NASCAR Talladega Spring Recap

The NASCAR Xfinity Series and the NASCAR Cup Series went down to the biggest and baddest track on the schedule, Talladega Superspeedway for what ended up being another exciting weekend of nonstop action.

Talladega is no stranger to there being an upset winner, and we got just that in the Xfinity Series race as Jeb Burton secured his second career win in the series, two years from his first career win that was this exact race. Not only that but also scored the first win for Jordan Anderson Racing, as he led for 20 laps and held off Sheldon Creed for the victory.

“Man, I’m pumped up and out of breath from yelling,” said the 30-year-old Burton, son of 2002 Daytona 500 Champion Ward Burton. “These guys have made racing fun for me again.”

This win for Burton and Anderson’s team locks them into the 2023 Xfinity Series playoffs. Sheldon Creed however is still left searching for his first career Xfinity Series win.

“I let the 27 [Burton] get way out there and had the 00 [Cole Custer] on me getting ready for a big run,” said Creed after the race, “Nonetheless, a great day. Plate racing is not my best, and I’ve been trying to get better at it. Happy to get Whelen Manufacturing a good finish. We’ve been up and down this year, so just to have a solid day like that is really good for us.”

After all of the smoke cleared, Parker Kligerman finished third, Cole Custer finished fourth and took home the Dash 4 Cash, and Brennan Poole of JD Motorsports finished fifth. Caesar Baccarella scored a career-high sixth-place finish for Alpha Prime Racing. Burton’s teammate Parker Retzlaff finished seventh, while Gray Gaulding, Joey Gase, and Josh Williams rounded out the top ten.

Daniel Hemric was fighting for the win with three laps to go until he tried to put a late block that ended his chances of winning and put him on his roof in a twelve-car pileup.

“Just got too far out, it looks like,” Hemric said after being checked and released from the Infield Care Center “For sure, late on the block there. I committed, there had been so much give and take on the day.”

Blaine Perkins also had a wild wreck when his No. 02 Chevrolet barrel-rolled several times earlier in the race. Despite the hard impacts, Perkins was able to exit his car but was taken to a local hospital in an abundance of caution. Perkins was later checked and released. The No. 02 Car was also taken to the R&D Center for further inspection after the accident.

The Cup Series race had a chaotic overtime restart that resulted in a rather unexpected winner. While Richard Childress Racing was no stranger to victory lane at Talladega, their newest member, Kyle Busch ended up being the winner. On the final lap, Bubba Wallace had taken the lead and was trying to hold off a hard-charging Ryan Blaney. Wallace was unable to secure a block and lost control of his No. 23 Toyota, causing a pileup that resulted in Kyle Busch winning the GEICO 500.

For Busch, this was his first win at Talladega since 2008 when he first joined Joe Gibbs Racing. That race was his second Cup win with the team. 15 years later, Kyle Busch won his second Cup race with Richard Childress at Talladega.

“Sometimes you’ve got to be lucky, you know,” said Busch, smiling after the race. “Sometimes these races come down to that and you’ve got to take them when they come your way.”

“The seas kind of parted there when they [Blaney and Wallace] went up the race track there,” Busch added. “They were trying to push-draft and these cars are just not stable enough to do that. I saw the 23 (Bubba Wallace) turn a little bit sideways, and I was like, ‘just get out of the way.’ “

Ryan Blaney finished one position short of snapping a 55-race winless streak as he led for 76 of the 196 laps.

“It’s just you get big runs and you take them when you can,” Blaney commented afterward, “I’m glad everyone’s okay, but in my mind, you can’t make a triple move like that, a triple block. You can’t block three times, I don’t know, the runs are so big, and as the leader Bubba’s trying to block, which is the right thing to do. But I think he kinda moved three times. I got to go somewhere. I hate for cars to get torn up and I hate for us to be so close to the win. I’m not blaming anybody. It’s just hard racing at the end of this thing and unfortunate that cars got torn up and we missed out on another win.”

It was a good day for RFK Racing as Chris Buescher finished third and teammate Brad Keselowski finished fifth. In between then was Stewart Haas Racing’s Chase Briscoe in fourth. Erik Jones, William Byron, Christopher Bell, Daniel Suarez, and Todd Gilliland rounded out the top ten.

Both Series head next to Dover Motor Speedway next Saturday and Sunday.