Talladega again lived up to its reputation with a dramatic finish in the second race of the NASCAR Round of 12. With just five laps remaining, chaos unfolded as over 25 cars were swept up in a massive pileup. The incident started when Austin Cindric, battling for the lead with Ricky Stenhouse Jr., was nudged slightly by Brad Keselowski‘s #6 car. This small bump to Cindric’s Ford set off a chain reaction, involving Chase Elliott’s #9 among others, sending cars spinning across the track.
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Initially, it seemed Keselowski might have been the catalyst for the turmoil, having pushed Cindric into the fateful spin. However, the sequence of contact began further back in the pack. Chase Briscoe, running just behind Harrison Burton’s #21, nudged Joey Logano’s #22, which in turn propelled Keselowski into Cindric. But the disarray didn’t stop there; towards the rear of the pack, Josh Berry’s #4 Ford collided with Noah Gragson’s #10, which then careened into John Hunter Nemechek’s #42, exacerbating the melee.
As the pace slowed in the upper lanes at Talladega, a parallel wreck ensued when Tyler Reddick’s #45 collided with Kyle Busch’s #8, setting off a chain reaction that swept up Denny Hamlin’s #11 in its wake. However, Kyle Larson and William Byron, positioned just ahead of Hamlin, narrowly dodged disaster, with Kyle Busch maintaining control of his car despite the jostle.
The crash went down in the books as the largest ‘Big One‘ in NASCAR history, involving 28 cars in a monumental tangle. The wreck was the second mishap of the day affecting playoff contenders, following an earlier accident that brought the stage two curtain down on defending champion Ryan Blaney and Kansas victor Ross Chastain.
When the dust settled, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Keselowski emerged from the wreckage to claim the top two spots, with William Byron, Kyle Larson, and Erik Jones completing the top five finishers in a tumultuous day at Talladega.
Joey Logano shares his insights on the biggest ‘Big One’ of NASCAR
As the race wound down, with just three laps remaining and the track was strewn with debris and disabled cars, NASCAR had no choice but to wave the yellow flag, soon escalating to a red flag situation to manage the clear-up. Logano, who found himself in sixth place when the turmoil unfolded but ultimately crossed the finish line in P33, broke down the sequence post-race after being checked out at the infield care center.
He explained, “The No. 2 got out there a little bit more than what he has been. The No. 21 gave me a shove, and I transferred that to the No. 6. You can’t see what’s in front of you from there. He got to the No. 2 with a fair amount of steam; it’s nobody’s fault, it’s not Brad’s fault, it’s not anybody’s fault. It’s the product of the races we’ve got. Everyone gets more and more aggressive as the laps wind down. It happens; it happens a lot.”
The accident did not spare Chase Elliott and Chase Briscoe, both playoff contenders, who suffered major setbacks, finishing in P29 and P30 respectively. Meanwhile, William Byron capitalized, securing a comfortable lead in the playoff standings with a 57-point cushion, marking him as the first to advance to the next segment. At the same time, Logano finds himself with a 13-point deficit in the bottom four.
