Last year, Chris Buescher’s race at Michigan Int’l Speedway consisted of him spinning on the frontstretch doing celebratory donuts after winning.
On Monday, he was doing the same thing — spinning, but without the celebration.
Past the halfway point of the FireKeepers Casino 400, Buescher was involved in a multi-car wreck, which eliminated Kyle Larson, Christopher Bell and Joey Logano from the race.
Buescher also sustained damage, however, was able to continue.
A caution flag later forced overtime, which allowed Buescher to pit for fresher tires than his competitors.
From there, the driver of the No. 17 RFK Racing Ford used two overtime restarts to jump from 15th to sixth, his first top 10 since Nashville (Tenn.) Superspeedway (fifth) in June.
“It was a good strategy call and a good move to pit there and do something different for us,” Buescher said. “Ultimately our chance at winning this thing had gone away. I had been caught up in whatever happened in that early accident, and we have damage on all four corners of this Fifth Third Bank Ford Mustang.
“We were still fast but the balance was not near as good. It was a lot of fun before that. We had a chance to win this race. So it was a good call to do something different and take the right side tires and we were able to pass a ton of cars. It was wild but a heck of a way to salvage a day that should have been better.”
For Buescher, his solid result was vital as he jumped to 15th on the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs grid, 16 points above the cutline with only two races left.
While Buescher is “adamant that we are not points racers,” he admitted once he knew a win was out of the question that he was focused on notching the best points day possible.
“Ultimately that was some of the mentality, to figure out how to make the best of our day,” Buescher said.
“We had seen troubles from some of the other cars that were on the bubble. I wouldn’t say we weren’t aggressive on restarts, though. We were moving, but we were also trying to be smart and methodical about it and not put ourselves in a really bad spot.
“It was on our mind there at the end. It is what you have to do once you aren’t in contention to win the race.”
Daytona (Fla.) Int’l Speedway and Darlington (S.C.) Raceway are the remaining races left in the regular season.
Notably, Buescher is the defending winner of the 400-mile race at Daytona.