Daniel Suarez Tag

By David Morgan, Associate Editor With the conclusion of Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas, the first round of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs is nearly complete, as the first elimination race looms large next weekend. Here’s how the points standings look heading to Bristol Motor Speedway. Only Christopher Bell is safe from whatever carnage may lie ahead at Bristol as the Playoff field is cut from 16 to 12, with the driver of the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota accumulating enough points to secure his passage into the nextRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Driving the same car number that carried teammate Kurt Busch to victory in the May race at Kansas Speedway, Bubba Wallace claimed a dramatic win at the same track in Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400, the second event in the first round of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs. Wallace regained the lead on Lap 225 after the final cycle of green-flag pit stops at the 1.5-mile track and stayed out front for the final 43 circuits as his car owner, DennyRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – During Saturday’s qualifying session at Kansas Speedway, NASCAR Cup Series drivers soon migrated to the top of the track—which was fine with notorious rim rider Tyler Reddick.  The last of 10 drivers to make a qualifying run in the final round, Reddick knocked Joey Logano off the provisional pole and claimed the top starting spot for Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400, the series’ second Playoff race (3 p.m. ET on USA, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).  In the money round, ReddickRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor One race down, nine to go. The NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs enter its second week as the title contenders move on to Kansas Speedway looking to punch their ticket into the next round by winning Sunday’s running of the Hollywood Casino 400. Among those drivers in the running for the Bill France Cup, six of them are previous winners at Kansas, with Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick Chase Elliott, Kyle Larson, and Joey Logano having won at the track in recent years. Kansas Speedway hasRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor After a wild weekend in Daytona to wrap up the regular season and set the 16-driver field for the Playoffs, the NASCAR Cup Series heads to one of the crown jewels on the circuit, Darlington Raceway, for Sunday’s running of the Cook Out Southern 500. A staple of the Cup Series since 1950, there are many elements to Darlington that make it a special track. From the egg-shape of the track that features one end narrower than the other as a result of building the trackRead More

By Holly Cain and Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service CHARLOTTE, N.C. – A quarter of this year’s NASCAR Cup Series 16-driver Playoff field will be competing for the season prize for the first time—Daytona 500 winner Austin Cindric, Phoenix winner Chase Briscoe, two-race winner Ross Chastain and Sonoma victor Daniel Suarez. No first-time Playoff driver has ever advanced to the final round of the Playoffs (with the obvious exception of the inaugural year of the elimination format in 2014) but many say it would be no surprise to find oneRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Mother Nature won the day at Daytona International Speedway as persistent rain eventually forced NASCAR’s hand to postpone Saturday night’s scheduled Coke Zero Sugar 400 to Sunday. Though NASCAR waited out the rain for Friday night’s Xfinity Series race, which did not reach its conclusion until the early morning hours on Saturday, the sanctioning body pulled the plug on the Cup Series race shortly after the scheduled start time on Saturday night, rolling the dice on better weather during the day onRead More

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service For the second-consecutive day Kyle Larson took his first lead of the race with five laps remaining and held off road course ace and fellow Californian A.J. Allmendinger for a trophy. Larson completed the rare weekend sweep at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International Sunday afternoon with a clutch win in the NASCAR Cup Series’ Go Bowling at the Glen. Larson made a dramatic pass on his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Chase Elliott on a restart with five laps to go on the historic road course. As the race leader, Elliott gotRead More

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service NASCAR Cup Series championship leader Chase Elliott won the pole position for Sunday’s Go Bowling at the Glen at Wakins Glen (N.Y.) International (3 p.m. ET, USA Network, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) making a strong statement for his championship chases as the regular season winds down. Elliott turned a lap of 125.147 mph around the 3.377-mile road course in the No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet besting his teammate, reigning series champion Kyle Larson by a slight .015-seconds to claim his third pole position ofRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service  RICHMOND, Va. – Kyle Larson was a man on the move on Saturday at Richmond Raceway.  First off, he won the pole position for Sunday’s Federated Auto Parts 400 (3 p.m. ET on USA, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).  Shortly thereafter, Larson left on a plane for Knoxville, Iowa, where he was locked into the main event in the prestigious Knoxville Nationals for winged sprint cars.  But before he was set to run the 1,425-pound sprint car, he navigated the .75-mile Richmond short trackRead More