1. Will the final laps of Atlanta prove to be costly for Ty Gibbs?
Entering the playoffs tied for the fewest playoff points, Ty Gibbs needed to find himself ahead of the curve by the end of the opening race at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
He had a modest first half with three stage points scattered through the first two stages, but he then came to life in the final stage, leading a total of 37 laps and leading as late as four laps to go. He had fallen back to fifth by the time Noah Gragson’s crash with two to go set up an overtime restart, and in the final two-lap shootout, Gibbs sunk all the way back to 17th.
What could’ve been a potential first Cup win or a huge day on the cut line instead ended with a mediocre finish and the No. 54 team just one point to the good. Gibbs has now led 503 laps in his Cup career, and he now ranks third all-time in laps led among non-winners in Cup, only trailing Joe Ruttman (807) and Mike Skinner (1,029).
It’s certainly not an ideal spot for Gibbs the next two races, but luckily for him, the next two races at Watkins Glen International and Bristol Motor Speedway are among his best tracks.
He finished fifth at Watkins Glen a year ago after running top five for the entire race, and he also finished fifth at Bristol last September, leading 102 laps in a race that was dominated by Joe Gibbs Racing.
Gibbs did even better at Bristol in March, as he led 137 laps, swept both stages and had control of the race in the final stage until a flat tire under green (among the many flat tires that day) cost him precious time and relegated him back to ninth, one lap down.
On paper, Gibbs easily has the pedigree and the speed to advance to the Round of 12. But Watkins Glen and Bristol are both wild cards in their own ways, and if the No. 54 team runs into the trouble in either race, the 15-ish points that Gibbs lost in the Atlanta finish could prove to be costly.
2. Is this Chase Elliott’s best chance of returning to victory lane on a road course?
In the early 2000s, it seemed inevitable that Dale Earnhardt Jr. or a Dale Earnhardt Inc. car would win at Daytona International Speedway or Talladega Superspeedway. In the mid-2010s, it seemed all but certain that Kevin Harvick would dominate at Phoenix Raceway en route to the win. And at road courses at the turn of the last decade, Chase Elliott was the man, as he scored wins in five of the six road course races held between August 2018 and October…
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