Austin Cindric's Round of 12 Hopes Aided by Stage Points, 10th-Place Result
Every single year, when the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs come around, Team Penske is able to find a way to kick its performance up another notch. With all three drivers qualified for the post-season, this season was no exception, with two of the team’s entries inside the top three, and the third, Austin Cindric, leading a career-high 92 laps and finishing 10th.
Not only did the Mooresville, North Carolina native score a much-needed top 10 result, but by electing to race at the front of the pack all afternoon, Cindric managed to collect 19 stage points, bringing his daily points total to 46 – fourth-most behind only Ryan Blaney, Alex Bowman, and race-winner Joey Logano.
Cindric dominated the race’s second stage, in a way that lacked repetition, leading every single green-flag circuit around the 1.54-mile superspeedway – except for one, where Alex Bowman narrowly pulled ahead at the start-finish line.
The only downside to Cindric’s stranglehold on the field in the second stage, was that the leader always tends to burn more fuel on the superspeedways, so when the No. 2 came down pit road, the team had to hold for a couple of seconds longer to reach their required fuel number, dropkicking the 26-year-old down to the end of the top 20.
“We just got off cycle there with a bad pit stop and I just really took a long time to get back up to the front of the field,” Cindric said post-race. “I feel like I could have made some better decisions on the last couple of restarts, but a solid effort all around with all of the challenges of pack racing.”
At one point in the closing laps of the Quaker State 400, Cindric was following Joey Logano, his Team Penske teammate and the eventual race-winner up through the pack, but with the uncertainty of superspeedway racing, the pair got separated, and while the No. 22 went forward, the No. 2 did not.
“I’m just glad a Team Penske car won it,” said Cindric. “We’ve come to so many of these speedways with cars that are capable of winning races and I’m proud of Joey and the guys to get it done. Obviously, Ryan and I worked really well together to get a ton of points to start.”
Even though the afternoon didn’t end with a champagne-drenched celebration in Victory Lane at Atlanta Motor Speedway, the solid top-10 results, and the field-leading stage points on Sunday afternoon, did put Cindric in a fantastic position after the opening race of the Round of 16.
“Yeah, just base hits all around,” Cindric said about his points position. “I’m so proud of the team. We have just a little bit left on execution, but, otherwise, happy with the result.”
The 2021 NASCAR Xfinity Series champion leaves Atlanta with a 27-point cushion on the cutline for the opening round of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, which one could argue was made for a driver like Austin Cindric, who excels on superspeedways and road courses.
NASCAR will finish off the ‘Round of 16’ with a pair of tire-sensitive events. First at Watkins Glen, where a new Goodyear tire is predicated to create major amounts of tire wear over the run, and then Bristol, which after a bizarre race in the Spring has several teams guessing on what the tires will do around the half-mile concrete oval.
During NASCAR's Playoff Media Day on Wednesday, Cindric commented on the overall absence of pressure in his situation, saying he believed the No. 2 team was "playing with house money" and that anything beyond making the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, was going to be a bonus.
That mindset is clearly working for Cindric, who after a stellar showing at Atlanta is sitting in a pretty decent spot to advance to the Round of 12 -- which also features a trip to both a road course and superspeedway.
JOSEPH SRIGLEY