NASCAR Daytona takeaways: A thrilling throwback, playoff predictions and more

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — In NASCAR’s Next Gen Era, Daytona racing has become frustratingly repetitive: Major fuel savings for much of the race, an inability to pass with an emphasis on track position, a big wreck at the end when everyone decides to finally go for it and a “leader at the moment of caution” controversy to decide the winner.

It’s been frustrating for nostalgic fans who remember how good superspeedway racing used to be, when drivers could slice their way through the pack by taking big runs. These days, it’s felt like even Dale Earnhardt Sr. would have been stuck in line with nowhere to go in this car — whether he could “see the air” or not.

But then came Saturday, when Ryan Blaney passed a dozen cars in the final two laps — 13th to first! in two laps! — to break the hearts of five potential win-and-in drivers staring at their last gasp to make the playoffs, change their seasons and perhaps even alter their careers.

Blaney saved Alex Bowman’s year at the same time, somehow threading his way to the front of the pack in a four-wide finish — an ending which came relatively cleanly and in regulation! And all that despite the sheer desperation of those drivers who were facing elimination if they didn’t win.

“They raced really smart and well and didn’t throw their cars in any foolish situations,” Blaney said. “Everyone did a great job of having a great race but also keeping it clean as well.

“Props to everybody where you didn’t have a guy who needed to win that was just the absolute hammer out there. They were really, really respectful of everybody else, and it was a good race.”

That’s incredibly refreshing and reminded us of Daytona’s thrilling nature. Often, the best Daytona races are about the threat of disaster rather than actually seeing it; when drivers race right up to the edge of chaos and somehow emerge unscathed, few things in all of motorsport are more thrilling.

In fact, according to NASCAR Insights, the separation between the top four finishers — 0.049 seconds — is the “closest known top four finish” in Cup Series history. And it wasn’t just Blaney who made huge gains in the final laps, either. Daniel Suárez went from 19th to second. Erik Jones went from 25th to fifth.

The ability to take runs and race it out at the finish? Check. Maximizing the drama from what the win-and-in format was designed to do? Check. A finish with no big wreck, no controversy and no overtime? Check. It didn’t even rain on race day.

All of those things added up to reasons why Saturday night almost felt too good to be true. Except it wasn’t.

Checking our results

Both Jordan Bianchi and I correctly predicted 12 of the 16 playoff drivers. We both missed the inclusion of Josh Berry, Austin Cindric, Austin Dillon and Bubba Wallace. My predicted four drivers in their place were Chris Buescher, Ty Gibbs, Michael McDowell and Brad Keselowski (Bianchi had Kyle Busch instead of Keselowski).

Where did I go wrong with my picks? Buescher finished 10th in the regular-season standings with the seventh-best average finish in the series, but ended up as the first driver out (33 points behind Bowman). Gibbs (16th) and Keselowski (19th) both had miserable starts to the season that doomed their chances of making it on points, then couldn’t find their way to victory lane in time. I was sure McDowell (20th) would be better at Spire Motorsports than he was at Front Row Motorsports, and while his average finish has improved by two spots, he’s on pace to have fewer top-10 finishes than in the previous three years.

Ultimately, this playoff field has few major surprises: All four Hendrick Motorsports cars made it (though it was obviously a close call for Bowman), powerhouse teams Joe Gibbs Racing and Team Penske added three cars each, everyone thought Shane van Gisbergen would win at least one road course race (he won four) and Tyler Reddick missing the field the year after making the Championship 4 would have been a shock.

More predictions

With the playoffs stacking up exceptionally well for Team Penske, which has won all three championships so far in the Next Gen Era, I’m picking them to do it again. Specifically, Joey Logano and Paul Wolfe seem to have mastered this format and now have even better tracks that suit them (Gateway and New Hampshire joined the playoffs this year in place of Watkins Glen and Homestead).

So Logano and Blaney are in my Championship 4, along with two JGR cars — Chase Briscoe, who has been great in the second half of the regular season, and Denny Hamlin, who has been oddly under the radar in terms of performance despite tying for the series lead in victories (and having a constant spotlight on him due to both his podcast and ongoing lawsuit against NASCAR).

My final eight include Cindric, William Byron, Kyle Larson and Christopher Bell — it’s just that I don’t think Hendrick is set up to win the championship this season, so I don’t have any of their drivers in the final four.

Berry makes it through to the Round of 12 based on his short track prowess and his Penske alliance, and is joined by Reddick, Bowman and Chase Elliott.

And my first cuts are Dillon, Wallace, Chastain and van Gisbergen — despite SVG’s playoff points, escaping a round that includes a track he’s never seen before (Gateway) will be a challenge.

Joey Logano, master of this playoff format, appears set up well for another deep run. (Meg Oliphant / Getty Images)

Win-and-in does the trick

Now that the regular-season standings are complete, we can note six of the eight one-win drivers would have missed the playoffs had they not scored their lone victory of the season. Obviously, these must be taken as separate instances — but if any one of these wins did not occur, these drivers would have been out based on finishing below Buescher in the regular-season points:

• Wallace (11th in the standings) would have missed by 15 points had he not won the Brickyard 400;

• Logano (12th) would have missed by 16 points had he not won at Texas;

• Chastain (13th) would have missed by 25 points had he not won the Coca-Cola 600;

• Cindric (15th) would have missed by 111 points had he not won at Talladega;

• Berry (21st) would have missed by 151 points had he not won at Las Vegas;

• Dillon (26th) would have missed by 182 points had he not won at Richmond.

Elliott (fourth) and Briscoe (eighth) would have made it on points even without their respective victories at Atlanta and Pocono.

Zilisch rises

After one of the quickest ascensions we’ve seen, 19-year-old Connor Zilisch was announced as a full-time Cup Series driver for next season at Trackhouse Racing — less than 18 months after making his first NASCAR national series start.

During his short time in the sport, Zilisch has wowed fans and those in the garage with his elite talent and wise-beyond-his-years maturity. He conducts himself and speaks like a 35-year-old veteran, not a teenager.

But now he’s on the precipice of Cup Series racing, a stressful, no-fun environment that has reshaped many a young driver. Over the last couple of decades, we’ve seen many drivers enter the Cup Series a certain way and quickly become a different person; it’s tough not to be affected by all the outside forces.

The last thing anyone wants is to see Zilisch change, since he’s so refreshing and has all the potential of a budding superstar. Yet he’s so young, it will be tough to avoid becoming reshaped by the relentless grind and pressure of Cup racing.

So we wondered: What’s his outlook on all of it? Here’s his answer, thoughtful as usual:

“You get to Sunday and all of a sudden this becomes a job and your finishing position determines if you’re going to stay in the sport or not,” Zilisch said. “And obviously that adds pressure and makes things more difficult, and it certainly adds to the fact that this is no longer all about having fun.

“But that’s what I’m going to try and do my best to keep every Sunday, is to make sure that I’m enjoying it and enjoying the ride. You can’t travel 38 weeks a year around the country and be miserable and expect to do well. So you have to enjoy it.

“The good days are going to be special and the bad days are part of it. That’s what you’ve got to understand from the get-go. There’s nothing that can really prepare you for this jump, and only time will tell how it affects me. But I’m going to do my best to stand on my ground and stay true to who I am.”

Just 19 years old, Connor Zilisch will be full-time in the Cup Series next season for Trackhouse Racing. (James Gilbert / Getty Images)

Trackhouse changes

Last week, Heavy.com reported that Trackhouse fired two members of its competition department, including competition director Tony Lunders. Though the timing right before the playoffs seems unusual, Trackhouse owner Justin Marks said the moves were about “establishing the standard of the company.”

“The direction we’re going is going to require really, really aggressive pursuit of excellence inside the business,” Marks said. “There are people in the business who show up every day and think anything is possible and work toward the goal that I stated — which is being the best team in the business. And there are some that are not.

“We have to just cultivate a workforce of people who believe we can do it and fight all day, every day, to be able to do it.”

Nix-ville

NASCAR scheduled next year’s Richmond race on a Saturday night directly against the Knoxville Nationals, meaning Larson won’t be able to participate in the world’s biggest sprint car race.

“Sure, I wish the schedule would work out to where I could run all the big (sprint car) races,” Larson said. “But I’ve missed it before, so it’s kind of whatever.”

Larson said he saw an earlier version of the schedule that looked like it would allow him to compete, but then realized there was a conflict when the NASCAR schedule was released last week.

Though Knoxville is popular on its own — its 20,000-seat grandstands sold out again this year — Larson represents a major bridge between the sprint car world and NASCAR, since he is an elite driver in both. His presence at Knoxville, which this season required flying back and forth from Watkins Glen, is a great addition to the event.

But ultimately, Larson said, “it’s two different series and they both have to worry about themselves.”

“So it’s fine,” he said. “It shouldn’t revolve around me anyway.”

(Top photo of Ryan Blaney taking the checkered flag in Saturday’s regular-season finale at Daytona: Michael Bush / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)