William Byron wins at Martinsville, 2nd victory of 2022 season (4-9-22)
By: Becca Cottingham Quimby
Headline Photo Courtesy: NASCAR Twitter Page
We head to the paperclip of Martinsville, Virginia. Just shy of an hour behind schedule of the initial start of the race due to weather. Chase Elliott will bring us to the green flag of track that just got a mix of different weather: rain, sleet, and even some snow mixed in. The first sixty-plus laps until Chase Elliott got into heavy traffic was his show. Once he got into heavy traffic his teammate William Byron caught up and was right on his bumper. The battle between Denny Hamlin and Chase Elliott went on for several laps. Denny Hamlin entered a little too high and this allowed Chase to finally get below him and around him. This would put one car between him and his teammate. Chase Elliott will keep a small lead over his teammate and will win stage one.
Bubba Wallace and Brad Keselowski both had to the rear for penalties and will have to work back to front. Brad for equipment interference and Bubba crewman over the wall too soon. We also saw contact on pit road between teammates of Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. We head to green for stage two with Chase Elliott leading us back to green. He gets out to a decent lead in front of his teammate William Bryon. The battles are throughout the rest of the field as Chase Elliott maintains the rest of the field. The bumpers get used as Christopher Bell slams into Cole Cluster trying to get him moved out of the way. Chase Elliott will go on to win stage two. Daniel Suarez battles back so that he can get one of his two laps back at the very last moment.
Cole Custer will head to the back of the field due to an uncontrolled tire. We will then get our first lead change all night and that is due to William Byron winning the battle off of pit road. William gets a great run out front. The drivers are going to have to possibly look at a green flag pit stop since this has been a green flag race. This has the potential to truly mix things up for the drivers. William Bryon is trying to move drivers by using his bumpers when they get in his way because he sees Chase Elliott. Green flag pit stops did start just before lap three hundred. Martin Treux Jr and Brad Keselowski both had major issues. Martin Truex Jr had an issue with a tire being flat. Brad had an issue with the crew over the wall too soon. Both were costly issues. Things settled back down at Martinsville while Chase Elliot got shuffled back and Austin Dillon moved forward. With just ten laps to go Todd Gilliland hits the safer barrier rather hard and brings out the caution and will send us into overtime. Part of the group decides to pit others to stay out for track position. Alex Bowman and Austin Dillon will square off for possibly the final time for tonight’s race. Unless something happens on this restart. They get a clean restart and William Bryon gets just ahead of Austin Dillion. He will be driving while looking behind him as much as possible. William Bryon will be our unofficial winner at Martinsville.
