Martinsville Recap

Good evening everyone and welcome back to Captain Josh's Pit Stop. Tonight I recap the weekends action from Martinsville. There was certainly a lot of action, and controversy for sure. Also to note, the Xfinity Series had an off weekend. They are back at Texas this weekend. And in Formula One news, Lewis Hamilton claimed his 4th Drivers World Championship at Mexico. Max Verstappen took home the win for Red Bull at the Mexican Grand Prix on Sunday. And Noah Gragson won the Truck Series race at Martinsville on Saturday. Gragson drives for Kyle Busch's truck team. Photo courtesy of Google images.

The First Data 500 ran on Sunday afternoon and went into the night for the first time ever at the historic track. Joey Logano won the pole with Martin Truex Jr alongside. The first and second stages consisted of 130 laps. The final stage made up the final 240 laps. The race was 500 laps long. Photo courtesy of Google images.

The first caution of the day came out in stage 1 with 95 to go in the stage. Ty Dillon went for a spin along with Ricky Stenhouse Jr in turn 2 after contact from Michael McDowell. Photo courtesy of Google images.

The day ended early for AJ Allmendinger as he went for a spin off turn 2 after contact from behind by Danica Patrick. Allmendinger was out of the race. The incident occurred in stage 1 with 43 to go. Photo courtesy of Google images and NASCAR.

The spring winner at Martinsville Brad Keselowski swept the stages winning both stage 1 and 2. Could he hold on for the win? Photo courtesy of Google images.

The action heated up in the final stage. Erik Jones went for a spin off turn 4 after being hit by Cole Whitt. The incident occurred at lap 217 in the race. Photo courtesy of me. Well a screenshot from YouTube. Credit goes to the YouTuber in the photo.

The day also don't go well for Front Row Motorsports teammates David Ragan and Landon Cassil. Both drivers made contact off turn 2 which sent Ragan spinning off turn 2. Turn 2 was the action corner all day. Photo courtesy of the YouTuber I mentioned earlier.

Another driver who runs in the back that had a rough evening was Carl Long. Long went for a spin off, you guessed it, turn 2. Long hit the wall also and was out of the race. The incident occurred with 43 to go in the race. Photo courtesy of the YouTuber.

Here is the incident that started the wild end to the race. Kyle Busch made contact with the left rear tire of Joey Logano, after getting squeezed by Ryan Blaney going into turn 1 with 14 to go. Logano would cut the tire a few laps later off turn 2 with 9 to go in the race. Photo courtesy of Google images and NASCAR.

The controversial move of the night occurred with 3 to go in the race. Denny Hamlin made contact with leader Chase Elliott going into turn 3. Hamlin pushed Elliott's car into the corner and put him in the wall. What's your take of the move? Did Hamlin do it on purpose? Leave your comment below. Photos courtesy of Google images.

At the end of the night, the race ended at night in a wild finish. Kyle Busch passed Denny Hamlin on the overtime restart and held off a hard charging Martin Truex Jr to win the race and punch his ticket to the championship 4 at Homestead Miami. Photos courtesy of Google images.

Here are the Playoff Standings after Martinsville. As I mentioned, with his win, Kyle Busch advanced to the championship race at Homestead Miami. Now three spots are up for grabs for the championship 4. Who will be next to punch their ticket to have a chance at the title at Texas this weekend. Martin Truex Jr is the favorite and is going for his 5th straight win on a 1.5 mile track. We will see. Photo courtesy of NASCAR on NBC.