Las Vegas Review, Homestead Miami Preview, and More | Chasing The Cup S1:E33

In this episode, the host reviews the races from Las Vegas, highlighting Joey Logano's win and the incident between Kyle Larson and Bubba Wallace. The host criticizes Wallace's reaction and discusses the impact on the championship point standings. The host also talks about the Xfinity race, mentioning Josh Berry's win and Hailey Deegan's debut. The host speculates on Deegan's future in Xfinity. In other news, there is a split decision between Gene Haas and Tony Stewart on who will drive the 41 car next year. Chevrolet has clinched the 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series Manufacturers Championship. Kurt Busch has announced his retirement from full-time racing, with Tyler Reddick replacing him. The host previews the upcoming races at Homestead, making predictions for the Truck, Xfinity, and Cup races. The host also shares some news about crew chief changes and upcoming events, like the possibility of a street race in New York City. Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of Choosing the Cup. I'm your host, Will, and as an end to this episode, I'm going to be reviewing the races from Las Vegas. I'll also go over the news and I'm going to preview the Antepenultimate weekend at Homestead. But first, let's take a look at the results from Las Vegas. Joey Logano picks up another win at Las Vegas and he becomes the first driver to advance to the championship four, followed by Ross Chastain in second, Kyle Busch in third, Chase Briscoe in fourth, Danny Hamblin in fifth, Tyler Rettick in sixth, Martin Truex Jr. in seventh, Eric Jones in eighth, AJ Ombenegger in ninth, and Austin Dillon rounds out the top ten. And this race was just fantastic. You had multiple groups of racing and there was plenty of action going on and it was a fantastic race. Up there with some of the best races this year, including the Coca-Cola 600, but we gotta talk about some things. First let's call out the obvious, and that is the incident between Kyle Larson and Bubba Wallace. So coming off of turn four, Larson over-drove the corner and put Bubba in the wall. But then Bubba, in a fit of rage, he came down and right hooked him, straight up. He got on the throttle and right hooked him and sent Kyle Larson straight into the wall and he collected also Christopher Bell, who was a championship contender. And then after they got out, Bubba was pissed off and he went over Kyle Larson and started shoving him and punching. And then afterward, Bubba was like, my steering just broke. Stop pushing me, NBC. And Kyle Larson said that maybe he'll think twice before he does it again. In my opinion, Bubba Wallace was definitely overreacting. Definitely. You can't just right hook someone on the straightaway like that with how these cars take hits during their sides right now. Why would you do that? You've been one of the big complainers about how this car takes hits and you just turned Kyle Larson around to the wall. Are you stupid, Bubba? Come on, man. And then afterward, you're punching him. I mean, come on. You can't get more stupid than that. What are you doing? And afterward, they're not fishing you because it's obvious. You wrecked him on purpose. And you also skewed the championship point standings because you took out a championship contender. It's just stupid. And it shows how big of a hypocrite Bubba Wallace is. He's been saying throughout the year that he hurts because of the hits that he's taken with this car. But then, when he gets pissed off, he right hooks someone and they hit on the driver's side and they're like, uh, I don't care. And although I've done some defending for Bubba Wallace on this show, I cannot defend that. It's stuff like this that proves the haters right. This is why they hate him. Because of the things he says and does. Not because he's a bad driver. Besides the other incident back in 2020, this is probably going to be up there. It's one of the things that will lead to Bubba Wallace being a hated driver in the future. Bubba, you gotta think before you act. Because this is probably the stupidest thing you've done. And then, on the last lap, Ross Chastain was at it again. And he put Kyle Busch into the wall. And Kyle Busch was not happy afterward. I think that's Ross Chastain driving over his head a little bit again. And he was doing a lot of blocking on Lugano. And I guess he was blocking Busch too. That block went wrong on the final lap. And so overall, this race was excellent for the racing, but it gets taken down some points because of the Bubba Wallace shenanigans. But it was still a very great race. This car really does well on these mile and a halfs. Next up for Xfinity, Josh Berry becomes the first driver to advance into the championship 4 for the Xfinity series and gets his second straight Las Vegas fall win. Aced by Noah Gregson in second, Justin Allgaier in third, Ty Gibbs in fourth, Trevor Bain in fifth, Austin Hill in sixth, Sam Mayer in seventh, Daniel Hemrick in eighth, Brandon Jones in ninth, and Anthony Alfredo rounds out the top ten. And this race was good too, but it was not living up to the cup race because the current Xfinity car has some dirty air problems. Kind of like how the Gen 6 cup cars had. And so this race was pretty lackluster compared to cup when it comes to mile and a halves currently. And of course, this race was also highly anticipated because of Hailey Deegan's first Xfinity start and she comes home in 13th position in her first career start. And that's pretty excellent for an Xfinity debut. I think it's the best this year, although it's not the best in racing memory because Ty Gibbs won in his first start. But Hailey did a good job in her first try. 13th is not bad at all. I think it's the best of any driver making their debut in Xfinity this year. And I think after this race, she might be ready for Xfinity because she's ran better at this race track in Xfinity currently than she's ran this race track in trucks because she's DNFed both times because of how these truck races are. So to be honest, she could move up next year, but she's got to find some funding and a team owner that will believe in her. I think Storthaus could hire her next year if she brings in enough funding, but we'll have to see. And overall, a solid weekend for Las Vegas, an excellent cup race, and a good Xfinity race. Not as good as Cup, but it was still pretty good. So a very solid weekend for Vegas and Las Vegas shows that it seems to be one of the best mile and a half on the schedule right now. And so with that out of the way, let's get to the news. Starting off, I have some news that came out this morning and that is that Jennifer Friar has reported that there seems to be a split between Gene Haas and Tony Stort between who's to drive the 41 next year. Gene wants Cole Custer in the car and Tony wants Priest in the car. So it'll be interesting to see who they choose. Right now, there's a split decision on two drivers for the 41. Chevrolet has clinched the 2022 NASCAR Xfinity Series Manufacturers Championship. And also with the win, it is Chevy's 500th win all time in Xfinity. And here's the big news that broke over the weekend. Kurt Busch has announced that he'll be stepping away from full-time racing in 2023 and Tyler Reddick will replace him. Of course, I've talked about in the last episode when the news broke, but now it is official. Kurt Busch is done and Reddick will come and replace him. It's sad to see Kurt Busch's career shortened by the injury. I hope he continues to recover well. But I'm excited to see what Reddick can do in the car next year. Because of how he's ran at RCR, he can help build the 2311 team up. Kurt Busch has said that although he's done with full-time competition, he says that he may run part-time in a bucket list. Kind of like how Jimmy Johnson is going to do next year as well. Rockingham Speedway is about to begin a repave that should happen over the next few weeks and be done before December. And it's part of an effort to bring NASCAR back to the Rock. Blake Harris has been named the crew chief for Alex Bowman in 2023. And Blake Harris has done very well with Michael McDowell this year and he's helped build that front row team up. So I'm excited what he can do with Alex in that 48 next year. Dead on Tools returns to our motorsports for the Markersville race. Billboard award winning artist, Nettie Natasha will serve as the honorary pace car driver for the cup race at Miami. Brent will be returning to junior motorsports and Justin Allgaier for the 2023 Xfinity Series season. Alex Bowman will miss at least three more races as he continues to recover from his concussion. NASCAR is interested in having a street race in New York City. Of course, there's been some street racing in New York City and Brooklyn, but a decision still has to be made. So we'll see. And finally, Hentrick Motorsports has given Kyle Larson the green light to run the Memorial Day Double, which is both the Indy 500 and Coca-Cola 600. And so that's it for this week's news. Now it's time to preview the Antepenultimate Weekend at Homestead. Starting off, we have the Baptist Health Cancer Care 200. The race will be 134 laps and 201 miles. And the race will be on October 22nd at 1pm Eastern Time. And this will be, of course, the Truck Series penultimate race and will be the last race of the round of eight. And after this race, the Championship Four will be set for the Truck Series. So let's take a look at the playoff standings coming into Homestead. Ty Majewski is the only one locked in right now after the win at Bristol. Chandler Smith is 30 points above the cut line in second. Zane Smith is 18 points above the cut line in third. And Ben Rhodes is the last guy in with three points above the cut line in fourth. Christian Agus and Stork Friesen are both three points below in fifth and sixth with Agus getting the tiebreaker. John Henry Niemicek is five points below the cut line. And Grant Enfinger is 29 points above the cut line. So it looks like it'll be a must-win scenario for Grant Enfinger. But he'll be close around the cut line with a lot of drivers within the margin of error. And so for my pick, I'm going with Chandler Smith. Chandler Smith has run really well in that number 18 truck. And after Ian asked that he's moving to College next year, I think, with no pressure, I think he'll run really well and he'll win at Homestead and lock himself into the championship four for trucks. Next up for Xfinity, we have the contender boats 300. The race will be 200 laps and 300 miles. And the race will be on October 22nd after the truck race set for 30 p.m. Eastern time. And so for my pick, I'm going to go with Noah Gregson. Noah Gregson has shown good speed at Homestead, Miami, and he's been fast this year. And so I think this will be the race that he'll lock himself into the championship four by winning at Homestead. And finally for the cup race, we have the Dixie Vodka 400. The race will be 267 laps and 400.5 miles. And the race will be on October 23rd at 2.30 p.m. Eastern time. And so let's take a look at the weather for the cup race. On Sunday, it'll be mostly sunny with a thunderstorm in spots. The high will be 83 degrees. It'll be north to northeast at six miles per hour. And there'll be a 40% chance of rain. So rain is likely for the Homestead race. So expect a little bit of a rain delay. It is South Florida, so there might be some rain in the afternoon. So possibly expect a rain delay. And so for my pick, I'm going to go with William Byron. William Byron won this race last year. And although he's below the cut line right now, I think he will lock himself into the championship four by winning at Homestead. And so that's it for this week's episode. If you enjoyed it, please like and subscribe for more. And if you're going out to Homestead this weekend, I hope you have a good time. And if you're not, have a good time wherever you are. I'll see you next week for the penultimate weekend preview at Martinsville. Only two races to go this year.