From Lap 333 to Lap 340, Ryan Blaney and Austin Dillon ran side-by-side at Richmond Raceway. With one driver edging the other at the line for the race lead and the other following suite. Dillon tried the outside multiple laps, but it killed the good in his tires. Thanks to Carson Hocevar running the bottom line and forcing Blaney and Dillon to race three-wide in Turn 3, Dillon cleared Blaney for the race lead on Lap 340.
Then he pit that same lap.
Saturday’s Cook Out 400 injected much needed life back into the “action track.”
The White Zone: Richmond is the ‘action track’ once more
For years, Richmond drastically lacked the action and importance of tires that made it famous in the first place. So often, twice a year, the NASCAR Cup Series came to Richmond and it turned into a follow the leader procession where lead changes almost always happened on pit road. Be it under caution or a cycle of green flag stops.
Eventually, the fans stopped packing out the “action track,” the track scaled down the grandstand seating and lost one of its two race dates.
On Saturday, in front of the first sold out crowd at Richmond since 2008, that all changed.
The Cook Out 400 saw a good mix of on-track and pit road lead changes. Why? Because tires made a difference.
Case in point: During the first cycle of green flag stops, while most of the field pitted for new tires, race leader and pole sitter, Ryan Preece, stayed out to save a set for later in the race. This, however, backfired, as Denny Hamlin and Tyler Reddick ran him down with 12 laps to go in the first stage. While Reddick won the stage, Preece finished 13th.
Furthermore, how much you used up the tires over a ran made the difference in the run to the finish.
Blaney overcut Dillon on the last cycle of stops and cut the lead down to 3.5 seconds with 37 laps to go. But he used up the good in his rear tires and hovered around there for multiple laps.
“I thought I was really trying to be disciplined saving tire,” he said. “Just lost it.”
On a night where the overcut was the route to go, Dillon’s undercut of Blaney won out in the end.
The White Zone: Richmond is the ‘action track’ once more
As fireworks exploded in the sky above Richmond Raceway and Dillon celebrated punching his ticket into the playoffs, I’m willing to bet that a good chunk of the people who paid to watch Saturday’s race will come back, next season. Richmond might not get a second date, again, but it earned the nickname “action track” once more.
That’s my view, for what it’s worth.
