Cars in field: 39
Pole: Ryan Blaney (12)
Outside Pole: Austin Cindric (2)
Stages: 60-100-100
Weather: Mostly cloudy, 53°F, Feels like (sun) 59°, Feels like (shade) 53°, Wind W 4 mph, Wind Gusts 7 mph
Josh Berry (21) wins stage one. They drove around in circles for sixty laps. There was some passing, but it didn’t really look as much like racing as it looked like they were just trying to see what their cars could do, like practice. Boring.
Restarting on lap 68 of 260.
Caution on lap 82 of 260 for an incident involving (10). I have no idea what happened since the television broadcast has mostly been showing bumpers and hoods and doors of cars instead of the field racing. From the only video they seem to have, it looks like he may have spun out by himself. The video is from far away and only showed him seemingly driving away from the wall. He may have lost a tire. Hard to say. Terrible video.
PRN is chatting about the new Damaged Vehicle Policy. I’m still unclear about it. From what they’re saying it sounds like you have eight minutes to repair the car on pit road and then you can take it to the garage and work on it at your leisure. Also the driver has three attempts to make minimum speed.
Restarting on lap 88 of 260.
Caution on lap 103 of 260 for a spin by Erik ‘EJ’ Jones (43) who turned himself off another car’s from bumper – that would be Chris Buescher (17). Not sure that he knew Buescher was down there – looks like that’s what happened. EJ was closing on the car in front of him 35 and went down toward the middle to avoid the 35 and turned himself on Buescher’s front bumper. Of course the television broadcast was showing dash cams and the such, so we couldn’t really see what happened until they found some replays. Thoroughly useless coverage. The race is boring so you show everything but the race thereby missing anything remotely interesting that occurs during the race. Disastrous logic.
Restarting on lap 107 of 260 with Joey Logano (22) and Todd Gilliland (34) on the front row.
Maybe the Atlanta race should be split into three stages, at least until they figure out a way to make the 255 laps that are typically boring, more interesting. They ride around for almost the entirety of the event and race in the final handful of laps. The final laps are sometimes exciting, giving a preview of what might happen if they actually had to race the entire event. But they don’t – or if they do it’s never shown on television. Today I’ve seen a lot of hoods, bumpers, track surface, the wall, grandstands, and moments ago an extended view of a driver’s feet. Nothing worth watching overall. PRN says “this has been an action-packed race”. Clearly they are watching something other than what’s being shown on the television broadcast, or prevaricating.
Caution on lap 134 of 260 for debris from Todd Gilliland’s (34) right rear tire issue.
Some pit, some stay out.
Restarting on lap 140 of 260 with Joey Logano (22) and Alex Bowman (48) on the front row with second place Austin Cindric (2) lined up behind teammate Logano.
Caution on lap lap 149 of 260 for Chase Elliott spinning after getting clipped by Brad ‘It’ Keselowski (6) hit Chase Elliott (9) who was trying to gather it back up collecting Corey LaJoie (01). According to PRN, Keselowski says he has no oil pressure and his day is done. PRN reports Ricky Stenhouse Jr (47) and Chase Briscoe (19) got into each other squeezing Chase Elliott (9) got into the outside wall which seemed to break the right toe-link on Chase Elliott’s car. Elliott (9) slowed on the track trying to maintain control until he can get to pit road. Keselowski came upon him going full speed slamming into the 9.
Restarting on lap 156 of 260 with Joey Logano (22), Austin Cindric (2), Alex Bowman (48), and Kyle Larson (5) up front.
Kyle Larson (5) wins stage two.
Restarting on lap 168 of 260 with Briscoe, John Hunter ‘JHN’ Nemechek (42), Ross ‘WatermelonBoy’ Chastain (1), Shane ‘SVG’ Van Gisbergen (88), Riley Herbst (35), Kyle ‘KyBu’ Busch (8) up front. Chase Elliot (9) is restarting in 35th two laps down.
On lap 172 of 260 bumper-cam for an extended time. Blimp cam from the bumper-cam. Hood/helmet-cam from blimp cam. Quick shot of the field, then back to helmet-cam, quick shot outside the cars, then back to helmet-cam, split-screen of helmet came and a driver driving, then the field and a driver’s feet, a long, long time on this idiotic video, blimp cam, the field heading toward the camera, the field passing by the camera, a short of a half-dozen cars, bumper-cam, split screen of some car in the distance hitting the wall with a glancing blow, then shot of about six cars in the field, bumper-cam, fish-eye cam, bumper cam, the plastic piece view of the back right side of a car, bumper-cam, bumper-cam, finally the field heading toward the camera, back to a bumper cam – that’s the last ten laps of television coverage. Awful.
PRN is not much better as Brad Gillie blathers incessantly – sometimes about the race. There’s a lot of excited chatter, but the television broadcast video doesn’t show the exciting action PRN seems to be watching.
Caution on lap 183 of 260 for a crash involving Daniel Suarez, Corey La Joie, Ty Gibbs, Cody Ware, and Cole Custer. Ty ‘TeamOwnerJoeGibbsIsMyGrandpa’ Gibbs (54) tried to shoot-the-middle by Suarez (99) and instead got Suarez into the wall then Daniel bounced off and turned on Gibbs’ bumper in front of the field collecting Zane Smith (38), Noah Gragson (4), Cole Custer (41), JJ Yeley (44), Cody Ware (51). Chase Elliott (9) avoids the spinning cars.
Restarting on lap 192 of 260 with Kyle ‘KyBu’ Busch (8), Chase Briscoe (14), William ‘WilliB’ Byron (24), Ryan Blaney (12), Austin Dillon (3), Austin Cindric (2), Josh Berry (21), Chris Buescher (17), Tyler ‘TyRed’ Reddick (45), Shane ‘SVG’ Van Gisbergen (88). Chase Elliott (9) starts in 29th one lap down.
It would be nice to see the race from the cameras with camera operators inside the track and without the use of the bumper-cam, or any of the other camera attached to, or inside the cars. It would be nice to just follow the on-track action and let the viewer watch the drama of the race. Instead we’re subjected to a dizzying variety of terrible camera shots that show useless video, that tells nothing about the actual race, and drives the viewer to find something interesting to watch on television.
Caution on lap 204 of 260 for an incident involving Chase Briscoe (19), Chris Buescher (17) and Alex Bowman (48). Buescher turned in front of Bowman who had nowhere to go. Chase Briscoe bounced off the wall and went down into Buescher turning Buescher into Bowman.
Chase Elliott (9) is back on the lead lap after receiving a free pass in this incident.
Restarting on lap 212 of 260 with Josh Berry (21), Ryan Blaney (12), Kyle Busch (8) up front.
They were kind of battling for the lead, unfortunately we kept getting stuck looking at bumper-cam shots until the battle was over. As soon as it looked like there might be more action up front we were back with the bumper-cam shot instead of watching the actual racing.
Caution on lap 233 of 260 for a spin by Ryan Blaney (12).
Restarting on lap 238 of 260 with Josh Berry (4), Ross Chastain (1), Austin Cindric (2), Kyle Larson (2), Carson Hocevar (77), Christopher ‘CBell’ Bell (20), Kyle ‘KyBu’ Busch (8), Darrell ‘Bubba’ Wallace (23), Ricky Stenhouse Jr (47), William ‘WilliB’ Byron (24), ‘Desperate’ Denny Hamlin (11), Tyler ‘TyRed’ Reddick (45).
On lap 250 of 260 the front of the field is single file. The television broadcast is showing bumpers and random shots through the field, seemingly of little to no consequence, while ignoring the front of the field.
PRN mentioned a piece of debris on the track while calling the race at the front of the field.
Caution on lap 257 of 260 as Cindric (2) bounces off the wall into WilliB (24) sending both for a spin.
“This race is almost like going to Bristol. You have to hang on, because something could happen on any lap. You just have to hang in there”, PRN’s Mark Garrow describing this Atlanta race.
There’s a shot of the grandstands with the fans waving their phones with the flashlights on. It’s nice.
Overtime. Restarting on lap 264 of 266 with Kyle Larson (5), Ross Chastain (1), Christopher Bell (20), Carson Hocevar (77), Josh Berry (4), Ricky ‘Wrecky Spinhouse’ Stenhouse Jr (47), Ryan Blaney (12), ‘Desperate’ Denny Hamlin (11), Kyle ‘KyBu’ Busch (8), Darrell ‘Bubba’ Wallace (23).
Kyle Larson (5) takes the white flag.
Josh Berry (21) wrecks at they head to the checkered flag.
The caution comes out with Christopher ‘CBell’ Bell (2) out front.
Ross Chastain (1) is having a long conversation with Carson Hocevar (77).
Berry appears to have collected Ryan Preece (60) in his last lap crash.
Ryan Blaney (12) is now talking to Carson Hocevar.
During his PRN Radio interview Ross Chastain said he would not discuss the conversation with Hocevar.
As he talked to Hocevar his body language grew more and more tense. Same with Blaney, as his conversation with Hocevar progressed he grew more and more tense.
I’m sure Hocevar doesn’t recognize what he did wrong. From his television comments, he accepts that there are drivers angry with him, but he believes he did the right thing.
PRN is very excited with 50 lead changes in the race. They believe that tells the listener something about the race. In a drafting race, it tells the listener that the leader changed multiple times which is not unusual in a speedway race that is often three-wide and each line will ebb and flow.
That was a boring race. If the race was actually good, the television broadcast avoided showing that. The overtime finish was the best two laps of the event. Two laps of racing of 265 laps is unacceptable. If there was more racing, the television broadcast should show it to entice fans to the track. The weather was miserable, so the racing needs to be fire. What we could see of that, it was anything but, until the final laps.
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