On the conclusion of Stage 1 , the sector filed down pit street with Joey Logano main each the race and the title battle. Whereas pit stops had been pretty simple for the sector, a extremely uncommon second was quickly to observe.
The official Toyota Camry tempo automotive was herding the sector to the restart to start the second stage when a serious lapse in judgement was made. The tempo automotive was about to overlook its pit street turn-in and abruptly turned down on the last-second, crossing proper in entrance of latest race chief Chase Elliott.
Nonetheless, the tempo automotive made the transfer a second too late and hit the barrels at pit street entry whereas spinning sideways. The wounded tempo automotive then retreated behind the wall and backup was introduced out.
After all, the race didn’t go inexperienced and was as an alternative positioned below crimson flag circumstances on Lap 69 of 312. Crews instantly went to work to wash up up the mess from the spilled sand barrels. The stoppage solely lasted a couple of minutes.
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“Was that Michael Phelps?” requested Ryan Blaney, referencing the truth that the embellished Olympian was the honorary tempo automotive driver for the beginning of the race. And no, he was not behind the wheel.
Logano may solely chuckle whereas Denny Hamlin commented: “That is simply so NASCAR.” In the meantime, Elliott’s crew chief Alan Gustafson needed to ensure the tempo automotive knew it was on the damaged-vehicle coverage and had six minutes to repair it as all the discipline poked enjoyable on the weird incident. It was an ideal second of levity throughout an in any other case tense title-decider.
Whereas pure hypothesis, the error may have come on account of the bizarre setup at Phoenix Raceway. The tempo automotive is meant to peel off on the exit of Flip 2 as an alternative of the exit of Flip 4 because of the sequence flipping the backstretch and frontstretch a number of years in the past.
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