Denny Hamlin punches his ticket into the next round of “The Chase” wins at Talladega (10-4-20)
By: Becca Cottingham
Headline Photo Credit: NASCAR Twitter Page
We head to Talladega Speedway for the second race in the round of twelve. On lap one we already are having issues and a caution. Low-pressure tires and Christopher Bell and multiple other drivers involved. Ricky Stenhouse Jr has an issue when John Hunter Nemechek bumps him within the first eight laps and will exit the race early. We get back to green but Corey LaJoie had no fuel pressure in the car and he is stalled. Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin battle it out just before the competition caution. Aric Almirola gets out front along with Ryan Blaney to lead some laps. We see aggressive shoving with a little over twenty laps to go. We seem to have manufacturers working together in a line trying to get the stage one win. Multiple chase drivers fell to the back due to the aggressiveness upfront. The aggressiveness truly shows up with less than five laps to go when Aric Almarilo and multiple other drivers end up in a crash. This will mean we will end under caution with Chris Buescher winning stage one.
With all the action that took place in stage one, stage two should be extremely interesting. Kyle Busch had a left front tire blows and damages his car even more. Chris Buescher is being pushed by Brad Keselowski and they seem to be working well. We see that the group of Chevy’s come down pit road for green flag pitstops. However, Ryan Blaney had a tire go down and he hit the wall and hit the wall bringing out the caution. The chevy’s that pitted just a few laps earlier will all be at the front. Jimmie Johnson gets bumped by Clint Bowyer in the tri-oval and sends multiple drivers into an accident. A total of thirteen drivers are involved and five of those drivers are playoff drivers. We get back under green and there is a lot of push and shoving. Multiple lead changes are happening with two laps to go. Joey Logano was penalized and fell backward. Martin Truex Jr continued to block drivers to get the stage two win.
Martin Truex Jr and Brad Keselowski bring us to the green for the final stage. We see multiple drivers get out front to lead some laps. Brad Keselowski, Tyler Reddick, Bubba Wallace, and even Joey Logano are just some of those drivers. With about forty laps to go, Jimmie Johnson rear starts shredding and brings out a caution. This will put most drivers on the bubble of making it to the end of the race on fuel. Bubba Wallace did not get a good push from Ryan Preece and Bubba scraped the wall. James Davison blew a right-front tire and brought out the caution. This will make the race go into overtime. During overtime, Joey Logano got penalized again for pushing the driver below the line. He moves back through the field and another big one happens. NASCAR placed the race under the red to clean up all of the debris on the track. We are set to try overtime for the second time. We have third overtime and wrecks are happening all over the track. Denny Hamlin gets shoved below the line double yellow line. He comes back on the track neck and neck with two other drivers. Denny Hamlin hangs on tight and just does get out in front of Matt DiBenedetto for the unofficial win.
