DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.: Chase Briscoe started off his sophomore NASCAR Cup Series season with a career-best third-place finish in Sunday’s Daytona 500.
It was an eventful “Great American Race” for the Stewart-Haas Racing driver, but a relentless effort by Briscoe and his No. 14 Mahindra Tractors Ford Mustang team kept them in contention which included a NASCAR-overtime finish which saw Briscoe restart sixth.
With momentum on his side on the final lap, Briscoe found himself latched onto the rear of the No. 6 of Brad Keselowski – but as the cars screamed along the backstretch for the final time – Briscoe backed off and found himself being pushed by Kyle Busch to create a two-car tandem exiting Turn 4.
Their effort, however, would be stalled by Keselowski who pinched the two cars in the wall heading to the checkered flag. Even with some right-side damage, Briscoe emerged from the contact underneath the crashing car of Ryan Blaney who was blocked by his Team Penske and eventual winner Austin Cindric.
Briscoe crossed the start-finish line third, behind Cindric and Darrell Wallace Jr.
“Just couldn’t quite get to Brad,” said Briscoe. “I needed to be able to get to Brad, and he was having to drag so much brake for me to be able to help him. I wish I was more help. If I could have locked on, I could have got him up there.”
Briscoe, 27, was extremely thankful for the opportunity to compete in his second Daytona 500 event given his circumstances to climb to the pinnacle division of NASCAR.
“Sleeping on couches and volunteering six, seven years ago, and now to have a chance to win the Daytona 500 at the end and finish third and start the year off with these Mahindra Tractors folks and HighPoint.com, all the people that get us to the racetrack,” added Briscoe.
“We want to be a playoff contender this year, and having a good run here is a good start.”
Earlier in the race, Briscoe was spun in Turn 2 by Cindric after a wheel came off the No. 50 Chevrolet of Kaz Grala. Luckily for Briscoe, the main damage came from the rear diffuser – which his Johnny Klausmeier-led team was able to repair forty-five laps into the 201-lap event.
The 11-time NASCAR Xfinity Series winner said he wished he would have had another 2.5-miles to race on Sunday as he believed he could have battled it out with Cindric and Wallace for the victory.
“It’s crazy,” Briscoe added. “You dream when you grow up racing just being in the Daytona 500 and I never in a million years thought I would ever get an opportunity to even run in one,” To be restarting sixth with a green-white-checkered was pretty surreal in the first place, but I just couldn’t get to Brad. I kept trying to get there and I just couldn’t.
“He was having to drag so much brake to get back to me. I just wasn’t much help to him, to be honest with you, and then Kyle (Busch) got me really good into three and I had such a run that I had to take it. I wish it was Talladega because I felt like if the start-finish line was a little further down I may have had a shot at that thing, but really cool to start our year off with Mahindra Tractors with a third-place finish in the Daytona 500.
“Wish we could have had one more lap. You never know what could have happened, but yeah, super cool to finish third and really cool for one of my best friends to win the race.”
The Mitchell, Ind. native captured his first career top-five finish and fourth top-10 overall.
Briscoe leaves Daytona and headed to Auto Club (Calif.) Speedway fifth in the NASCAR Cup Series championship standings – points behind leader Cindric.
Follow Chris Knight on Twitter @Knighter01.
