February 20, 2022 | By Lee Spencer

Cindric celebrates first Cup win in the Daytona 500

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.—Austin Cindric held off a last-lap charge by Ryan Blaney to win the Great American Race—his first NASCAR Cup victory—on Sunday.

The 23-year-old won the Daytona 500 in his eighth series start to give Roger Penske his third Harley J. Earl trophy on his 85th birthday.

Cindric the rookie to pull off the feat and the first of the Penske drivers to accomplish the task behind the wheel of the flagship No. 2 Ford.

“Oh, my God, I've got so many people to thank,” Cindric said. “First and foremost Roger Penske, happy birthday. Oh, my gosh. Appreciate Ryan being a great teammate. Obviously, he wants to win this one, but I'm so pumped for Discount Tire, Menards, Ford. Everybody works so hard with this Next-Gen car, through this whole process, and damn, I am so excited.

“This makes up for losing a championship race I did last year.”

Cindric survived several late-race wrecks to beat Bubba Wallace by .036-seconds at the line, as cars wrecked behind him. Chase Briscoe finished third followed by Blaney, Aric Almirola, Kyle Busch, Michael McDowell, David Ragan, Brad Keselowski and Chase Elliott.

The Next Gen car proved prevalent in the early storylines of the race. The new, single-lug wheel came loose on Kaz Grala’s car then rolled down Turn 2 on Lap 41 to cause the first caution. The incident forced Briscoe to check up and Cindric plowed into the No. 14 Ford. Seven laps later, Justin Haley also lost a wheel to force NASCAR to call the second caution for “debris.”

Harrison Burton’s coming-out party ended on the roof of his No. 21 Wood Brothers Ford. He went airborne on the backstretch after a push from Keselowski sent him spinning into Christopher Bell’s path. The No. 21 Ford made contact with flipped on its side and on top of the car of Alex Bowman.

“I don’t know if it was too much,” Burton said of the push. “I just think it might have been in the wrong spot. It’s hard. These bumpers don’t line up as good as the old ones did. Through the testing I always found that dead center was the best, so when I was pushing Joey (Logano) or whatever you want to push in the center of the bumper. I couldn’t tell. I haven’t watched a good video of it yet, so don’t take what I say to the bank.

“Obviously, I’m not questioning Brad’s ability, but I think he just got a little wide on my right side and kind of shot me on the inside there.  We were working good together up to that point.  There were a couple of moments where I was having to save it kind of sideways and obviously just one too many and we ended up upside-down.”

Denny Hamlin, Ross Chastain Kyle Busch, Bell, William Byron and Kurt Busch sustained damage during the incident.

In his 16 previous Daytona 500 starts, Hamlin had not experienced a DNF. His 56-race streak of running at the finish of an event dated back to the 2020 Brickyard 400.

“The 6 (Keselowski) was pushing the 21 (Burton) and you could see the 21 was kind of getting out of control there, so you know the mindset was that you’ve got to back off but I think the 6 was just insistent on pushing him at all costs and eventually turned the 21 around,” Hamlin said. “Tough, you know, considering it was just for the stage. We were kind of boxed in there where I noticed that something was going to happen, but I was boxed in, I was behind a teammate and I wanted to try to help. Again, just too aggressive pushing right there when they weren’t lined up and in control.”

Stage 1 ended under caution with Martin Truex Jr. claiming the first stage win of 2022. Keselowski was second followed by Todd Gilliland, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Joey Logano, Austin Dillon, Kurt Busch, Erik Jones, Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott.

Blaney started the second stage at the point on Lap 72. The next 60 laps proved fairly tame with Truex cycling back to the front for the second stage win. But the fireworks ignited over the final 50 laps.

Keselowski, who led a race-high 67 laps, assumed the lead for the sixth and final to start the stage. His lead ended when Tyler Reddick, who was running ninth, became loose in the pack after breaking a right rear toe link on Lap 152. When he overcorrected, Reddick spun into the right front of Truex’s No. 19 Toyota on the frontstretch. Kurt Busch and Joey Logano turned into the grass to avoid the accident, but not before Busch made contact with Truex.

Cindric took over the lead on Lap 160. The pack maintained a single-file formation with Blaney continuing to push the No. 2 Ford. Cindric exchanged the point with Wallace on the outside lane until Ricky Stenhouse Jr. got a run and took the lead on Lap 179.

With 12 to go, the leaders with Stenhouse at the point caught a pack of lapped-down cars and moved high to avoid slower vehicles. Two laps later, Larson had a run coming down the front stretch and hit the rear of Kevin Harvick’s car.

“It’s disappointing,” said Larson, who finished 32nd. “I had a run there on the No. 4 (Harvick). I didn’t realize how close he was to the No. 17 (Buescher). I got to him right as he was getting to him and it got him out of shape. I hate that I did that. It’s so hard see in front of him, especially on the straightaway like that.”

Harvick, who was running third, tagged the rear of Chris Buescher then spun left into Noah Gragson. Chase Elliott and Todd Gilliland received the damage in the Lap191 melee. NASCAR red-flagged the race for five minutes. Cars began to roll again with nine laps remaining and Stenhouse in the lead.

The race returned to green and Cindric pulled out to the lead. Before the field completed one lap, Keselowski turned Stenhouse into Wallace. Stenhouse then spun back into the wall and clipped Chris Buescher.

Cindric pulled low in front of Blaney on the restart with two to go. Wallace continued to pound the back of the No. 12 Ford over the final lap with Keselowski on the outside. Blaney felt comfortable enough to try the high lane, but Cindric put on the block and he hit the wall. Wallace made his move but fell short.

“What could have been, right? Man, need to talk about some happy stuff here,” Wallace said. “Just dejected, but the thing that keeps me up is just the hard work that we put into our speedway stuff and the hard work from everybody at 23XI, proud of them, can't thank them enough.

“I knew this was a big move last year for me to go out and be competitive, and we're showing that. It's always the first race of the season and you're getting through everything, but when you come out of the gates like that, it's empowering, it's encouraging. So thanks, everybody, back at the shop, McDonald's, almost got them another one, back-to-back superspeedway wins. That would have been awesome, especially with it being the 500. But just short.”

Cindric celebrated with a burnout on the front stretch, apologizing in advance for burning down the engine.

“I'm surrounded by great people,” Cindric said. “That's all there is to it. I know there's going to be highs and lows, being a rookie in a field of drivers this strong. I'm just grateful for the opportunity, excited to climb the mountain we've got ahead of us on the 2 team.

“But we're in the playoffs. That's one good box checked. My gosh, what an awesome group of fans, what an awesome race car. Just really thankful.”