Austin Dillon wins one of the wackiest Xfinity finishes you’ll see
The Joe Gibbs Racing cars of Kyle Busch, Erik Jones and Daniel Suarez were cruising to a third-straight 1-2-3 finish during Saturday’s Xfinity Series race at Auto Club Speedway.
Then it got insane and none of them won. Instead, Austin Dillon crossed the finish line first.
• Jones ran out of fuel with less than three laps to go. That handed second place to Suarez, who was about eight seconds behind Busch, the race leader, when Jones ran out.
• After Jones’ fuel tank became empty, Busch backed his pace up significantly to prevent the same fate. Suarez closed to within three seconds when the two took the white flag.
• As Busch went into turn 1 on the final lap his left-front tire exploded. He continued to drive as fast as he could, knowing that Suarez was closing. NASCAR did not throw a caution.
• Suarez was in position to take the lead and the win after passing Busch off turn 2. He then ran out of gas down the backstretch. Dillon, who was a distant fourth and also saving gas himself, suddenly was the fastest car on track with a chance to win the race.
• Dillon passed Busch off turn 4 on the final lap. Busch’s car (purposely?) moved up the track off 4 and the two made slight contact. Dillon kept control of his car and won the race.
That’s a lot to dissect, isn’t it? It’s important to note that NASCAR kept the race green for the final lap. If Busch had blown a tire on lap 100 instead of lap 150, you can pretty much guarantee that NASCAR would have thrown a caution flag. Busch was livid on his radio saying there was a bunch of debris on the track. Given the pace he was running when he blew the tire, it’s reasonable to assume that he ran over something to cause a puncture.
But let’s say NASCAR throws a caution. Who wins the race? Busch is the guy who caused the caution flag and since the race was on the final lap, it would have been considered over. Busch would have been able to keep pace car speed and cross the finish line ahead of the rest of the field. And Suarez would have likely been able to feather the throttle enough to make it to the finish too.
Could the winner of the race really be the guy whose car caused the last-lap caution? It’s reasonable to complain that NASCAR’s decision to not throw a caution is inconsistent, especially given the debris Busch’ car was spewing. But if you’re going to make that complaint, you also have to acknowledge the existence of the numerous complaints that would exist if NASCAR threw the caution and then sorted out the race’s winner.
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Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
