Richmond and Texas Recap, Bristol Dirt Preview, and More | Chasing The Cup S2:E9

The host of Chasing the Cup gives a quick recap of the races at Richmond and Texas. He mentions notable finishers, highlights the action during the races, and gives his opinion on the quality of the races. He also provides news updates on sponsorships, penalties, and upcoming races at Bristol on the dirt. The host gives his picks for the truck and cup races at Bristol. He ends by inviting viewers to like and subscribe, and wishing those attending the race a good time. Hello everyone, welcome back to another episode of Chasing the Cup, I'm your host Flo Engel and in this episode, I'm going to be doing a quick recap of the races at Richmond in Texas. I'm also going to go over the news that I'm going to preview this weekend's races at Bristol on the Dirt. But first, let's do a quick recap of Richmond and Texas. The reason why I'm only doing a quick recap this week is because I'm preparing to go to this weekend's races at Dirt Bristol, so to save me some time with editing, I'm just going to do a quick recap here. So here's a couple of notable finishers. Kyle Larson gets his first win of the season, shotting the scheme that Ricky Hendrick drove. On what would have been his birthday, which is sad. Josh Berry finishes second, subbing in for Chase Elliott. Ty Gifts has been very consistent the past few weeks. This is his third top ten in a row. Michael McDowell nearly gets a top five, but has to settle for sixth. And Chandler Smith, in his first ever cup start, finishes a respectable seventeenth. Not bad for the young driver, who also got his first win in the Xfinity series the previous day. It was a great weekend for him overall, and overall this was a great race. There was plenty of passing going on and some action, which is quite unusual for modern Richmond races. Usually there's snooze fest, but the leaders spread out by three seconds. It was kind of like that during long green flag runs. We're not immune to that, but there was plenty of more action going on than there had been in the past several years. In my opinion, this was probably the best Richmond race since 2016 spring, when Carl Edwards moved Kyle Busch. It's been truly a long time, but in my opinion, it does not reach the pinnacle of Richmond, which was back in the early 2000s. But this new package has definitely made it a lot better than even with the gen six. Probably because this is the least amount of downforce that the cup cars have had in a long time. And also, the fox booth was also really solid this week. Larry Mack and Mike Choi do very well with each other, and also Clint Boyer was good as well. But for the Xfinity race, Chandler Smith finally breaks through and gets his first career win. Cass Rolla has a good run in fourth. Cole Custer finally snaps that up his bad luck streak and finishes fifth. And Derek Krause, in his first ever Xfinity start, rounds out the top ten. Very impressive run for him. And this race wasn't as good as the cup race, but it was still pretty good. Most of the race was basically new Richmond. It was kind of a snoozer. But in the closing laps, it definitely got a little more action packed. Thanks to Jeremy Clements stalling on pit road because his battery wasn't working. And finally, we have the truck race at Texas. Carson Josafar finally breaks through and gets his first career win. Chase Spurdy finishes second. Good run for him. Jake Garcia finishes top five, and he barely beats out Haley Deegan for that top five spot, and she finishes sixth. She ties her best career finish and gets her first top ten of the season, and with Thor Sport. And she seems to be finally pulling things together over the past few weeks after her bad start this year at Daytona in Las Vegas. Ryan Barkus finishes eighth. Good run for him. And Mason Massey finishes eleventh. Decent run for him in that 33 for the Ram brothers. And man, this was a wreck fest. But I'd say the best NASCAR series that runs in Texas is the truck series, in my opinion. And also, there was plenty of action going on. It almost looked like the IndyCar race and the IndyCar race was spectacular. So in my opinion, I think Texas needs to stop putting resin down for NASCAR. Because in my opinion, the truck series was pretty good despite being a wreck fest, and the IndyCar race was spectacular. And overall, a solid weekend for Richmond, and probably one of the best weekends Texas Motor Speedway has had in a long time. And so with that out of the way, let's get to the news. TPG has renewed its sponsorship of Team Penske's IndyCar and NASCAR teams. Richard Petty and Daryl Waltrip, who were two rivals back when Daryl Waltrip was starting his career, will be the co-grand marshals for the All-Star race. Next up, we have CODA penalties, first with Daniel Suarez, who was fined $50,000 for running into another competitor on Pitt Road following the race. And if you didn't see the video, Daniel Suarez drove like a madman during the Koolhawk lap. He ran into everyone without a care. He got into his teammate, he got into Alex Bowman. That was just very immature of him, especially since he's been doing this for a long time. He shouldn't have done that. Next up, we have news on the Hendrick penalty. The appeals panel rescinded all the points, allowing Hendrick Motorsports to have their points back, but the monetary fines and the suspensions still stand. So it'll still be the largest combined fine in NASCAR history, but there will be no points penalties. Let's just say NASCAR wasn't too happy about that part. They were happy that they were penalized, but they were not happy that they did not get their points taken away. Moose Fraternity has returned to Trekhaus Racing to sponsor Ron Chastain in four races. Jonathan Davenport, who will be driving in the Cup Series this weekend for Colic, will be running a truck race with Spire Motorsports, probably in place for Chase Elliott, who did it last year. Dexter Stacey will be driving for MBM Motorsports at Talladega in the 66. Joey Logano will be driving for Thor Sport Racing for the Bristol Dirt Truck Race this weekend. Blue Cross and Blue Shield has joined McDonald's as one of the founding partners for the Chicago Street Course. Big Machine Racing team owner Scott Borchetta was hospitalized last weekend after wrecking in a TA2 race at Road Atlanta. And so that's it for this week's news, now it's time to preview this weekend's races at Bristol on the Dirt. Starting off with the truck race, we have the Weatherguard Truck Race on Dirt. The race will be 150 laps and 75 miles, and the race will be on April 8th at 8 p.m. ET. And so from my pick, I'm going to go with Stork Friesen. Stork Friesen last year, being there at the race, he had a really fast truck, but Stork was unable to contend for the win, but I think this time, Stork Friesen being the Dirt Master that he is, I think he'll win at Bristol on the Dirt. And finally, for the cup race, we have the Food City Dirt Race. The race will be 250 laps and 125.5 miles, and the race will be on April 9th at 7 p.m. ET. And so from my pick, I'm going to go with Chase Briscoe. Chase Briscoe was so close to winning last year, but he ended up getting into Tyler Reddick, and they both spun out of the lead on the last lap, allowing Kyle Busch to pass Reddick on the front straightaway. But I think this time, I think Chase Briscoe is going to bounce back and get his first win of the season by winning at Bristol on the Dirt. 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 the Bristol Dirt Race this weekend, I hope you have a good time. If you're not having a good time wherever you are, I'll be there, and I bet you it'll be a fun time. I'll probably record some footage. If you're going out to Bristol this weekend, I'd recommend you to check out my Local's Guide to Bristol. The link will be in the description. But that's it for now. I'll see you next week.