Chris Buescher held off a hard charging Martin Truex Jr. to claim his second straight NASCAR Cup Series victory and fourth of his career in a rain delayed FireKeepers Casino 400 at the Michigan International Speedway.
With Truex closing the distance between the cars over the final six laps, Buescher roared off Turn 4 and crossed the finish line .152 seconds ahead of the runner-up.
“This Castrol Mustang was so good in practice, qualifying,” said Buescher, who picked up his fourth career victory. “Gave me a great car again. Had to work for that one too, hard racing at the end.
“Martin was very clean with me. I appreciate that. Get to go to Victory Lane two weeks in a row. That’s pretty awesome.”
It wasn’t just the fact that Buescher won, it’s the fact that he held off the fastest car of the race too.
“When we sat down and I think looked at the next three weeks ahead of us two weeks ago, I would have said we’ll run okay at Richmond, top five, top 10, we’ll come to Michigan and run 10th to 15th, given Kansas, then we’ll go to Indy and be very, very strong,” said race winner car owner, Brad Keselowski.
“I’m tickled to death that we’re as strong as we were this weekend and last weekend.
The 19 car, Martin Truex, is no slouch, I can tell you that. Sure you guys already talked to him. He was a rocket most of the day. For Chris to be able to hold him off is really impressive.”
With 13 laps to go, Truex had his best chance. Buescher slipped slightly off Turn 4, and Truex pulled alongside. The No. 19 Camry edged ahead to the inside, but Buescher doggedly kept Truex beside him for nearly two laps.
Rounding Turn 4 on Lap 188 of 400, Buescher held Truex’s car to the bottom of the track, forcing Truex to slip and lift off the gas. Truex also had to clear the lapped car of Michael McDowell as Buescher opened a gap of 10 car lengths.
That gave Buescher enough of a margin to hold off Truex for the win over the final 11 circuits.
Kyle Larson finished fifth, followed by Daniel Suarez, Ross Chastain, Kevin Harvick, Ryan Blaney and Erik Jones. Ty Gibbs came home 11th and supplanted McDowell in the 16th and final Playoff-eligible position. McDowell trails Gibbs by three points, with Suarez five points back.
With Buescher winning his second race and qualifying for the postseason, all the single-race winners this season also clinched Playoff berths on Monday: Christopher Bell, Chastain, Blaney, Joey Logano, Tyler Reddick and Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
Bell, the Michigan pole winner, damaged his car severely with a spin into the wall on Lap 65 on Sunday, but after repeated trips to pit road for repairs, he salvaged a 13th-place result.
Truex has eight Top-7 finishes in the last 10 races on the season including being first, third, seventh and second the last four weeks. Hamlin four consecutive Top-7 finishes on the season including being first, second and third respectively in the last three. Keselowski has 3 top six finishes in the last 4 weeks.
Here are my thoughts from the race.
RFK Racing Is Back
Brad Keselowski said after Chris Buescher’s Richmond win that he felt like RFK Racing has moved from irrelevant to relevant. The next step was being contenders.
“I told somebody, a lot of you guys here this year, we moved from irrelevant to relevant. The next step is to try to be contenders,” he said then. “You get to the contender status by winning races.
“We’re not where we want to be. We want to be where we win every week, we’re 1-2 finishing. This is another step in our progression and a lot to be proud of.”
Now, after two straight wins though, how about now?
“We’re letting our results speak for themselves,” he said after Buescher’s win in Michigan on Monday. “Chris has done a heck of a job driving the car. When you get win, it feels really good.
“We got to keep some humbleness and keep our head down. There’s some great competition out here.
“Yeah, it’s been two great weekends. I’m just thrilled to death for our company. There’s a lot of people just working their guts out, trying to push, work within the limits of the rules and regulations, but not leave anything on the table, at the same time executing at the highest of levels, whether it be on pit road, restarts, whatever else it takes. I’m happy for them, their efforts getting them the results they deserve.”
Keselowski himself threw away a win in Richmond but still finished P6. He was P4 on Monday in Michigan giving RFK Racing four combined top six finishes in four opportunities the last two weeks now. Keselowski has four top sixes alone in his last five races now too.
“We got a lot of racing left in front of us,” he continued. “We’re now in a position to have at least one car fully locked in the Playoffs, and realistically both cars are probably locked in the Playoffs with today’s results. That’s super exciting.
“Not officially, Ford, don’t get mad at me, but realistically (smiling).”
With Ford only having 4 wins this season, RFK Racing has two of them. Penske, Keselowski’s former team, has the other 2. However, one could say that there’s not much a difference between Penske and RFK Racing anymore either.
Keselowski says that he wouldn’t want to quantify that yet, but he does feel like they’re in a really good spot already.
“I don’t know how you would measure that. How do you quantify what’s best and what’s not?
“If you go by wins, yeah, we’ve got a win and we’re locked in the Playoffs. That feels good, right? I think we’re on a good streak. If you go by points, I think the 12 and the 22 are maybe in front of us in points.
“Fords, we’re all really close. 12, 22, 17, the 4, we’re all very close in points. I don’t know how you quantify who’s best and who’s not.
“I think the four cars – the 22, 12, 4 and 17 – are all right on top of each other. I’m right there as well. Maybe the five of us you could lay a blanket over.
“We do have two cars and we’re a two-car team, and we have both cars there. We don’t have any good cars or bad cars. We don’t have any bad cars, which that feels good.
“We’re positioning ourselves to get there one day, and I’m proud of that. That’s earned, right? You got to earn that title. You do that with winning multiple races and contending for championships. We’re knocking on the door of that.
“Until we are walking in at Phoenix with three or four win stickers on our cars, it’s hard to say that we’re the best. That’s what we want to be.”
They’re well on their way. Compared to this time last year, Keselowski had 0 top 5 finishes and 3 top 10’s. This year, he has 5 top 5 finishes and 10 top 10’s. Buescher had 1 top 5 and 6 top 10’s at this point in 2022 where this season he has 5 top 5’s and 10 top 10’s.
Both have improved their finishing position by 4-6 spots too. Keselowski from 19.0 to 14.0 with Buescher from 17.95 to 13.0.
“I mean, so much has happened in 15 years I’ve been there,” said Buescher. “But the last two years, last 18 months, just to see the turnaround, new car kind of being a good reset for us, to be able to be competing for wins.
“A lot of different size racetracks, a couple checkered flags now, some great pit strategy there, great pit stops. It’s every department working hard to make this happen and get us this checkered flag.”
Keselowski said the peaks and valleys are as high and low there than anywhere else.
“Yeah, the highs are high and the lows are low over here,” he said. “We had a lot of lows last year. It’s nice to have these high marks. I don’t take ’em for granted. They mean more to me probably because of how big a struggle last year was for both teams. Probably even more specifically for me.
“I’m thrilled for it. I know the work that goes into it on all aspects. I’m thrilled for every department of our company, from the marketing side through all of competition.
“We’ve come so far. We still have a long ways to go to get to where I want us to be, but we’re building some really strong momentum with these wins.
“I’m just as curious as anyone else to see where it goes from here. I try not to have expectations for good or bad. I just try to do our best, see what that plays out to on the field.”
Keselowski, Truex Still Shutout Of Driver Wins at Michigan
There’s no doubt about it, both Brad Keselowski and Martin Truex Jr. are future NASCAR Hall of Famers. However, for as good as they’ve been over the course of their careers, they’re both still winless in Michigan.
Truex is 0-for-33. Keselowski is 0-for-26.
Both finished in the top four on Monday but it was Chris Buescher instead taking the win.
“I think we needed maybe a little bit longer run to wear the tires some more,” Truex said after leading six times for 47 laps. “I feel like we were a little better. It’s hard to pass the leader on equal tires.
“We had an unbelievable car today. It was a rocket. The leader in clean air is really, really hard to pass. Just didn’t quite have enough.
“It would have been nice to get a win today, but all in all it was a good day. Strategy kind of shook us up a little bit. We were luckily able to get our track position back all day just because of our speed.
“Man, that one more stinks. Tough to get a win here. We’ve been really good in the past. Just can’t get it done. Hopefully, I don’t know, maybe next year.”
Truex has eight Top-6 finishes in his last 11 Michigan tries, including six in the last seven.
Keselowski, while he didn’t get the win as a driver, he did get the win as a team owner though.
“Yeah, it’s a different feeling,” asid Keselowski about winning as an owner vs. as a driver. “I’m glad to be there no matter what’s circumstances. I want to be there as a driver, don’t get me wrong. Being there as an owner is phenomenal, as well.
“Like I said, I’m still soaking it in. With all the mixed emotions of, Hey, man, I was so fast at the end, if I could have gotten any kind of breaks to go our way. Then also just thrilled to death for Chris and his team and everybody on it.”
Keselowski admitted that he’s still digesting it though because he didn’t expect one of them to win this weekend.
“Yeah, I’m probably still digesting it, to be quite honest (smiling). I was really caught off guard because I didn’t foresee us being able to win here this weekend,” he admitted.
“Honestly, at the end of the race both cars had a great shot at winning. That’s a real pleasant surprise, to be honest. I’m still scratching my head on how we got there, but I’m not complaining. Don’t get me wrong.
“In the end we found good speed and executed and did all the right things. Like I said, we had the strategy covered on both ends. If a yellow came out, we were covered with my car. If the race went green, Chris had it covered with his car. It’s good to see that.
Ford Still Dominating Michigan
Ford is undefeated (9-0) still at Michigan since 2018. With Chris Buescher winning again, it leaves Ford to a dominating showing despite entering the last two years down on the season too.
If any year their streak was going to end, this was going to be the one. However, we were singing this tune last year as well. Coming into Michigan in 2022, the blue ovals had won just twice in the last 18 points paying races and their main drivers are backing their ways into that weekend.
Then Kevin Harvick went out and won.
Similar set of circumstances this season.
On intermediate tracks, they led 48 of 200 laps in Fontana, 14 of 271 in Vegas, 9 of 267 in Kansas, 9 of 295 in Darlington, 201 of 400 at Charlotte, 83 of 243 in Gateway, 2 of 300 in Nashville and 23 of 160 at Pocono.
On Monday, they led 68 of 200 laps.
Hendrick Motorsports Reeling
Hendrick Motorsports hasn’t won a race at Michigan since 2014. That’s why I’m not shocked to see someone else celebrating in victory lane on Monday. However, for them to be as bad as they were with three drivers finishing 33rd or worse, plus seeing how they’ve been on the season lately, I’m starting to get concerned about them.
Due to Chase Elliott’s crash early on at Michigan, he was credited with a 36th place finish. As a result of that, he drops from 40 points behind the cutline to 55 back with just three races remaining.
Elliott is taking it in stride though with saying that even when he came back from injury, he always expected to have to win anyhow. The problem is, he’s winless in his last 21 starts.
Indy is up next to where he’s winless. Then it’s to Watkins Glen to where he’s been great at. He won two of the last four years at The Glen with being runner-up (2021) and fourth (2022) in the others.
On road courses this season, Elliott didn’t race COTA this year but was fifth in Sonoma and third in Chicago this season.
This is his best hope for winning. Daytona isn’t a place that he wants to have to score his first career win there with playoff hopes riding on the line of it.
William Byron has just 1 top 5 finish in the last 9 races while Alex Bowman hasn’t had a top 10 finish since Richmond this past spring.
Kyle Larson did score his 10th top 5 of 2023 but he also has 10 finishes too of 18th or worse as well.
Playoff Cut Line
The 16th and final spot changed hands again on Monday with Michael McDowell having another dismal week with a 24th place effort. He was also 22nd in Richmond and now falls from +17 entering Richmond to +18 entering Michigan to -3 entering Indy.
That’s also because Ty Gibbs has gotten hot. He’s made up 31 points in two weeks in going from 28 points down to three points up. He’s done so without a top 10 finish too (15th, 11th). He’s just getting stage points and not making mistakes.
Bubba Wallace has also made up a lot of ground too. He went from +27 to +58 in two weeks but the most growth came between Richmond and Michigan in going from +27 entering to +54. He still gained four points in Michigan. Now, he just needs to maintain.
Daniel Suarez was a big winner too in going from -34 to -3. That’s a 31-point gain in Michigan and is back within striking distance. AJ Allmendinger continues to drop (-24). Alex Bowman (-44), Austin Cindric (-53) and Chase Elliott (-55) are now in really must win mode over the final three weeks.
Who will stand out over the next three weeks of wildcard races (2 road course, 1 superspeedway).
Right now, Brad Keselowski is +168 after being +122 two weeks ago. Kevin Harvick is +180 and so long as we don’t see another new winner, both are good.
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