North Wilkesboro All Star Review, Bubba Controversy, and Coke 600 Preview | Chasing The Cup S2:E14

In this episode of Chasing the Cup, the host discusses the results of the all-star race, with Kyle Larson winning and some criticism about the lack of passing. The host suggests that the next-gen car and the race format may have contributed to the boring race. There is also controversy surrounding Bubba Wallace, as he was criticized for his comments and for flipping the bird after the race. The host discusses a fan tuning into Bubba's radio frequency and the debate about whether it was racist or not. Kyle Larson also wins the truck race at North Wilkesboro, and Haley Deegan gets into some incidents during the race. The host previews the upcoming races at Charlotte and gives their predictions. The episode ends with news updates and a reminder about Memorial Day. Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of Chasing the Cup. I'm your host Will England and in this episode I'm going to be revealing the races from North Wilkesboro. I'll also go over the news and I'm going to preview this weekend's races at Charlotte including the Coca-Cola 600 but first let's take a look at the results for the all-star race. Kyle Larson puts on a dominant performance and wins his third NASCAR all-star race tying him with Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt. One more and he'll tie with Jimmy Johnson for first all-time and he's followed by Bubba Wallace in second, Tyler Riddick in third, Chase Briscoe in fourth, Chase Elliott in fifth, Ryan Blaney in sixth, Daniel Suarez in seventh, Eric Jones in eighth, Ty Gibbs in ninth and Joey Logano rounds out the top ten and there's no and or buts about it. This race was boring there wasn't that much passing going on and Kyle Larson just straight up dominated on fresh rubber at one time going up to a 12 second lead over the field and in my opinion the reasons why were of course because of the next-gen car with how bad the racing is at short tracks particularly at night I'm pretty sure one of the reasons why this race was like luster compared to Richmond was probably because it was at night there's something that seems to be going on with this car when ran at night at a short track because Richmond was in a day and it was great Martinsville was an outlier because of how the track is designed where you have to shift hopefully NASCAR can come up with a solution for that with Martinsville but the solution for North Wilkesboro probably is a day race because the all-star open was really good there's plenty of beating making short track action going on had tempers flare between Michael McDowell and Ty Gibbs it was fun to watch but the all-star race was not and also I think the other reason was probably because of the all-star race format everyone was just saving their tires for the end because no one wanted to make a pit stop under green in those last 100 laps so in my opinion we need smaller segments like most all-star races are they have several segments that keep the races together and not too long runs it worked for the clash because it's a tight narrow track for contact is pretty much a given because of how small it is but here the track is too wide to have a lot of contact so you need to keep things together by throwing cautions and there was only one other caution besides halftime and that was I believe for a car spinning out or hitting the wall I believe it was Ricky Stenhouse that did but besides that the race went mostly caution free so if we're going back to North Wilkesboro next year for the all-star race we need to come up with a new format and now we have to cover the controversy of the weekend with Bubba Wallace it all started after the truck race when local news outlets talked to him about being booed and he said he doesn't care about that all he cares about is if he has a good payday and a lot of the right wing sports commentators went after him on that slamming him on it like like annoyed sports but that wasn't it for Bubba Wallace after the all-star race Bubba Wallace right before he spoke he flipped the bird and apparently it was not done maliciously and it was apparently done to a friend as like an inside joke and I know some friends that do that but Bubba there's a time and place for that that was not the time and place whether or not it was malicious it was a bad time and a bad place to do it and once again the right wing sports media slammed him on that and when NASCAR said that they were not going to penalize him the right wing sports media said that that was the wrong choice but to be honest in my opinion it was probably the best choice to make because NASCAR drivers always flip someone off on TV because there are drivers that get mad at other drivers like with Sam Mayer and Rye Trix earlier this year so I think that was the right choice there unless he had done it maliciously toward the fans but that was not the case and finally of course we are going to talk about the radio after the race a fan decided to tune in to Bubba Wallace's radio frequency on a radio and said that Bubba Wallace sucked and he should not be in NASCAR and a lot of the left wing NASCAR fans and left wing sports media outlets said that this was done with racist intentions meanwhile the right wing sports media said that there was nothing racist about it and said that they can do it because it's free speech and before I give my opinion on it let me just say that what this fan did was bad to do whether if it's legal or not it's not the right thing to do to just tune in to someone's radio frequency and start telling them they suck but in my opinion it does not sound like that the intention was racism there were no racial slurs used and if it were racism why is no one going after Kyle Larson or Daniel Suarez or Raja Karuth or Haley Deegan or Tony Breidinger I'm pretty sure they were just going after Bubba because of the several things that he has done on and off the track not because of racism things like going on to CNN and playing a victim after it was proven that the garage pull was not a noose as well as kind of being a jerk like splashing water into Alex Bowman's face while he's suffering a heatstroke and of course wrecking Larson blatantly at Las Vegas that's what most NASCAR fans don't like about Bubba Wallace not racism but the left-wing NASCAR fans still claim racism when that's not even the case like what Jet MDK was implying when he made his video on it what he said was absurd he implied that 85% of Bubba Wallace haters which probably make up most NASCAR fans today are racists he didn't blatantly say that that they hated Bubba Wallace because of racism but it's clear that he implied it that's just not the case and that's just an absurd thing to say so I will not say that this was done with racism as motive until I know what the motive is whether or not if NASCAR finds the man who did it but to be honest I'm not sure if they will find the man because they never found the guy who talked to Kyle Busch and told Alex Bowman to shut up in the 2018 Coca-Cola 600 and to be honest I don't think they're gonna find this guy I think it'll continue to go down as one of NASCAR's biggest mysteries but to be honest unless this man comes out clean I will not say that this was done with racism as the motive like Jet MDK and Darian from Black Flags Matter said I will not do that I will not assume racism unless proven and finally for the truck race Kyle Larson sweeps the weekend by getting the truck series victory at North Wilkesboro by dominating and he's followed by Ty Majewski in second Matt DiBenedetto in third Carson Josevar in fourth Bubba Wallace in fifth Corey Heim in sixth Matt Crafton in seventh Chase Purdy in eighth Ross Chastain in ninth and Grant Infinger rounds out the top ten and this race compared to the cup race it was great to watch there's plenty of passing going on a lot of beating and bagging short track action a lot of tempers flaring it was a fun race to watch despite Kyle Larson dominating but we gotta talk about Haley Deegan there were some moments during the race that she got into a couple of drivers although she started 10th she started to fall back after her team decided to stay out and a lot of the guys on fresher tires started to pass her and that led her getting into once again Johnny Sauter that seems to be some sort of rivalry that's being made between Sauter and Deegan but that was not the only driver that got into Deegan after that caution the green flag came out Haley Deegan got into Timmy Hill and Timmy Hill's crew chief was ticked saying that Timmy should go and pay her back but I don't think he would ever do that but it was not over there was one other driver that got into it with Deegan and that was Dean Thompson I'm not sure what was going on between the five and the 13 but in turn one Haley Deegan dumped Dean Thompson and that led to Dean Thompson hitting the wall and DNFing and afterward he said there were some drivers that race with you with no respect when talking about Haley Deegan so I'm not sure what was going on I'm not sure if they were beating and banging with each other before Deegan dumped them but Haley Deegan ended up salvaging a 20th place finish after all that and in my opinion this was probably Haley Deegan's worst showing because she got into two guys ruined their days and although she had a lot of speed at the beginning and toward the end when she ended up 20th she was kind of slow all day remaining laps down after getting into Johnny Sauter but it wasn't all her fault for getting laps down but when it comes to getting the drivers she needs to stop making enemies on the racetrack like what happened between her and Timmy Hill and Dean Thompson because she has a lot to learn and although she has some great speed she does not seem to be very competitive right now for top 10 spots she is not very consistent at all so Haley you need to improve if you want to make the playoffs because you went from being close to the cut line to now your gap being expanded to 54 points so if you're going to make the playoffs you need to start finishing in the top 10 more as well as finishing in the top 5 and getting that first win and so overall in my opinion this weekend was successful although the all-star race sucked the all-star open was fun to watch and the track race was also great to watch and according to people that were at the track it was a near sellout and everyone seemed to have a fun time because of all the activities that were going on which in my opinion is a great thing to have at a NASCAR event with all the concerts and all the fun and everyone having a great time in my opinion if there's no other choices for the all-star race next year I think I'd like to see the all-star race come back to North Wilkesboro again to have another shot after NASCAR improves the package and I think Goodyear also has a better tire that they're going to use soon for short ovals and I hope one day if SMI decides to move the all-star race North Wilkesboro gets a points paying date on the schedule which in my opinion will lead to better racing because it'll be a lot better to watch 36 cars on track than 27 and so with that out of the way let's get to the news reserved grandstand seating and camping has been sold out for this weekend's coca-cola 600 next we have the North Wilkesboro TV readings FS1 got a 1.28 rating and 2.203 million viewers for the all-star race which is down from a 1.38 and 2.481 million viewers last year that was for the overall broadcast but according to Adam Stern the race specific portion on FS1 was almost blacked so I'd say less people were tuned in to the pre-race than usual but the race was about the same I think the main cause for the 200,000 viewer difference is probably because of the Dallas Fort Worth market I'm pretty sure that market was down compared to last year because the race wasn't in that market and we got some rumors going on with the new TV contract Adam Stern has reported that the Xfinity series may potentially move to streaming exclusively with Amazon the likely partner as well as the six race stint in the summer similar to what TNT had in 2014 but according to Adam Stern nothing is close to being finalized but his sources predict that NASCAR will have handshake deals before Independence Day weekend so I'd say we'll get an announcement sometime in July about the new TV contract Lettuce Entertainment U restaurants has been named the official food and beverage partner the NASCAR Chicago Street Race weekend and it was officially announced that supercar champion Shane Van Gisbergen will drive for Trek House Project 91 at the Chicago Street Course another former NASCAR driver has also considered returning and that driver is Casey Kane who retired during the 2018 season due to health issues Casey said that he thinks it would be great to run a stock car again because he was struggling with this health pretty bad during that time but he said that he feels better and said he would like to get back behind the wheel and finally Jordan Taylor will be driving for Colic Racing in the number 10 at Portland and so that's it for this week's news now it's time to preview this weekend's races at Charlotte including the Coca-Cola 600 starting off with the truck race we have the North Carolina Education Lottery 200 the race will be 134 laps and 200 miles and the race will be on May 26th at 8 30 p.m. Eastern Time and because there are no cup guys running this race my pick is going to be Carson Josevar. Carson Josevar was so close to winning last year before he got into Ryan Preece and wrecking out and of course that led to the infamous don't do that meme but I think this time after getting his first win at Texas I think Carson Josevar will get a second win by winning at Charlotte next up for the Xfinity race we have the Osco Uniforms 300 the race will be 200 laps and 300 miles and the race will be on May 27th at 1 p.m. Eastern Time and so for my pick I'm gonna go with Chandler Smith Chandler Smith got his first career Xfinity series win at Richmond and he was so close to winning at Las Vegas before being passed by Austin Hale for the win on the last lap I think this time Chandler Smith will get his first mile and a half win in the Xfinity series by winning at Charlotte and finally for the cup race we have the Coca-Cola 600 the race will be 400 laps and 600 miles and the race will be on May 28th at 6 p.m. Eastern Time and so for my pick I'm gonna go with Kyle Larson. Kyle Larson has been very fast this year and because it is the longest race of the year I think the best of the best will make their way toward the front and I think Kyle Larson will end up getting the victory by dominant margin by winning at Charlotte and so that's it for this week's episode if you enjoyed it please like and subscribe for more if you're going out to Charlotte this weekend I hope you have a good time and if you're not have a good time wherever you are and remember on this Memorial Day weekend that many have lost their lives defending our country and I ask you to never forget those who have lost their lives on the battlefield and so that's it for now I'll see you next week