TALLADEGA, Ala.: In his final superspeedway race for Wood Brothers Racing, Matt DiBenedetto started the postponed YellaWood 500 at Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway from 15th and with the hopes of contending for his first NASCAR Cup Series win.
Instead, DiBenedetto found himself collected in a late race accident and a distant 35th place finish.
Stage 1 looked to be promising for DiBenedetto. He led two laps and was running in the top 10 before the standard competition caution came out on Lap 25. After the yellow, DiBenedetto shifted into “ride” mode and finished the stage 25th.
In Stage 2, DiBenedetto seemed to get back into the rhythm on track and worked his way up to fifth but then found himself in the wrong lane and was shuffled back to 18th by Lap 118.
Unfortunately for DiBenedetto, he became an innocent victim when the cars of William Byron and Ryan Preece collided and tagged the No. 21 Quick Lane Tire & Auto Center Ford sending him into the outside wall and unable to duplicate his top-five finish from the spring.
“We went up there early and led some and were feeling our car out,” offered DiBenedetto. “We had good speed and was as good as always. The Quick Lane Mustang and Wood Brothers always bring really fast race cars here and really wanted to feel it out.
“We got shuffled a little and was just riding. We were committed to that before the day started. Leverage the situation to our advantage that we don’t need stage points, so we were gonna cruise and let the wrecks happen and then in stage three go and try to run up front and go for the win, but Mother Nature threw a little kink in our plans here and obviously we see what happened.”
DiBenedetto said the weather contributed to the race shifting into full blast mode and the intensity peaking at its highest level.
“It was nuts,” he said. “We were on borrowed time for sure, but when the weather obviously became a factor, and everyone wasD communicating it to all the drivers you saw it just instantly pick up and everyone was on full blast mode there at the end. “
“We didn’t have the track position since we were committed to riding and then we had to go and just was not the right situation. It was circumstance, Mother Nature threw a big kink in our plan, but we had another fast car.”
Despite suffering his second did not finish of the season, DiBenedetto isn’t ready to give up on his final five races aboard the No. 21 Ford Mustang and hopeful he could pull an upset and spoil the Playoff picture – much like Darrell Wallace Jr. did in Sunday’s YellaWood 500.
“We’ve got some good races left,” sounded DiBenedetto. “We’ve been on a roll. Our team has been doing awesome, so we’re gonna take that momentum and try and snag a win.”
Still looking for a ride in 2022, DiBenedetto heads to the Bank of America ROVAL at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway Road Course on Sun., Oct. 10, vying to improve on his 22nd place finish.
