Manufacturer wins among the top 3 series.
Chevrolet 8 - Ford 0 - Toyota 3.
______________
Cup race #4 : Chevrolet 3 - Ford 0 - Toyota 1.
Xfinity Race #4 : Chevrolet 2 - Ford 0 - Toyota 2.
Truck Race #3 : Chevrolet 3 - Ford 0 - Toyota 0.
Ring the CBell !!! Fucking A, great car, overcame a bad pitstop and drove his balls off to get back to first car with enough fuel. Proud of the 20 team and stoked that he’s locked into the chase and can start trophy hunting now
There was enough fall off that 2 tires was better than 0, and slightly better than 4 for about 5 laps, but then 4 would overtake both other strategies. We saw guys take 2 to short term success.
After several years of being mostly an afterthought at Phoenix, I'm enjoying how this race looked for Toyota. All of JGR and 23XI finishing in the top 16 is huge.
Considering how Bell is arguably the best driver in the Toyota stable and a returning Champ 4 driver, winning at Phoenix now could be an indication of him winning the championship in November.
Toyota taking Phoenix seriously, in my mind, means they’re going for broke this year. Chip or bust.
2 of the top-5 were champ 4 last year, and Blaney runs better at Phoenix in the fall than in the spring. Chastain was right back at the front again this week, also. November is going to be interesting.
Eh, honestly I would rather they use dirt late model chassis on dirt rather than use the NextGen chassis on dirt. A purposely built dirt race car is always going to put on a better show than a chassis that's trying to be the "Jack of All Trades."
A lot to take in from that race! But one thing I learned and all drivers need to know: stay the hell away from Austin Dillion at the start of races. Flag goes green and monkey paw curls.
Can I just rant about fox for a second ?
Fox. You don't have to always show the leaders. It's ok to show the middle of the pack. That's where the interesting stuff happens. Why were you showing bell when we all knew he was going to win, and not showing truex going from 21st to 7th? That's something interesting, and you didn't show him after his pit stop that made him go a lap down.
Please show the middle of the pack for once fox. Also, if you just have to show the leader, do the side by side thing you do for your commercials, but for the race. Show bell on one side, and show whatever driver you want on another.
I guess I am just mad I couldn't see my favorite driver go from 21st to 7th. Oh well.
(Had to post it here since the mods took down the original post)
Truex timed that pit stop perfectly had other drivers suddenly needed to pit or conserve way more fuel than they needed to. Reminded me of that Richmond race a couple of years back where Hamlin and Harvick chased down Byron and Truex.
That raced sucked. Its takes a championship to make a race at Phoenix interesting. Win pit road on the last stop and win the race. Basically that happened again today with Turex having to pit after a long run on tires.
Not that the race was great, but the car who won the race had to overtake half the field after the last pitstop.
If Truex would have made it on fuel, I think he still wouldn't have had the speed to keep Bell behind him.
It did. It does.
Vegas, Phoenix, and Kansas are fun for drivers and really bad for fans. Fox has not been helping, but these tracks with this car create 2-second gaps throughout the field. Strategy is not as important, the track is not difficult for drivers, and the entire race promotes spacing out. It’s just not a good show.
With how that looked, pretty much Toyota/Ford dominance of the Top 10, outside of Ross, is Chevy in trouble when it comes to winning the title in Phoenix come November?
He was moving forward for a small bit, but nothing crazy. Was just inside the top 20 most of the day and drove it up to around 12th-ish before that slew of cautions. Listening to his radio, was dealing with a tight in the center car that was loose on entry and exit. Said he didn’t feel comfortable entering 1 for a good part of the race.
Agree with you, just hoping they are able to tweak a few things if they make it to the final 4
Race was fine. I watched every lap.
1) I’m convinced this is Tyler Reddicks year. Dude has speed. Bad luck or getting beaten by themselves. If they clean that up they’re a threat.
2) What happened to Larson? I’ve always said he has a lot of invisible weeks to be a generational talent.
3) Kyle Busch looked off before he had trouble.
4) Noah Gragson is over performing and I’m here for it.
5) I don’t hate Phoenix at all, I like it even. Being so hard to pass is a character all it’s own. But I think it’s bad for the championship race. I vote to take it back to Homestead.
Race was fine.
Stupidly hard ot pass (Reddick and Denny were top 3-5 cars all day but were stuck back in 10th-11th) but I think thats more a Pheonix thing than a Package thing
Soooo....
A single, dominant car was able to slowly but surely make passes?
Vs. The 45, 11, or 9, all unable to pass. Hell, even the 54 got stuck behind the 41 for a while, who was on older tires and nonexistent before then.
Not great.
The 12 made it all the way to 5th. Would have made it to 4th in another lap. I won't say that it was impossible to pass. Some cars were better than others. The 20 obviously was the class of the field and was slicing through the field at the drop of the green flag.
The 12, 11, and 45 gained 10 ish spots at the end of the last run.
The good cars could make it through the field. Was it hard? Duh! Should it be that hard? That's up for debate. The package could definitely be better. But it's not impossible to pass in this car.
I mean the first couple of weeks of racing was good no? Not all of them can be barn burners but I agree that the Fox booth needs to improve and the short track package needs an overhaul.
As long as Phoenix is where Nascar wants the championship race the one thing I really want done is to get rid of the huge advantage that pit box one offers! It is too much of a advantage over the rest of the field. No other track does the first box have that much of advantage.
It was about an average race. Good luck making back to the front if you got back in traffic. (See Reddick and Hamlin for reference).
Why the HELL does this track get the finale? Take it back to Homestead or put it at Las Vegas.
And my god, the 5 team decided to bring the biggest shit box in their arsenal to Phoenix. If they continue to hold the final race here, the 5 team won't win another title. They even ran like crap in 2021 despite the win. Were it not for the caution, he would have finished 4th worst.
Yeah man, nothing soft about it. There might be some drivers I’m not a fan of but if anyone gets in a wreck, I’m always looking for that window net to come down. You wreck at racing speeds, it’s quick and the hits are hard.
🤷🏼♂️might be an unpopular opinion but that race wasn’t too bad; yea Bell ran away with it and finish was kinda boring but there did at least appear to be some passing happening on track this race. Felt like there was more passing in this race than INDYCAR or F1 this weekend
I would have liked to see a caution at the end. But good for bell earned the win good car thought it may have been Reddicks day just seemed like as the day went on they kept losing the long run speed
Car sucked in bad traffic on restarts. A bunch of stupid cautions in the beginning of stage 3 led to them pitting because they were inside the window. They took 4. Restarted 17th and the rest is history. Just stuck on the slot car line. Seemed like the chevys couldn’t do anything but maintain. Only a few Toyotas could move through the field. A couple fords were decent too. Best move woulda been for Alan to throw on 2 rights maybe restart 10th or something. But shoulda coulda woulda. On to Bristol.
Race was fine. Not good, not bad, it was just fine. And not a damn thing wrong with that in the end. They can’t all be constant action, racing does that sometimes.
I think there’s been a shift towards Blaney over Logano (ala Keselowski to Logano) in the Penske shop over the past year or two. Just seems to me Ryan has been getting the better stuff for a while now.
You're spot on. People who aren't Blaney fans like us definitely never noticed, but Once he won the Championship, Joey and other drivers were talking about how fast Ryan is everywhere. Raw speed can only take a driver so far, which is why Ryan was a 1 win a season guy for a while.
I am 100% certain that Ryan is the most emotional driver on track. Which, when managed correctly is a tremendous asset. He's been able to focus and finish strong. Finesse = Success.
Blaney has literally been the fastest Ford in the garage for at least 3 years now. Probably longer than that (I started watching in 2020 so I'm not a good person to speak on the matter).
Joey definitely has a veteran's experience, but I wouldn't say he is a better driver than Ryan.
I can understand what you are saying but I think I believe in the saying “you are only as good as the equipment you get” I guess the only way we can find out who has more raw talent between the two would be to have them race in identically prepared equipment. I think their equipment isn’t the same quality anymore. I might be wrong but we’ll never know.
At first when Todd Gordon and joey were split, I had mixed feelings about it. I thought these guys were just 1 year removed from their championship and finished 5th in 2019 why are these guys changing a working pair? Then when I saw Paul Wolfe and Logano getting good results I thought it was for the best, but despite their success, I could help but notice how well Todd Gordon and Blaney were since the change.
I think this consistency and speed came with Gordon’s move to the 12 team. And they’ve been a better team overall ever since.
This sometimes leads me to believe and question “just how close are these teams? even though they are from the same organization do they share every thing with each other?” How transparent are the individual teams within the organisation?”
I believe there was something that Todd Gordon brought to the 12 team that they don’t share with the other two teams let alone the 21 WBR.
That's fair. Although I think they have nearly identical equipment. To me it's more about the setup and which crew chief can get the setup to be exactly what the driver needs to make the car go.
I also just think Ryan is more comfortable with the "new" car than Joey honestly. It may suit his driving style better.
We'll never know really, but it's an interesting discussion for sure!
Blaney seems to have a consistency that Logano doesn't, even before this shift. Logano seems to be very hot and cold, whereas Blaney is showing up every single week and racing his ass off to get to the front. He may not always get to P1, but he consistently runs up front for much longer than the 22.
Even in 22’ (unless I’m just misremembering) I believe Ryan ran consistently better all year it was just that Joey was able to capitalize at the end of the year to win it all. It is kind of interesting since I believe Joey is one of the best of the generation but I feel like he might have hit his ceiling at Penske.
For sure. I didn’t the the race was bad at all. But you start thinking about the championship being here and how there really hasn’t been a great Phoenix race.. then it gets frustrating.
One race / year would be way more palatable in my opinion, but they seem to always be selling out and it’s a warm weather market so I don’t see nascar taking a race away anytime soon. Hopefully they move the fall race out of the championship slot though.
Still a crime that Homestead isn’t the finale. I know people think the finale should rotate but I think Homestead is just too perfect of a setting not to have it there
If it makes y'all feel a little better I only just made it back to my car in the parking lot and I'm really sunburned and I'm pretty sure I'm gonna have to sit here for another hour because no one is moving
Kinda dumb to have the c4 race stay in the same location for so long. We are going to have manufacturers focus a huge part of their design on one track with years of data to do so.
Go backwards all race long
Have a chance to pit and get off schedule with the leaders and just follow the trend and finish in the back. But on the other hand Chase doesn’t really drive like he wants it anymore either
I think that’s a symptom of Alan and how he’s stuck in 2022, his playbook for the new car is exposed and he can’t make the mid race adjustments he was known for with the gen-6. He can’t control his pit crew. I’m an Eagles fan and the whole team gave up because of their defensive coordinator was an arrogant prick, they replace him mid-season with another useless dickhead. He’s going through the motions because he knows he’ll lose 5 spots every pit stop and the car will lose speed in the third stage.
I must be crazy reading these comments, I thought it was a good race. Had some organic cautions that created different strategies. It was fun watching Bell and Truex go through the field on different strategies too.
Unless you were there I don’t think any of us actually saw Truex come from a lap down to 7th in 40 laps. From the tv coverage he could’ve been in the garage…even when he passed Hamlin
This. Obviously MTJ wasn’t going to win when their strategy didn’t work out. They said on the radio that they were banking on another caution in order for it to work, obviously the yellow never came. But I did notice him sliding up the leaderboard or whatever on the left side of the screen. Didn’t get any attention from the crew till the end, but I’m really happy the 19 was able to salvage the day and get some points. Still ended up better than Denny I think lol
How did you get to watch Tried move through the pack other than the leaderboard. I rewatched the last 30 laps and he was never significantly shown. A decent to mid race, with absolute dog shit production
I also enjoyed the race! It was a good race for Phoenix. We've had worse races here. The 20 ran through the field. I enjoyed it. I think some biases are showing.
So I get that CBell won the race in dominant fashion and the 11 and 45 were cutting it up in the front, isn't the top 10 dominated by Fords. Where is the Ford hype?
The fords mainly finished where they did due to strategy. Blaney and Gragson were fast enough to run top 10 but the rest of them ran outside the top 10 all day.
HMS and Chevy in general have one bad race and everyone acts likes it’s over. Did you all forget Chevy won the first three races this year? Or how bad ford was last year only for them to turn it around. We need to chill a little, no need to hit the panic button yet.
I don’t think the worry is that Chevy or HMS has lost it, but I think Toyota hit it on their new body design. I’m super interested to follow HMS/track house vs JGR/23xi this year
The fact that Preece was a 20th place car all day, stayed out , and legit could have won if it wasn’t for being a little short on fuel …. This track/car is an awful combination
I was going to vote no on the poll but now that i saw all the Hendrick tears in the race thread...
https://preview.redd.it/ohm84kj8dlnc1.png?width=914&format=png&auto=webp&s=cca34599b4f35c49cc8bf1ed569034b1f10fdc66
Don't insert your bias for teams into the good race poll. It was a bad race. A terrible, no good, awful race.
There was nothing redeemable here. Well, unless it happened in stage 1 because I decided to take a nap through the start of the race knowing the track we were at.
Haha I sat here and thought " If the racing was like that every weekend I wouldnt be so excited to see Hendrick down in the running...." So i will vote NO because the race WAS not good. In the tier of no good... id say cum stain... we got some action in.. but now I gatta clean it up and hide it from the kids
This has to be the most uninteresting track they could choose for the championship race... Good Lord I can't wait til they move it literally anywhere else.
You know what? 16th after a poor qualifying effort and getting doored into Erik is fine. I hate it for my friends who like Jones. Still the best driver on restarts. Like 17th or whatever to 5th in two rapid fire restarts is nuts.
I’m trying to see if it was caught on camera, my son (also a KBusch fan) got the flag (his best friend is a Bell fan), and got it! Then the lady just snatched it from him. I wasn’t at the race today (baby duty) but I’m feeling some kind of mama bear about it
Had to leave to go drop my kiddo off at my parents for a few days so we can head to the hospital to have baby girl #2 tomorrow. Doesn't sound like I missed much.
Yeah, it’s a fun track to watch if you just think of the difficulty level of passing. You have to set a guy up for multiple laps. Always been that way and guys like Harvick and Gordon were outstanding at it. I look more at the difficulty level of the track than the passing. Idk, I’m probably doing it wrong, but I enjoyed the race and strategies.
Eh didn't think this one was that bad, definitely not texas or one of those Martinsville races but would absolutely welcome a move for the championship to somewhere else
Shew glad my wife came and woke me up after that one. All we needed was Grant Hill on the play by play and some blades of grass or sherwin Williams drying in turn 3. Brutal.
Boring
Toyota SUCKS ASS!!!!!!
Is there ever a close finish at Phoenix?
2016 was the only time and like Kentucky that was manufactured by a GWC.
Manufacturer wins among the top 3 series. Chevrolet 8 - Ford 0 - Toyota 3. ______________ Cup race #4 : Chevrolet 3 - Ford 0 - Toyota 1. Xfinity Race #4 : Chevrolet 2 - Ford 0 - Toyota 2. Truck Race #3 : Chevrolet 3 - Ford 0 - Toyota 0.
It was a fun race, better than vegas for sure.
I guess Phoenix has been getting better and not a complete snooze fest anymore, but I still hate how the title is fought here.
Ring the CBell !!! Fucking A, great car, overcame a bad pitstop and drove his balls off to get back to first car with enough fuel. Proud of the 20 team and stoked that he’s locked into the chase and can start trophy hunting now
3 top 5's in 4 races for Blaney so far is a fun start to the season!
And speed in all 4 races. Loving the start.
More tire fall off needed.
There was enough fall off that 2 tires was better than 0, and slightly better than 4 for about 5 laps, but then 4 would overtake both other strategies. We saw guys take 2 to short term success.
After several years of being mostly an afterthought at Phoenix, I'm enjoying how this race looked for Toyota. All of JGR and 23XI finishing in the top 16 is huge.
Considering how Bell is arguably the best driver in the Toyota stable and a returning Champ 4 driver, winning at Phoenix now could be an indication of him winning the championship in November. Toyota taking Phoenix seriously, in my mind, means they’re going for broke this year. Chip or bust.
2 of the top-5 were champ 4 last year, and Blaney runs better at Phoenix in the fall than in the spring. Chastain was right back at the front again this week, also. November is going to be interesting.
Hendrick Motorsports had an off week. Daytona: victory Atlanta: failure Las Vegas: victory Phoenix: failure
Bristol: victory?
Will next week at Bristol give a better indication of how the short track package has improved or not?
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R.I.P. y’all are gonna regret b*tching about dirt so hard next week.
Eh, honestly I would rather they use dirt late model chassis on dirt rather than use the NextGen chassis on dirt. A purposely built dirt race car is always going to put on a better show than a chassis that's trying to be the "Jack of All Trades."
A lot to take in from that race! But one thing I learned and all drivers need to know: stay the hell away from Austin Dillion at the start of races. Flag goes green and monkey paw curls.
Man had to have sold his soul for the Daytona win in 2022 because it’s been downhill ever since.
Can I just rant about fox for a second ? Fox. You don't have to always show the leaders. It's ok to show the middle of the pack. That's where the interesting stuff happens. Why were you showing bell when we all knew he was going to win, and not showing truex going from 21st to 7th? That's something interesting, and you didn't show him after his pit stop that made him go a lap down. Please show the middle of the pack for once fox. Also, if you just have to show the leader, do the side by side thing you do for your commercials, but for the race. Show bell on one side, and show whatever driver you want on another. I guess I am just mad I couldn't see my favorite driver go from 21st to 7th. Oh well. (Had to post it here since the mods took down the original post)
He finished 7th??? After pitting and going a lap down?? With NO CAUTIONS????
Truex timed that pit stop perfectly had other drivers suddenly needed to pit or conserve way more fuel than they needed to. Reminded me of that Richmond race a couple of years back where Hamlin and Harvick chased down Byron and Truex.
That raced sucked. Its takes a championship to make a race at Phoenix interesting. Win pit road on the last stop and win the race. Basically that happened again today with Turex having to pit after a long run on tires.
Not that the race was great, but the car who won the race had to overtake half the field after the last pitstop. If Truex would have made it on fuel, I think he still wouldn't have had the speed to keep Bell behind him.
It did. It does. Vegas, Phoenix, and Kansas are fun for drivers and really bad for fans. Fox has not been helping, but these tracks with this car create 2-second gaps throughout the field. Strategy is not as important, the track is not difficult for drivers, and the entire race promotes spacing out. It’s just not a good show.
That was awful
This track is just so damn boring. We desperately need a new Championship track
Hoping NASCAR takes notice and moves the finale else where, or make it a rotation.
Rotation 100%
Definitely needs to be a rotation. Happy for Bell though
What the hell is up with RCR cars and short tracks? They were terrible last year and seem even worse somehow this year.
I've already come to the realization it's not getting fixed.
One of the races of all time
It was a race, nothing special about it.
But also nothing terrible
With how that looked, pretty much Toyota/Ford dominance of the Top 10, outside of Ross, is Chevy in trouble when it comes to winning the title in Phoenix come November?
And Ross wasn’t moving forward, just got up there due to pit strategy. Definitely something to file away for November.
He was moving forward for a small bit, but nothing crazy. Was just inside the top 20 most of the day and drove it up to around 12th-ish before that slew of cautions. Listening to his radio, was dealing with a tight in the center car that was loose on entry and exit. Said he didn’t feel comfortable entering 1 for a good part of the race. Agree with you, just hoping they are able to tweak a few things if they make it to the final 4
Thought the racing was good for what is supposed to be the worst most boring race on the schedule.
My driver didn’t have the best of days but I still enjoyed getting to watch a nascar race.
That’s nice dear. :)
Where you there in person? I went to my first ever race in person last week and it exceeded all my expectations!!
Race was fine. I watched every lap. 1) I’m convinced this is Tyler Reddicks year. Dude has speed. Bad luck or getting beaten by themselves. If they clean that up they’re a threat. 2) What happened to Larson? I’ve always said he has a lot of invisible weeks to be a generational talent. 3) Kyle Busch looked off before he had trouble. 4) Noah Gragson is over performing and I’m here for it. 5) I don’t hate Phoenix at all, I like it even. Being so hard to pass is a character all it’s own. But I think it’s bad for the championship race. I vote to take it back to Homestead.
I vote to stop having a championship race
Race was fine. Stupidly hard ot pass (Reddick and Denny were top 3-5 cars all day but were stuck back in 10th-11th) but I think thats more a Pheonix thing than a Package thing
20 car made passes
Soooo.... A single, dominant car was able to slowly but surely make passes? Vs. The 45, 11, or 9, all unable to pass. Hell, even the 54 got stuck behind the 41 for a while, who was on older tires and nonexistent before then. Not great.
The 9 was incredibly slow all day. Denny ran up from the tail end to almost a top 10 finish. Blaney moved all the way to 5th. Passing was fine
The 12 made it all the way to 5th. Would have made it to 4th in another lap. I won't say that it was impossible to pass. Some cars were better than others. The 20 obviously was the class of the field and was slicing through the field at the drop of the green flag. The 12, 11, and 45 gained 10 ish spots at the end of the last run. The good cars could make it through the field. Was it hard? Duh! Should it be that hard? That's up for debate. The package could definitely be better. But it's not impossible to pass in this car.
Congrats 20. Good job.
Had some pretty good wide shots during the restarts
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I mean the first couple of weeks of racing was good no? Not all of them can be barn burners but I agree that the Fox booth needs to improve and the short track package needs an overhaul.
As long as Phoenix is where Nascar wants the championship race the one thing I really want done is to get rid of the huge advantage that pit box one offers! It is too much of a advantage over the rest of the field. No other track does the first box have that much of advantage.
Qualify better 🤷
William Byron had it this past championship race.
Thankfully he didn’t succeed with it
It was about an average race. Good luck making back to the front if you got back in traffic. (See Reddick and Hamlin for reference). Why the HELL does this track get the finale? Take it back to Homestead or put it at Las Vegas. And my god, the 5 team decided to bring the biggest shit box in their arsenal to Phoenix. If they continue to hold the final race here, the 5 team won't win another title. They even ran like crap in 2021 despite the win. Were it not for the caution, he would have finished 4th worst.
Just watched Logano's in-car of the crash. Holy crap, you can't appreciate just how violent those minor looking crashes are.
It was hard to watch and I'm not a fan of his.
Yeah man, nothing soft about it. There might be some drivers I’m not a fan of but if anyone gets in a wreck, I’m always looking for that window net to come down. You wreck at racing speeds, it’s quick and the hits are hard.
You would’ve hated watching pre soft wall lol.
I liked it. Setup mattered, strategy mattered and cars looked unstable on worn tires. 7/10.
That's what I'm saying. These people want a perfect race every week.
🤷🏼♂️might be an unpopular opinion but that race wasn’t too bad; yea Bell ran away with it and finish was kinda boring but there did at least appear to be some passing happening on track this race. Felt like there was more passing in this race than INDYCAR or F1 this weekend
I would have liked to see a caution at the end. But good for bell earned the win good car thought it may have been Reddicks day just seemed like as the day went on they kept losing the long run speed
I missed the 3rd stage how did chase drop bad strategy or just sucked?
Car sucked in bad traffic on restarts. A bunch of stupid cautions in the beginning of stage 3 led to them pitting because they were inside the window. They took 4. Restarted 17th and the rest is history. Just stuck on the slot car line. Seemed like the chevys couldn’t do anything but maintain. Only a few Toyotas could move through the field. A couple fords were decent too. Best move woulda been for Alan to throw on 2 rights maybe restart 10th or something. But shoulda coulda woulda. On to Bristol.
Everyone flipped a coin the chevys got a bad caution.
Yes.
Seemed to be both
Racing today was fun, far from boring. Nothing particularly special but it was nice.👍
Way better than the Indycar opener & F1 this weekend! (Though the Bearman story was fun.)
Race was fine. Not good, not bad, it was just fine. And not a damn thing wrong with that in the end. They can’t all be constant action, racing does that sometimes.
remindme! Before logano has a a falling out like brad and joins another team at Honda
I think there’s been a shift towards Blaney over Logano (ala Keselowski to Logano) in the Penske shop over the past year or two. Just seems to me Ryan has been getting the better stuff for a while now.
Hot take but I think Blaney has more raw talent than Joey. Joey gets his wins but you usually don't see him having the speed that Blaney has.
You're spot on. People who aren't Blaney fans like us definitely never noticed, but Once he won the Championship, Joey and other drivers were talking about how fast Ryan is everywhere. Raw speed can only take a driver so far, which is why Ryan was a 1 win a season guy for a while. I am 100% certain that Ryan is the most emotional driver on track. Which, when managed correctly is a tremendous asset. He's been able to focus and finish strong. Finesse = Success. Blaney has literally been the fastest Ford in the garage for at least 3 years now. Probably longer than that (I started watching in 2020 so I'm not a good person to speak on the matter). Joey definitely has a veteran's experience, but I wouldn't say he is a better driver than Ryan.
I can understand what you are saying but I think I believe in the saying “you are only as good as the equipment you get” I guess the only way we can find out who has more raw talent between the two would be to have them race in identically prepared equipment. I think their equipment isn’t the same quality anymore. I might be wrong but we’ll never know. At first when Todd Gordon and joey were split, I had mixed feelings about it. I thought these guys were just 1 year removed from their championship and finished 5th in 2019 why are these guys changing a working pair? Then when I saw Paul Wolfe and Logano getting good results I thought it was for the best, but despite their success, I could help but notice how well Todd Gordon and Blaney were since the change. I think this consistency and speed came with Gordon’s move to the 12 team. And they’ve been a better team overall ever since. This sometimes leads me to believe and question “just how close are these teams? even though they are from the same organization do they share every thing with each other?” How transparent are the individual teams within the organisation?” I believe there was something that Todd Gordon brought to the 12 team that they don’t share with the other two teams let alone the 21 WBR.
That's fair. Although I think they have nearly identical equipment. To me it's more about the setup and which crew chief can get the setup to be exactly what the driver needs to make the car go. I also just think Ryan is more comfortable with the "new" car than Joey honestly. It may suit his driving style better. We'll never know really, but it's an interesting discussion for sure!
I agree that it could be the new car. Btw u might wanna read my previous comment again I edited it to add some stuff
Blaney seems to have a consistency that Logano doesn't, even before this shift. Logano seems to be very hot and cold, whereas Blaney is showing up every single week and racing his ass off to get to the front. He may not always get to P1, but he consistently runs up front for much longer than the 22.
Totally agree. Ryan isn’t gonna rattle off wins like Logano but he might be the new model of consistency in Cup
Yeah 100% agree
Even in 22’ (unless I’m just misremembering) I believe Ryan ran consistently better all year it was just that Joey was able to capitalize at the end of the year to win it all. It is kind of interesting since I believe Joey is one of the best of the generation but I feel like he might have hit his ceiling at Penske.
Dumb homer comment
It’s a joke keyboard warrior
OMG HAHAHAHAHA!
Just my personal opinion but I’d hate Phoenix a lot less if it wasn’t the finale and had 1 race. Doesn’t deserve 2.
For sure. I didn’t the the race was bad at all. But you start thinking about the championship being here and how there really hasn’t been a great Phoenix race.. then it gets frustrating. One race / year would be way more palatable in my opinion, but they seem to always be selling out and it’s a warm weather market so I don’t see nascar taking a race away anytime soon. Hopefully they move the fall race out of the championship slot though.
Definitely. I mean, I get why, but still, it's absolutely not a championship type track.
Still a crime that Homestead isn’t the finale. I know people think the finale should rotate but I think Homestead is just too perfect of a setting not to have it there
If it makes y'all feel a little better I only just made it back to my car in the parking lot and I'm really sunburned and I'm pretty sure I'm gonna have to sit here for another hour because no one is moving
That's when the post-race clarity hits. It's not a bad feeling lol.
Yeah, Phoenix is boring. Chase needs a new CC.
Okay so I’m still convinced this race would have been better if we gave the drivers little fez’s to wear and Mini Shriner cars to race.
Yes!
That would've been entertaining
Kinda dumb to have the c4 race stay in the same location for so long. We are going to have manufacturers focus a huge part of their design on one track with years of data to do so.
How awful is Alan Gustafson?????????
He belongs in the truck series
He is the 3rd worst HMS crew chief
More like 3rd worst charter team crew chief
As a fan of all the HMS cars, but bowman as my main driver …. I would take 4 and fuel Alan over car terrorist Blake Harris lol
Yes.
I think this will be the last season with him as Chase's CC.
How about a mid-season change?
Go backwards all race long Have a chance to pit and get off schedule with the leaders and just follow the trend and finish in the back. But on the other hand Chase doesn’t really drive like he wants it anymore either
I think that’s a symptom of Alan and how he’s stuck in 2022, his playbook for the new car is exposed and he can’t make the mid race adjustments he was known for with the gen-6. He can’t control his pit crew. I’m an Eagles fan and the whole team gave up because of their defensive coordinator was an arrogant prick, they replace him mid-season with another useless dickhead. He’s going through the motions because he knows he’ll lose 5 spots every pit stop and the car will lose speed in the third stage.
I don’t see Hendrick hesitating to switch mid season at this rate tbh
Swap with Bowman's CC? Can't be any worse.
This. Blake Harris is so bad…
If Noah ends up having a few strong runs, he’ll end up being the flagship car with a win.
Hot take but Noah makes the 10 a flagship
I must be crazy reading these comments, I thought it was a good race. Had some organic cautions that created different strategies. It was fun watching Bell and Truex go through the field on different strategies too.
Unless you were there I don’t think any of us actually saw Truex come from a lap down to 7th in 40 laps. From the tv coverage he could’ve been in the garage…even when he passed Hamlin
This. Obviously MTJ wasn’t going to win when their strategy didn’t work out. They said on the radio that they were banking on another caution in order for it to work, obviously the yellow never came. But I did notice him sliding up the leaderboard or whatever on the left side of the screen. Didn’t get any attention from the crew till the end, but I’m really happy the 19 was able to salvage the day and get some points. Still ended up better than Denny I think lol
How did you get to watch Tried move through the pack other than the leaderboard. I rewatched the last 30 laps and he was never significantly shown. A decent to mid race, with absolute dog shit production
I also enjoyed the race! It was a good race for Phoenix. We've had worse races here. The 20 ran through the field. I enjoyed it. I think some biases are showing.
So I get that CBell won the race in dominant fashion and the 11 and 45 were cutting it up in the front, isn't the top 10 dominated by Fords. Where is the Ford hype?
NASCAR announcers are required to suck off Toyota throughout every race, as far as I can tell. I guess it must be in their contract.
The fords mainly finished where they did due to strategy. Blaney and Gragson were fast enough to run top 10 but the rest of them ran outside the top 10 all day.
That's fair. I think Kez was running between 9 and 15th all day as well, but strategy definitely played a big role.
That was a normal 6.5/10 Phoenix race. Atleast Bell could pass to get to the big lead he had.
One race weekend, let Michael Waltrip and Martin Brundle trade places. Waltrip on the F1 grid walk and Brundle on Nascar.
I managed to get a college assignment done during this race. I, for one, am grateful it was boring af lol.
Good job Todd. Started 29th, finished 17th.
Need more stages, at least 8 at Phoenix, that would fix the short track package.
This is honestly the best idea I have heard yet. It’s all about the restarts, baby! Sex sells
I had 3 naps during that race to catch up on daylight savings lol
HMS and Chevy in general have one bad race and everyone acts likes it’s over. Did you all forget Chevy won the first three races this year? Or how bad ford was last year only for them to turn it around. We need to chill a little, no need to hit the panic button yet.
I don’t think the worry is that Chevy or HMS has lost it, but I think Toyota hit it on their new body design. I’m super interested to follow HMS/track house vs JGR/23xi this year
The fact that Preece was a 20th place car all day, stayed out , and legit could have won if it wasn’t for being a little short on fuel …. This track/car is an awful combination
Did we watch the same race?
Zero shot at winning
He had fallen out of the top ten before he pitted.
I know NASCAR loves the Phoenix area for the finale but this track sucks so much ass. Homestead was a perfect place for the last race
Next repave will add banking to Phoenix. A Rockingham of sorts. I’d almost willingly bet the house on it.
No. Phoenix doesn’t need more messing with.
Needs grass on the dog leg again
Won't fix the problem. Dover is somewhat similar to that and not very exciting, better, but not amazing.
Dover is kinda its own monster, no pun intended lol. It’s really hard to run the high line without getting tight off the corner.
I was going to vote no on the poll but now that i saw all the Hendrick tears in the race thread... https://preview.redd.it/ohm84kj8dlnc1.png?width=914&format=png&auto=webp&s=cca34599b4f35c49cc8bf1ed569034b1f10fdc66
I’m mostly Hendrick fan but that race wasn’t good even before all the Hendrick drivers got shuffled back.
Don't insert your bias for teams into the good race poll. It was a bad race. A terrible, no good, awful race. There was nothing redeemable here. Well, unless it happened in stage 1 because I decided to take a nap through the start of the race knowing the track we were at.
The best car won, so there’s that at least.
Haha I sat here and thought " If the racing was like that every weekend I wouldnt be so excited to see Hendrick down in the running...." So i will vote NO because the race WAS not good. In the tier of no good... id say cum stain... we got some action in.. but now I gatta clean it up and hide it from the kids
This has to be the most uninteresting track they could choose for the championship race... Good Lord I can't wait til they move it literally anywhere else.
Texas championship confirmed /s
If the rumors of it turning into Dover Plus are true, I guess it would be better than what we got
At this point I'd be a little more excited for that one lol
Bell has a pretty hilarious list of career wins: Phoenix, Homestead, Martinsville, New Hampshire, the Roval, Bristol Dirt, and the Daytona Road Course
Most of those are the "but we have ________ at home" choices
It's like he bought 'em at the thrift store.
You know what? 16th after a poor qualifying effort and getting doored into Erik is fine. I hate it for my friends who like Jones. Still the best driver on restarts. Like 17th or whatever to 5th in two rapid fire restarts is nuts.
We had a great chance at another top 5 up until then. Just bad luck, two weeks in a row
Just one year I’d like Bootie and Dave to get the crew in shape so Bubba doesn’t have to bust his ass to squeak into the playoffs
He’s gotta win more. He gets the opportunity often, just needs to find himself in those positions more so he can capitalize. It’s a numbers game
Did anyone else see that lady yank the checkered flag from that little boy?
No. What a bitch, if true.
I’m trying to see if it was caught on camera, my son (also a KBusch fan) got the flag (his best friend is a Bell fan), and got it! Then the lady just snatched it from him. I wasn’t at the race today (baby duty) but I’m feeling some kind of mama bear about it
Had to leave to go drop my kiddo off at my parents for a few days so we can head to the hospital to have baby girl #2 tomorrow. Doesn't sound like I missed much.
Good luck and congrats! Watch an old race while you’re waiting if you have to.
I've got the 2001 Pepsi 400 and the 2022 spring Martinsville race bookmarked. Ones for entertainment, the others to help me go to sleep.
Good luck! Name her Rosey !
Close. She's Ruth, and we've been calling her Ruthie already.
Good luck tomorrow.
I don’t even think this is a package issue. Has Phoenix EVER been truly good? Gen 4, 5, 6, 7? Tolerable at absolute best imo.
Gen 5 wasn’t bad, but I’m just remembering all the fights that broke out there lol.
It was pretty solid during the early 2010s. The bowyer and Gordon fight and the Harvick/Edwards photo finish were pretty good races.
Phoenix has always been atrocious, and the year they finally change the championship destination will be a blessing
Yeah, it’s a fun track to watch if you just think of the difficulty level of passing. You have to set a guy up for multiple laps. Always been that way and guys like Harvick and Gordon were outstanding at it. I look more at the difficulty level of the track than the passing. Idk, I’m probably doing it wrong, but I enjoyed the race and strategies.
Rarley a great race here
This exactly. It’s never been just bang up good racing. Even the flat old layout was garbage racing wise.
I agree with what Kez said, this track is not the best judge on this package
And no one realizes they won’t use this package again until Richmond.
They are using it at COTA
Ah forgot about that but still wouldn’t judge it off of a RC. That’s a cost saving thing and a whole other monster.
Eh didn't think this one was that bad, definitely not texas or one of those Martinsville races but would absolutely welcome a move for the championship to somewhere else
Zzzzz….oh it’s over? Seriously a mucho boring race.
Disagree
Fair, not going to argue it. There were some good points, I just didnt find it personally all that interesting
Absolute snoozefest. Phoenix is possibly worse than Texas at this point.
always has been worse
You just have no attention span.
At least the restarts are somewhat better
Shew glad my wife came and woke me up after that one. All we needed was Grant Hill on the play by play and some blades of grass or sherwin Williams drying in turn 3. Brutal.
I didn't think it was as bad as people thought it was gonna be