RICHMOND, Va. (AP) — Austin Dillon was first to the finish at Richmond.
The question is whether he crossed a different sort of line on his way there.
Dillon won for the first time in nearly two years in the Cup Series on Sunday night, but the race seemed out of reach before he spun Joey Logano out of the way and then sent Denny Hamlin into the wall as well — all in the final few seconds. Once the initial celebration ended, Dillon had quite a bit to answer for — but becoming a NASCAR villain for a few days may be a small price to pay for such a desperately needed victory.
“Absolutely a line was crossed, but it’s an invisible line,” Hamlin said. “It’s not defined. I mean, they have rules and provisions for stuff like this, but they never take action for it.”
Elton Sawyer, the senior vice president of competition, indicated NASCAR would take a good long look at the end of this race, but that doesn’t mean the penalties will outweigh the benefits of Dillon’s aggressiveness. He was outside the top 30 in the standings, but this one victory put him on track to make the playoffs.
“Our sport has been a contact sport for a long time. We always hear, ‘Where’s the line?’” Sawyer said. “I would say that the last lap was awful close to the line. We’ll take a look at all the available resources. ... If anything rises to a level that we feel like we need to penalize then we’ll do that on Tuesday.”
The reactions from other drivers were unsurprising. Logano was livid. Hamlin said the collision blew his shoulder out. Even Bubba Wallace — tangentially involved because Dillon leapfrogged him in the playoff race — tossed a few barbs the winner’s way.
There’s no denying the excitement of the wild finish. The 400-lap race had been pretty quiet for the first 398 or so. There wasn’t a single unplanned caution until a wreck involving Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Ryan Preece sent the race to overtime and likely robbed Dillon of a much less controversial win.
Until then, the race’s biggest story involved tire strategy. It was the first time in a points-paying Cup race that teams had multiple tire options, and that created some choices to analyze. It was an interesting topic, but not a particularly thrilling one.
Then Dillon bumped two veteran drivers out of the way to win.
“As far as good for the sport, I heard we were trending No. 1 on Twitter right now,” Dillon said. “People must be viewing it right now, so that’s good.”
NASCAR, of course, is no stranger to the larger debate about when aggressive driving becomes reckless driving. But a more modern development — the playoff race — probably played a role Sunday as well. The win-and-you’re-in nature of postseason qualification means the difference between first place and second can be massive.
“It’s just the rules of the sport, right? It is what it is,” Dillon said. “Wins get you into the next round.”
So Richmond turned into a perfect storm of sorts. A struggling driver had a chance — perhaps his last decent chance — to salvage a mediocre season. Dillon had every incentive to push the envelope and apologize later if need be.
Not that his team was all that apologetic.
“They would have done it to him, you know?” said owner Richard Childress, Dillon’s proud grandfather. “It’s one of those deals that when it comes down to winning a race and you’re in that position, you’re hungry, you do what it takes. That’s what I told him all his life.”
Unless NASCAR hands down unusually substantial penalties, it was probably worth it for Dillon — although he’ll want to watch his back for the rest of this season. Logano offered an ominous “wait and see” when asked how he’d race Dillon in the future.
Hamlin’s thoughts were about the big picture.
“What happens is you see young guys coming up in the short track ranks seeing that, and they think it’s fine,” Hamlin said. “That’s why we see some of the lower series turn out the way they do in these green-white-checkered situations because some of the best that they’re seeing on Sunday do stuff like that.”
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