SPEEDWAY, Ind. – Sitting on his pit box, crew chief Randall Burnett shared the thoughts of many during the overtime finish of Sunday’s (July 31) NASCAR Cup race on Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course.
“Where did that guy come from?”
As Tyler Reddick‘s No. 8 Chevrolet streaked down the backstretch of IMS’ 14-turn road course, he was unexpectedly racing behind the No. 1 of Ross Chastain.
To everyone watching, it looked like Reddick was battling Chastain to win the second annual Verizon 200.
Well, the images on your screen were not what they appeared.
Moments earlier, Reddick had led the charge as a mass of cars raced toward Turn 1 on the restart.
Like plenty of restarts before, cars did everything and went everywhere: they spun, rubbed doors and became one with the Turn 1 grass.
It was mayhem.
“No other form of motorsports, no other race that’s ever been put on in this place (like that) other than NASCAR, man, that’s all I can say to describe it,” Austin Cindric said later. “Last time I’ve really been a part of something like that was rally cross, that’s kind of the context for it. I figured it would be a bit that way with not having steel fenders anymore, but that was a lot.”
Amid all that chaos, as Cindric drove beneath Daniel Suarez, Ryan Blaney and AJ Allmendinger – yes, they were four-wide – NBC’s cameras caught a blue and black car streak onto the access road that split off from Turn 1.
That was Chastain.
Located right up against outside wall as everything began unfolding underneath him, Chastain judged he wouldn’t make the right-hand turn and made his decision.
Chastain claimed it was “just pure reaction” on his part.
“I thought we were four wide, and couldn’t go any farther right, and decided to take the NASCAR access lane out there,” Chastain said. “I took it in practice on exit, overshooting Turn 1. You know where (the escape routes are) at and in (Turn) 12 you have to go around the loop there. …
“Just wanted to not get hit and merged back on where I merged.”
That was to the left of Reddick as he raced through Turn 3.
“I was trying to watch on TV and then it flashed away and was showing the cars wrecking and they flashed back to Tyler and (Chastain) is right there,” Burnett said. “I saw one car go blowing through the whole thing. I didn’t realize that’s where he came out. I was trying to get caught up.”
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