No one is safe at Superspeedways. No matter where your favorite driver is on track, they are still at risk of a crash. However, many drivers have long used one strategy to not only survive a Superspeedway race but contend for the win. However, is it time to put this mythical strategy to rest?
Racing at Daytona, Talladega, or even Atlanta Motor Speedway really is a game of chance. You can run at the front and get wrecked by an aggressive push. Or, you can hang towards the front or front half of the pack and get caught up in those accidents that start at the very front. But what about hanging out back?
Many drivers practice this idea during Superspeedway races, hoping that hanging out back will allow them to dodge major accidents throughout the majority of the race. Out back, of course, until the right time to work their way to the front.
While it may not win you a race, sometimes it’s more important to finish well at these drafting tracks than to win. Drivers like veteran Cup Series winner Ryan Newman have used this strategy, and even some part-timers like Jordan Anderson have used it to success in the past.
Some drivers have laid back even in the Playoffs, such as 2023 NASCAR Cup Series Champion Ryan Blaney, who led only seven laps in his Playoff win at Talladega last fall. However, Denny Hamlin laid back this past weekend in Atlanta. It didn’t go so well for the veteran.
Atlanta is unique from other drafting tracks on the NASCAR schedule. The Intermediate Superspeedway hybrid track keeps drivers on the edge of their seats.
Denny Hamlin entered Atlanta in a comfortable spot. However, the race itself was not so comfortable. It was clear early on that hanging out back was Denny’s strategy. Even after the race, he admitted on his podcast, Actions Detrimental, that this was the plan all along.
Atlanta not only has those typical drafting wrecks, but it can pull a driver’s car out from under them; ask Kyle Larson, who had a violent wreck at Atlanta. Of course, someone would have to try hanging out back to avoid the big wrecks, and it worked for the most part, with Denny missing five accidents.
However, as the race came toward its conclusion, Denny didn’t seem to move up, almost as if the strategy was gone or as if there was no strategy at all. Denny ended up in an 11-car accident on the final lap, resulting in a 24th-place finish.
Of course, Denny heard comments from all around NASCAR about this, with Denny saying on Actions Detrimental that a late debris caution changed his plan, or at least what he thought would happen late in the race.
“It was about to happen. And then a caution came, and then, okay, now we got a five-lap dash. So that took out six laps of that really intense time that typically those wrecks happened. So. Hey, it just didn’t work out.” — Denny Hamlin on Actions Detrimental
This survival strategy may not work anymore, and that may not be for the worst. Fans and former drivers like Kevin Harvick were displeased with Hamlin’s “scared strategy.”
The Next-Gen car further complicates the plans of any team and driver using this strategy to win or, like Hamlin, merely finish the race. The Next Gen’s fuel window makes it all the more difficult to plan out.
While the car’s maneuverability eliminates many of the great late-race runs that drivers used to make to get to the front, this maneuverability is especially bad on Atlanta Motor Speedway’s narrow, packed surface.
However, it may not be as dead as some think. Remember that Ryan Blaney led just a handful of laps before winning at Talladega last year, and in the 2023 Spring race, Kyle Busch led just three.
Life intervened in Hamlin’s plan with the debris caution and the last lap crash. However, Hamlin did say on Actions Detrimental, “If I qualified up front, I would have tried to stay up front.”
So maybe this wasn’t a strategy, rather, just a means of finishing close to his starting spot. This means perhaps this strategy may not be dead, and some familiar faces could lay back early on when we get to Talladega.
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Another race weekend in the books. While Ryan Blaney battled back from several pit road setbacks to win his second straight race at Phoenix, other drivers were much to be desired. It was a big win for Penske but for several others, they leave the first “real” race of the season scratching their head with a lot that they need to figure out. Here are the biggest losers of NASCAR’s Spring 2026 Phoenix race weekend.
I’m afraid that this is starting to be habitual. Another race weekend at RCR for Kyle Busch, another terrible result. Well, the finish wasn’t exactly awful. While 17th is hardly up to Kyle’s standards, it’s about as good as it gets anymore for the two-time champion who hasn’t won a race in nearly a hundred starts.
To start things off, there was a reason to be cautiously optimistic about the future of that RCR No. 8 Chevy. New crew chief. Personnel changes. A new Chevy body. He even scored the pole for the 68th running of the Daytona 500 last month. But, since then, it has been a sharp slope downward. He was mostly a non-factor in the first three races. And, today, it seemed like the No. 8 Chevy was out to lunch. They unloaded slow. They qualified in the back of the pack. And, before Stage 1 even ended, Kyle was running 34th with no apparent issues and went a lap down to leader Ryan Blaney. To add insult to injury, Kyle Bush had a tire go down on him three times today. More than any other driver. It appears to be back to the drawing board for team No. 8.
You could say that the Hendrick No. 48 team had a rough weekend in general. But I think it would be more accurate to say that the entire start to 2026 has been catastrophic. Heading into today’s race, even with Bowman starting the first three races of the season, the No. 48 team was 36th in points, last among all full-time drivers. Even Cody Ware was ahead of him. If that’s not bad, I don’t know what is.
To rub salt in the wound, their driver missed today at Phoenix due to showing symptoms of vertigo. So, Anthony Alfredo was into sub and…it went about as well as you’d expect. He went a lap down early and never recovered. He got caught up in the incident involving Joey Logano and DNF’d. Officially, they scored a 33rd finishing position. This is the worst start Bowman could ever imagine, considering that he’s in a contract year.
I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that I’ve lost my marbles. “Come on, dude! Penske just swept the weekend! How can they be losers?” Hear me out. Let’s start first with the two other Penske drivers, shall we? Joey Logano caused not one, but two multi-car pileups, one involving his Penske teammate, Austin Cindric. Cars were utterly destroyed. Before that, both Cindric and Logano were running solidly in the top 10.
So, it’s not for a lack of speed that they make our Biggest Losers list. The reason they’re listed here is that a lot of their problems today, if not all of them, were self-inflicted. Logano was driving sloppily and that took out Cindric. And even race winner Ryan Blaney almost lost this race on pit road numerous times. Rookie mistakes by the pit crew constantly had him charging from behind. Pit road penalties. He was like a yo-yo going back and forth throughout the field. What saved him in the end was that, on that last restart, Blaney took two tires and Christopher Bell took 4. If that had not happened, it is extremely possible that Blaney ultimately would have lost the race and it would have been because of their numerous mistakes in the pits.
They got lucky this week. They probably won’t get that lucky again. They need to clean up those nagging, senseless mistakes.
Ole, Danny boy. If Alex Bowman’s seat is the hottest in the series, Daniel Suarez has to be the second hottest in the garage. That No. 7 car has been a revolving door of drivers for the last several years and it looks like Suarez is shaping up to be Spire’s latest victim. It’s the same old story with the team: they show impressive speed in qualifying and even early on in the race. But rarely do they ever put a full race together. That criticism isn’t just for Suarez, it applies to the team across the board.
But Carson Hocevar is the team’s golden child. He’s not going anywhere. And the team seems pretty high on Michael McDowell at the moment. That leaves Suarez looking like the odd man out, a seat-warmer, if you will. He needs to perform. And, he’s done well to start, admittedly. But he qualified 5th for today’s race. He even earned a few stage points in the opening stage. Then, he faltered and left the race with an unceremonious whimper. Ultimately, after he was no longer a factor, he was caught up in a mid-race wreck. He finished 30th. That’s a tough pill to swallow for the Mexican-born driver. If he wants to keep his ride next year, he needs to show stark improvement in the coming weeks. I have a strong feeling that that ride is about to be a highly sought-after commodity once silly season rolls around.
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The first checkered flag of the 2026 rendition of the NASCAR West Coast Swing (as abbreviated as it is) has officially flown. It was an exciting race, full of close, tight-cornered racing, a plethora of tire issues littered throughout, and a couple of heartbreaking, hard hits. Surviving it all was Ryan Blaney, who captured the flag in the Straight Talk 500 at Phoenix Raceway. He survived pit road mishaps and passed a total of 49 cars to win the race today. It marks his 18th career victory, sweeping the weekend for Team Penske. So, for Blaney and Team Penske, the race was the highest of highs. Not everyone escaped unscathed, though. Here are the key takeaways from NASCAR’s spring date at Phoenix.
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Following a relatively clean first stage, Stage number 2 and beyond was littered with cautions. Most of these cautions were a result of tires going down after only about 20 laps or so of use. But the caution on Lao 216 was purely driver error. Joey Logano, who was running 7th at the time, made a move down on the apron approaching the finish line. Chaos ensued. Here’s what happened.
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