MOTORSPORTS MONDAY - Kansas Delivers; Xfinity Beef; Silly Season
KANSAS THE FINAL DESTINATION?
The average temperature for Kansas City on November 1st is 55 degrees. Maybe it’s worth putting a sweater or jacket in the hauler and holding the NASCAR season finale weekend at Kansas Speedway.
Once again the 1.5-mile track just west of Kansas City delivered over the racing weekend as all three NASCAR National Tours plus the ARCA Menards Series were in competition.
While the opening acts were pretty good in their own right, Sunday’s Cup Series Hollywood Casino 400 provided spice to the Playoff picture.
Nine of the 12 drivers in the second round found themselves dealing with some sort of issue whether it be mechanical, an accident, or self-inflicted with a pit road miscue (or two).
When the checkered flag flew it was Playoff spoiler Ross Chastain taking the somewhat unexpected win while the majority of the title contenders were left scrambling.
Among those who struggled was Kyle Larson, who less than a week prior dominated at Bristol leading 462 of 500 laps to win for the fifth time this season. But the Hendrick Motorsports driver’s hopes for back-to-back wins and a sweep at Kansas after his May victory were over very early in the race with a tire issue. It got worse from there as the No. 5 team did its best to get Larson up to speed but to no avail.
“It is what it is but we’ll regroup and move on to Talladega,” Larson said after a 26th place finish.
Larson can take at least some solace that he was not along among Playoff drivers suffering disappointment. Denny Hamlin, Tyler Reddick, Joey Logano, Austin Cindric and Daniel Suarez were just a few of the other names that left Kansas in a foul mood.
Playoff drivers dealing with adversity has been the calling card of the Kansas fall race for several years. Throw in the fact the Gen 7 Cup car excels so well as the track and late September in The Heartland is one of the most intriguing stops on the calendar.
Why not consider putting Kansas a month and change later on the schedule and have all the marbles up for grabs in the finale? Football fans think nothing of a few extra layers and a hot beverage to watch their favorite teams battle in late fall. NASCAR fans are a hearty bunch and it may be worth the possible on track payoff to give it a try.
XFINITY SERIES BEEF
Saturday’s Kansas Lottery 300 kicked off the Xfinity Series Playoffs and two title contenders aren’t seeing eye to eye.
Aric Almirola won the race, keeping the Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota firmly in the owners championship race. But the bigger story was the incident between Cole Custer and Chandler Smith.
Smith washed up the track and forced Custer into the wall as the duo raced through Turn Four. While neither car sustained enough damage to warrant a caution or to come down pit road, the contact forced both drivers to slip back in the running order while exchanging some harsh words on the radio with their respective teams.
Those words continued when the checkered flag flew.
“He killed us,” Custer said after finishing second. “Just definitely burned our stuff up trying to get by him. It really made me mad when he put us in the fence on that restart. He's going to get his. He’s going to pay the consequences for that, and I'm going to race him like he races me.”
Smith, who has been outspoken in recent weeks about drivers either not showing respect to him on track or teammates not working with him, admitted he might have made a mistake.
“I definitely understand his position,” Smith said. “Last week, I was racing behind somebody for 80 laps, and couldn't find a way around him because we were running the same lane. I need to go back and watch the replay because, by all means, if he did get all the way to my right rear, and could've right-reared me and lifted for me, I need to apologize because that's not fun. I've been in those shoes.”
Talladega and The Roval remain in this round and it will be interesting to see if Smith’s concession is enough to calm Custer down or if retaliation is still on the table.
ROUND AND ROUND
The merry-go-round driver lineup at Kaulig Racing made another revolution over the weekend. Ty Dillon was named to replace Daniel Hemric in the team’s No. 31 Cup ride next year where he’ll pair up with AJ Allmendinger, who returns from the Xfinity Series to run full-time again in NASCAR’s top division.
Dillon has spent the last couple years bouncing around from ride to ride most recently the Rackley War Racing Craftsman Truck entry. That team announced Dawson Sutton would take the wheel for the remainder of the season paving the way for Dillon to migrate back to Cup.
Kaulig and Richard Childress Racing have shared an alliance in recent years and that partnership will accelerate into what is being referred to “One Welcome,” a reference to the campus the team’s share at RCR’s long-time home in Welcome, North Carolina.
Officials from both organizations are hopeful that stronger relationship will yield better performance. Both RCR cars missed the Playoffs, although Austin Dillon was credited with the win at Richmond despite his last lap driving penalty stripping away the automatic Playoff berth. Kyle Busch is in danger of seeing his streak of winning at least one Cup race for the last 19 years coming to an end.
Hemric took the wheel of the Cup No. 31 at Kaulig, which will change to the No. 10 next year, after winning the Xfinity Series title with Joe Gibbs Racing the season prior. He was never able to parlay that success to Cup and this season he has four top-10 finishes and an average finishing position of 22.7.
Kaulig’s 2025 Xfinity Series roster will include Daniel Dye, Christian Eckes, and holdover Josh Williams.
SHORT TRACK ATTACK
Carson Kvapil dominated Saturday’s Valleydale Credit Union 300 at Martinsville Speedway, the biggest Late Model Stock Car race in the country. The second-generation driver led 119 laps and was able to work his way through a series of late-race incidents and restarts for the JR Motorsports driver to take the $35,000 payday.
Casey Roderick also turned in a dominant performance in his Southern Super Series win at 5 Flags Speedway Saturday night. He got around Cole Butcher for the top spot and took the checkered flag in comfortable fashion, also earning the track’s season Super Late Model championship.
Pete Pistone is a veteran motorsports and general sports reporter/journalist with nearly 30 years experience. During his career he has worked for media outlets such as WGN Radio, The Chicago Sun-Times, Chicagoland Television (CLTV), CBS Sports, Motor Racing Network and SiriusXM. Pistone has been with SiriusXM since 2008 and co-hosts “The Morning Drive” on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Ch. 90) with Mike Bagley, which airs Monday through Friday at 7 am ET. He is also the host of “Fantasy Racing Preview,” a weekend show focusing on NASCAR gambling and fantasy racing, which is part of the channel’s NASCAR Cup Series pre-race programming. Additionally, Pistone is a member of the SiriusXM College Sports team as an on-air personality and contributor on Big Ten Radio (Ch. 372). He is one of the hosts of “Big Ten Today” and can also be heard on “Big Ten Whip Around,” a weekly hour-long program spotlighting a variety of sports around the conference. Pistone is also the host of several specials as well as providing a range of digital content for both the NASCAR and Big Ten channels. A Chicago native, Pistone resides in the northern suburbs of the city with his wife and daughter.