NASCAR
Chris Buescher Locks into 2023 Playoffs With Richmond Victory
RICHMOND, Va. – The 2023 Playoff field grows by one with another new winner. Chris Buescher converted a dominant second half at Richmond into career win number three, putting RFK Racing back in victory lane for 2023.
Both Stages saw different teams run 1-2. Stage 1 was the 23XI Racing invitational, with Tyler Reddick leading wire-to-wire from the pole over Bubba Wallace. These marked Reddick’s first laps led ever on a short track.
Early in Stage 2, Wallace got by Reddick and took off from the pack. A slow green flag pit stop saw the 23 lose valuable track position though, handing the Stage 2 win to the 6 of Brad Keselowski over RFK Racing teammate Chris Buescher.
Just outside of 100 laps left, Keselowski also had a costly pit stop error forcing the 6 to lose ground. This cycled Chris Buescher to the lead, with the 17 narrowly trailing the 6 before this pit stop.
Aside from green flag pit stops the 17 led from this point onward. At one point Buescher held a nearly seven-second gap over second place.
Buescher’s Sunday drive to Richmond victory lane was not without a late twist. Inside of the final 10 laps a caution came out, setting up a three-lap dash to the checkers. Buescher was perfect on the restart over Denny Hamlin, edging the 11 by half a second at the checkered flag.
“I don’t get too stirred up most of the time,” Buescher said laughing. “I was sitting there and we had a nice easy lead going there. I was taking care of it and then shifting and about the time Scott (Graves, crew chief) came on the radio and said, ‘Let’s work it just like that. Keep it smooth.’ I don’t think he even got off the button and, caution.’ So, I knew it was gonna take some work to get back going, but our Fastenal Mustang was so good firing off today, so good in practice. I didn’t get the job done in qualifying. I had to pass a bunch of cars today and have some great strategy and some great pit stops.”
“Everybody at RFK Racing who has worked so hard to get us to this point. This is awesome. I knew that last restart was gonna be tough. But I knew we had the speed in this thing.”
“I love it when it gets hot and slick out here. I like searching for grip, that line moving around made it fun. I felt like the spring race we were pretty decent. We didn’t have everything go our way. That was just textbook execution from everybody. We had a clean day, good strategy, good pit stops, good choices and that got us here to victory lane with our Fastenal Mustang. I just feel that the hot, slick weather lets us move around and chase what we need to have that speed in our racecars.”
Behind Buescher, the Richmond top-10 finishers were: Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch, Joey Logano, Ryan Preece, Brad Keselowski, Martin Truex Jr., Aric Almirola, Austin Dillon, and Kevin Harvick. Hear from some of these drivers below on their strong days in Richmond.
Four races remain in the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series regular season, with only four Playoff spots now up for grabs. Buescher is the 12th different driver to lock themselves into the postseason with a win. See the remainder of the Playoff standings below following Richmond.
Written by Peter Stratta
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Photo Credit to Noah Lewis/TSJSports
