{"id":97849,"date":"2024-09-20T12:01:50","date_gmt":"2024-09-20T19:01:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=97849"},"modified":"2024-09-20T12:05:25","modified_gmt":"2024-09-20T19:05:25","slug":"nascar-cup-watkins-glen-recap-and-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/nascar-cup-watkins-glen-recap-and-news\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR Cup Watkins Glen Recap and News"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-attachment-id=\"97857\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/nascar-cup-watkins-glen-recap-and-news\/buescherwins1\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"1000,666\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"buescherwins1\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-medium-file=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1-300x200.jpg\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1.jpg\" class=\"aligncenter wp-image-97857\" src=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1.jpg\" alt=\"NASCAR Cup News - Week of 9\/20\" width=\"620\" height=\"413\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1-768x511.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 620px) 100vw, 620px\" \/><\/h2>\n<h2><strong>Road course aces flew high, while playoff drivers faced adversity at every turn.<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Say what you want to about the NASCAR Cup Series playoff format &#8211; at various times I\u2019ve called it \u201ccontrived,\u201d \u201cconfusing,\u201d and \u201ccheesy.\u201d In the case of last Sunday\u2019s excellent race at Watkins Glen, however, it can\u2019t be denied that this race produced season-high levels of excitement, and may very well rival the 2023 COTA race as the best road course race of the Next gen era (so far).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">From the first lap, it was clear that this race would have serious playoff implications. <strong>Denny Hamlin<\/strong>\u2019s championship run looked promising until last month, when a bizarre inspection violation stemming from a Bristol race win in the spring cost him the bulk of his carefully stockpiled playoff points. His \u201cplay if safe\u201d strategy didn\u2019t pay off at Atlanta, but given that he qualified on the pole at the Glen last year and finished second, things were looking up heading into the weekend.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Unfortunately, a first-lap wreck involved playoff cars that hadn\u2019t qualified well, including Denny Hamlin and <strong>Ryan Blaney<\/strong>. Hamlin, once a contender for the regular season championship, finds himself having to fight to advance to the Round of 12 by repeating his springtime performance at Bristol on Saturday.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"NASCAR official Extended Highlights from Watkins Glen: 2024 Go Bowling at The Glen\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_kAXbA6622U?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The trouble wouldn\u2019t stop there, however. <strong>Martin Truex, Jr.<\/strong> would win Stage 1, while teammates <strong>Ross Chastain<\/strong> and <strong>Shane van Gisbergen<\/strong> would dominate the remainder of the race. Their teammate, playoff driver <strong>Daniel Suarez<\/strong>, would spin on lap 38 and get stuck in a gravel trap, losing precious track position. Chastain would go on to win Stage 2, but would soon find himself challenged by <strong>Chris Buescher<\/strong>. Buescher had a great season, but found himself narrowly missing several wins &#8211; and the playoffs &#8211; in increasingly frustrating fashion.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Stage 3 would become the Buescher and van Gisbergen show, with these two excellent road course aces &#8211; and non-playoff drivers &#8211;\u00a0 battling it out. That didn\u2019t mean the end of trouble for playoff drivers, however. <strong>Harrison Burton<\/strong> would experience trouble, and <strong>William Byron<\/strong> and <strong>Brad Keselowski<\/strong> would collide in dramatic fashion, with Keselowski staring at Byron\u2019s right front tire through his window net. Regular season champion <strong>Tyler Reddick<\/strong> would subsequently wreck with <strong>Kyle Busch<\/strong>, forcing overtime.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you thought it couldn\u2019t get more dramatic, you\u2019d be wrong. Buescher and van Gisbergen separated themselves from the field on the final restart, and it was a battle for the ages. Like many Roush Racing drivers before, Buescher isn\u2019t one for aggressive driving. A perpetually soft-spoken \u201cnice guy\u201d from the mold of <strong>Mark Martin<\/strong> and <strong>Matt Kenseth<\/strong>, Buescher finally had enough, taking advantage of a rare SVG slip-up to move the Chevrolet aside and, finally, make his way to victory lane. After the race, it was clear there were no hard feelings between these two intense &#8211; but ultimately respectful &#8211; competitors.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Round of 16 finishes up this weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway for the legendary Bass Pro Shops Night Race on Saturday. Will everyone be calmed down from Watkins Glen, or will we see even more fender-banging aggression? Of course we will &#8211; it\u2019s Bristol, baby!<\/span><\/p>\n<p>The drama has already started, with Spire Motorsports and Rick Ware racing taking the unusual step of swapping drivers ahead of the completion of the season in preparation for next year.\u00a0<strong>Justin Haley<\/strong> will move to Spire, while longtime Spire driver\u00a0<strong>Corey LaJoie<\/strong> will move to Rick Ware Racing for the remainder of the season. This is a very surprising turn of events &#8211; with the complexities of manufacturer relationships, sponsor obligations, and team politics seemingly pushed aside in one fell swoop. It&#8217;s my guess that this move has been planned for a long time now behind the scenes, with many moving parts sorted out well in advance of the announcement. We&#8217;ll see if this change results in an improvement for one or both teams, and we won&#8217;t have to wait long to find out.<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo: Watkins Glen International<\/em><\/p>\n<p><br style=\"font-weight: 400;\" \/><br style=\"font-weight: 400;\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Road course aces flew high, while playoff drivers faced adversity at every turn.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":104,"featured_media":97857,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3424,3470,5029,1],"tags":[10569,10821,127,10820],"class_list":["post-97849","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nascar","category-news","category-racing","category-uncategorized","tag-2024-nascar-cup-series","tag-lajoie","tag-nascar","tag-spire"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/buescherwins1.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-psd","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97849","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/104"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97849"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97849\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":97861,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97849\/revisions\/97861"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97857"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97849"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97849"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97849"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}