In NASCAR, issues tend to return full circle.
That was the case on Sunday night time, the place Chase Briscoe — driving the identical No. 14 automobile that his childhood hero, Tony Stewart, made iconic — received the Southern 500 at Darlington to clinch a playoff berth within the Cup Sequence regular-season finale.
The character through which Briscoe received the crown jewel race appeared like one thing his boss would’ve finished when Briscoe was only a child watching on TV, as an unbelievable slingshot transfer with 25 laps to go shot Briscoe from fourth to the race lead in a matter of seconds.
After a late-race restart noticed two-time Cup Sequence champion Kyle Busch — who like Briscoe, wanted a win to make the playoffs — claw his option to second place, the 2 drivers placed on an unbelievable recreation of cat and mouse that led to Briscoe barely edging the 63-time Cup Sequence winner to assert the victory.
The win was eerily harking back to the 2020 Xfinity Sequence race at Darlington, the place Briscoe outdueled Busch in what was the Xfinity Sequence’ first race again from the COVID-19 pandemic. That win was significantly emotional for Briscoe, whose spouse, Marissa, suffered a miscarriage simply two days earlier than the race befell.
As Briscoe soaked up his victory on Sunday night time along with his son Brooks beside him, having fun with his second with dad, a September night time in 2024 could not really feel a lot farther from that Could afternoon in 2020, the place Briscoe was not solely coping with private loss but in addition with skilled strain to carry out.
2020 would go on to be Briscoe’s greatest yr to that time, nonetheless, as he received 9 races and made it to the Xfinity Sequence championship race at Phoenix.
2021 noticed Briscoe be referred to as as much as the NASCAR Cup Sequence to drive SHR’s famed No. 14, and at Phoenix in 2022, Briscoe broke by means of for his first Cup Sequence victory in a season that ended with a Cinderella run to the Spherical of 8.
For Briscoe and the No. 14 staff individually, 2023 and the primary 25 races of 2024 noticed a drop-off in efficiency. The on-track points have been difficult by the truth that Stewart-Haas introduced in Could that they have been shutting down on the finish of 2024, bringing an finish to a staff that at one level appeared destined to achieve the identical heights as Joe Gibbs Racing and Hendrick Motorsports.
That is to not say SHR hasn’t carried out throughout its time within the Cup Sequence — championships with Stewart in 2011 and Kevin Harvick in 2014 disprove that — however a pointy decline in velocity for the reason that finish of 2020 made it clear that whether or not or not the doorways stayed open, there was little gentle on the finish of the tunnel.
In a contemporary sports activities world that’s more and more extra about cash and enterprise somewhat than the love of the sport, the previous appeared to virtually fade into the South Carolina sky that witnessed Briscoe’s victory on Sunday night time.
On the finish of the day, each Briscoe and SHR have plans for the longer term — Briscoe will be part of Joe Gibbs Racing in 2025 and Gene Haas will retain one Cup Sequence constitution — however Sunday’s win appeared to strip away the unlucky enterprise of racing and plant a seed of hope in a corporation with little to talk of.
Now, the 323 workers that make up Stewart-Haas Racing have a possibility to go win a championship and go away the game the identical approach they got here into it a decade and a half in the past — with a bang solely Tony Stewart might dream up.
