There was more than one winner at Darlington and plenty of losers

DARLINGTON, SOUTH CAROLINA - MAY 14: Martin Truex Jr., driver of the #19 Auto-Owners Insurance Toyota spins behind Ross Chastain, driver of the #1 Worldwide Express/UPS Chevrolet, during the NASCAR Cup Series Goodyear 400 at Darlington Raceway on May 14, 2023 in Darlington, South Carolina. (Photo by Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images)

There were plenty of winners, and losers, in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup race at Darlington Raceway. William Byron scored his third victory of 2023 charging to the lead on an overtime restart set up with Kyle Larson and Ross Chastain tangled.

But a couple of multicar crashes, and the late race incident with Larson and Chastain, helped several drivers salvage finishes that they might not otherwise have had.

Kevin Harvick managed to avoid heavy damage during an 8 car crash on lap 282. He was able to take his Ford to a second-place finish.

“The Fords struggle in traffic with this particular aero package and it’s hard to make up ground, and then we lost a bunch of ground on pit road under the green flag pit stop,” he said. “Then we got toward the end and missed all the wrecks. Well, we came out the other side of the wrecks. We were in the wrecks, but just didn’t have any damage to the wheels and tires, just structural damage.

“William ended up being the only car that didn’t have damage and he just drove off, so still a good day for our Sunny Delight Ford Mustang and we’ll just keep plugging away.”

Polesitter Marin Truex Jr. led the most laps on the day, 145, and early on looked to be the car to beat. But contact with Chastain, and finally with Joey Logano on a restart on lap 282 put him out of the race and left him with a 31st place finish.

“When we got into (Ross) Chastain there at the end of the second stage going for the win in that, it knocked the tow out so we were tight from there on out,” Truex explained. “Just an unfortunate deal.

“There was plenty of room there, but he just came off the wall and hit me. Like I said, knocked the tow out in the right front. Pretty crappy from there and then on that restart I guess I just got real tight and I don’t even know who I squeezed into the wall, but I apologize to them. Probably my fault, just got real tight and couldn’t stay down the track.”

Perhaps no one was as unscathed, and happy, as Harrison Burton. The Wood Brothers driver avoided all the carnage and finished a season best sixth.

“I felt like we kind of just bounced around 15th after we lost the top 10 track position early on pit road,” he said. “That was a mixture of my fault and the pit crew, so it’s kind of nice we got the last caution, and it was a chance for both of us to redeem ourselves and felt like we did that and got a decent finish out of it.”

The Wood Brothers have an alliance with Team Penske and Burton finished ahead of both Ryan Blaney (ninth), and Joey Logano in 18th.

“It was a fast car,” Burton said. “I mean, it felt relative to our alliance teammates at Team Penske. That’s been our goal as of late is to try and run with those guys and, relative to them, we were right there. It’s a good day for us and something to build on.”

The team’s first top 10 finish of the season was one Burton said he and the team really needed.

“The last few weeks we’ve kind of been on the other side of it, where we’ve been fast and didn’t have anything to show for it,” he said. “This week was kind of the opposite. We were probably a 10th-place car and finished sixth. That was just about execution at the end, restarts at the end and getting a decent finish.”

Greg Engle