Ricky Stenhouse Jr claimed his first win of the 2024 season in a photo finish at Talladega.
The 37-year-old took victory at the YellaWood 500 over Brad Keselowski and William Byron by a mere 0.006 seconds in a three-wide finish to the line.
Stenhouse Jr becomes the third non-NASCAR playoff driver to win a playoff race, following in the footsteps of Chris Buescher at Watkins Glen and Ross Chastain at Kansas.
The No. 47 JTG Daughtery Racing driver has been well out of the running this season, with Talladega being only his sixth top 10 finish this season. The win puts Stenhouse Jr into 24th in the drivers’ standings.
Ricky Stenhouse Jr pinpoints the execution of his final pit stop as the ‘winning move’ at Talladega
The 37-year-old lost the stage one victory to Buescher after a late overtake and narrowly avoided the biggest crash in Talladega’s history five laps from the end.
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28 cars were involved in a pile-up that took out several playoff contenders, including Austin Cindric who was hit by Keselowski and spun into the pack.
Stenhouse Jr was to the right of Cindric and was hit on the left side by the No. 2 driver before he spun into the field and caused the ‘big one’. Luckily for the No. 47, he continued on his way and narrowly held on to victory.
Speaking with Kevin Harvick on Victory Lap, Stenhouse Jr outlined what was the ‘winning move’ for his victory as he lauded his team’s efforts over the weekend.
“For me and my team I feel like we put a lot of preparation into our race car, making it drive good, making sure that I can take pushes, I can push people.
“We don’t qualify very well but we race really well, and then we do a lot of pre-event work on how to time that last green flag pit stop, making sure that I get a good enough track position throughout the start of that third stage and safe enough fuel at the same time so that our pit stop can be as short as possible.
“And I think that was the winning move for us really, was just making sure that we executed that last pit stop. We were able to leave put road with the No. 9 behind us and eventually that whole line ended up being that outside line and kept us on the front row battling for the win.”
What does the NASCAR playoff picture look like now?
Following the massive accident at Talladega which affected several playoff drivers, the final race of the Round of 12 at the Bank of America Roval 400 could be an even more aggressive affair.
For Cindric and Chase Briscoe, it is effectively a win-or-be-eliminated situation, while Daniel Suarez, Tyler Reddick and Chase Elliott will also be under pressure after they were caught up in the crash.
William Byron has gained enough points to qualify for the last eight, as his third place at Talladega means he leads the standings over Christopher Bell by 17 points.
With the Roval presenting an equally challenging course and with the stakes high for several drivers, expect another chaotic edition of the NASCAR playoffs at Charlotte.