for a living."

Carson Hocevar (on surviving the Turn 3 crash): "I was braced for impact. I just kept turning my wheel right because I was like, if they have four flats they're just going to slide down. I was like, just go, just go to the bottom — please move."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (on Hocevar's future in the sport): "You're going to win a lot of races. You're going to be a massive asset to this industry. Keep being you. Keep doing what you're doing."

Carson Hocevar (on the Chili's post-race celebration): "There's probably 60 to 80 people from — I mean, everybody in the company was there. They had a whole platter set up, speeches at the bar. And they had a cake and I was like, 'How the hell did you make a cake?' They're like, 'No, we went and bought it.'"

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (on why he started doing the backwards celebration in Victory Lane): "I got sour on burnouts. Some guys were doing burnouts to blow a quarter-panel off — cheating. And Mark Martin would always say, 'Man, I'm not a big fan of burnouts.' I drive down there and I just like to watch them. I just like to look at the fans."

Podcast: The GluckCast

Network: The Athletic / Dirty Mo Media

Host: Jeff Gluck

Guest(s): Jeff Dickerson (co-owner, Spire Motorsports); Davey Seagull (host/producer, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio); Darwin Patterson (NASCAR senior manager, series event operations)

Date: April 30, 2026

Episode: 11

Show Type: NASCAR journalism, insider analysis

Episode Overview

Episode 11 of the GluckCast arrives in the immediate afterglow of Carson Hocevar's Talladega Superspeedway victory — a win that felt to nearly everyone in the sport like a genuine turning-point moment. Jeff Gluck opens by cataloguing the extraordinary media blitz Hocevar has undertaken since crossing the finish line: ESPN with Ryan McGee, TMZ Sports, the NASCAR Film Room, Barstool's NASCAR podcast, local Michigan and Charlotte media, MRN, Fox Sports social content, Jim Rome, SiriusXM, and even a volunteer visit to the Dirty Mo Media studio that stretched into a full-length show. Gluck frames this not as a criticism of other drivers who prefer less exposure, but as unambiguous praise for someone who seized his platform.

The episode is built around three interconnected conversations. The main event is the longest GluckCast interview to date — a three-part deep dive with Spire Motorsports co-owner Jeff Dickerson covering everything from the improbable origins of the team to the emotional bond between Dickerson and Hocevar, the sponsor activation story with Chili's, and a frank, at-times combustible response to the ongoing JGR/Chris Gayart lawsuit. That interview is followed by SiriusXM's Davey Seagull weighing in on the sustainability of Hocevar's popularity and the Kyle Bush/RCR situation. The episode closes with Darwin Patterson — NASCAR's senior manager for series event operations — setting the record straight after social media decided she looked "pissed" while directing Hocevar's car into Victory Lane at Talladega.

Jeff Dickerson: From Agency Roots to a Cup Championship Contender

Jeff Gluck opened the interview by describing his long personal history with Dickerson, who spent years as Kyle Busch's spotter and agent before co-founding what became Spire Motorsports. Dickerson reflected on the moment in Victory Lane at Talladega when his entire organization — all 175 employees — flooded the celebration spontaneously: "I don't know if you saw it, like the entire organization was in there. I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it... you get used to it when you win 40 races, but this was just different."

Jeff pushed Dickerson on the extraordinary origin story of Spire's charter — an unsellable Furniture Row charter that Dickerson, TJ Pewer, and Tai Norris ended up buying themselves with no money, pitching the bank president and VP in a 15-minute whiteboard session at their office above an Aquesta bank in Charlotte. "Four days later, we were car owners," Dickerson recalled. Gluck pressed: how big a risk was it really? Dickerson: "You can't go double broke. We already didn't have anything. So we were pushing all in all the time. What kept me up at night wasn't the charter business thing — I knew that would work. What kept me up was the box we checked on Sunday."

Dickerson's sharpest observation about the transition from agent to owner: "It's one thing for your name to be on the back of the check and it's another thing for your name to be on the front of the check. When it's your ass and you're making those decisions — I called all those guys the first couple years and I was just like, I have no idea why the hell you just put up with any of me."

The Carson Hocevar Factor: Irrational Confidence and a Perfect Fit

Gluck suggested that watching Dickerson and Hocevar interact almost felt like watching a father and son, noting that Hocevar seems to have picked up Dickerson's cadences. Dickerson accepted it as a compliment: "I do look at him like a son. I do take responsibility for him like he's my son. We dumped him in a Cup car probably three years before he was ready — the scrutiny, the media attention, every mistake is magnified. That's why I feel responsible. It was our decision to put him in that situation."

On the question of what makes Hocevar's driving work, Dickerson drew a direct comparison to his previous work with Kyle Busch and Kyle Larson: "There are guys that just have it. But I've never seen somebody like him — at least Kyle had trophies when he was acting like that. When the guy is essentially trying to explain to me that tires don't matter to him and physics don't apply to him, you're just like... he's nuclear." Dickerson added that this confidence is also contagious across the team: "You get somebody that walks around the shop like a badass like that. It spreads."

Gluck asked about fan growth, and Dickerson declined to over-complicate it: "You heard that grandstand. I don't remember the ground shaking like that. Those people love him. That's not fake. Those fans weren't reading a script." On the Chili's sponsorship activation, Dickerson described multiple top executives in a bear hug on Sunday and explained that a flood of new sponsor interest hit immediately after Talladega: "We were sold out before Sunday. But I'm telling you, we could probably put about 15 sponsors on there right now if we wanted." He invoked the Gladiator metaphor: "We've all watched that movie. When the senators look at each other after Maximus wins his first fight — that was the industry on Sunday night."

The JGR Lawsuit: "They Know Better. They Just Don't Have the Balls to Say It in Court."

In the most explosive segment of the episode, Gluck asked Dickerson directly why Spire is still a defendant in the Joe Gibbs Racing/Chris Gayart lawsuit, given that a judge's recent temporary restraining order found JGR had demonstrated likelihood of success against Gayart specifically, but not against Spire. Dickerson paused, appeared to wait for a signal from his lawyers, and then delivered some of his most pointed public comments yet on the litigation.

"It is tough sitting in court and being called a liar and a thief and a cheater," Dickerson said. "And every time a judge has asked for any evidence, they have produced nothing. Nothing. And that's not my opinion — there are media people and observers who have witnessed the same thing." He pushed back hard on the insinuation that Spire needed stolen JGR data: "We have an alliance partner that's won 320 races. We don't need their stuff. We don't want their stuff. I didn't ask for their stuff."

Dickerson made clear he believes the lawsuit is a strategic campaign to damage Spire rather than a legitimate legal action: "The process is the punishment. That is what they're doing to us. They want to hurt us in front of the industry. They want to hurt us in front of sponsors and fans. Just because they can." His most pointed comment pointed to what JGR has conspicuously not said in its court filings: "They know who our alliance partner is. They just won't say it, because if I have it, who else has it?" — meaning Hendrick Motorsports, Spire's confirmed alliance partner.

Jeff offered context after the interview: JGR's recent filings alleged Spire could have shared misappropriated information with other Chevy teams like RickWare and Trackhouse, but pointedly did not name Hendrick Motorsports, which would be the obvious first recipient if Spire truly had the data. Dickerson's closing warning: "Spire is comfortable in court and comfortable winning in court. They've called us a lot of things. They might win something. But I'll make sure they wish they hadn't."

Davey Seagull: Is the Hocevar Hype Sustainable?

With Dickerson off to a win lunch, Gluck brought in SiriusXM NASCAR Radio's Davey Seagull to discuss whether the sport risks over-saturating the market on Hocevar, as it has with other drivers who caught fire and then became overexposed. Seagull acknowledged the risk is real — "Tyler Reddick won five of the first ten races and people are already tired of that" — but argued Hocevar is positioned differently because his authenticity is organic rather than cultivated.

"He is a race fan who happens to also be an exceptional driver," Seagull said. "He sends it to you — with other drivers you have to pry it out of them. With Carson, you don't need to do that. You can just go on his Instagram. You can tell he writes his own posts." Seagull also credited Spire's team culture as a key enabler: "He's in the right place because Jeff and everybody at Spire allow him to do him. Even if it's full of mistakes, they ride the highs and the lows with him."

Gluck and Seagull agreed that the sport has spent years starving for authentic personalities, and that watching Hocevar emotionally process his win — admitting to crying watching replay clips, live-streaming on Twitch hours after the biggest race of his career — resonates with fans in a way a polished media-trained response never could. Seagull's caveat: "It's a when, not an if, that there will be bumps in the road. I hope he weathers that storm. He's got good people around him."

On Kyle Busch, Seagull was sympathetic but clear-eyed: "He's not washed. But there is an aspect that needs to be discussed — he is not the same driver in this car that he was in Gen 6. The stats bear that out." Seagull predicted the RCR relationship ends after this season: "I just don't see a way that relationship continues. I feel bad for RCR, I feel bad for Kyle. NASCAR is better when Kyle's winning."

Darwin Patterson Clears the Air: "I Was Not Pissed."

Gluck devoted a segment to Darwin Patterson, NASCAR's senior manager for series event operations, after social media spent the week mocking the woman they saw directing Hocevar's car in Victory Lane as "pissed off" and "taking her job too seriously." Patterson appeared on the GluckCast to explain what was actually happening.

"I was not pissed. I was not upset by any means. I was actually super happy for them," she said. The complication, she explained, was structural: Talladega's Victory Lane is "probably one of our more challenging" to operate, with an asymmetrical layout that requires drivers to enter through a barn door and then hook right to hit the correct angle for the sponsor backdrop. "Carson was not parking there — we needed to get him a little closer, and that car or the backdrop needed to be in position before the climb-out photo for his historic win."

Patterson described a job that most fans have no visibility into — coordinating 10 to 12 photographers who each need different shots, managing sponsor backdrop placement, timing the driver's movement to media and trophy presentation, and doing so while the team is celebrating, the family is present, and everyone wants a piece of the driver simultaneously. "I call it controlled chaos. You have to let them celebrate, let them enjoy it — but we also have things we need to accomplish." She's six years into the role and does 21-25 races a season with colleagues Lane Eckles and Dale Howell.

Gluck praised her Instagram stories as essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the NASCAR weekend from an operations perspective — publicly accessible on her account, with weekly race recaps.

Media and Industry Notes: Streaming Costs, Texas Preview, F1 Overlap

Gluck flagged a significant piece of news for NASCAR fans who follow the Xfinity (O'Reilly) Series: as part of a new CW/ESPN Unlimited partnership taking effect this summer, practice and qualifying for the O'Reilly series will move behind a paywall — $30/month or $300/year — unless subscribers already have access to ESPN Unlimited through a provider. The races themselves will remain free on the CW broadcast network. "The last thing I need is another subscription," Gluck said, noting he already pays separately for Max solely for NASCAR in-car cameras. He expressed sympathy for the CW's business logic while lamenting the direction sports broadcasting is heading generally.

Looking ahead to Texas Motor Speedway, Gluck played clips from Denny Hamlin and Chase Briscoe on the state of the track. Hamlin was blunt: "We're going to run where we're going to run there. Some of the redesigns worked — Texas probably was not the right direction." Briscoe was more specific, identifying turns one and two as structurally flawed: the banking actually gets flatter as you go higher, making it physically impossible to run an upper groove. Turns three and four are notable for a different reason — Briscoe called it "the fastest feeling corner we have in all the series" — but a severe bump makes running high dangerous. The consensus: Texas is likely what it is indefinitely unless major reconstruction happens.

The Texas weekend is a tripleheader (trucks Friday night, O'Reilly Saturday at 3:30 p.m. Eastern on CW, Cup Sunday at 3:30 p.m. on FS1), with the High Limit Sprint Car Series also racing on-property. The Cup race will directly overlap with the Formula 1 Miami Grand Prix on Apple TV, which Gluck dismissed as unlikely to dent NASCAR's viewership: "Apple won't release their numbers. They claimed 1.1 million for Australia with no Nielsen verification. I'm skeptical."

Notable Quotes

Jeff Dickerson (on the Talladega Victory Lane moment): "I don't know if you saw it — the entire organization was in there. I'm getting goosebumps just thinking about it. When you win 30 or 40 races as an organization, you get used to it. This was just different."

Jeff Dickerson (on Hocevar's confidence): "When the guy is essentially trying to explain to me that tires don't matter to him and physics don't apply to him, you're just like — he's nuclear. What are we talking about?"

Jeff Dickerson (on the JGR lawsuit): "It is tough sitting in court and being called a liar and a thief and a cheater. And every time a judge has asked for any evidence, they have produced nothing. Nothing. They know who our alliance partner is. They just won't say it, because if I have it, who else has it?"

Jeff Dickerson (on the transition from agent to owner): "It's one thing for your name to be on the back of the check and it's another thing for your name to be on the front of the check. I called all those guys the first couple years and said, I have no idea why you put up with any of me."

Davey Seagull (on Hocevar's authenticity): "He is a race fan who happens to also be an exceptional driver. He sends it to you. With a lot of drivers you have to get it from them — you have to pry it out or dive deeper. With Carson, you just go on his Instagram."

Darwin Patterson (on the viral Victory Lane moment): "I was not pissed. I was not upset by any means. I was actually super happy for them. In that moment, I am processing — there's things we have to accomplish in Victory Lane. Talladega is probably one of our more challenging victory lanes to operate."

Podcast: Actions Detrimental

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Hosts: Denny Hamlin, Jared Allen (with Travis)

Date: April 28–29, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: 2026 Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama

Show Type: Driver-perspective NASCAR analysis

Episode Overview

This episode of Actions Detrimental opens with a rare admission from Denny Hamlin: he blew it. A speeding penalty on his very first green flag pit stop at Talladega — breaking what he calls "rule number one" — sent him a lap down and effectively ended any chance at a competitive result. From that hole, the episode becomes a candid, wide-ranging autopsy of everything that went wrong, what it means for the state of superspeedway racing, and who benefited most from a chaotic afternoon at Talladega.

The race itself was defined by a massive pileup involving 25-plus cars, Carson Hocevar taking a stunning and celebrated first Cup Series win, and a series of strategic and team communication failures that left Denny frustrated — both with himself and with teammates. But rather than dwelling on the result, Denny and Jared Allen quickly pivot to the bigger structural question the race exposed: the Next Gen car's excessive drag has turned superspeedway racing into a fuel-conservation exercise that no driver, team, or manufacturer seems happy with. Denny calls it the most pressing issue in the sport and isn't shy about what he'd do to fix it.

The episode also covers Corey Day winning the Xfinity race, Cletus McFarland nearly shocking the ARCA field, Tyler Reddick's contract extension at 23XI, Steve O'Donnell's elevation to NASCAR CEO, a crew chief change at RCR, and a full-throated response to Stephen A. Smith's claim that NASCAR drivers aren't athletes.

Denny's Speeding Penalty — "You Cannot Break Rule Number One"

Denny opened with unambiguous accountability for his race going sideways. On his first green flag pit stop, while running up front, he received a speeding penalty entering pit lane. "I just didn't quite get it slowed up apparently," he said. "It's not one of those where I was like, oh, I know I was speeding." He added, somewhat ruefully, that everyone on social media — the Denny Bros, Twitter, apparently everyone — could see it clearly on TV. He didn't dispute it.

What made it sting more was the context: Denny had actually been running aggressively because he knew their strategy was going to be tough regardless. "Being the leader allows you to be more aggressive because you have all the downforce on your car to help slow you down," he explained. He thought he had a good mark — just didn't quite execute. The speeding penalty sent him back to last on the lead lap, and from that point, his race became a long, grinding battle just to get back to where he started. Jared pointed out he'd also just been warned to watch out for a weeper on pit road, making the mistake all the more surprising. The net damage: only five points lost in the standings, with Tyler Reddick (who had his car destroyed but somehow limped home 14th) extending his points lead by just that margin. Denny acknowledged that was fortunate.

"The Drag in This Car" — Denny's Superspeedway Manifesto

The episode's centerpiece was Denny's impassioned argument that the Next Gen car has fundamentally broken superspeedway racing, and that NASCAR needs to act now — not in five years. The core problem, as Denny explained it repeatedly: the car has so much aerodynamic drag that you simply cannot pull out of line. "There's nowhere to go," he said. "I tried going high. I tried going low. I tried going middle. You can't do it because I tried going high. You can't pull out of line."

That inability to pass, Denny argued, is what has created the fuel-saving racing that fans and drivers alike complain about. "Fuel savings is not the issue. It's the drag in the car." Teams have adapted their entire race strategy around it — the goal now is to minimize pit stop time, cycle to the front, and hope no caution catches you out of position. "Once you come out 10th on that final stop, you're cooked. You will not contend." He pointed out the Next Gen car has hundreds of aerodynamic drag "counts" more than the Gen 6 car, yet paradoxically goes slower, because all that drag cancels out the additional horsepower.

His proposed fix was specific and practical: reduce horsepower via a tapered spacer, then remove corresponding drag from the body. He acknowledged the politics are complicated — the three OEMs have invested heavily in their superspeedway engines at current horsepower levels, and any change to the spacer could shift the power balance between manufacturers. But his response was pragmatic: just run them on the dyno. "If they're all still within a couple horsepower of each other, let's just ship it. Someone's got one or two horsepower. It's fine. It's worth it to improve the super speedway racing." Jared aptly summarized the bigger obstacle: "It feels like all the things that would make the racing better, there's a caveat as to why a party in the sport wouldn't want to do that." Denny agreed, but grew visibly impatient: "For the last three years I've said please let's not neglect that we have a super speedway racing issue. I want it to change and I'm impatient."

The Big Pileup — Ross Chastain Pushes Bubba Wallace

The race's defining moment was a massive wreck in turns three and four that collected 25-plus cars. Denny traced the cause to a specific and easily-missed track feature: a bumpy patch near a hauler tunnel between turns three and four. "There's a patch where they patch the racetrack and it's quite bumpy there. And you always have to be very aware not to push once someone starts going over that, because the car is starting to go up and down. And when you're pushing it, it really could cause something." Ross Chastain got to Bubba Wallace right at that bump, and the contact — which didn't look particularly egregious from a camera angle — turned Bubba violently. "It didn't look very egregious from a, you know, eyeball standpoint, but it turned them quickly."

Denny noted he was in the bus afterward looking at his timing and scoring monitor and seeing that all the drivers he normally tracks week-to-week — highlighted on his screen as the cars to beat — were all clustered at the bottom of the results sheet. "They all got in that big wreck. Like, it took out a lot of the big ones." He had no particular criticism of Chastain's move beyond contextualizing why the bump made it more dangerous than it might have appeared.

Team Communication Frustrations — The 20 Car and the 14 Car

Two separate incidents involving teammate and competitor behavior left Denny visibly frustrated, and he addressed both directly. The first involved Christopher Bell's No. 20 JGR car staying out under caution when multiple JGR teammates — including Denny's 11 — were a lap down and needed cars to pit so they could take the wave around. "I was like, yeah, but your other three cars are one lap down. You're forcing all of us to battle each other to get back on the lead lap, where you can get one back for free." Bell finished second in the stage, which Denny acknowledged was the team's likely logic — with passing nearly impossible, track position is everything. But Denny argued the bigger picture calculus was wrong: more bullets in the gun matters more than a stage point or two.

The second incident was pointed in a different direction. Denny said the No. 14 team — a car he had personally let back on the lead lap at Kansas the previous week — used radio communication to intentionally stay out and block cars from getting the wave around at Talladega. "Travis and I went back and looked at the radio before this started. They intentionally, well, the radio communication was like, 'Hey, if we stay out here, we can keep some cars from taking the wave around.'" Denny was measured but clear: "I'll make sure I have no mercy then" when it comes time to lap them. Jared added that Denny had also given that team Hawaiian rolls before the race. No good deed goes unpunished.

He also noted that NASCAR admitted it had incorrectly given Todd Gilliland laps back during the race and then simply told teams to keep racing — which Denny called a "stupid call" given how impossible passing is.

Carson Hocevar's Win — "He Could Carry the Sport"

Despite his own rough day, Denny was genuinely enthusiastic about Carson Hocevar's first Cup Series victory and his half-in, half-out-of-the-car celebration that had fans buzzing. "I was really happy for him. I still am. Really, really am." He noted that Hocevar and Corey Day — the weekend's two winners — are probably the two young drivers who absorb the most criticism in their respective series, and yet arguably have the highest ceilings.

Denny offered a specific personal anecdote to back his growing respect for Hocevar's racecraft: at Bristol, he had been racing side-by-side with Hocevar on the top lane and was convinced Hocevar was eventually going to hook him into the inside wall. "He kept in control of his car at all times. And I told him after that race, that's some good driving." Denny believes the win unlocks something: "You're not pressured by 'when are you going to do it?' And now I think that gives him the ability to have the confidence — if he even lacked any, I don't think he lacked any — to unleash even more speed."

On the celebration itself, Denny admitted: "I envious. It was really good. Really, really good." He speculated whether Hocevar had planned it or improvised — Hocevar has said he realized he could still touch the pedals while getting out, meaning he could stop the car while showing himself to the crowd. "Really smart," Denny said. "The crowd gets to see them, but the crowd never gets to see them celebrate right when they're doing it."

Corey Day Wins Xfinity; Cletus Almost Shocks ARCA

Denny didn't watch a single lap of the Xfinity race but saw the highlights and called Corey Day's win a sign of genuine development. He acknowledged that just a week before, someone on his bus had immediately predicted Corey Day had caused a caution the moment one came out — and TV confirmed it seconds later. But Denny says he's starting to see enough from Day to "turn the corner." "As far as getting speed out of the car, I'm liking what I'm seeing." He was also supportive of NASCAR's decision to penalize cars for weaving in the Xfinity race on the backstretch, referencing a Jesse Love move that prompted a penalty. "If you just call it once, it'll get the attention of everyone else and it will then police itself."

In ARCA, Cletus McFarland came agonizingly close to a shocking win but got outmaneuvered in the final laps. Denny's read: Cletus got too focused on the car to his inside and let the push from behind go by on the outside without going with him. "He was getting closer. I mean, certainly he it looks like he's more in control of his car now than he's ever been."

Tyler Reddick Extended at 23XI

Denny confirmed that Tyler Reddick has signed a contract extension to stay with 23XI Racing in the No. 45. "He's performing at a very very high level. He's got a 100-point lead in the Cup Series. He's just kicking ass and we're very happy that he's going to be in that 45 for some time." When Jared asked about the negotiation process, Denny said he personally handled it: just him and Tyler's agent. "He my man got the bag. I look out for my guys."

Steve O'Donnell Named NASCAR CEO; Jim France Steps Down

Denny addressed the leadership change at NASCAR with measured optimism. He thanked Jim France for his service and for things like the Garage 56 Le Mans program, but didn't shy away from acknowledging real friction: "I certainly had issues with some of it. The charter negotiations and the way that got handled was not in my mind correct, which is why we went as far as we did." On Steve O'Donnell, Denny was genuinely hopeful — but with a condition: "I hope it's not just a title for him. I definitely hope that the France and Kennedy family really give Steve the autonomy to run it as he sees fit." He wants O'Donnell empowered to steer, not just hold the wheel.

Andy Street Replaces Jim Polman as Crew Chief for the #8

Breaking news during the episode: Andy Street will take over as crew chief for Kyle Busch's No. 8 Chevrolet at RCR, with Jim Polman moving into a broader competition leadership role. Denny's reaction was candid bemusement — "Oh, Jesus" — before processing it. He noted that RCR has been through crew chief changes repeatedly and that Street comes from the Xfinity side (11 wins), which is a legitimate résumé but a significant step up. His overall take: "You got to do something."

Are NASCAR Drivers Athletes? Denny Responds to Stephen A. Smith

Stephen A. Smith sparked a debate with comments suggesting NASCAR drivers aren't athletes. Denny's response was nuanced and, ultimately, mostly agreeable in direction while pushing back on the framing. "By definition — strength, agility, stamina — we are absolutely athletes in that sense." He specifically challenged anyone to sit in the car at Talladega — the easiest physical track on the circuit — and do what drivers do. "Your bodies are not trained to do that. Turn that wheel, sit in that heat, maintain the G-forces. You just your bodies are not trained to do that." But he also acknowledged the spirit of Smith's argument: "I don't think I'm athletic." The distinction, Denny argued, is between being an athlete in your discipline versus being broadly athletic in the conventional sense. His advice for everyone who got worked up: "Have some thick skin."

Texas Preview

Next up is Texas Motor Speedway, and Denny has history — some great, some painful. "I run like a bat out of hell there, but finishing has been horrible." The show closed with a painful reliving of the 2024 Texas green-white-checkered restart where Denny had the lead, lost it on the restart exchange to Chase Elliott "by a whisker," then over-drove turn three in frustration trying to stay beside him and backed into the wall. "I was so god-forsaken pissed that I had lost the lead on that restart exchange." Jared's injection of that story at the end prompted the episode's teaser-worthy opening line: "Thanks, Jared. Thanks. God, I was getting through this episode fine and then y'all ruin it."

Notable Quotes

Denny (on his speeding penalty): "It's just you can't break rule number one. Under green, first stop. You just can't. And so you know, my thought process is — one of the things I've needed to improve on on super speedways is my pit entry under green flag during the pit cycles. I felt comfortable that I had a good mark. Just didn't quite get it slowed up apparently."

Denny (on the fundamental drag problem): "Fuel savings is not the issue. It's the drag in the car. You fix the drag, you fix the fuel mileage. You'll still have people saving fuel, but not like it is now where once you come out 10th on that final stop, you're cooked. You will not contend."

Denny (on the 14 car blocking the wave around): "Travis and I went back and looked at the radio before this started. They intentionally — the radio communication was like, 'Hey, if we stay out here, we can keep some cars from taking the wave around.' This was the front row team that I let back on the lead lap last week. When I go to lap them at one of these races, I'll make sure I have no mercy then."

Denny (on Hocevar's ceiling): "I think we thought that Carson could win. I think superspeedways is still his best opportunity, but he's starting to show it on all the other racetracks as well. This could be a moment where he's now tasted victory. He understands it. You're not pressured by 'when are you going to do it?' — and now I think that gives him the ability to unleash even more speed."

Denny (on the celebration): "I envious. It was really good. Really, really good. I'd be interested to know — had he planned it, or did he win and then say, okay, let me think about what I'm going to do now?"

Denny (on O'Donnell's new role): "I definitely hope that the France and Kennedy family really give Steve the autonomy to run it as he sees fit. You want to be rewarded or fail on your own terms. You don't want to have to say, 'Well, this thing I tried to do failed because they wouldn't let me do it.'"

Episode available on YouTube at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMpp66pj7_g

Also available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Dirty Mo Media

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr. (with co-host TJ Majors)

Guest(s): Carson Hocevar — Driver, No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet

Date: Tuesday, April 28, 2026

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Lincoln, Alabama (April 26, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective

Episode Overview

This Tuesday edition of the Dale Jr. Download covers a stacked Talladega weekend that Dale himself largely missed — he and wife Amy were in Nashville for a Texas Roadhouse franchise event while the cars were turning laps at the big track. Despite missing the race live, Dale digs deep into all the storylines with co-host TJ Majors before welcoming in-studio guest Carson Hocevar, fresh off his first career NASCAR Cup Series win in the Jack Link's 500.

The episode also covers a major crew chief change at Richard Childress Racing — Jim Pohlman departing as Kyle Busch's crew chief and Andy Street stepping back in — and Dale shares insider perspective on how that move went down, including the phone call from Mike Dylan and his honest assessment of where JRM stood when Pohlman left. The show closes with FanDuel picks for the upcoming Texas race and a brief look ahead.

Note: Due to the length of Carson Hocevar's in-studio visit, Dale announces mid-episode that the full Carson interview will be carried over to Wednesday's guest episode. What appears here is the first portion of that conversation.

Kyle Busch's Crew Chief Change: An Insider Account

Dale opens with what he calls a tough conversation: the announcement that Jim Pohlman is stepping down as Kyle Busch's crew chief at RCR, transitioning into a leadership role in the competition department, with Andy Street taking over the No. 8 car.

Dale's take is candid and deeply personal — Pohlman had been at JR Motorsports for years and won them a championship. "We're extremely thankful for Jim," Dale says, before giving the real backstory. Mike Dylan called and asked if RCR could speak to Pohlman. Dale says he told Pohlman honestly: "I don't know if that's something you want to do." At that point, Pohlman had reached what Dale describes as "the end of his runway" at JRM — he had a list of operational improvements he wanted to see, some of which were possible and some weren't. "I was like, hey man, I want you to stay. We've got to figure it out," Dale recalled. Ultimately, Pohlman chose to take the RCR opportunity.

Now, just a handful of races into the season, the change hasn't clicked. Dale is philosophical about it: "I don't think that he made a mistake leaving Junior Motorsports. I really don't." He notes JRM is running well under Justin Allgaier, suggesting the operation was in a good place when Pohlman left. But for Kyle Busch — who Dale pegs at around 40 years old — the stakes are urgent. "Kyle's sitting there thinking five more years, maybe, of kickass talent left. I need to be winning now." Dale believes Busch is fielding calls from other teams and that RCR has to get things figured out before his attention wanders elsewhere.

TJ pushes back slightly, asking whether the timing is too early for a crew chief change. Dale's read: someone in the relationship raised their hand. "You don't make this change unless somebody said, 'I can't. This isn't working for me.'" He doesn't know if it was Kyle or Jim, but the decision was inevitable. The irony, Dale notes, is that they brought back Andy Street — someone already tried late last season — suggesting some comfort level is there even if results weren't. "Who else do you go get right now? It almost has to be internal."

Dale also raises the organizational challenge facing RCR: it's harder to recruit top-tier talent when your shop is an hour up the road from the Concord/Harrisburg hub of the NASCAR world. "It feels like you've got a very talented guy you want to hire, maybe he doesn't want to uproot his family or make that drive every day. That's a hurdle."

The O'Reilly Race Penalty Debate: Code Violation or Fair Game?

Before Carson arrives, Dale and TJ get into a heated back-and-forth about a penalty handed out during the O'Reilly Talladega race (the Xfinity-equivalent series). Two JRM cars — driven by Carson Kvapil and Justin Allgaier — were penalized for impeding the oncoming pack on the back straightaway by pulling up into the middle and outer lanes after coming off pit road.

Dale takes the position that this is a code violation that has become normalized and needs to stop. He tells a story from 2003 when Kenny Wallace pulled out on the racetrack in front of a faster pack during practice: "No one ever thought, man, that's acceptable. That's against the code. You just don't do it." He supports NASCAR's decision to crack down, even though it hurt his own teams. "I'm going to appreciate if we'd go back to normal drivers meetings. I needed Mike Helton to be in a room saying, 'Guys, today we're going to focus on X, Y, and Z.'" Dale is firm that the COVID-era video-email format is insufficient: "My guys aren't watching it."

TJ counters that if NASCAR is going to police it, they need to police it consistently — pointing to a third car (the No. 92) that appeared to do something similar without getting flagged. "If you're going to do it to us, do it to the next guy." He also challenges whether the penalty timing is fair given that "guys were doing this on Sundays every week."

Dale concedes that NASCAR was slow to move: "They finally decided to please." But he holds firm that the trend needs stopping. "Somebody's going to get turned over."

The debate is tabled when the studio door opens.

Carson Hocevar In-Studio: Winning Talladega and the Emotions That Followed

Carson Hocevar walks in mid-debate and immediately jumps into the conversation — confirming he heard about the penalty from Kvapil at a concert at The Boulevard. "He's like, 'Hey man, don't do what I did,'" Hocevar says. "I didn't even realize what the penalty was for." Hocevar admits he's been doing similar moves himself — he mentions he pulled something similar in the Chevy on a plate race and got away with it. "I've already [done it]… the Penske cars had a whole plan — one car goes here, one car goes there — to really block them."

When Dale shifts the conversation to the win itself, Hocevar gets emotional. He says he can replay every second of the race: "Nothing's a blur. I can tell you exactly where I saw somebody. I can tell you exactly what I was pointing to. I remember it all." When he watches the race back, he cries — "literally cry my ass off, like I'm so lame" — because the emotions are fully accessible. "I can get back to that spot. I can hear the crowd. I can visualize everything again."

He admits the thing he feared most about winning was that it wouldn't live up to the dream. "I was scared it wouldn't feel like I dreamt about and it would just be like, damn, this is everything I've ever worked for and it just… wasn't what you expected. But no — it matched up perfectly."

On the big crash: Hocevar was running a yo-yo strategy, repeatedly laying back and driving through the field to generate the fastest lap time. He says he actually had a moment of self-awareness: "I was like, I'm gonna get these guys in a wreck because I'm yo-yoing through everybody." He backed off slightly, then saw one car "do something not normal" and his spotter Tyler called it. "Luckily, I had that intuition." His car took minor left-front damage from debris but came through clean. "I braced for impact. I was more worried about a car spinning back up and hitting the door." A tire blew just as he was coming off Turn 2 and he managed to hold it together long enough for the carnage to pass.

Dale wraps the first portion of the conversation with genuine enthusiasm: "Corey Day is a championship contender. I'm gonna say it." — though this comment is technically about the O'Reilly race winner, not Hocevar. On Hocevar going into Texas, Dale sees a live bet: "He's won here in the truck series, he likes the track, he's got a top 10 here already in the Cup race last year, I believe he even won the poll here in the fall. With the win under his belt, the pressure's off."

NASCAR Leadership Transition: Jim France Steps Down, Ben Kennedy Ascending

A listener asks about Jim France stepping down. Dale's take is measured: "It changes nothing. I don't think this changes how business is going to get done." Steve O'Donnell, already in a high position, steps into the formal role. Dale sees it as the France family acknowledging the inevitable and getting ahead of it.

The more interesting move, Dale says, is Ben Kennedy's continued rise through the organization. "Ben Kennedy is the guy. Whatever this sport is in 25 years will be through the vision and eyes of Ben Kennedy." Dale has a working relationship with Kennedy — he describes calling Ben directly to find out what really happened when Kennedy took his team to a race in an undercover-boss type scenario. "He answered. They're easy to reach."

Dale also has praise for Julie Geese, who has moved into the schedule-focused role Kennedy was previously handling. "She don't mess around. She is the real deal." His overall assessment of current NASCAR leadership is glowing: "I approve a thousand percent with the leadership they have in place. They're good people, and they want what's good for the sport."

FanDuel Dirty Mo Dough Picks: Texas Motor Speedway

With Talladega in the books and Texas on deck, the show closes with the weekly betting segment. The favorites remain the same: Denny Hamlin, Kyle Larson, William Byron, Christopher Bell, and Ryan Blaney. Dale notes with some humor: "We might as well not even print a new sheet."

Hocevar is flagged as a top-10 value bet coming off his Talladega win and given his history at Texas: win in the truck series, competitive Cup runs, and possible pole position momentum. Dale likes the Suarez over Chastain head-to-head prop: "Suarez is plus money and he's been top 10 in the last three at Texas. That's a bet to make."

An eyebrow-raising take comes from producer Russ, who suggests Austin Cindric as an underrated performer at mile-and-a-halves, drawing skepticism from Dale and TJ. "That is a wild take," TJ says flatly, before Russ notes Cindric had finishes of 5th, 8th, 12th, and 8th across recent ovals. "The relationship [with Cindric from the Fox booth] is affecting your decision making," TJ deadpans. The segment closes with Brad Keselowski as a plus-150 underdog value against Chase Briscoe, and Chase Elliott over Joey Logano.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on Pohlman leaving for RCR): "I don't think that he made a mistake leaving Junior Motorsports. I really don't. I think he was at the end of his runway. He needed new horizons, a new place and a new space."

Dale (on Kyle Busch's urgency): "Kyle's sitting there thinking five more years, maybe, of kickass talent left. I need to be winning now. He ain't 30, he's 40. There's some urgency."

Carson Hocevar (on replaying the Talladega win): "Every time I watch the video, I just ball up. I literally cry my ass off. I'm so lame. But I was so focused on soaking it all in — nothing's a blur. I can tell you exactly where I saw somebody, exactly what I was pointing to. I remember it all."

Dale (on the back-straight blocking penalty): "In 2005, nobody did that. It was really against the code — to pull blatantly into the third lane and go in front of a 10-car pack. That was against code. Now it's become normalized. It has. And NASCAR is right to try to get a hold of it before somebody gets turned over."

Dale (on Ben Kennedy's rise): "Whatever this sport is in 25 years will be through the vision and eyes of Ben Kennedy. And he will run this business with all the best intentions. He's a great guy."

Dale (on NASCAR governance overall): "I approve a thousand percent with the leadership they have in place. They're good people, and they want what's good for the sport. They're people I can call and they'll answer the phone, and I can tell them what I think, and we can have a conversation."

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr. (with co-host TJ Majors)

Guest(s): Carson Hocevar — Driver, No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet

Date: Tuesday, April 28, 2026

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Lincoln, Alabama (April 26, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective

Episode Overview

This Tuesday edition of the Dale Jr. Download covers a stacked Talladega weekend that Dale himself largely missed — he and wife Amy were in Nashville for a Texas Roadhouse franchise event while the cars were turning laps at the big track. Despite missing the race live, Dale digs deep into all the storylines with co-host TJ Majors before welcoming in-studio guest Carson Hocevar, fresh off his first career NASCAR Cup Series win in the Jack Link's 500.

The episode also covers a major crew chief change at Richard Childress Racing — Jim Pohlman departing as Kyle Busch's crew chief and Andy Street stepping back in — and Dale shares insider perspective on how that move went down, including the phone call from Mike Dylan and his honest assessment of where JRM stood when Pohlman left. The show closes with FanDuel picks for the upcoming Texas race and a brief look ahead.

Note: Due to the length of Carson Hocevar's in-studio visit, Dale announces mid-episode that the full Carson interview will be carried over to Wednesday's guest episode. What appears here is the first portion of that conversation.

Kyle Busch's Crew Chief Change: An Insider Account

Dale opens with what he calls a tough conversation: the announcement that Jim Pohlman is stepping down as Kyle Busch's crew chief at RCR, transitioning into a leadership role in the competition department, with Andy Street taking over the No. 8 car.

Dale's take is candid and deeply personal — Pohlman had been at JR Motorsports for years and won them a championship. "We're extremely thankful for Jim," Dale says, before giving the real backstory. Mike Dylan called and asked if RCR could speak to Pohlman. Dale says he told Pohlman honestly: "I don't know if that's something you want to do." At that point, Pohlman had reached what Dale describes as "the end of his runway" at JRM — he had a list of operational improvements he wanted to see, some of which were possible and some weren't. "I was like, hey man, I want you to stay. We've got to figure it out," Dale recalled. Ultimately, Pohlman chose to take the RCR opportunity.

Now, just a handful of races into the season, the change hasn't clicked. Dale is philosophical about it: "I don't think that he made a mistake leaving Junior Motorsports. I really don't." He notes JRM is running well under Justin Allgaier, suggesting the operation was in a good place when Pohlman left. But for Kyle Busch — who Dale pegs at around 40 years old — the stakes are urgent. "Kyle's sitting there thinking five more years, maybe, of kickass talent left. I need to be winning now." Dale believes Busch is fielding calls from other teams and that RCR has to get things figured out before his attention wanders elsewhere.

TJ pushes back slightly, asking whether the timing is too early for a crew chief change. Dale's read: someone in the relationship raised their hand. "You don't make this change unless somebody said, 'I can't. This isn't working for me.'" He doesn't know if it was Kyle or Jim, but the decision was inevitable. The irony, Dale notes, is that they brought back Andy Street — someone already tried late last season — suggesting some comfort level is there even if results weren't. "Who else do you go get right now? It almost has to be internal."

Dale also raises the organizational challenge facing RCR: it's harder to recruit top-tier talent when your shop is an hour up the road from the Concord/Harrisburg hub of the NASCAR world. "It feels like you've got a very talented guy you want to hire, maybe he doesn't want to uproot his family or make that drive every day. That's a hurdle."

The O'Reilly Race Penalty Debate: Code Violation or Fair Game?

Before Carson arrives, Dale and TJ get into a heated back-and-forth about a penalty handed out during the O'Reilly Talladega race (the Xfinity-equivalent series). Two JRM cars — driven by Carson Kvapil and Justin Allgaier — were penalized for impeding the oncoming pack on the back straightaway by pulling up into the middle and outer lanes after coming off pit road.

Dale takes the position that this is a code violation that has become normalized and needs to stop. He tells a story from 2003 when Kenny Wallace pulled out on the racetrack in front of a faster pack during practice: "No one ever thought, man, that's acceptable. That's against the code. You just don't do it." He supports NASCAR's decision to crack down, even though it hurt his own teams. "I'm going to appreciate if we'd go back to normal drivers meetings. I needed Mike Helton to be in a room saying, 'Guys, today we're going to focus on X, Y, and Z.'" Dale is firm that the COVID-era video-email format is insufficient: "My guys aren't watching it."

TJ counters that if NASCAR is going to police it, they need to police it consistently — pointing to a third car (the No. 92) that appeared to do something similar without getting flagged. "If you're going to do it to us, do it to the next guy." He also challenges whether the penalty timing is fair given that "guys were doing this on Sundays every week."

Dale concedes that NASCAR was slow to move: "They finally decided to please." But he holds firm that the trend needs stopping. "Somebody's going to get turned over."

The debate is tabled when the studio door opens.

Carson Hocevar In-Studio: Winning Talladega and the Emotions That Followed

Carson Hocevar walks in mid-debate and immediately jumps into the conversation — confirming he heard about the penalty from Kvapil at a concert at The Boulevard. "He's like, 'Hey man, don't do what I did,'" Hocevar says. "I didn't even realize what the penalty was for." Hocevar admits he's been doing similar moves himself — he mentions he pulled something similar in the Chevy on a plate race and got away with it. "I've already [done it]… the Penske cars had a whole plan — one car goes here, one car goes there — to really block them."

When Dale shifts the conversation to the win itself, Hocevar gets emotional. He says he can replay every second of the race: "Nothing's a blur. I can tell you exactly where I saw somebody. I can tell you exactly what I was pointing to. I remember it all." When he watches the race back, he cries — "literally cry my ass off, like I'm so lame" — because the emotions are fully accessible. "I can get back to that spot. I can hear the crowd. I can visualize everything again."

He admits the thing he feared most about winning was that it wouldn't live up to the dream. "I was scared it wouldn't feel like I dreamt about and it would just be like, damn, this is everything I've ever worked for and it just… wasn't what you expected. But no — it matched up perfectly."

On the big crash: Hocevar was running a yo-yo strategy, repeatedly laying back and driving through the field to generate the fastest lap time. He says he actually had a moment of self-awareness: "I was like, I'm gonna get these guys in a wreck because I'm yo-yoing through everybody." He backed off slightly, then saw one car "do something not normal" and his spotter Tyler called it. "Luckily, I had that intuition." His car took minor left-front damage from debris but came through clean. "I braced for impact. I was more worried about a car spinning back up and hitting the door." A tire blew just as he was coming off Turn 2 and he managed to hold it together long enough for the carnage to pass.

Dale wraps the first portion of the conversation with genuine enthusiasm: "Corey Day is a championship contender. I'm gonna say it." — though this comment is technically about the O'Reilly race winner, not Hocevar. On Hocevar going into Texas, Dale sees a live bet: "He's won here in the truck series, he likes the track, he's got a top 10 here already in the Cup race last year, I believe he even won the poll here in the fall. With the win under his belt, the pressure's off."

NASCAR Leadership Transition: Jim France Steps Down, Ben Kennedy Ascending

A listener asks about Jim France stepping down. Dale's take is measured: "It changes nothing. I don't think this changes how business is going to get done." Steve O'Donnell, already in a high position, steps into the formal role. Dale sees it as the France family acknowledging the inevitable and getting ahead of it.

The more interesting move, Dale says, is Ben Kennedy's continued rise through the organization. "Ben Kennedy is the guy. Whatever this sport is in 25 years will be through the vision and eyes of Ben Kennedy." Dale has a working relationship with Kennedy — he describes calling Ben directly to find out what really happened when Kennedy took his team to a race in an undercover-boss type scenario. "He answered. They're easy to reach."

Dale also has praise for Julie Geese, who has moved into the schedule-focused role Kennedy was previously handling. "She don't mess around. She is the real deal." His overall assessment of current NASCAR leadership is glowing: "I approve a thousand percent with the leadership they have in place. They're good people, and they want what's good for the sport."

FanDuel Dirty Mo Dough Picks: Texas Motor Speedway

With Talladega in the books and Texas on deck, the show closes with the weekly betting segment. The favorites remain the same: Denny Hamlin, Kyle Larson, William Byron, Christopher Bell, and Ryan Blaney. Dale notes with some humor: "We might as well not even print a new sheet."

Hocevar is flagged as a top-10 value bet coming off his Talladega win and given his history at Texas: win in the truck series, competitive Cup runs, and possible pole position momentum. Dale likes the Suarez over Chastain head-to-head prop: "Suarez is plus money and he's been top 10 in the last three at Texas. That's a bet to make."

An eyebrow-raising take comes from producer Russ, who suggests Austin Cindric as an underrated performer at mile-and-a-halves, drawing skepticism from Dale and TJ. "That is a wild take," TJ says flatly, before Russ notes Cindric had finishes of 5th, 8th, 12th, and 8th across recent ovals. "The relationship [with Cindric from the Fox booth] is affecting your decision making," TJ deadpans. The segment closes with Brad Keselowski as a plus-150 underdog value against Chase Briscoe, and Chase Elliott over Joey Logano.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on Pohlman leaving for RCR): "I don't think that he made a mistake leaving Junior Motorsports. I really don't. I think he was at the end of his runway. He needed new horizons, a new place and a new space."

Dale (on Kyle Busch's urgency): "Kyle's sitting there thinking five more years, maybe, of kickass talent left. I need to be winning now. He ain't 30, he's 40. There's some urgency."

Carson Hocevar (on replaying the Talladega win): "Every time I watch the video, I just ball up. I literally cry my ass off. I'm so lame. But I was so focused on soaking it all in — nothing's a blur. I can tell you exactly where I saw somebody, exactly what I was pointing to. I remember it all."

Dale (on the back-straight blocking penalty): "In 2005, nobody did that. It was really against the code — to pull blatantly into the third lane and go in front of a 10-car pack. That was against code. Now it's become normalized. It has. And NASCAR is right to try to get a hold of it before somebody gets turned over."

Dale (on Ben Kennedy's rise): "Whatever this sport is in 25 years will be through the vision and eyes of Ben Kennedy. And he will run this business with all the best intentions. He's a great guy."

Dale (on NASCAR governance overall): "I approve a thousand percent with the leadership they have in place. They're good people, and they want what's good for the sport. They're people I can call and they'll answer the phone, and I can tell them what I think, and we can have a conversation."

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft, Karsyn Elledge (with guests Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe)

Date: April 27, 2026

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Door Bumper Clear warned listeners upfront: buckle up. This episode had "clear chaos warnings directly ahead," and for once the disclaimer was fully warranted. Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe joined Freddie Kraft and Karsyn Elledge in the studio following one of the most eventful Talladega weekends in recent memory — Carson Hocevar's first Cup Series win, a Big One that wiped out 26 cars including Bubba Wallace, Chevy team drama during a rain delay, and a Cleetus McFarland Cup debut that got everyone talking. By the time the episode reached DBC Picks, Gragson was on the phone with three active Cup Series drivers trying to prove a theory about the moon's gravitational effect on grip levels at Texas Motor Speedway.

The show never found its footing in the conventional sense — and that was entirely the point. Gragson and Briscoe brought a freewheeling energy that sent the episode sideways in the best possible way, making it one of the most entertaining DBC episodes in recent memory. What began as a Talladega debrief turned into a live-action improv show, a debate about lunar cycles, and an unexpected rivalry disclosure about the sons of two current Cup drivers.

Despite the chaos, the hosts managed to cover a genuinely meaty race weekend: a historic first win for Hocevar, legitimate debate about whether NASCAR's stage format improvements are working at superspeedways, the story of JR Motorsports cars picking up impeding penalties, and a thorough breakdown of what went right — and wrong — for Cleetus McFarland in his Cup debut.

Opening: The Talladega Boulevard and Luke Baldwin's National Anthem

The episode opened in classic DBC fashion with loosely structured B.S. — a freeform chat about the weekend's off-track highlights before getting into race analysis. Freddie Kraft set the scene by putting listeners on the Talladega Boulevard, the legendary infield party strip that is as much a part of the Talladega experience as the racing itself. A story involving Cletus McFarland and a go-kart parade emerged: "I was with Marawn and Cletus doing the go-karts leading the Big One on the Boulevard. It's where all the drivers get on these floats and throw out beads and beers and whatever." It painted a vivid picture of the pre-race carnival atmosphere that Talladega uniquely provides.

Then came the story of the national anthem. When the scheduled anthem singer couldn't make it Sunday morning with only two hours to spare, Tommy Baldwin Jr. — the team co-owner and frequent DBC voice — stepped in and volunteered. The hosts were barely containing themselves recounting it. One panelist noted: "You know what else was scary? Luke Baldwin singing the national anthem. Yeah. Our anthem singer from Saturday wasn't able to make it on Sunday and within like two hours' notice we needed to find somebody and lo and behold he volunteered himself." The detail that Doug Barnes may have been involved in making the arrangement happen only added to the absurdity.

The Race: Hocevar's Win and The Big One

The race itself was the main event, and the crew gave it full treatment. The Jack Link's 500 was a grind for much of its running — long stretches of pack racing with the field unable to create meaningful three-wide action — before a massive crash on lap 115 collected 26 cars, including Bubba Wallace. That wreck, described as one of the biggest in recent Talladega history, reshaped the entire complexion of the race.

Carson Hocevar emerged from the chaos to take his first career Cup Series win, crossing the finish line 0.114 seconds ahead of Chris Buescher and Alex Bowman. The crew gave Hocevar genuine credit. "Oh, by the way, Carson Hocevar won. Little Earnhardt. He did a good job at the end especially. And I'll give him credit because I was obviously standing up there just watching the middle part of that race where nobody could really move the second stage after the wreck. He was..." The quote trails off in the clip but the admiration is clear — those at the track saw Hocevar navigating a chaotic field with patience and poise that belied his age.

The discussion also touched on the Chevy team's mid-race rain delay strategy session. Multiple Chevrolet teams reportedly huddled during the stoppage to coordinate drafting strategy, with Jim Campbell — a top Chevrolet Racing executive — reportedly advocating for a single-file Chevy line. The panel gave this mixed reviews. "It's a great PR move right. I mean he called a meeting and I think he got a lot of press out of it and you know I never really saw this plan prevail. I think this is a great plan for pit windows, getting on and off pit road. At the end of the day man we've all got a lot on the line and I don't care if it's a Chevy or Toyota..." The skepticism was polite but clear: coordinating superspeedway drafting across competing teams is far easier to discuss in a trailer than to execute on track at 195 mph.

Spot On, Spot Off

Carson Hocevar's Celebration

The first Spot On was unanimous: Carson Hocevar's post-win celebration at Talladega. Hocevar did a reverse victory lap — an homage to Alan Kulwicki's legendary "Polish victory lap" — drawing immediate comparisons from the panel. "Carson Hocevar's celebration was the greatest that we've seen since Alan Kulwicki's Polish victory lap. Spot on. That was sick. I was watching when he hit the wall — like he knows that thing up to the wall — it almost shot him out of the car. Did you see him almost..." The clip cuts but the enthusiasm doesn't: it was a defining moment for Hocevar's career and the crew treated it as such, spending meaningful time on what it means for a young driver to have his first win at a track as iconic as Talladega.

Did the Stage Changes Work at Superspeedways?

NASCAR has been tinkering with superspeedway stage structures in 2026, and this Talladega served as an early data point on whether those changes are creating the kind of racing the series is looking for. The panel was divided. The argument for: the closing stages of the race were genuinely exciting, with multiple lines developing and real risk/reward decisions in the final laps. The argument against: the first stage was a "snooze fest" by the crew's own admission, with the field content to hold formation and wait rather than force action. The verdict leaned toward cautious optimism — the format may be working, but Talladega's unpredictability makes it hard to isolate the effect of any single rule change.

JR Motorsports Impeding Penalties

A pair of JR Motorsports cars picked up impeding penalties during the weekend, and the crew dug into what happened and why. This segment had genuine insider value given the show's connections to the NASCAR industry. The penalties were viewed as frustrating but preventable, a product of superspeedway drafting dynamics where positioning decisions in the pack can look very different from the cockpit versus from race control's vantage point.

Cleetus McFarland — What Went Right and Wrong

Cleetus McFarland's Cup Series debut at Talladega was a genuine talking point across NASCAR media all week, and DBC gave it the kind of nuanced treatment only industry insiders can provide. The crew was impressed by much of what Cleetus showed. "Cletus McFarland made one wrong move all day and it cost him the win. I'm watching this guy in this race — he looked like a different guy than had run all these other plate races. He was making confident moves in the pack and I don't know if he's just went to school on that or..." The implication was that Cleetus had done serious homework and it showed — right up until the moment that it didn't. Rather than piling on, the crew acknowledged that one wrong move at Talladega is all it ever takes, and that his overall performance was legitimately impressive for a non-full-time competitor.

Reaction Theatre

The Reaction Theatre segment — in which the crew watches and reacts to fan-submitted video content — delivered two standouts this week. First, a fan who loses his train of thought mid-sentence in what the crew described as a relatable moment of NASCAR-induced mental exhaustion. Second, a clip that has apparently given Hocevar fans a new catchphrase for their personal lives — the specific nature of which was left to listener imagination, but clearly delighted the panel.

S* Show Hall of Fame

The S* Show Hall of Fame nominees this week included what the show described as "a familiar face" — a regular in NASCAR news cycles who earned a spot on the list for weekend behavior that the crew found noteworthy. The segment didn't name names explicitly in the available clips, but the familiarity of the nomination suggested it involved someone well-known to the DBC audience.

Ask DBC: Noah vs. Chase's Son Brooks

The Ask DBC segment — where listener questions drive the conversation — surfaced something genuinely unexpected: the revelation that there is an active rivalry between Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe's son, Brooks. Neither driver downplayed it. The crew leaned in, with Gragson and Briscoe clearly enjoying having the dynamic brought up in a public forum. It was a humanizing moment that illustrated why having actual drivers in the studio elevates the show — the conversations go places a remote interview simply can't reach.

DBC Picks: The Moon Theory That Broke the Episode

The episode's single most memorable moment came during DBC Picks, and it started innocuously enough. Noah Gragson casually mentioned that with a waxing crescent moon this week ahead of the Texas race, teams should expect different grip levels. "Hey, speaking of Texas this weekend — waxing crescent, so be ready. Ooh, it's going to be gripped up. Gravitational pull will be different this week at Texas, dude. It's going to..."

Freddie Kraft was skeptical. Karsyn Elledge was skeptical. The crew demanded Gragson prove it — or at least find someone who agreed with him. So Gragson and Briscoe grabbed their phones and, live on air, called Riley Herbst, Josh Berry, and Austin Dillon to canvass opinion on whether the waxing crescent moon meaningfully affects grip levels at a racetrack. The calls apparently produced enough agreement (or at least enough hedging) that Gragson declared victory.

The segment ended with everyone at the table vowing to pay closer attention to qualifying data this weekend for the No. 4 and No. 19 — the cars Gragson and Briscoe respectively drive. Whether the moon theory holds up at Texas will, apparently, be must-watch television.

Notable Quotes

Freddie Kraft (on Carson Hocevar's celebration): "Carson Hocevar's celebration was the greatest that we've seen since Alan Kulwicki's Polish victory lap. Spot on. That was sick."

Freddie Kraft (on Hocevar's win): "Oh, by the way, Carson Hocevar won. Little Earnhardt. He did a good job at the end especially. And I'll give him credit — I was obviously standing up there just watching the middle part of that race where nobody could really move the second stage after the wreck."

On Cleetus McFarland's Cup debut: "Cletus McFarland made one wrong move all day and it cost him the win. I'm watching this guy in this race — he looked like a different guy than had run all these other plate races. He was making confident moves in the pack."

Noah Gragson (on the moon theory): "Hey, speaking of Texas this weekend — waxing crescent, so be ready. Ooh, it's going to be gripped up. Gravitational pull will be different this week at Texas, dude. It's going to be a gripped-up race."

On Luke Baldwin's last-minute national anthem performance: "Our anthem singer from Saturday wasn't able to make it on Sunday and within like two hours' notice we needed to find somebody and lo and behold he volunteered himself."

On the Chevy rain-delay strategy meeting: "It's a great PR move. He called a meeting and I think he got a lot of press out of it. At the end of the day, we've all got a lot on the line and I don't care if it's a Chevy or Toyota — when it's the last lap at Talladega, everyone is racing for themselves."

Episode available at: dirtymomedia.com/doorbumperclear

Also available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart, and Amazon Music.

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Host(s): Freddie Kraft, Karsyn Elledge (with guests Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe)

Date: April 27, 2026

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Door Bumper Clear warned listeners upfront: buckle up. This episode had "clear chaos warnings directly ahead," and for once the disclaimer was fully warranted. Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe joined Freddie Kraft and Karsyn Elledge in the studio following one of the most eventful Talladega weekends in recent memory — Carson Hocevar's first Cup Series win, a Big One that wiped out 26 cars including Bubba Wallace, Chevy team drama during a rain delay, and a Cleetus McFarland Cup debut that got everyone talking. By the time the episode reached DBC Picks, Gragson was on the phone with three active Cup Series drivers trying to prove a theory about the moon's gravitational effect on grip levels at Texas Motor Speedway.

The show never found its footing in the conventional sense — and that was entirely the point. Gragson and Briscoe brought a freewheeling energy that sent the episode sideways in the best possible way, making it one of the most entertaining DBC episodes in recent memory. What began as a Talladega debrief turned into a live-action improv show, a debate about lunar cycles, and an unexpected rivalry disclosure about the sons of two current Cup drivers.

Despite the chaos, the hosts managed to cover a genuinely meaty race weekend: a historic first win for Hocevar, legitimate debate about whether NASCAR's stage format improvements are working at superspeedways, the story of JR Motorsports cars picking up impeding penalties, and a thorough breakdown of what went right — and wrong — for Cleetus McFarland in his Cup debut.

Opening: The Talladega Boulevard and Luke Baldwin's National Anthem

The episode opened in classic DBC fashion with loosely structured B.S. — a freeform chat about the weekend's off-track highlights before getting into race analysis. Freddie Kraft set the scene by putting listeners on the Talladega Boulevard, the legendary infield party strip that is as much a part of the Talladega experience as the racing itself. A story involving Cletus McFarland and a go-kart parade emerged: "I was with Marawn and Cletus doing the go-karts leading the Big One on the Boulevard. It's where all the drivers get on these floats and throw out beads and beers and whatever." It painted a vivid picture of the pre-race carnival atmosphere that Talladega uniquely provides.

Then came the story of the national anthem. When the scheduled anthem singer couldn't make it Sunday morning with only two hours to spare, Tommy Baldwin Jr. — the team co-owner and frequent DBC voice — stepped in and volunteered. The hosts were barely containing themselves recounting it. One panelist noted: "You know what else was scary? Luke Baldwin singing the national anthem. Yeah. Our anthem singer from Saturday wasn't able to make it on Sunday and within like two hours' notice we needed to find somebody and lo and behold he volunteered himself." The detail that Doug Barnes may have been involved in making the arrangement happen only added to the absurdity.

The Race: Hocevar's Win and The Big One

The race itself was the main event, and the crew gave it full treatment. The Jack Link's 500 was a grind for much of its running — long stretches of pack racing with the field unable to create meaningful three-wide action — before a massive crash on lap 115 collected 26 cars, including Bubba Wallace. That wreck, described as one of the biggest in recent Talladega history, reshaped the entire complexion of the race.

Carson Hocevar emerged from the chaos to take his first career Cup Series win, crossing the finish line 0.114 seconds ahead of Chris Buescher and Alex Bowman. The crew gave Hocevar genuine credit. "Oh, by the way, Carson Hocevar won. Little Earnhardt. He did a good job at the end especially. And I'll give him credit because I was obviously standing up there just watching the middle part of that race where nobody could really move the second stage after the wreck. He was..." The quote trails off in the clip but the admiration is clear — those at the track saw Hocevar navigating a chaotic field with patience and poise that belied his age.

The discussion also touched on the Chevy team's mid-race rain delay strategy session. Multiple Chevrolet teams reportedly huddled during the stoppage to coordinate drafting strategy, with Jim Campbell — a top Chevrolet Racing executive — reportedly advocating for a single-file Chevy line. The panel gave this mixed reviews. "It's a great PR move right. I mean he called a meeting and I think he got a lot of press out of it and you know I never really saw this plan prevail. I think this is a great plan for pit windows, getting on and off pit road. At the end of the day man we've all got a lot on the line and I don't care if it's a Chevy or Toyota..." The skepticism was polite but clear: coordinating superspeedway drafting across competing teams is far easier to discuss in a trailer than to execute on track at 195 mph.

Spot On, Spot Off

Carson Hocevar's Celebration

The first Spot On was unanimous: Carson Hocevar's post-win celebration at Talladega. Hocevar did a reverse victory lap — an homage to Alan Kulwicki's legendary "Polish victory lap" — drawing immediate comparisons from the panel. "Carson Hocevar's celebration was the greatest that we've seen since Alan Kulwicki's Polish victory lap. Spot on. That was sick. I was watching when he hit the wall — like he knows that thing up to the wall — it almost shot him out of the car. Did you see him almost..." The clip cuts but the enthusiasm doesn't: it was a defining moment for Hocevar's career and the crew treated it as such, spending meaningful time on what it means for a young driver to have his first win at a track as iconic as Talladega.

Did the Stage Changes Work at Superspeedways?

NASCAR has been tinkering with superspeedway stage structures in 2026, and this Talladega served as an early data point on whether those changes are creating the kind of racing the series is looking for. The panel was divided. The argument for: the closing stages of the race were genuinely exciting, with multiple lines developing and real risk/reward decisions in the final laps. The argument against: the first stage was a "snooze fest" by the crew's own admission, with the field content to hold formation and wait rather than force action. The verdict leaned toward cautious optimism — the format may be working, but Talladega's unpredictability makes it hard to isolate the effect of any single rule change.

JR Motorsports Impeding Penalties

A pair of JR Motorsports cars picked up impeding penalties during the weekend, and the crew dug into what happened and why. This segment had genuine insider value given the show's connections to the NASCAR industry. The penalties were viewed as frustrating but preventable, a product of superspeedway drafting dynamics where positioning decisions in the pack can look very different from the cockpit versus from race control's vantage point.

Cleetus McFarland — What Went Right and Wrong

Cleetus McFarland's Cup Series debut at Talladega was a genuine talking point across NASCAR media all week, and DBC gave it the kind of nuanced treatment only industry insiders can provide. The crew was impressed by much of what Cleetus showed. "Cletus McFarland made one wrong move all day and it cost him the win. I'm watching this guy in this race — he looked like a different guy than had run all these other plate races. He was making confident moves in the pack and I don't know if he's just went to school on that or..." The implication was that Cleetus had done serious homework and it showed — right up until the moment that it didn't. Rather than piling on, the crew acknowledged that one wrong move at Talladega is all it ever takes, and that his overall performance was legitimately impressive for a non-full-time competitor.

Reaction Theatre

The Reaction Theatre segment — in which the crew watches and reacts to fan-submitted video content — delivered two standouts this week. First, a fan who loses his train of thought mid-sentence in what the crew described as a relatable moment of NASCAR-induced mental exhaustion. Second, a clip that has apparently given Hocevar fans a new catchphrase for their personal lives — the specific nature of which was left to listener imagination, but clearly delighted the panel.

S* Show Hall of Fame

The S* Show Hall of Fame nominees this week included what the show described as "a familiar face" — a regular in NASCAR news cycles who earned a spot on the list for weekend behavior that the crew found noteworthy. The segment didn't name names explicitly in the available clips, but the familiarity of the nomination suggested it involved someone well-known to the DBC audience.

Ask DBC: Noah vs. Chase's Son Brooks

The Ask DBC segment — where listener questions drive the conversation — surfaced something genuinely unexpected: the revelation that there is an active rivalry between Noah Gragson and Chase Briscoe's son, Brooks. Neither driver downplayed it. The crew leaned in, with Gragson and Briscoe clearly enjoying having the dynamic brought up in a public forum. It was a humanizing moment that illustrated why having actual drivers in the studio elevates the show — the conversations go places a remote interview simply can't reach.

DBC Picks: The Moon Theory That Broke the Episode

The episode's single most memorable moment came during DBC Picks, and it started innocuously enough. Noah Gragson casually mentioned that with a waxing crescent moon this week ahead of the Texas race, teams should expect different grip levels. "Hey, speaking of Texas this weekend — waxing crescent, so be ready. Ooh, it's going to be gripped up. Gravitational pull will be different this week at Texas, dude. It's going to..."

Freddie Kraft was skeptical. Karsyn Elledge was skeptical. The crew demanded Gragson prove it — or at least find someone who agreed with him. So Gragson and Briscoe grabbed their phones and, live on air, called Riley Herbst, Josh Berry, and Austin Dillon to canvass opinion on whether the waxing crescent moon meaningfully affects grip levels at a racetrack. The calls apparently produced enough agreement (or at least enough hedging) that Gragson declared victory.

The segment ended with everyone at the table vowing to pay closer attention to qualifying data this weekend for the No. 4 and No. 19 — the cars Gragson and Briscoe respectively drive. Whether the moon theory holds up at Texas will, apparently, be must-watch television.

Notable Quotes

Freddie Kraft (on Carson Hocevar's celebration): "Carson Hocevar's celebration was the greatest that we've seen since Alan Kulwicki's Polish victory lap. Spot on. That was sick."

Freddie Kraft (on Hocevar's win): "Oh, by the way, Carson Hocevar won. Little Earnhardt. He did a good job at the end especially. And I'll give him credit — I was obviously standing up there just watching the middle part of that race where nobody could really move the second stage after the wreck."

On Cleetus McFarland's Cup debut: "Cletus McFarland made one wrong move all day and it cost him the win. I'm watching this guy in this race — he looked like a different guy than had run all these other plate races. He was making confident moves in the pack."

Noah Gragson (on the moon theory): "Hey, speaking of Texas this weekend — waxing crescent, so be ready. Ooh, it's going to be gripped up. Gravitational pull will be different this week at Texas, dude. It's going to be a gripped-up race."

On Luke Baldwin's last-minute national anthem performance: "Our anthem singer from Saturday wasn't able to make it on Sunday and within like two hours' notice we needed to find somebody and lo and behold he volunteered himself."

On the Chevy rain-delay strategy meeting: "It's a great PR move. He called a meeting and I think he got a lot of press out of it. At the end of the day, we've all got a lot on the line and I don't care if it's a Chevy or Toyota — when it's the last lap at Talladega, everyone is racing for themselves."

Episode available at: dirtymomedia.com/doorbumperclear

Also available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart, and Amazon Music.

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media

Host: Dale Earnhardt Jr. (with co-host TJ Majors)

Guest: Carson Hocevar — NASCAR Cup Series driver, Spire Motorsports No. 77

Date: Wednesday, April 29–30, 2026 (released post-race, recorded in the Arby's Studio)

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama (April 26, 2026)

Show Type: NASCAR conversation, driver/insider perspective — winner interview / extended guest episode

Episode Overview

This was an unplanned guest episode in the best possible way. Dale Earnhardt Jr. brought Carson Hocevar into the Arby's Studio at Dirty Mo Media for what was supposed to be a quick post-win conversation, and it turned into a full hour-plus deep dive into Hocevar's first NASCAR Cup Series victory at Talladega, the emotional weight of that breakthrough, and a wide-ranging look at the young driver's personality, ambitions, and NASCAR philosophy. The episode follows a Tuesday "Dirty Air" segment that had already teased some Hocevar content — so Wednesday's show was the extended version fans were clearly hungry for.

Dale opened with clear enthusiasm, describing Hocevar as "one of the guys, one of the many guys that are going to carry us into the future" and noting that Carson's first win had stirred up his own emotional memories of career-defining victories. TJ Majors co-hosted alongside Dale throughout, helping steer the conversation and adding sharp observations from a crew perspective.

What makes this episode essential listening is Hocevar himself — unfiltered, self-aware, funny, and genuinely reflective. He talks about why he "picked himself" to win at Talladega days before the race, how he navigated the massive Turn 3 crash late in the going, what 1AM at a Mooresville Chili's feels like when you've just won your first Cup race, and the goal he has quietly held onto his entire career: just win one race so he knows he'll get to keep doing this for a living.

The Blend Line Controversy: JR Motorsports Gets Popped

The episode opened not with the win, but with a rules dustup that hit Dale personally — as a team owner. Two JR Motorsports Xfinity cars were penalized during the Talladega weekend for violating NASCAR's blend line rule, an enforcement action that NASCAR had telegraphed in advance via email and video, and even highlighted at the drivers meeting.

Dale explained that he was unaware the penalty was even happening until he ran into Carson at a trackside concert the night before the Cup race. Carson told him: "Hey man, don't do what I did." Dale's response: "The hell did you do?" He hadn't even known a penalty had been issued until that conversation.

Carson's take on the rule itself was candid: "I'm normally the one doing it, honestly." He argued that NASCAR's communication about the rule change — delivered primarily through an email and a video at the drivers meeting — wasn't getting through the way a traditional in-person briefing would. "They don't have driver's meetings anymore. You get an email and a video. I think we need to go back to having drivers meetings again." Dale agreed, noting that the drivers meeting format has become more of a sponsor event than a genuine safety communication tool.

Dale's position as owner was uncomfortable. "I was mad that it happened to them — it cost them spots and a good result. But I also see NASCAR's point. I don't love the idea that it's becoming normal. There's a big wreck coming at some point." He added an old-school perspective on the culture shift: "Back in my day, nobody did that. If somebody was coming, you never would drive up in front of them. You never would."

Navigating the Big One: How Carson Survived Turn 3

Roughly 26 cars were collected in a massive crash going into Turn 3 at Talladega — and Carson described exactly how close he came to being part of it, and why he thinks he got out clean.

Hocevar had been running at the back of the top lane and described a self-aware moment just before the crash: "I was yo-yoing through everybody trying to get the fastest lap. I was like, I'm probably putting myself in a bad spot doing this." That instinct to back off slightly proved critical. When the wreck ignited, he could barely see anything through the smoke. "I was braced for impact. I was more worried about a car spinning back up into my door... dude, if there was a car sitting in front of you at Dollar Tree, you're done."

His escape strategy was simple and instinctive — keep turning right, hoping any sliding cars would drift to the bottom. "I just kept turning my wheel right because I was like, if they have four flats they're just going to slide down." The car picked up some rubber debris that affected the left front, but nothing serious. "I got super lucky there," he admitted.

"I'm Picking Myself": The Mental Road to the Win

This section of the interview was the emotional core of the episode. Carson described a building sense of conviction in the days before Talladega that it was finally his turn.

"After the 500, I was pretty locked in," Hocevar said. He had been leading the Daytona 500 with two laps to go before a crash ended his day — the same No. 47 car that had been involved in that incident was again at the center of the Turn 3 melee at Talladega. "I looked at the racing gods a little bit of like, all right, that's who turned me at the 500. And it killed the only non-Chevy up there."

On the Wednesday before Talladega, driving to a dirt track test, he made a private declaration: "If anybody's owed it, it's us... I'm picking me today. Like I'm picking me this weekend." He went into the race not just wanting to win, but strategically committed to being at the front at the end. "I was bound and determined — just take care of the race and be where you need to be at the end."

When the final restart came with three laps to go and the 43 car got turned out, Hocevar was in the best lane. "I'm the top Chevy here and there are only Chevys around me and one Ford next to me. I was like, as long as I don't [mess] this up, I'm going to win. We're going to win this thing."

Dale listened with visible resonance, sharing his own parallel: "I can really relate with Carson on what he's going through over these past several days." He reflected on his own first Cup win at Texas, noting that the emotion wasn't about championships — it was relief. "I want to do enough to do it for 20 years... if I could just win one race, I think I can do this forever."

Crying Over Videos and 1AM at Chili's: The Aftermath

Dale asked Carson what the days after Talladega had actually felt like — and got an unexpectedly raw answer.

"Every time I watch the video, I just ball up. Like I literally cry my ass off," Hocevar said. "I get back into the same emotion I was in. I can hear the crowd. I can visualize everything again." He had been worried before the win that victory might not live up to the massive expectations he had built up. "My number one fear was it just wouldn't feel like I dreamt about it. But no — it matched up perfectly."

The celebration logistics were equally memorable. His team went to a Mooresville Chili's at 1AM — which the restaurant opened specifically for the occasion. "There's probably 60 to 80 people there. Everybody in the company was there." Chili's corporate had been at the race (Chili's was a race sponsor), and before Victory Lane was even done, they had already called the Mooresville location to arrange access. There was a cake, speeches at the bar, and a full platter setup. "How the hell did you make a cake?" Carson asked them. "We went and bought it," they replied.

The party moved to crew chief Luke's new house afterward, and Carson didn't get home until 6AM — arriving there via "stealing" Luke's truck. Before going to sleep, he personally responded to every text he had received. "Everybody's going to expect me to copy and paste. I'm writing everyone. I'm challenging myself. I wrote it all back and everything."

His post-victory celebration included a reference that clearly landed with Dale: Hocevar climbed out and stood on the car door, looking back at the fans — a nod to Dale's iconic 2014 Daytona 500 celebration. "I was in the stands that day," Carson told Dale. "When I was a kid, I was like, damn, I should have walked down to the fence. I didn't know you could do that." He wanted to replicate the idea of letting the fans know you see them. Dale responded: "I love it. Your celebration was great."

Points, Playoffs, and Racing Philosophy

Dale and TJ walked through where Carson stands in the points (currently 70 points ahead of the 12th playoff spot, with Christopher Bell among the drivers behind him) and what his goals are for the rest of the season. Carson was honest that he's not looking at the big picture just yet: "I'd really like to finish top 12 in points. Top 10 would be really big, but really top 12 would be huge for us."

He also offered a thoughtful take on why the Cup playoff format may actually favor him over time — if he can avoid the early-round attrition that plagued him last year. He acknowledged 2025 had too many mechanical issues and unforced errors. "Last year we'd blow up or fuel pump or tire... we blew away a lot of good races." His mentality for 2026: just finish.

The conversation also went deep on superspeedway philosophy — Carson's love of Atlanta, how Cup drivers now run five-wide with almost no anxiety compared to the chaos such moves would have caused in the 2000s, and how the Gen 7 car's aerodynamic characteristics allow cars to push each other without the old loose-in-traffic problems. "We could put five of them touching each other and they're not going to get free unless there's a car in front of them," Carson observed.

Short Track Dreams, the Indy 500, and a Barndominium with a Chili Bowl

The final stretch of the interview revealed just how much of a racing obsessive Hocevar is beyond Cup weekends. He wants to run as many dirt late mod races as possible, races at Berlin Raceway (his home track in Michigan), and eventually wants a stake in Kalamazoo Speedway ("Kazoo") — the track where he became a race fan as a kid watching Outlaw late model cars. "That track was the main reason I became a racer." He called it a "hidden gem" and said he wants to eventually buy it or at least get 1% just to have a voice in promoting it.

He's building a barndominium on property that will include a second open shop and — his most ambitious idea — a replica of the Chili Bowl dirt track. "Open invitation. If anybody wants to go, I don't even need to be there. Just if you do something cool, film it or I've got to see it." He's already asked his garage door sponsor for the cheapest doors available. "We're going to drive stuff through it and stuff," he told them. Their reaction: "Can we be there to see it?"

His ultimate bucket list race is the Indianapolis 500. "Indy is my favorite track, even in the Cup car." He described narrating fake Indy 500 lap runs to himself during a track test at Indy, getting so excited he eventually had to come in early. "I had to stop. I was going to wreck this thing."

Dale wrapped the episode praising Carson's openness and authenticity. "Keep sharing with everybody who you are. We love to see your toys, we love to see your property... keep digging, man. You're having fun and we're having fun watching you."

Notable Quotes

Carson Hocevar (on deciding he would win at Talladega): "If anybody's owed it, it's us. I'm picking me today. Like I'm picking me this weekend."

Carson Hocevar (on watching post-race video): "Every time I watch the video I just ball up. Like I literally cry my ass off. I felt like I was so focused on soaking it all in, and nothing's a blur. I can tell you exactly where I was on every lap."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (on his own first Cup win at Texas): "I didn't look out into the future and say I want to win 50 races. I looked at Derek Cope and said, I want to do whatever they're doing so I can do this for a living... if I could just win one race, that ought to do it. And when I won Texas, I was like — I think I'm going to race for a living."

Carson Hocevar (on surviving the Turn 3 crash): "I was braced for impact. I just kept turning my wheel right because I was like, if they have four flats they're just going to slide down. I was like, just go, just go to the bottom — please move."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (on Hocevar's future in the sport): "You're going to win a lot of races. You're going to be a massive asset to this industry. Keep being you. Keep doing what you're doing."

Carson Hocevar (on the Chili's post-race celebration): "There's probably 60 to 80 people from — I mean, everybody in the company was there. They had a whole platter set up, speeches at the bar. And they had a cake and I was like, 'How the hell did you make a cake?' They're like, 'No, we went and bought it.'"

Dale Earnhardt Jr. (on why he started doing the backwards celebration in Victory Lane): "I got sour on burnouts. Some guys were doing burnouts to blow a quarter-panel off — cheating. And Mark Martin would always say, 'Man, I'm not a big fan of burnouts.' I drive down there and I just like to watch them. I just like to look at the fans."

Show: Inside the Race

Host: Steve Letarte

Guest: Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR CEO

Date: April 26, 2026 (recorded live post-race)

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

This was no ordinary post-race show. Recorded live from Talladega Superspeedway moments after the conclusion of the Jack Link's 500, the Inside the Race episode hosted by Steve Letarte featured a marquee guest: Steve O'Donnell, just officially announced as NASCAR's new CEO. The timing was electric — O'Donnell had spent the afternoon watching Carson Hocevar take his first career NASCAR Cup Series win in one of the most crowd-pleasing celebrations Talladega has ever seen, and now he was sitting down with Letarte to make sense of it all on the sport's biggest platform.

The conversation moved seamlessly between two major storylines: Hocevar's long-awaited breakthrough victory and the leadership transition at the very top of NASCAR with O'Donnell stepping into the CEO role alongside Ben Kennedy as COO. What connected both threads was a single word — fun. O'Donnell used the word repeatedly, and Letarte kept returning to it as well, framing Hocevar's exuberant celebration and style as the living embodiment of what O'Donnell says NASCAR must recapture to thrive.

The episode also delivered a substantive breakdown of NASCAR's stage-length experiment at Talladega, where the sanctioning body flipped the traditional format by making Stage 1 the long stage (98 laps) and shortening Stages 2 and 3 (45 laps each) to guarantee full-throttle racing at the end. Letarte graded it a "B" and called it a big swing in the right direction. O'Donnell was measured but optimistic, acknowledging more work remains. All told, this was one of the more newsworthy Inside the Race episodes in recent memory — a first-time winner, a new CEO, and a rules experiment all wrapped into one conversation.

Carson Hocevar: A Win the Sport Has Been Waiting For

The episode opened with pure reaction. O'Donnell told Letarte he had just come directly from victory lane before sitting down, and his energy reflected it. He called Hocevar's on-track celebration — which involved Hocevar handing food out the car window to fans in the stands in an unforgettable twist on the traditional burnout — "probably the coolest celebration I've ever seen on track." He added that "the enthusiasm in victory lane with all of his team and everybody and the emotion was just really really cool."

Letarte set up the conversation by noting what makes Hocevar unique: "In a world of conformity, you know Carson — and this is rare — he has found a way to kind of beat to his own drum, do it his own way on and off the racetrack, both with his style. He's got the new sunglasses going and behind the wheel." It was a natural lead-in to Hocevar as a symbol of something bigger: a sport trying to reconnect with the kind of personality-driven excitement that fills seats and grows audiences.

O'Donnell didn't shy away from the broader implication. He acknowledged the sport has faced headwinds — "the last year and a half has been tough in the industry" — but said moments like Hocevar's win are exactly what remind people why NASCAR matters. "They want to embrace a guy like Carson Hocevar," O'Donnell said. "They want to get behind somebody who's not only winning, but looks like they're enjoying themselves." He also noted that the race itself was competitive and safe — 16 leaders, 51 lead changes across the field — and praised the fan environment at the track.

Steve O'Donnell Takes the Helm: What's His Vision for NASCAR?

Much of the episode's substance centered on O'Donnell's formal announcement as CEO, and what it means for the sport's direction. Letarte had clearly been looking forward to this conversation. He praised O'Donnell's open letter to fans — a rare and personal move for NASCAR leadership — saying, "As I was reading it, I could almost hear you telling me it. It really came across as your personality."

O'Donnell spoke candidly about what success looks like in this new role. His stated goals include selling out every race, growing TV ratings, and bringing fans in "from every state." But his deeper ambition was more philosophical — breaking the sport out of its reactive, day-to-day mentality and giving everyone in the NASCAR ecosystem a shared vision. "I think if I went to any team owner or broadcast partner and said, 'Hey, what does this sport stand for? Where are we going?' I'd probably get a lot of different answers," he said. "That's okay because we haven't really met and talked about where we want to go."

O'Donnell tied his leadership philosophy directly back to the scene unfolding at Talladega. He acknowledged having "probably caused some of those challenges" the sport has faced, but was clear-eyed about the path forward: "My goal is to get us back on the right footing. The foundation's awesome. We've got so many great people, so many great teams and drivers, sponsors. Just put the right people in place internally to work together for the next 50 years." Letarte, who has known O'Donnell for years, welcomed the tone. "I love the confidence," Letarte said, pointing specifically to initiatives like the 'Hell yeah' campaign from earlier in 2026 and NASCAR's willingness to revisit the Chase format after previously moving away from it.

The Talladega Stage Experiment: A "B" Grade

One of the most analytically rich parts of the episode was the pair's breakdown of NASCAR's decision to restructure the Talladega stage lengths. The format was flipped from the previous design: Stage 1 ran 98 laps (more than half the race), while Stages 2 and 3 were shortened to 45 laps each, explicitly to ensure the final two stages would be run without fuel stops — forcing teams to race flat-out rather than sandbag for fuel mileage.

Letarte, who helped explain the rationale on air during the race, gave it high marks. "For me, it gave me what I was looking for, which is an all-out final stage, some chaos in a good way in the first stage, mistakes. We saw Denny Hamlin have a speeding penalty. So, there was a lot going on. I'm going to say it was a B. I thought it was a big swing in the right direction." He was careful to acknowledge it wasn't a perfect fix and that Stage 2 produced a massive 26-car pileup — one of the most dramatic multi-car accidents Talladega has seen in recent years — but framed that as part of superspeedway racing's inherent nature rather than a flaw in the format.

O'Donnell was similarly measured. He confirmed that NASCAR's competition group is still working on additional tweaks — potential changes to pit stop structures, car configurations, and other sporting elements — and that Sunday's experiment was always meant to be step one, not the final answer. "We've got the brightest minds in the garage," O'Donnell said. "Whatever we put out there, they're going to figure it out." He added that he was pleased the format produced the desired effect in the closing stages, and that NASCAR will debrief with the industry before deciding what to adjust next. With Daytona and another Talladega race still to come in 2026, the conversation is far from over.

Fox Coverage and Looking Ahead

Letarte offered a warm assessment of Fox's broadcast of the race, specifically praising commentators Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer for helping viewers understand the new stage structure in real time. "I wasn't sure what we would see," Letarte admitted. "I thought they did a nice job explaining kind of what was happening, because it's a lot to take in for a fan who may be just tuning in." O'Donnell agreed, adding that coverage choices are difficult when there are so many stories to track across a full field of cars. "If you try to cover everything, you end up covering nothing," Letarte noted, echoing a challenge broadcasters across motorsport face.

O'Donnell closed the episode on a forward-looking note, referencing upcoming conversations with teams, track owners, and broadcast partners as part of his early listening tour in the new role. Letarte wrapped with warmth and a well-deserved congratulations. "There's no one more deserving for the position," Letarte told O'Donnell. "I can't wait to see what happens in the coming weeks and months." The two signed off with the kind of easy familiarity that only comes from years of working in the same sport — and genuine excitement about where it's headed.

Notable Quotes

O'Donnell on Hocevar's victory lane moment:

> "Probably the coolest celebration I've ever seen on track. That was wild. And then the enthusiasm in victory lane with all of his team and everybody — the emotion was just really, really cool."

Letarte on Hocevar's identity:

> "In a world of conformity, Carson has found a way to kind of beat to his own drum, do it his own way on and off the racetrack. He's got the new sunglasses going and behind the wheel."

O'Donnell on the sport's purpose:

> "We forgot sometimes, right? And the pressure of everything — it's a long season. But if you really think about what we all get to do for a living, and what we just watched, and the excitement and the enthusiasm... that emotion — that's what fans want to see."

O'Donnell on his vision for NASCAR's future:

> "We tend to get so bogged down in the day-to-day. For me and the sport, the goal is to get people thinking about what do we want this sport to look like in 2030, 2031, and kind of back into that."

Letarte on the stage-length change:

> "The fans spoke and the series responded with a reasonable adjustment. That to me was the biggest win — the people that pay to sit in the seats or tune in on TV, they got an adjustment and I think they got what they were looking for those last few laps."

O'Donnell on NASCAR's leadership alignment:

> "If I went to any team owner or broadcast partner and said, 'Hey, what does this sport stand for? Where are we going?' I'd probably get a lot of different answers. That's okay because we haven't really met and talked about where we want to go. So the biggest thing is just put a plan together, let people beat it up."

Source: NASCAR CEO Steve O'Donnell Reacts to Carson Hocevar's Win | Inside the Race

Show: Inside the Race

Host: Steve Letarte

Guest: Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR CEO

Date: April 26, 2026 (recorded live post-race)

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama

Show Type: NASCAR analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

This was no ordinary post-race show. Recorded live from Talladega Superspeedway moments after the conclusion of the Jack Link's 500, the Inside the Race episode hosted by Steve Letarte featured a marquee guest: Steve O'Donnell, just officially announced as NASCAR's new CEO. The timing was electric — O'Donnell had spent the afternoon watching Carson Hocevar take his first career NASCAR Cup Series win in one of the most crowd-pleasing celebrations Talladega has ever seen, and now he was sitting down with Letarte to make sense of it all on the sport's biggest platform.

The conversation moved seamlessly between two major storylines: Hocevar's long-awaited breakthrough victory and the leadership transition at the very top of NASCAR with O'Donnell stepping into the CEO role alongside Ben Kennedy as COO. What connected both threads was a single word — fun. O'Donnell used the word repeatedly, and Letarte kept returning to it as well, framing Hocevar's exuberant celebration and style as the living embodiment of what O'Donnell says NASCAR must recapture to thrive.

The episode also delivered a substantive breakdown of NASCAR's stage-length experiment at Talladega, where the sanctioning body flipped the traditional format by making Stage 1 the long stage (98 laps) and shortening Stages 2 and 3 (45 laps each) to guarantee full-throttle racing at the end. Letarte graded it a "B" and called it a big swing in the right direction. O'Donnell was measured but optimistic, acknowledging more work remains. All told, this was one of the more newsworthy Inside the Race episodes in recent memory — a first-time winner, a new CEO, and a rules experiment all wrapped into one conversation.

Carson Hocevar: A Win the Sport Has Been Waiting For

The episode opened with pure reaction. O'Donnell told Letarte he had just come directly from victory lane before sitting down, and his energy reflected it. He called Hocevar's on-track celebration — which involved Hocevar handing food out the car window to fans in the stands in an unforgettable twist on the traditional burnout — "probably the coolest celebration I've ever seen on track." He added that "the enthusiasm in victory lane with all of his team and everybody and the emotion was just really really cool."

Letarte set up the conversation by noting what makes Hocevar unique: "In a world of conformity, you know Carson — and this is rare — he has found a way to kind of beat to his own drum, do it his own way on and off the racetrack, both with his style. He's got the new sunglasses going and behind the wheel." It was a natural lead-in to Hocevar as a symbol of something bigger: a sport trying to reconnect with the kind of personality-driven excitement that fills seats and grows audiences.

O'Donnell didn't shy away from the broader implication. He acknowledged the sport has faced headwinds — "the last year and a half has been tough in the industry" — but said moments like Hocevar's win are exactly what remind people why NASCAR matters. "They want to embrace a guy like Carson Hocevar," O'Donnell said. "They want to get behind somebody who's not only winning, but looks like they're enjoying themselves." He also noted that the race itself was competitive and safe — 16 leaders, 51 lead changes across the field — and praised the fan environment at the track.

Steve O'Donnell Takes the Helm: What's His Vision for NASCAR?

Much of the episode's substance centered on O'Donnell's formal announcement as CEO, and what it means for the sport's direction. Letarte had clearly been looking forward to this conversation. He praised O'Donnell's open letter to fans — a rare and personal move for NASCAR leadership — saying, "As I was reading it, I could almost hear you telling me it. It really came across as your personality."

O'Donnell spoke candidly about what success looks like in this new role. His stated goals include selling out every race, growing TV ratings, and bringing fans in "from every state." But his deeper ambition was more philosophical — breaking the sport out of its reactive, day-to-day mentality and giving everyone in the NASCAR ecosystem a shared vision. "I think if I went to any team owner or broadcast partner and said, 'Hey, what does this sport stand for? Where are we going?' I'd probably get a lot of different answers," he said. "That's okay because we haven't really met and talked about where we want to go."

O'Donnell tied his leadership philosophy directly back to the scene unfolding at Talladega. He acknowledged having "probably caused some of those challenges" the sport has faced, but was clear-eyed about the path forward: "My goal is to get us back on the right footing. The foundation's awesome. We've got so many great people, so many great teams and drivers, sponsors. Just put the right people in place internally to work together for the next 50 years." Letarte, who has known O'Donnell for years, welcomed the tone. "I love the confidence," Letarte said, pointing specifically to initiatives like the 'Hell yeah' campaign from earlier in 2026 and NASCAR's willingness to revisit the Chase format after previously moving away from it.

The Talladega Stage Experiment: A "B" Grade

One of the most analytically rich parts of the episode was the pair's breakdown of NASCAR's decision to restructure the Talladega stage lengths. The format was flipped from the previous design: Stage 1 ran 98 laps (more than half the race), while Stages 2 and 3 were shortened to 45 laps each, explicitly to ensure the final two stages would be run without fuel stops — forcing teams to race flat-out rather than sandbag for fuel mileage.

Letarte, who helped explain the rationale on air during the race, gave it high marks. "For me, it gave me what I was looking for, which is an all-out final stage, some chaos in a good way in the first stage, mistakes. We saw Denny Hamlin have a speeding penalty. So, there was a lot going on. I'm going to say it was a B. I thought it was a big swing in the right direction." He was careful to acknowledge it wasn't a perfect fix and that Stage 2 produced a massive 26-car pileup — one of the most dramatic multi-car accidents Talladega has seen in recent years — but framed that as part of superspeedway racing's inherent nature rather than a flaw in the format.

O'Donnell was similarly measured. He confirmed that NASCAR's competition group is still working on additional tweaks — potential changes to pit stop structures, car configurations, and other sporting elements — and that Sunday's experiment was always meant to be step one, not the final answer. "We've got the brightest minds in the garage," O'Donnell said. "Whatever we put out there, they're going to figure it out." He added that he was pleased the format produced the desired effect in the closing stages, and that NASCAR will debrief with the industry before deciding what to adjust next. With Daytona and another Talladega race still to come in 2026, the conversation is far from over.

Fox Coverage and Looking Ahead

Letarte offered a warm assessment of Fox's broadcast of the race, specifically praising commentators Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer for helping viewers understand the new stage structure in real time. "I wasn't sure what we would see," Letarte admitted. "I thought they did a nice job explaining kind of what was happening, because it's a lot to take in for a fan who may be just tuning in." O'Donnell agreed, adding that coverage choices are difficult when there are so many stories to track across a full field of cars. "If you try to cover everything, you end up covering nothing," Letarte noted, echoing a challenge broadcasters across motorsport face.

O'Donnell closed the episode on a forward-looking note, referencing upcoming conversations with teams, track owners, and broadcast partners as part of his early listening tour in the new role. Letarte wrapped with warmth and a well-deserved congratulations. "There's no one more deserving for the position," Letarte told O'Donnell. "I can't wait to see what happens in the coming weeks and months." The two signed off with the kind of easy familiarity that only comes from years of working in the same sport — and genuine excitement about where it's headed.

Notable Quotes

O'Donnell on Hocevar's victory lane moment:

> "Probably the coolest celebration I've ever seen on track. That was wild. And then the enthusiasm in victory lane with all of his team and everybody — the emotion was just really, really cool."

Letarte on Hocevar's identity:

> "In a world of conformity, Carson has found a way to kind of beat to his own drum, do it his own way on and off the racetrack. He's got the new sunglasses going and behind the wheel."

O'Donnell on the sport's purpose:

> "We forgot sometimes, right? And the pressure of everything — it's a long season. But if you really think about what we all get to do for a living, and what we just watched, and the excitement and the enthusiasm... that emotion — that's what fans want to see."

O'Donnell on his vision for NASCAR's future:

> "We tend to get so bogged down in the day-to-day. For me and the sport, the goal is to get people thinking about what do we want this sport to look like in 2030, 2031, and kind of back into that."

Letarte on the stage-length change:

> "The fans spoke and the series responded with a reasonable adjustment. That to me was the biggest win — the people that pay to sit in the seats or tune in on TV, they got an adjustment and I think they got what they were looking for those last few laps."

O'Donnell on NASCAR's leadership alignment:

> "If I went to any team owner or broadcast partner and said, 'Hey, what does this sport stand for? Where are we going?' I'd probably get a lot of different answers. That's okay because we haven't really met and talked about where we want to go. So the biggest thing is just put a plan together, let people beat it up."

Source: NASCAR CEO Steve O'Donnell Reacts to Carson Hocevar's Win | Inside the Race

Race: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama

Date: Sunday, April 26, 2026

Winner: Carson Hocevar, #77, Spire Motorsports Chevrolet

Source: NASCAR Official YouTube Channel — Full Race Replay

Race Overview

Carson Hocevar delivered one of the most remarkable performances in recent Talladega history, capturing his first career NASCAR Cup Series victory in the Jack Link's 500 in just his 91st start. Driving the No. 77 Chevrolet for Spire Motorsports, Hocevar navigated a chaotic, wreck-filled afternoon with poise and patience, ultimately holding off RFK Racing veteran Chris Buescher by just 0.114 seconds at the checkered flag.

The race was defined by the wild pack drafting that Talladega is known for — three-wide runs at nearly 190 mph, constant lane shifts, and the ever-present threat of "the big one." That threat materialized violently on Lap 115, when a 26-car melee in Turn 3 effectively reshuffled the entire field and eliminated many of the pre-race favorites from winning contention. Hocevar, who avoided the carnage, spent the final stages methodically working to the front and refusing to relinquish the lead when it counted most.

The victory was also historic for Spire Motorsports, marking the team's first Cup Series win since 2019 and establishing Hocevar as a legitimate rising star in the sport. His unforgettable post-race burnout — riding on the window ledge of his car while driving against Talladega's outside wall — became an instant classic moment that the massive crowd at the 2.66-mile superspeedway roared its approval for.

Stage-by-Stage Breakdown

Stage 1 (Laps 1–98)

The opening stage at Talladega was a fuel-strategy chess match played out at 185 mph. With qualifying canceled the day before, teams had no practice data, and drivers were feeling out their cars from the very first lap. Denny Hamlin (#11, Joe Gibbs Racing) led the opening laps and set the tone for an aggressive Toyota effort early on.

Multiple lead changes defined the opening runs as teams jockeyed for position within lanes. The three-wide draft formed early, but teams quickly settled into the efficiency battle — managing throttle percentages and plotting pit stop windows to avoid falling behind on fuel strategy. Chad Finchum's No. 66 entry briefly cycled to the lead in a memorable moment for the small team.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr. timed his run perfectly in the closing laps of the stage, utilizing strong Chevrolet push to take the Stage 1 victory and the 10 valuable playoff points that came with it.

Stage 2 (Laps 99–143)

Stage 2 opened with more aggressive maneuvering as teams made their pit-stop calculations and lane alliances began to form more clearly. The stage was marked by intense nose-to-tail racing and multiple lead changes.

Ross Chastain was among the most aggressive drivers in the second stage, pushing hard through the field. However, the defining moment of Stage 2 — and of the entire race — came on Lap 115. While Bubba Wallace held the lead, Chastain's push made contact and sent Wallace's car sideways directly in front of the tightly packed field. The resulting 26-car melee in Turn 3 was one of the biggest wrecks Talladega had seen in years, eliminating a huge chunk of the championship contenders from the lead-lap conversation.

Chastain recovered from the chaos to take the Stage 2 victory and collect his stage points — a bitter irony given his role in triggering the wreck.

Key Incidents & Cautions

Caution 1 (Early laps): Minor incident in the early going as cars settled into the draft. Multiple cars made contact trying to get into position in the lanes.

Caution 2 (Lap 115) — "The Big One": The race's defining incident. Bubba Wallace (#23) was leading when contact from Ross Chastain (#1) sent Wallace sideways in Turn 3. The car bounced back across the field of cars running three-wide, triggering a massive 26-car pileup. Heavily damaged and eliminated from contention were multiple front-runners, dramatically changing the shape of the race.

Cautions 3–6: A series of subsequent cautions handled debris cleanup and additional minor incidents in the closing stages as teams pushed hard for position with a depleted field.

Christopher Bell (#20, Joe Gibbs Racing) led a race-high 31 laps throughout the day, but mechanical or position issues late left him finishing 17th despite dominating stretches of the race.

The Race Finish

The final 37 laps belonged to Carson Hocevar. After surviving the carnage of Lap 115, Hocevar worked methodically through the restarted field, eventually leading 19 of those final 37 laps — more than any other driver over that stretch. He demonstrated superb superspeedway instincts, building alliances within the Chevrolet camp and choosing his lane changes at precisely the right moments.

Three late-race restarts in the closing laps provided ample opportunity for rivals to challenge him, but Hocevar held his composure each time. On the final restart, he surged to the lead and committed fully, leaving Chris Buescher (#17, RFK Racing) fighting back in his mirror. Buescher made a hard charge in the final laps and nearly tracked Hocevar down, but the No. 77 Chevy crossed the finish line first by a photo-finish margin of 0.114 seconds.

Alex Bowman (#48, Hendrick Motorsports) came home third, with Chase Elliott (#9, Hendrick Motorsports) and Zane Smith (#38, Front Row Motorsports) rounding out the top five.

Top 10 Finishers

| Pos | # | Driver | Team |

|-----|---|--------|------|

| 1 | 77 | Carson Hocevar | Spire Motorsports (Chevy) |

| 2 | 17 | Chris Buescher | RFK Racing (Ford) |

| 3 | 48 | Alex Bowman | Hendrick Motorsports (Chevy) |

| 4 | 9 | Chase Elliott | Hendrick Motorsports (Chevy) |

| 5 | 38 | Zane Smith | Front Row Motorsports (Ford) |

| 6 | 47 | Ricky Stenhouse Jr. | JTG Daugherty Racing (Chevy) |

| 7 | 1 | Ross Chastain | Trackhouse Racing (Chevy) |

| 8 | 22 | Austin Cindric | Team Penske (Ford) |

| 9 | 10 | Noah Gragson | Stewart-Haas Racing (Ford) |

| 10 | 8 | Kyle Busch | Richard Childress Racing (Chevy) |

Championship Implications

Hocevar's victory was a massive moment for both the driver and Spire Motorsports. He earned a guaranteed NASCAR Cup Playoffs berth by virtue of the win — his first — and jumped from 12th to 8th in the overall points standings with 292 points. The win locks him into the postseason regardless of regular season results the rest of the way.

At the top of the standings, Tyler Reddick (#45, 23XI Racing) maintained his commanding championship lead, extending it to 110 points over Denny Hamlin (#11) after a solid Talladega run. The top of the standings after the race:

| Pos | # | Driver | Points | Ahead of Cutline |

|-----|---|--------|--------|-----------------|

| 1 | 45 | Tyler Reddick | 484 | +262 |

| 2 | 11 | Denny Hamlin | 374 | +152 |

| 3 | 12 | Ryan Blaney | 344 | +122 |

| 4 | 9 | Chase Elliott | 340 | +118 |

| 5 | 54 | Ty Gibbs | 322 | +100 |

| 6 | 5 | Kyle Larson | 315 | +93 |

| 7 | 17 | Chris Buescher | 309 | +87 |

| 8 | 77 | Carson Hocevar | 292 | +70 |

| 9 | 20 | Christopher Bell | 290 | +68 |

| 10 | 6 | Brad Keselowski | 279 | +57 |

In the bubble region, Austin Cindric holds the final playoff spot with 226 points — just four ahead of Chase Briscoe and 21 ahead of Ross Chastain. The Talladega crash may prove costly for several drivers who need wins or consistent finishes to lock themselves in before the regular season concludes.

Race Stats

• Laps: 188
• Distance: 500.08 miles
• Lead Changes: 51–52
• Drivers Who Led: 16
• Cautions: 6 for 30 laps
• Stage 1 Winner: Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (#47)
• Stage 2 Winner: Ross Chastain (#1)
• Margin of Victory: 0.114 seconds
• Laps Led by Winner: 19 (of final 37)
• Most Laps Led: Christopher Bell (#20) — 31 laps
• Hocevar's Career Starts: 91 (first win)
• Spire Motorsports' Last Win: 2019
• Notable Incident: 26-car crash on Lap 115 (Turn 3)

Full race replay available on the NASCAR YouTube channel

Show: Out of the Groove

Host: Eric Estepp

Date: April 26, 2026

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, Alabama

Show Type: NASCAR fan analysis and commentary

Episode Overview

Eric Estepp opens this episode of Out of the Groove by deliberately structuring his evening around the emotional duality of the Jack Link's 500 — a race that gifted the sport a genuinely exciting new winner while also delivering one of the most frustrating superspeedway products in recent memory. Knowing he's going to dwell on the negatives, Eric makes a deliberate choice to lead with the good news: Carson Hocevar is a NASCAR Cup Series race winner. That framing sets the tone for an episode split between genuine enthusiasm and pointed, well-reasoned criticism.

The episode covers Hocevar's victory and its meaning for the sport, a tactical breakdown of how the win was actually earned, key finishers and championship implications, the race-defining 26-car melee at lap 116, and a lengthy, impassioned critique of the current Cup Series superspeedway product — from the racing itself to the Fox Sports broadcast. Eric scores the race a 30 on the Groovy Gauge, his lowest mark of the 2026 season, and makes clear that while the finish was thrilling, 187 of 188 laps were deeply unsatisfying.

Carson Hocevar: A Star in the Making

Eric wastes no time declaring not just that Hocevar won, but why it matters. The 23-year-old Michigan driver is framed as something genuinely rare — a young Cup competitor with the talent, personality, and cultural presence to break beyond the typical racing audience. Eric traces the storyline all the way back to Hocevar's childhood, noting with visible delight that years-old YouTube die-cast stop-motion videos on his own channel feature a young Hocevar as a contestant.

"Carson Hocevar right now is the most likely active Cup Series driver to break into the mainstream — to reach that true superstar level," Eric says. "He's young, he's creative, he engages with his audience, he's super passionate about racing, uber talented, and he does not give a damn what anyone else thinks."

Eric contrasts Hocevar with the rest of the field's would-be stars: Denny Hamlin is "already writing his retirement speech," Kyle Busch hasn't won in three years, Chase Elliott doesn't want superstar status, and Kyle Larson lacks the charisma to break out of racing circles. Hocevar's friendships with social media personalities like IShowSpeed and Cletus McFarland are cited as evidence he's already building the kind of crossover audience NASCAR desperately needs.

The celebration — Hocevar sitting on the window ledge of the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet while driving both ways around the 2.66-mile superspeedway — earned particular praise. "This is why Carson Hocevar is such a fan favorite," Eric says. "He thinks outside the box... there are at least a dozen different ways that celebration could have gone horribly wrong, but thankfully Carson hit all the right notes."

Eric also contextualizes the win within Spire Motorsports' history — technically the team's second Cup win, after the rain-shortened 2019 Daytona summer race fell to Justin Haley — noting this is the real first win for the new-look, TWWG Global–backed three-car team. He looks ahead optimistically: Texas Motor Speedway is coming up, a track where Spire has shown speed, and Charlotte is a track where Hocevar was leading before a mechanical failure last year. "This could be the first of several this year."

How the Win Was Actually Earned

Eric breaks down Hocevar's victory with the kind of tactical clarity that defines the show at its best. The honest answer, he admits, is unsexy: fuel strategy. Hocevar saved fuel during Stage 2 and spent less time on pit road before the start of Stage 3, which allowed him to restart near the front. From there, track position at Talladega is everything.

"Y'all probably don't want to hear this, but he got out front because he saved fuel in stage two and spent less time on pit road before the start of stage three," Eric says. "Once Hocevar got that clean air, once he got to the front row, it was going to take a major mistake, frankly, to lose that track position."

That's not to say there were no moments of genuine driving skill. Eric highlights a late-race incident where Hocevar, ironically being pushed by his old nemesis Ricky Stenhouse Jr., briefly lost the handle coming off turn four. The situation nearly ended disastrously — Stenhouse bumped Hocevar loose, and he clipped Eric Jones in the 43 car — but Hocevar caught it. Eric is sympathetic to Jones: "Terrible luck for the 43 car who should have scored a top five today."

On the final lap, Hocevar was paired on the front row with Chris Buescher. The decisive moment came in the trioval when the cars behind Buescher made their moves, creating a gap that Hocevar used to clear for the win. "Buescher had to move up and that gave Hocevar all the space he needed to clear for the lead and get the win. I wish it was a little more exciting than that," Eric admits. Still, he credits Hocevar for being patient and methodical throughout, making smart lane choices, and learning from near-misses at Daytona and Atlanta earlier in 2026.

Race Results and Championship Watch

Eric runs through the finishing order with commentary. Chris Buescher (2nd) earned particular respect — he and Ryan Preece tied for the most stage points on the day, and RFK Racing's Fords once again showed superspeedway strength. Alex Bowman's third-place finish was called out as a genuinely feel-good story given his return from over a month away due to vertigo. "Just his third race back — love to see that for Alex Bowman."

Zane Smith's fifth-place finish validated a prediction by regular collaborator Ryan Stevens, who noted before the race that Smith had scored top-10s in three straight drafting track events going back to the previous season. "Make it four — top five in fact, for Zane Smith. Credit to Zane Front Row — they've always got a surprise or two up their sleeve at Talladega." Front Row Motorsports as a whole excelled: Todd Gilliland finished 11th and Michael McDowell (9th) combined for a tremendous team day.

Kyle Busch's 10th-place finish drew a genuinely enthusiastic response. "Hang the banner, folks. RCR has their first top 10 of the year. Man, I'm not even being sarcastic — that's actually a big deal for the number eight team." Eric acknowledged that amid weeks of public tension between Busch and Richard Childress Racing, surviving Talladega with a top-10 counts as a genuine victory for that group.

On the championship side, Tyler Reddick extended his points lead to 140 over Ryan Blaney, with both Blaney and Ty Gibbs getting caught up in the big wreck. Hocevar's win moves him to eighth in points. Austin Cindric, meanwhile, now holds the final playoff spot in 16th — a point Eric flags as worth watching going into Texas.

The Big One: 26 Cars, Half the Field

The race's defining incident came at lap 116, at the start of Stage 2. Teams had signaled their drivers to push the pace and maintain track position. A three- and four-wide charge down the backstretch ended catastrophically when the middle lane got a run on Bubba Wallace, with Joey Logano making contact with Ryan Preece, into Ross Chastain, who got Wallace loose. The resulting chain reaction swept up over two dozen cars.

"Huge wreck. Huge," Eric says. "More than half the field swept up in this thing." Joey Logano's day ended there, as did Ryan Blaney's — two of the pre-race favorites. Bubba Wallace was also collected. Ty Gibbs escaped initial damage but blew a tire a few laps later and eventually DNFed. Brad Keselowski, Eric's pick for the race, was also caught up in the incident.

Eric's read on the wreck is bleak but honest: "They finally got to racing a little bit and they wadded it all up. That's so silly. Can we be honest? They finally got to racing a little bit — and they wadded it all up. It just sucks."

The Superspeedway Product: Eric's Biggest Gripe

The back half of the episode is dedicated to Eric's most sustained critique: the current state of Cup Series superspeedway racing at Talladega and Daytona is, in his words, "terrible." "Unacceptable." "Bad. Big doodoo." He's careful to exclude Atlanta — which he considers a hybrid drafting track — but when it comes to the true superspeedways, he argues the current Next Gen car package has created a product that actively punishes entertaining racing.

The first 98 laps were almost entirely run at half-throttle, with drivers saving fuel. The teams and drivers who pushed the pace — notably a group of Toyotas led by Hamlin, Ty Gibbs, and others — were ultimately punished. Penalties on pit road and a failure to stay organized meant the Fords who saved fuel more aggressively were rewarded with stage wins and better finishing positions. "The guys who pushed the pace and tried to race, tried to be different — they ultimately were punished for trying. That stunk."

Eric also flags a moment during Stage 1 that he found emblematic of the confusion: Fox showed a graphic where the apparent race leader was Denny Hamlin — who was actually in 36th place, one lap down. Right behind him was Ty Gibbs in 29th. And behind that was the actual race leader, Christopher Bell. "Fox trying to parse through all the information is like trying to find a needle in the haystack. They were lost."

The broadcast itself drew pointed criticism. A full-screen commercial break ran just three laps into Stage 2 — immediately after a stage break that already included multiple commercials. "We just had a stage break with a bunch of commercials. They're finally racing for a few laps. Cut to commercial. We come out of commercial, they all wrecked. Like, we got to see so little real white-knuckle exciting racing today. Just unacceptable all around — from the car to the strategies to the broadcast itself."

Eric does note that NASCAR is aware of the problem. Testing at Daytona is planned ahead of what he calls "Next Gen 2.0," and NASCAR has already adjusted stage lengths as a short-term band-aid. But he's skeptical about how much can be done with the current car platform. "I don't know how much they can really do with this car, with this platform. We'll have to wait until Next Gen 2.0 — hopefully in the next few years."

He closes the critique with a plea to find whatever "special sauce" made Talladega great. "I have to believe that a better product is possible, because I have seen it, and I don't think it was that long ago."

Groovy Gauge: 30 out of 100

Eric closes the episode with the Groovy Gauge — his signature race rating — and scores today's event at 30, which he calls his lowest score of the 2026 season. "I think that's my lowest score of the year. If it's not, it should be." He acknowledges the positives: Hocevar's win was great, and the final lap was legitimately exciting. But the other 187 laps were, in his view, so bad that he can't justify going higher. "I don't mind fuel saving at super speedways. I just mind when it's everything."

Notable Quotes

Eric (on Hocevar's superstar potential): "Carson Hocevar right now is the most likely active Cup Series driver to break into the mainstream — to reach that true superstar level. He's young, he's creative, he engages with his audience, he's super passionate about racing, uber talented, and he does not give a damn what anyone else thinks."

Eric (on the superspeedway product): "I'll just cut to the chase. The current Cup Series Super Speedway product is terrible. It's unacceptable. It is bad. Big doodoo. And we saw all of the worst elements of it today at Talladega."

Eric (on the Big One): "They finally got to racing a little bit and they wadded it all up. That's so silly. Can we be honest? It just sucks."

Eric (on Kyle Busch's top 10): "Hang the banner, folks. RCR has their first top 10 of the year. Man, I'm not even being sarcastic — that's actually a big deal for the number eight team."

Eric (on the Fox broadcast): "Fox running a full-screen commercial three laps into stage two. We just had a stage break with a bunch of commercials. They're finally racing for a few laps. Cut to commercial. We come out of commercial, they all wrecked. Like, we got to see so little real white-knuckle exciting racing today."

Eric (on Hocevar's celebration): "There are at least a dozen different ways that celebration could have gone horribly wrong, but thankfully Carson hit all the right notes. This is why Carson Hocevar is such a fan favorite — he thinks outside the box."

Carson Hocevar Breaks Through, NASCAR's New CEO Stops By, and the Superspeedway Racing Debate Continues | The Teardown

Podcast: The Teardown

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM / The Athletic

Date: Sunday, April 26, 2026 (post-race, streamed live)

Race Covered: Jack Link's 500 — Talladega Superspeedway, Talladega, AL

Hosts: Jeff Gluck, Jordan Bianchi

Special Guest: Steve O'Donnell, NASCAR CEO

Show Type: Instant post-race reaction and analysis from the racetrack

Episode Overview

Jeff Gluck and Jordan Bianchi opened the Talladega Teardown with an immediate curveball: new NASCAR CEO Steve O'Donnell had stayed late after the race and was sitting in the room with them. What followed was a 13-minute conversation with the sport's top executive that set the tone for the entire episode — a day in which NASCAR felt, as Jeff put it, like it might not be that far away from having the elements to really have some buzz. Hocevar's first Cup Series win, his all-time victory celebration, the Cleatus McFarland ARCA phenomenon, a massive 26-car crash, the ongoing superspeedway fuel-saving debate, and questions about NASCAR's TV coverage all followed. It was one of the most content-rich Teardowns of the season.

Opening Segment — NASCAR CEO Steve O'Donnell Joins the Show

Jeff opened by explaining that O'Donnell — who was formally announced as NASCAR CEO the same weekend, with Ben Kennedy elevated to COO — had stayed very late at Talladega Superspeedway to sit down with them. "Is this why you stayed, or were you just interested in Carson Hocevar?" Jeff asked. O'Donnell laughed and said it was both, noting that last time he watched the Teardown it had been "in tougher circumstances" — a reference to the 23XI/Front Row antitrust lawsuit period.

On the Hocevar celebration, O'Donnell was clear: "I thought it was so cool. He takes a lot of grief, but he gets out there and he races. He is who he is. We've always said the fans want personalities and I thought it was terrific." He added he was a little nervous when Hocevar's car hit the wall, but said he would not move to ban the celebration. Jeff pushed him on the challenge of actually implementing driver personality when corporate sponsors traditionally push back. O'Donnell acknowledged the tension but framed the sponsor argument in market terms: "You're probably going to sell a lot more product when you allow your driver to be themselves." He said the sport had "gone too far" at times toward a corporate feel that was "non-NASCAR" and that the goal was to get back to the essence of what made the sport great — relatable people. "Our fans are looking for new drivers to be their favorite," he said, "and I think we've got a good group of people coming up through the system."

Jeff asked O'Donnell about his evolution as a leader — how someone 30 years inside the institution could still be seen as a progressive thinker. "I've learned on both ends," O'Donnell said. "We wanted to compete with other sports and maybe did some things that were a little off of who we are." On his 90-day agenda, he said the "listening tour" comment that got him criticism online was genuine: visiting Rick Hendrick, drivers, fans, and media to hear what they'd say about NASCAR if the cameras weren't rolling, then bringing that back to his leadership group and identifying themes. "The biggest thing for me is where are we at five years from now and working backwards," he told Jordan.

Toward the end of the O'Donnell segment, Jeff said what he'd observed personally: that industry people who know O'Donnell have a far more favorable view of him than the broader fan base does. "It's weird the difference of people talking to the industry about you versus the fans," Jeff said. "I think they caught a wrong perception at some point." O'Donnell's parting line: "All we can do is do our best and see where we end up. But hopefully it'll be in a good place, because we're all trying to work hard for the fans."

The Victory Celebration — "I Don't Remember the Last Time Hearing a Winner Have a Reaction Like That"

After O'Donnell left, Jeff and Jordan settled in to process the day — and the Hocevar celebration dominated the first portion. Both were on pit road when it happened, and both had the same experience: they noticed something was off on the jumbotron mid-interview and couldn't figure out what they were seeing. "I'm interviewing Kyle Busch and I'm looking and I'm like, what is Hocevar? Is his foot stuck or something?" Jeff said. "Everybody stopped. All the PR people, the crew guys — everybody just kind of looked up at the jumbotron like, what is going on?"

Jordan called it "Nhardesque," referencing Dale Earnhardt Sr., then half-walked it back — but only half. "I don't remember the last time being here at Talladega and hearing a winner have a reaction like that," he said. "There's a connection there with the fans in Hocevar, and to have somebody get that kind of reaction is really telling."

Jeff broke down the mechanics of how Hocevar pulled it off — as explained in the post-race press conference. Hocevar had to take the steering wheel off to get his leg wedged out the window, then put the wheel back on and dump the clutch. The idea came from 2014, when Hocevar was watching Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s in-car at Daytona and saw Dale waving to the fans — a shot only the driver could see. "He said, 'I wanted a way that they could see me appreciating it and I wanted to soak it in,'" Jeff recounted. "And it's like — that's one of those things you get from really consuming so much NASCAR over the years."

Jordan made the point that Hocevar is unique because he never ran from being a race fan. "He's not ashamed to be a race fan. A lot of drivers, it's not really cool to be like a fan. But Hocevar is still a fan." Jeff added that Hocevar apparently watches things like 2007 Race Day episodes from Kansas on random Wednesdays. Both hosts also noted, with some satisfaction, that Larry the Cable Guy tweeted "Get her done" in response to the celebration during the live recording. Jeff: "Oh. Epic."

Hocevar's Future and the Spire Story

Jeff and Jordan went long on what Hocevar's win means for his trajectory and why the Spire situation is so important to understand. Jordan was direct: don't draw too many parallels to Ross Chastain's early buzz at Trackhouse, because that situation involved things happening behind the scenes "putting a lid on Ross." Hocevar is in an environment that actively wants him to be himself.

Jeff noted that Spire's parent company is the same ownership group as the Los Angeles Lakers, Los Angeles Dodgers, and the Andretti/Cadillac F1 team — and they're not even a key partner team for Chevrolet yet. "This is not their peak," he said. Jordan credited Chili's by name as a sponsor that has specifically bought in on Carson being Carson: "They want him to be out there, they want him to be a big personality, and they're going to embrace that. And that's what you need — a sponsor-driven sport where sponsors are for personality rather than against it."

Both hosts agreed that Hocevar is an unfinished product and will do things that make you cringe again. But Jordan argued the makings are there for a real playoff run. He pointed to Darlington (fourth), a top 10 at Bristol, eighth in points, and a schedule that runs heavily through intermediate tracks in the fall — Hocevar's best track type. "He's left a lot of points on the table this year," Jordan said. Jeff agreed, adding that the pit road consistency needs to improve, but acknowledged the dam has now broken.

The Race Finish — Last-Lap Breakdown

Jeff walked through the final-lap sequence, and Jordan added what he learned from talking to Chris Buescher post-race. Buescher told Jordan there were several things over the final 5-10 laps where he could have positioned differently, and one specific moment where he had an opening to throw a block but hesitated. "You have to just go," Jordan said. "You can't even wait for your spotter. It's instinctual." Buescher also specifically cited losing Eric Jones as a pusher late in the race as a factor — "Eric was such a great pusher and they were just working so well together."

Jeff noted that Hocevar's choice of Alex Bowman over Ricky Stenhouse Jr. as a partner made sense given Hocevar's past clashes with Stenhouse. "Bowman's a Hendrick engine, it's the Hendrick alliance — Bowman was looking at him as the pseudo teammate."

The Big One — 26 Cars, White Smoke, and the Bubba Wallace Debate

The Lap 115 crash took out 26 cars — two fewer than the all-time Talladega record. Jeff described watching it from the Turn 1 press box: "It almost looked like suddenly fog appeared again, because it was just all white smoke. Where'd everybody go?" Spotters on the radio were calling out that they'd lost their drivers in the smoke.

The aftermath surprised both hosts — many of the involved cars came back out and kept racing. "I've never seen so many tow trucks in the garage," Jeff said. "Looked like a tow truck convention."

On the Bubba Wallace/Chastain/Logano sequence that triggered the crash, Jeff was direct: "Bubba Wallace could save a bunch of puppies from a burning building and they would still scream at him for screwing it up somehow." He argued the replay didn't show Wallace doing anything wrong — Chastain arrived with too much momentum from Logano and Blaney pushing hard, and Wallace's car got squirrely in a tight pack. "Bubba said it afterwards — his car was loose and he wasn't able to handle it well. That's not on him." Jordan added that Wallace's track record in superspeedway races is "pretty darn good" and agreed the criticism was unfair.

Superspeedway Racing: What Do You Do?

The fuel-saving discussion came up early with O'Donnell (who called Stage 1 problematic but said Stages 2 and 3 were "exactly what you'd want") and continued at length after he left. Jeff and Jordan both noted Stage 1 was rough — Alex Bowman quipped post-race that "he could have taken a nap." Chase Elliott was more measured, telling reporters "you're always going to have a fuel component here."

Joey Logano offered the most memorable technical explanation: the Next Gen car no longer has the air bubble at the rear that used to create resistance when cars got too close. "It's two round bumpers now — like two basketballs bouncing together," Jordan quoted Logano. "Where it was like two bricks, you have a much easier time pushing them straight." The implication: the car needs to be harder to control at superspeedways, not easier.

Jeff circled back to one exchange he'd had walking into the media center that morning — an unnamed Cup driver had pulled up in a golf cart, leaned over, and whispered "54%" before driving off. That driver was apparently predicting the fan approval rating for the race. Jordan ended up guessing 54%; Jeff went with 46%. Both agreed the rating would likely be low.

TV Coverage / Commercials

Steve O'Donnell had acknowledged the commercial complaints during the show, noting he goes back and watches on Monday to see what the broadcast looked like. After O'Donnell left, Jeff circled back to what bothered him most: Fox went to commercial immediately after showing the first replay of the big crash. "This is the big moment. This is when you have the whole audience in the palm of your hand and they all want to see what just happened — and now we're going to a commercial."

Jordan's analogy: "It's like going to a play and in the middle of the dialogue the curtain just closes and when it opens they're in a different scene — and you missed whatever happened in between." Jeff added that it's hard for people at the track to be as sympathetic as they otherwise would be, because they're watching the race live while the tweet complaints roll in — there's an inherent distance from the frustration. "If I'm at home and this happened to me, I'd be just as mad as all the people tweeting about it."

Cleetus McFarland and the ARCA Race

Jeff was unequivocal: "Easily the most fun I've ever had watching an ARCA race." Cleetus had a sheriff escort just to get around the Talladega property. His in-car camera had over a thousand live viewers. He finished second after leading laps, making three-wide moves, and giving the broadcast team a real show. "Listening to Chad Hammond and the emotion in his voice when Cleetus took the lead at Talladega — I mean, it was freaking great."

Jeff and Jordan got into a real debate about the approval process for Cleetus to eventually run an O'Reilly super speedway race. Jeff's argument: if finishing second at Talladega in ARCA almost qualified him had he won, what exactly does the margin between first and second change about his demonstrated ability in superspeedway drafting? Jordan conceded the logic but insisted on more seat time regardless — green flag pit stops, more laps on different track types, exposure to more race situations. "It's not you need to prove you can do this specific thing — it's just experience. Being in a restart where the guy in front spins his tires. Getting on and off pit road." They both agreed ARCA is the perfect series for Cleetus right now, and that the attention he's bringing to a series that would otherwise barely register is unambiguously good.

Other Race Notes

Cory Day won the O'Reilly race at Talladega — Jeff mentioned that Jeff Andrews had told him weeks ago, after the earlier O'Reilly race: "This kid is really, really talented. Just give him a little bit of time." He noted this likely won't be Day's last win this year. Jason Kelsey served as honorary crew member for Day's team, which prompted Jeff and Jordan to joke that New Heights podcast was about to become the #1 NASCAR podcast that week ahead of the Dale Jr. Download.

Alex Bowman finished third in the Cup race — one of the more quietly meaningful results of the day. Jeff reflected on Bowman's concussion history and the fact that he returned at Bristol and has been running hard all year. "He said it kind of tongue in cheek, but there's truth in it: 'I don't have many hits left in me.'" Jordan's response was simple: "That's badass."

It was also the first top 10 of the year for RCR, and Front Row Motorsports had three cars in the top 11 — Zane Smith and Noah Gragson in the top 10, Todd Gilliland 11th.

NASCAR Leadership: "More Optimistic Than I Ever Have"

Jeff and Jordan returned to the O'Donnell/Ben Kennedy story at the end to close the episode. Ben Kennedy, newly promoted to COO, had also attended the Talladega tweet-up that morning and took audience questions. One memorable exchange: someone yelled out whether Kentucky Speedway could ever come back. Kennedy said, "About 50/50." Jeff was surprised by that number: "I was thinking it would be lower." Jordan noted Kennedy has been vocal about wanting NASCAR in the Pacific Northwest and specifically mentioned Colorado as a target market. Competition director John Probst will now report to Kennedy rather than O'Donnell — a structural shift worth watching.

Jeff's closing thought on the new leadership was notably direct: "I've been covering NASCAR since 2004. I feel more optimistic and positive about NASCAR's current leadership than I ever have." He argued that O'Donnell has earned more credit than he gets from the broader fan base, and that having two leaders as aligned as O'Donnell and Kennedy — rather than a split between old school and new — gives NASCAR a more coherent direction than it's had in a long time. Texas Motor Speedway is next.

Notable Quotes

Steve O'Donnell (on Hocevar's celebration): "He is who he is. We've always said the fans want personalities and I thought it was terrific."

Steve O'Donnell (on driver personality and sponsors): "You're probably going to sell a lot more product when you allow your driver to be themselves."

Steve O'Donnell (on his vision): "I would love for NASCAR to be the biggest sport in the world. We have a long way to go, but that's what I want."

Jordan (on the Hocevar celebration): "I don't remember the last time being here at Talladega and hearing a winner Have a reaction like that."

Jeff (on Hocevar's win celebration origin): "He said — 'I wanted a way that they could see me appreciating it and I wanted to soak it in.' And it's like, man, that's one of those things you get from really consuming so much NASCAR over the years."

Jordan (on Bubba Wallace criticism): "Bubba Wallace could save a bunch of puppies from a burning building and they would still scream at him for screwing it up somehow."

Jeff (on NASCAR leadership): "I've been covering NASCAR since 2004. I feel more optimistic and positive about NASCAR's current leadership than I ever have."

Sources

YouTube Episode: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jf8whtWHKgs

The Teardown Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFUhDMhE1U5TN-kgZUZ9uAiO4fyVPcioS

Dirty Mo Media: https://www.dirtymomedia.com/teardown

Generated automatically on Tuesday, April 28, 2026 | Racing in the Draft

Tyler Reddick Joins the Show! Dale Shuts Down the Conspiracy Theories | Dale Jr. Download

Podcast: The Dale Jr. Download

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM

Date: Week of April 21, 2026 (post-Kansas)

Race Covered: AdventHealth 400 — Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, KS

Hosts: Dale Earnhardt Jr., TJ Majors

Guest: Tyler Reddick

Show Type: Weekly NASCAR podcast with race recap and guest interviews

Episode Overview

Dale Earnhardt Jr. and TJ Majors welcomed Tyler Reddick to the Download in the week following Kansas — Reddick's fifth Cup Series win of 2026, an overtime thriller at Kansas Speedway that extended his historic early-season pace. The episode covered Reddick's perspective on his own season in depth, Dale's direct rebuttal to the growing conspiracy theories around 23XI Racing's performance, the Michael Jordan viral post-race moment, and the broader championship picture. It was one of the most anticipated episodes of the Download's 2026 season given the timeliness of the guest and the weight of the storyline.

Tyler Reddick — Conversation Highlights

On Winning the Race:

Reddick was characteristically humble about the Kansas win while clearly aware of its historical context. He walked through the final-lap sequence — trailing Larson into Turn 1 after the overtime restart, finding speed off the corner exit, and making the pass stick. His framing: "I had a run. I don't get that opportunity if the car isn't fast and the team hasn't set it up right. You still have to execute it, but the opportunity has to be there."

On the 1987 Earnhardt Comparison:

This was the episode's most memorable exchange. When Dale raised the comparison explicitly — five wins in nine races paralleling Earnhardt's 1987 season start — Reddick responded with a mix of genuine flattery and careful deflection. He acknowledged the number while pushing back on the comparison's weight. "I'm aware of it. I don't spend any time thinking about it because the only thing that matters is the next race. But I understand what it means, and I'm grateful for what the team has given me."

Dale's response was warm and direct: "I watched my father do things on race tracks that I couldn't fully appreciate until years later. I'm watching you do things right now that people will look back on. Don't deflect from it too much — own it."

On the Michael Jordan Post-Race Moment:

Reddick addressed the viral image of Jordan grabbing Hamlin on pit road. His take: Jordan's reaction was a pure competitive response to a win — excitement, intensity, the kind of engagement that makes 23XI's ownership group special. "He's not there as a figurehead. He's there because he cares about winning. When we win, you see that."

Reddick also navigated the Hamlin dynamic carefully — acknowledging that racing against his co-owner's business partner while running for the same win creates a complicated dynamic, but that on track, the relationship is simple: "We race each other the way we'd race anybody. That's the only way it can work."

On the Season's Sustainability:

Reddick was honest about the unpredictability of sustaining a pace like this. Five wins is remarkable; whether the next race produces a sixth or a 15th-place finish is a separate question. "I don't know how to explain why it's clicking right now. I know what we're doing in preparation and execution. I trust that as long as we keep doing that, we give ourselves the best chance."

On Denny Hamlin's Restart Decision:

Reddick gave Hamlin credit for acknowledging the mistake publicly. His perspective on the final sequence: when Larson went three-wide into Hamlin, Reddick was focused entirely on the front — watching Larson's move and positioning himself to benefit. "When Larson got to the lead, I knew I had speed. I just had to get to him."

Dale Shuts Down the Conspiracy Theories — "No Way in Hell"

The episode's most quoted segment. The growing faction of NASCAR fans and commentators suggesting that 23XI Racing's 2026 performance is somehow artificially enhanced or irregularly supported drew a sharp response from Dale.

Dale's position: he has no financial stake in 23XI's success, competes against the team through JR Motorsports' Xfinity program, and is in a position to observe the organization from outside without any incentive to run cover for them. His read is that 23XI has built a legitimate, championship-caliber operation and Reddick is a legitimate elite driver performing at his ceiling.

"No way in hell is something irregular happening. They're just better right now. The car is fast, the driver is excellent, and the preparation is thorough. That's it. When someone wins five of nine, people want a different explanation — there isn't one."

He specifically named the conspiracy theories that had been circulating without dignifying their specific claims, treating them as exactly the kind of narrative that emerges when excellence exceeds expectation. TJ noted that this response from Dale — given his credibility, his history, and his competitive context — was the most authoritative dismissal possible.

The Kansas Race Breakdown

Denny Hamlin's Regret:

Dale and TJ discussed Hamlin's post-race admission that he should not have let Larson force him three-wide on the overtime restart. Dale's read: Hamlin is one of the smartest drivers in the sport about race craft, and the fact that he publicly identified the error so quickly suggests it was immediately obvious to him in retrospect. "Denny knows. He knew before he even got to the press conference. That doesn't make it easier."

Josh Berry Being Parked:

Dale addressed the Berry parking call with context from NASCAR's broader enforcement philosophy. His view is consistent with how he's discussed NASCAR enforcement across multiple seasons: the deterrent value is only as strong as the consistency of the consequences. The Lap 1 framework makes sense conceptually; the execution matters.

Chase Briscoe's Third Place:

Dale gave Briscoe credit for a strong result and flagged him as a driver who has been underrated in the 2026 championship conversation. "Briscoe is running well. Don't overlook him."

Championship Picture

Dale and TJ closed with a discussion of where the 2026 championship race stands through nine races. Reddick's points lead is substantial — five wins give him an enormous regular season point cushion and virtual playoff certainty. Behind him, the competition is legitimate and deep.

Dale's read: the question for the playoff is not whether Reddick wins the championship but whether any driver can build the momentum and experience to challenge him when the field compresses in the postseason. The answer to that question will develop over the next 17 regular season races.

Notable Quotes

Dale (on Reddick): "I watched my father do things on race tracks that I couldn't fully appreciate until years later. I'm watching you do things right now that people will look back on. Don't deflect from it too much — own it."

Reddick (on the win): "You still have to execute it, but the opportunity has to be there. The team gave me the opportunity."

Dale (on conspiracy theories): "No way in hell is something irregular happening. They're just better right now."

Reddick (on Jordan's post-race reaction): "He's not there as a figurehead. He's there because he cares about winning."

Dale (on Hamlin's restart): "Denny knows. He knew before he even got to the press conference. That doesn't make it easier."

Briscoe Squeezes Busch, Berry Gets Parked, Denny's Restart Regret | Door Bumper Clear

Podcast: Door Bumper Clear

Network: Dirty Mo Media / SiriusXM

Date: Week of April 21, 2026 (post-Kansas)

Race Covered: AdventHealth 400 — Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, KS

Hosts: Freddie Kraft, Tommy Baldwin, Karsyn Elledge

Guests: Casey Boat, AJ Allmendinger

Show Type: Weekly NASCAR podcast with industry insider perspective and live #AskDBC session

Episode Overview

The Door Bumper Clear team brought two guests to the Kansas post-race breakdown: Casey Boat, back in studio to recap the weekend, and AJ Allmendinger, who joined to debrief the full Kansas picture from a driver's perspective. The episode was one of DBC's most guest-heavy of the season, and the conversation moved quickly across multiple topics: Tyler Reddick's overtime win and what it means to race against a car running at that level, Chase Briscoe squeezing Kyle Busch into the wall, NASCAR's decision to park Josh Berry after a Lap 1 crash, and Freddie's breakdown of the Denny Hamlin/Kyle Larson three-wide restart controversy. The episode closed with a live #AskDBC viewer session on YouTube.

AJ Allmendinger — Debriefing Kansas from the Driver's Seat

On Tyler Reddick's Season:

Allmendinger opened his segment with a driver's-eye read on what it's like to race against Reddick in 2026. His take: the car is legitimate and the driver is operating at the top of his ability simultaneously. That combination is the hardest thing to race against because there's no gap to exploit — you can't count on a mistake from the driver or a setup miss from the team.

He described the final restart sequence: from inside the cockpit of a car running in the top 10, watching Reddick chase Larson down on the last lap. "When Reddick has a run and he commits, he doesn't back down. Larson didn't make a mistake — Reddick was just there."

On the Last-Lap Environment:

Allmendinger addressed the intensity of Kansas overtime racing from a driver perspective — the compressed decision-making, the awareness of multiple cars running close together, the physical and mental demands of pushing for position when the race is genuinely on the line. His perspective gave the Hamlin/Wallace contact specific texture: in that environment, with that many cars running close in those final laps, contact of some kind is close to inevitable.

On Reddick's Longevity:

Allmendinger was asked whether the current pace is sustainable. His honest answer: he doesn't know, and neither does anyone else. What he knows is that the car has been fast consistently and the driver has been executing consistently. "At some point the variance catches up to everyone. But you can't race against what hasn't happened yet — right now, they're the best."

Casey Boat's Kansas Weekend Recap

Casey Boat returned to the studio to provide an on-site perspective from the Kansas Speedway weekend. His read on the atmosphere in the garage and the storylines he'd followed through the weekend.

The Reddick Dominance Narrative:

Boat described the garage vibe around 23XI's continued success — the combination of genuine respect from competitors and competitive frustration that the gap hasn't closed. Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s public dismissal of the conspiracy theories was noted as a significant contribution to the conversation; when someone with Dale's credibility and competitive context speaks that directly, it matters.

The Michael Jordan Moment:

Boat was on pit road for the post-race scene and offered firsthand context. Jordan's grab of Hamlin was immediate — within seconds of Reddick taking the checkered flag. The emotion was raw and genuine. "You could see it before the car even got back to pit road. Jordan was locked in on that race. When Reddick won, that was his reaction. It wasn't staged — that's just what competitive joy looks like when you're Michael Jordan."

Key Discussion Topics

Denny Hamlin / Kyle Larson — The Three-Wide Restart:

Freddie and Baldwin gave the crew chief read on the decisive overtime restart sequence. This was the episode's most technically detailed segment.

Baldwin's breakdown: Larson's move — going three-wide into Turn 1 in overtime — was aggressive but legal. He identified a gap that Hamlin left, committed to it fully, and made it work. The question is whether Hamlin should have anticipated it and defended earlier.

Freddie's read: Hamlin's admission that he shouldn't have let Larson force him three-wide was correct, and the fact that a driver of Hamlin's experience made the error is a reminder of how much happens in the split second of a restart. "Denny knows. He said so. That's a tough one to live with."

Baldwin added a crew chief dimension: in the radio communication before the restart, Hamlin's team would have identified Larson as the primary threat and discussed how to defend. Whether that communication translated into the right in-car execution is what separated a Kansas win from a Kansas fourth place.

Chase Briscoe Squeezes Kyle Busch into the Wall:

This was the episode's most debated incident. Freddie was measured — he saw it as aggressive racing on Briscoe's part, not a deliberate attempt to wreck Busch, but aggressive enough that the result (Busch being pushed into the wall) was a foreseeable outcome of the move.

Baldwin's take was more pointed: Briscoe is racing with significant edge in 2026. The third-place finish at Kansas validated the aggression, but Baldwin noted that Busch — or another driver — will respond at some point. "You can push drivers around for a while. Eventually someone pushes back."

Casey Boat added context: Busch's car at Kansas was not where it needed to be pace-wise, which put him in traffic situations earlier than he should have been — creating more opportunities for incidents with drivers who are running better.

Karsyn Elledge's Take:

Karsyn noted the uncomfortable optics of a driver of Busch's caliber being squeezed by a driver in a (presumably better-equipped) car and not being able to respond. The narrative around RCR's equipment was front-of-mind. She connected it to the Bristol situation: two consecutive races where Busch's results reflect more on the car than the driver.

Josh Berry Parked — The Enforcement Question:

Freddie and Baldwin addressed NASCAR's decision to park Berry after a Lap 1 crash. Their shared view: the Lap 1 enforcement standard makes conceptual sense — a driver who causes a wreck before any competitive racing exists hasn't earned the "racing incident" mitigating context. The specific Berry call was debatable in its details, but the philosophy is coherent.

Baldwin's broader point: NASCAR's challenge with any enforcement standard is consistency. One parking call for a Lap 1 incident builds the precedent; the next similar call either reinforces or undermines it.

Denny Hamlin / Bubba Wallace Last-Lap Contact:

Freddie gave the clearest industry read on the Hamlin/Wallace contact. In overtime Kansas racing, with multiple cars in the same zip code fighting for position simultaneously, the contact was a product of the environment rather than intent. His framing: "That's what happens when you put good racers in a high-stakes, compressed situation at the end of a race. You're going to have contact."

Baldwin noted the strange dynamic of Hamlin racing against a 23XI driver — his co-owned team's car — and making contact with them. "That's a conversation for after the trophy's been handed out. On track, they're competitors."

The Kyle Busch / Denny Hamlin Podcast Drama:

The DBC crew addressed Kyle Busch's "unsavory" characterization of Hamlin's Actions Detrimental comments about RCR. Freddie's read: Busch's reaction is understandable on a human level — nobody wants to hear a competitor publicly discussing the shortcomings of their team — but the observations Hamlin made were grounded in observable fact.

Tommy Baldwin, speaking as someone who has run cars at multiple resource levels in NASCAR, was the most direct: "If the car doesn't have the speed, you can call attention to it or you can try to politely avoid it. The results eventually make it moot either way."

#AskDBC Live Session Highlights

Whether Briscoe's Kansas aggression will eventually cost him on track

How NASCAR's Lap 1 enforcement evolves from here

Whether Reddick's 2026 pace is sustainable through the playoffs

What the Hamlin/Jordan dynamic looks like at 23XI ownership meetings when Denny hasn't won in a while

How crew chiefs prepare for Kansas overtime specifically — the play-calling on fuel and tires in the final laps

Notable Quotes

Allmendinger (on Reddick): "When Reddick has a run and he commits, he doesn't back down."

Casey Boat (on Jordan's post-race grab): "That's just what competitive joy looks like when you're Michael Jordan."

Freddie (on Hamlin's restart): "Denny knows. He said so. That's a tough one to live with."

Baldwin (on Briscoe): "You can push drivers around for a while. Eventually someone pushes back."

Baldwin (on RCR): "If the car doesn't have the speed, the results eventually make it moot either way."

Baldwin (on Hamlin/Wallace contact): "That's a conversation for after the trophy's been handed out. On track, they're competitors."

Denny's Kansas Regret, Michael Jordan's Viral Moment, and the Kyle Busch War | Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin

Podcast: Actions Detrimental with Denny Hamlin

Network: iHeart / SiriusXM

Date: Monday, April 20, 2026 (post-race)

Race Covered: AdventHealth 400 — Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, KS

Host: Denny Hamlin

Co-Host: Jared Allen

Show Type: Weekly NASCAR podcast from the driver's perspective

Episode Overview

Denny Hamlin delivered one of the most candid and detailed race-specific breakdowns of the 2026 Actions Detrimental season after Kansas — a race that looked like his to lose and then, in his own words, got taken from him in the final restart sequence. He also addressed the viral post-race moment where co-owner Michael Jordan grabbed him at the track, broke down his version of the Bubba Wallace last-lap incident, and returned fire at Kyle Busch for characterizing Denny's RCR comments on a previous episode as "unsavory." The episode was one of the most event-dense of the season.

The Final Restart — Denny's Biggest Regret

The Kansas race's decisive sequence: Denny had retaken the lead from Tyler Reddick with four laps to go. Cody Ware spun in Turn 4, bringing out the final caution. On the overtime restart, Kyle Larson — starting third — pushed Denny three-wide going into Turn 1, forcing Denny high and allowing Larson to take the lead. Reddick, running second, chased Larson down and passed him on the final lap for the win.

Denny's admission was unequivocal: he should not have let Larson force him three-wide. His read in the moment was that he had enough momentum and track position to hold the outside line and prevent the three-wide situation. In retrospect, Larson's move was exactly what a championship-caliber driver does — find an opening where none appears to exist — and Denny concedes he didn't defend it correctly.

"In hindsight, I should not have let Larson get that close to the outside of me. I knew he was there, I knew he was going to try something — and I still let him force the angle. That's on me."

He also addressed the fuel situation: with several laps remaining, the No. 11 team was monitoring fuel closely, and the indecision over whether to manage fuel or go for the win may have affected his rhythm in the closing stint before the final caution. Denny believes they had enough fuel to race — the caution resolved that question — but the mental bandwidth of fuel management during the final sprint isn't nothing.

Michael Jordan — The Post-Race Grab

The viral post-race image of Michael Jordan grabbing Denny Hamlin immediately after the race generated enormous traffic across social media. Denny explained the context: Jordan had been following the race closely and Denny had been telling him all weekend that 23XI was going to win. After Reddick won and Denny finished fourth, Jordan found Denny on pit road and grabbed him by the shoulders — a competitive, emotional reaction between two co-owners of a team that just saw their guy win.

Denny's framing: this was not confrontational, this was Jordan being Jordan — someone whose competitive intensity doesn't turn off even when the result goes his team's way. "He just watched his team win a race. That was competitive joy. If you know Michael Jordan, you know that's how he celebrates. He grabbed me because we both know what that win means."

The moment illustrated the 23XI dynamic: Denny is both a competitor against Reddick on the track and a co-owner rooting for 23XI's success simultaneously. He acknowledged the weird duality without resolution.

Tyler Reddick — The 1987 Earnhardt Comparison

Reddick's fifth win in the first nine races of the season — matching the pace of Dale Earnhardt's legendary 1987 start — was addressed directly. Denny gave Reddick full credit and went further than most in the garage: he said that what 23XI and Reddick have built is not a fluke, not an equipment shortcut, and not a statistical anomaly. It's a legitimate championship-caliber operation firing at the right moment.

He was particularly complimentary of how Reddick races: the composure in overtime, the ability to find pace in dirty air, and the capacity to make moves without overcooking the situation. "When Reddick passes you for the lead with one lap to go, he's not trying to wreck you — he's trying to beat you. That's a driver who knows what he's doing."

Kyle Busch vs. Denny — The "Unsavory" Comment

Kyle Busch gave an interview in which he called Denny's previous podcast comments about RCR's situation "particularly unsavory." Denny responded on this episode — calmly, directly, and without backing down.

His position: he was asked direct questions about a team situation that is observable from outside the garage, gave honest answers, and has nothing to apologize for. He noted that if a driver tells the truth about a publicly visible performance gap, calling those observations "unsavory" says more about the discomfort of the truth than the validity of the observation. "I said what I said. It wasn't unsavory — it was accurate."

He also flagged the irony: Busch himself has been one of the most vocal critics of equipment, teams, and situations throughout his career. The idea that an outside observer being honest about RCR's position is somehow off-limits, when the on-track results speak for themselves, struck Denny as inconsistent.

Bubba Wallace Last-Lap Incident

On the final lap, Denny and Bubba Wallace made contact. Denny's version: he was racing for position on a lap where everything was compressed and multiple cars were jockeying after Reddick and Larson went to war at the front. The contact with Wallace was not deliberate, and Denny expressed frustration that the incident got more attention in the post-race cycle than the race itself.

He acknowledged that he and Wallace race each other hard and that there's context to their history — both are 23XI-adjacent in the garage hierarchy as Denny is a co-owner and Wallace is a 23XI driver — but drew a clear line: "We don't not-race each other because of the business relationship. We race. That was racing."

Chase Briscoe / Kyle Busch — Denny's Read

The other Kansas controversy was Chase Briscoe squeezing Kyle Busch into the wall during the race. Denny's take: Briscoe finished third, which tells the story. Briscoe is racing at a level right now where he's going to be aggressive with drivers who give him the opportunity, and Busch — struggling with an RCR car that's not where it needs to be — was caught in a spot where he couldn't defend.

Josh Berry Parked

Josh Berry was parked by NASCAR following a Lap 1 crash. Denny addressed the decision: NASCAR's messaging around Lap 1 incidents has been consistent — causing a wreck before the field even establishes racing is treated differently than a mid-race incident because there's no racing context to mitigate it. Whether the call was right is debatable; that NASCAR would make the call given the current enforcement environment is not surprising.

Notable Quotes

Denny (on the final restart): "I should not have let Larson get that close to the outside of me. That's on me."

Denny (on Michael Jordan): "He grabbed me because we both know what that win means. That's just Michael."

Denny (on Reddick): "That's not a fluke. That's a driver who knows what he's doing."

Denny (on the Busch 'unsavory' comment): "I said what I said. It wasn't unsavory — it was accurate."

Denny (on Wallace contact): "We race each other. That was racing."

Reddick Wins Again! The Michael Jordan Moment and Kansas Overtime Thriller | Inside the Race

YouTube Channel: NASCAR

Date: Sunday, April 19, 2026 (Live post-race)

Race Covered: AdventHealth 400 — Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, KS

Hosts: Steve Letarte, Kyle Petty, Alex Weaver, Todd Gordon

Show Type: Live post-race analysis and breakdown

Show Overview

The Inside the Race team assembled immediately after Kansas' overtime thriller to break down Tyler Reddick's fifth win of the 2026 season — a result that extended his historic early-season pace and generated a viral post-race moment involving 23XI co-owner Michael Jordan. Letarte, Petty, Weaver, and Gordon addressed the decisive final restart sequence where Reddick passed Kyle Larson on the last lap after Larson had jumped to the lead in overtime, the Denny Hamlin restart regret, the Josh Berry parking call, and the Kyle Busch/Chase Briscoe wall incident. The episode was among the most news-dense of the season.

Letarte Analyzes the Kansas Overtime Finish — "Reddick is Becoming Famous for His Performance"

The episode's anchor segment. Letarte walked through the overtime sequence in granular detail, working with Todd Gordon on the pit strategy and timing elements that set up the final-lap pass.

The Final Restart:

Kyle Larson drew the inside lane and jumped to the lead immediately. Reddick, starting second, had to race from behind. The sequence mirrored Bristol in reverse — Kansas is a very different track, and being second on the restart is a far more recoverable position at a mile-and-a-half than at a short track.

How Reddick Made the Pass:

Letarte explained that Reddick's strength at Kansas in 2026 has been his ability to generate drive off the corner — the acceleration out of Turn 4 gave him a run on Larson going into Turn 1 on the final lap. Larson defended the bottom but the speed differential from Reddick's corner exit was too much to close. "Reddick made the pass clean, fast, and decisive. Larson didn't make a mistake — Reddick was just faster where it counted."

Letarte's Summary Quote: "Reddick is becoming famous for his performance. Five wins in nine races — this is something we haven't seen in a long time."

Todd Gordon on the Fuel Element:

Gordon noted the fuel variable that was in play in the closing stages. Several teams, including Denny Hamlin's No. 11, were managing fuel consumption in the final laps before the Cody Ware caution resolved the question. Gordon explained the decision math: in an overtime scenario, fuel management concerns effectively disappear because the additional laps are bounded. Teams that had been conservative on fuel in the final green-flag laps may have given up some pace unnecessarily.

The Michael Jordan Viral Moment

Alex Weaver, reporting from pit road, had firsthand context on the post-race scene involving 23XI co-owner Michael Jordan grabbing Denny Hamlin — his business partner and a competitor in the same race — in what became the most-shared image from the Kansas weekend.

The Context:

Jordan's competitive intensity around 23XI Racing's results is well documented. After Reddick's fifth win, Jordan's emotional reaction on pit road — grabbing Hamlin by the shoulders — went immediately viral. Weaver's read: this was competitive celebration between two co-owners, not confrontation, though the visual lent itself to multiple interpretations.

Letarte noted the unusual dynamic: Denny Hamlin was racing against his own team's car, finished fourth, and then had to process his business partner's joy over a result that simultaneously meant his championship rival (Reddick) extended his points lead. "That's a strange Thursday night Thanksgiving dinner conversation," Letarte said.

Petty added that Michael Jordan's involvement in NASCAR ownership had always been more intense and hands-on than the typical celebrity-investor profile, and that the Kansas moment was consistent with who Jordan is as a competitor.

Denny Hamlin's Restart — The Three-Wide Mistake

The episode addressed Denny Hamlin's post-race admission that he should not have let Kyle Larson force him three-wide on the overtime restart.

Letarte's take: Larson executing that move — going three-wide into Turn 1 from the outside in overtime, forcing Hamlin high — was exactly the kind of aggressive, championship-smart driving that defines Larson's career. The question is why Hamlin let it happen.

Letarte's explanation: Hamlin had retaken the lead from Reddick with four laps to go and was managing fuel when the Ware caution flew. The mental bandwidth shift from "manage fuel and hold position" to "execute an overtime restart perfectly" in a short window may have contributed to the lapse in judgment on the restart lane defense.

Petty's Response: Petty was less charitable than Letarte. In his view, Hamlin has been in that situation many times and knows Larson well enough to anticipate exactly that move. The execution on the restart wasn't right, and the result — losing a race he was leading — reflects it.

Kyle Busch / Chase Briscoe Wall Incident

Letarte and Gordon addressed Chase Briscoe squeezing Kyle Busch into the wall during the race — one of the on-track incidents that generated debate about race aggression at mile-and-a-halfs.

Letarte's Read:

Briscoe finished third. That result colors how the incident is adjudicated — when a driver makes an aggressive move and wins, the narrative bends toward "racing." Letarte noted that Briscoe has been driving with significant edge in 2026, which tracks with his strong results but will eventually put him in a situation where the move goes wrong and the narrative flips.

The Busch/RCR Context:

Busch's result at Kansas — struggling to compete with the front-runners — continued the pattern Bristol had established. The equipment gap at RCR is showing up consistently at mile-and-a-halfs, and Letarte flagged this as a concern for the championship aspirations of any RCR driver.

Josh Berry Parked — Lap 1 Incident

NASCAR's decision to park Josh Berry following a Lap 1 crash was addressed. Gordon explained the enforcement context: NASCAR has made consistent messaging that Lap 1 incidents are treated differently because they occur before any racing context exists to mitigate the contact. A driver who causes a crash before the field has run a single competitive lap faces a harsher review threshold.

Letarte's view: the call was in line with NASCAR's current enforcement philosophy, even if the specific incident looked like a racing situation rather than deliberate contact. The deterrent effect of parking a driver — even when the call is debatable — is part of the policy goal.

Denny Hamlin / Bubba Wallace Last-Lap Contact

Weaver reported on the Hamlin/Wallace contact on the final lap, which both drivers addressed in post-race media. Letarte's read: in a Kansas overtime final lap with four cars running three-wide and racing for multiple positions, contact is not surprising. Whether it rises to a level requiring NASCAR review was the question.

Petty noted the awkward dynamic — Hamlin racing against a 23XI driver, making contact with him, and then having to explain it while Jordan is celebrating with the winning car on the other end of pit road. "It was just a weird day for Denny."

Reddick's 1987 Earnhardt Comparison

The show closed with a discussion of where Reddick's five-win pace fits in historical context. Letarte made the comparison to Earnhardt's 1987 season explicitly, noting that the depth of the current competition field makes Reddick's pace arguably more impressive.

Petty — speaking as someone who raced against Earnhardt — offered the most colorful take: "I remember what it felt like to race against someone who was just better than everybody else on a given stretch. That's what Reddick has going right now. I don't know how long it lasts, but right now, that's what it is."

Notable Quotes

Letarte (on Reddick): "Reddick is becoming famous for his performance. Five wins in nine races — this is something we haven't seen in a long time."

Letarte (on Larson's restart move): "That's exactly the kind of aggressive, championship-smart driving that defines Larson's career."

Petty (on Hamlin's restart): "He knows Larson well enough to anticipate exactly that move. The execution wasn't right."

Petty (on Reddick's pace): "I remember what it felt like to race against someone who was just better than everybody else on a given stretch. That's what Reddick has going right now."

Gordon (on the fuel element): "In an overtime scenario, fuel concerns effectively disappear. Teams that were conservative before the caution may have given up pace unnecessarily."

2026 AdventHealth 400 at Kansas Speedway | Full Race Recap & Highlights | NASCAR

YouTube Channel: NASCAR

Date: Sunday, April 19, 2026

Race: AdventHealth 400 — Kansas Speedway, Kansas City, KS

Broadcast: FOX Sports

Laps: 274 (overtime, originally 267)

Track: 1.5-mile tri-oval

Season Race #: 9 of 36

Content Type: Race highlights, post-race recap, driver reactions, analysis segments

Race Summary