In a stunning development in the shadow of St. Louis, Austin Cindric won the Enjoy Illinois 300 at World Wide Technology Raceway in dramatic fashion, capitalizing as Ryan Blaney inexplicably ran out of fuel coming to the white flag. Cindric's victory is the second of his Cup Series career, breaking an 85-race winless drought dating back to his first win in the 2022 Daytona 500.
On a day where he led more laps than any other race in his Cup career, Cindric had seemingly been set to run third as Blaney and Christopher Bell battled each other for the win, but he suddenly found himself second in the closing laps as Bell's engine went sour and left his car underpowered for the run to the end. Cindric started closing the gap on Blaney in the final laps, but it still seemed to be Blaney's race to win -- until the No. 12 slowed dramatically coming to the white flag after an apparent miscalculation by his team left him one lap short on fuel.
Enjoy Illinois 300 unofficial results
- #2 - Austin Cindric
- #11 - Denny Hamlin
- #6 - Brad Keselowski
- #45 - Tyler Reddick
- #22 - Joey Logano
- #3 - Austin Dillon
- #20 - Christopher Bell
- #77 - Carson Hocevar (R)
- #51 - Justin Haley
- #5 - Kyle Larson
Entering Sunday, Cindric -- the 2022 Cup Series Rookie of the Year -- had seemingly sat third in the Penske pecking order with just one top-10 finish and two top 15s the entire season. Suddenly, after an excellent race that put him in perfect position to capitalize on Blaney's misfortunes, he has now earned Penske's first win of the 2024 season and put himself on the NASCAR playoff grid as the ninth different driver to win this season.
Cindric's win is also his first victory in Cup with crew chief Brian Wilson, as the pair were reunited late last season after winning 13 races and the 2020 series championship together in the Xfinity Series.
"Honestly, I'm heartbroken for the 12 team. I don't know what happened to them at the end of the race, but they deserved to win this race," Cindric told Fox Sports. "Ryan's been a hell of a leader on this team. This weekend was a great weekend for everybody involved, to have two cars in the fight, an eventual 1-2 there -- I'm heartbroken for those guys, but this is huge for me. This is huge for this team.
"I'm so glad I was able to get a win with Brian as my crew chief in the Cup Series. You never know when it's gonna happen again -- just drove my butt off and hoped for the best."
Tough breaks for Blaney and Bell
With track position at a premium at Gateway and a series of long green flag runs stretching out the field, strategy became the name of the game Sunday as teams tried to gain track position and put themselves in position to win -- or at least even have a chance of challenging Christopher Bell -- at the end. Bell had prohibitively the best car in the field, leading a race-high 80 laps and time and again demonstrating he had the fastest car.
Presented with the sheer speed of Bell's car, the three Penske cars ran an alternate strategy, putting them on a different pit cycle than the No. 20 car and setting themselves up to race him for the win. Cindric spent much of the midway portion of the race as the frontrunner among the Penske cars, but Ryan Blaney would make his final pit stop a lap before Cindric, allowing him to leapfrog the No. 2 on track as the cycle of green flag stops played out. Eventually, Bell would make his final stop coming to 46 laps to go, putting Blaney and Cindric ahead of Bell on-track before Bell was able to run them both down on fresher tires.
Blaney and Bell put on a spirited battle for the race lead, and it initially looked like Bell had finally prevailed coming to 19 laps to go before Blaney crossed him over and successfully took the lead back. Then, suddenly, Bell's car began to drop back: An engine issue developed under the hood of Bell's car, leaving him without third gear and forcing him to try and nurse his car to the end of the race. Bell was able to limit his plummet, only falling to seventh despite being down on power.
"I have no idea what happened. Some sort of motor issue," Bell told Fox Sports. "I'm surprised that I made it to the end. Glad we were able to salvage something out of it. You don't get race cars like that very often. Whenever you do, you need to take advantage of it. Disappointing day."
After that point -- and even as lapped traffic allowed Cindric to cut into his lead -- it appeared that it would be smooth sailing for Blaney back to the checkered flag and his first win of the season. But then, just as suddenly as what happened to Bell, the defending Cup Series champion's car dropped off the pace taking the white flag. Blaney's car was evidently not packed full of fuel on his final stop, and he wound up a lap short and went from almost certain victory to crawling to the finish line in 24th.
"Never thought in my mind we were short, but one of those things," Blaney told Fox Sports. "... I had my work cut out for me holding off Christopher. That was a fun battle, I don't know what happened to him. But yeah, just one lap short, which just stinks ... Really happy with our showing today. Just I don't know what I've got to do to get some luck on our side.
"We've wrecked the last two points races and thought we had a great shot to win today and ended up bad. Appreciate the effort, just got to keep sticking with it."
Kyle and Kyle's collision
In the lead-up to Sunday's race, the dominant story of the week had been Kyle Larson and the playoff limbo he now finds himself in after missing the Coca-Cola 600 due to rain delays wreaking havoc on his Indianapolis 500 and Coke 600 plans. In the shadow of that story was the now 36-race winless streak being experienced by Kyle Busch, who entered Gateway as the race's defending winner. Those stories would converge -- and collide -- on the final lap of Stage 2.
Racing hard for seventh spot and points, Larson got loose on Busch's inside on the entry to Turn 1, sending him sliding up the track and into Busch and putting both cars into the outside wall. Busch got the worst of the crash by far, ending his race prematurely after he had led 15 laps.
Replays seemed to suggest that Busch had aggressively run Larson down the track and pinched him in a way that prevented him from taking a good angle into the corner, a theory Larson's team subscribed to over their team radio. When asked, Busch veiled his frustration with a self-deprecating answer.
"You've got a pretty good eye, so I'm sure it's my fault," Busch told Fox Sports' Regan Smith. "Hate it for my guys, everybody on the Rebel Camaro -- We can't afford days like this. ... Trying to race for a playoff spot and gradually fallen there a little bit. He got loose and wiped us out."
Busch would later tell reporters outside of the infield care center he wasn't sure what a single stage point would have meant for Larson. After going on to finish 10th, Larson would tell reporters that he thought Busch may have been "ticked off" that he had gotten into his quarter panel, but he attributed the incident to just hard racing between the two.
"I've got nothing bad to say about Kyle at all. We've always raced extremely well together," Larson said. "Nothing changes on my end."
Race results rundown
- Sunday became a much-needed day for Austin Dillon, who had by far his best race of the entire season. Dillon would run as high as second on an alternate strategy before earning a season-best sixth, his second top 10 of the year and his best finish overall since he ran third at Bristol Dirt in 2023.
- It was also a career day for rookie Carson Hocevar, as a well-timed caution during a cycle of green flag stops allowed him to gain significant track position and make his way well up inside the top 10 and even into the top five as his strategy played out. Hocevar finished eighth, a new career-best, and earned his second top 10 this year overall.
- Justin Haley once again carried the banner for Rick Ware Racing, matching his season-best outing from Darlington and giving him two top 10s in the last three races -- a run of consistency the team has never seen before. Haley's ninth-place finish marks the 10th top 10 in team history, with Haley accounting for 20% of the team's top 10s.
- It was a difficult week for Stewart-Haas Racing, with the team announcing it would shut down at the end of the 2024 season, and their drivers all had days ranging from unremarkable to ones to forget. Chase Briscoe would be best in class with a 17th-place finish ahead of Noah Gragson in 22nd and Ryan Preece in 29th. Josh Berry would finish 36th after a blown tire sent him into the turn 3 wall, ending his day after 109 laps.
- After setting a new track record in qualifying, Michael McDowell would lead the opening 40 laps of the race, in the process making Gateway his all-time best track in terms of laps led (74). However, McDowell would fade after his car became mired in traffic following the opening stage, and he wound up finishing 25th after his late-race strategy did not work out.
- It turned into a long day for Martin Truex Jr., as a cut left rear tire forced him to make an unscheduled pit stop and an ill-timed caution during green flag stops left him pinned behind Christopher Bell, preventing him from taking the wave around to get one of the two laps he lost back. Truex finished three laps down in 34th, playing a support role in the final laps as he pushed Bell's car down the straightaways to help him maintain as many positions as he could.
Next race
It's off to wine country for some road racing, as the NASCAR Cup Series heads to Sonoma Raceway for the Toyota/Save Mart 350 next Sunday at 3:30 p.m. ET on Fox.
