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Chris Buescher has taken Ford’s ninth consecutive win – and his second in a row – with victory in the postponed Firekeepers Casino 400 at Michigan International Speedway.
For much of Monday afternoon, Martin Truex Jr. could place his car wherever he wanted without a second thought, but it finally didn’t stick when he needed it to the most under Chris Buescher with 12 laps left in the NASCAR Cup Series race.
Truex swept the opening stages across Sunday and Monday and was once again closing on Buescher in the closing laps but just couldn’t overcome the advantage of clean air on equal tyres. He darted the Joe Gibbs Racing #19 under Buescher in the RFK Racing # 17 but the Toyota wouldn’t stick, bobbling in Turn 1, and losing a second in the process.
“I knew that was going to be really tough,” Buescher said. “Where [Truex] was so good was wrapping the bottom. We talked about it during the rain delay that we thought the 19 was the car to beat, the way he was able to maneuver and get through traffic so well.
“We had to commit to a low mid lane kind of line to make our minimum lap time to make our maximum speed but that gave him a lane to get clean air to get to us at times. I worked to cover it as best as I could.
“I missed it and didn’t pull the car down the hill fast enough. He got to the quarter panel and knew that would be tough to defend. We were close enough to the tail end of the field to get a sniff of the draft, but that also made us a little tight. Martin is a clean racer and we wanted to race that way too, but the tail of the field hurt and ultimately helped us at the same time.”
Even after the gap closed up again, Buescher used a defensive line to break up the draft and successfully drove away to his second consecutive win after Richmond last weekend.
The race was effectively won with 43 to go when Scott Graves called Buescher onto pit road three laps ahead of leader Truex. It actually surprised Graves that James Small responded by calling Truex down pit within three laps too given how little tire fall-off there was throughout the day.
Regardless, that netted the RFK #17 the track position over the dominant car of the weekend and that clean air is what Truex believes decided the race.
“It was clean air,” Truex said. “Passing the leader is next to impossible on equal tires. I needed him to slip. He slipped once and I got under him and I couldn’t complete it. It’s the nature of this track and this package. The leader has a huge advantage.
“The car was really good, and we could have won if we had a better cycle but weren’t close enough to take advantage.”
Truex ultimately led 47 laps and came up 0.152s short coming to the chequered flag. Denny Hamlin finished third ahead of RFK Racing team co-owner Brad Keselowski and Kyle Larson to complete the top five.
Hamlin suffered an issue on pit road during a caution on Lap 104 that dropped him from inside the top-10 to the rear of the field.
“I stalled it and then hit the starter too quick,” Hamlin said. “That sent it into some mode, and recycled it, and it affected us a little but not much because we got a good restart and our car was good enough to make it up.
“There was one move where I took the 19 three-wide and I thought that was going to be for the win, because we were so close in speed, but he was just able to maneuver so much better.”
Three expected contenders had their days end short before the remainder of the race was even postponed to Monday at Lap 74. That list included Kyle Busch, Chase Elliott and William Byron — each of whom retired with damage after contact with the outside retaining wall.
Alex Bowman was involved in a multi-car crash on Lap 127. He led seven laps on Sunday but with a 33rd place finish, now finds himself facing a must-win scenario to make the playoffs over the final three races of the regular season at Indianapolis, Watkins Glen and Daytona.
The same is true for Elliott after his flat tire and crash on Sunday.
Ty Gibbs holds the current final provisional NASCAR Cup Series playoff spot by three points over Michael McDowell. Daniel Suarez is five points out. A new winner from outside the top-16 would move that cutline up.
The back-to-back wins for Buescher marks the first time since November 2010 that Roush Racing has won consecutive races, when Carl Edwards won at Phoenix and Homestead to close out that season. This is the first time since February 2009 that the Roush No. 17 has won consecutive races when Matt Kenseth won the Daytona 500 and at Auto Club Speedway.
This was also Ford’s ninth consecutive win at Michigan, an important bit of bragging rights, as this race awards the annual manufacturer’s cup just an hour west of Detroit.
- Chris Buescher
- Martin Truex Jr.
- Denny Hamlin
- Brad Keselowski
- Kyle Larson
- Daniel Suarez
- Ross Chastain
- Kevin Harvick
- Ryan Blaney
- Erik Jones
- Ty Gibbs
- Austin Cindric
- Christopher Bell
- Joey Logano
- Corey LaJoie
- Aric Almirola
- Harrison Burton
- Bubba Wallace
- Austin Dillon
- Ty Dillon
- Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
- Ryan Preece
- Justin Haley
- Michael McDowell
- Cole Custer
- AJ Allmendinger
- JJ Yeley
- Austin Hill
- Todd Gilliland
- Tyler Reddick
- Chase Briscoe
- Josh Bilicki
- Alex Bowman
- Josh Berry
- William Byron
- Chase Elliott
- Kyle Busch
