Ryan Preece STUNS Daytona! NASCAR Playoffs Begin at Darlington

0:00It's Fall in America, make it count. At the Ram Drive-In to Fall Sales Event, make it powerful with our strongest Ram 1500 ever. Make it move with the Ram Heavy Duty with an available Cummins diesel and make it go to the distance with a 10-year or 100,000-mile powertrain limited warranty. Hurry and now for great deals during the Ram Drive-In to Fall Sales Event. Excludes fully electric vehicles applied to 2026 model-year vehicles non-transferable. Visit MoPAR.com for complete details and a copy of the powertrain limited warranty. Cummins is a registered trademark of Cummins Inc. Ram and Hemi are registered trademarks of FCA-US LLC. Kitchen and bathroom professionals know what goes behind the tile matters. That's why trade pros trust Fiber-Sement Party Backer Board to keep tile firmly in place, resist cracking, and help block moisture. Chosen over 40 million kitchens and bathrooms, Party Backer Board, what the best build on. Shop now at participating Home Depot, Lowe's, and floor into core stores. For more information, visit JamesHearty.com slash HeartyBacker.

1:00Football is back and this is believed. Your home for NFL and college football news and analysis all season long. Now, let's start the show. So no one really totally, completely dominated this race. I mean, he got Austin Hill with a bunch of laps lead, but and then other drivers sprinkled throughout. So the winner with only five laps lead is not a big surprise. No, I mean, that's kind of what you expect in this form of racing, right? The super she waist out racing. You expect someone to kind of sneak up late. We've seen lots of guys lead, literally just the last lap at Daytona, Tau Daga, Atlanta over the years. So it's not a huge surprise that the dominant car of the day wasn't the winner. And it's not a huge surprise. There wasn't one overwhelmingly dominant car in the race. So no, not super surprising. Yeah, let's get into it. Fire up the theme music. This is the final lap weekly.

2:01A show where a couple of guys talk about all things NASCAR. My name is Kerry Murphy. Long time host of all things. The final lap. Go host is Toby Christie. He is the founder and editor-in-chief at TobyCristy.com. Also does some stuff over there at sports illustrated NASCAR. So let's get into it. We got some sponsors for this show, right? Yeah, yeah. And we've we've we're so thankful for these folks and everyone on the entire Patreon support group and we'll go through the entire list at the end of the show. Stick around to that. But here at the top of the show, we like to talk about our three people who are currently at the sponsorship level. Devon over there at the only match title level two. Thank you. Devon, we've got Louisville Maxx as well at the only match title level two. Thank you, Louisville Maxx. And of course, my buddy from Daytona, I'm sure he was at the track this week. Quinn Whitaker. So cool to see him still on this list. And awesome, awesome to have everybody that continues to support this show. tirelessly with their own resources. We really appreciate it. And coming up in just a few minutes, we've got Rody Dragon back with your fantasy NASCAR for this coming weekend. And I am so happy we get to reset things.

3:03No more mid-tier to bottom feeder drivers just to get by through the week or whatever. We got a reset with five uses over the next 10. So you still got to be a little careful, but we can finally use some top tier drivers against a Rody Dragon coming up in just a few minutes with that. Right. But they reset our overall points like the chase into the seat. He'll get into it all. He'll get into all that stuff, but I'm just happy about getting to reuse drivers again. Okay. All right. All right, let's get into it. Tyler Reddick was at number three at last weekend's race. Five laps lead. And not a surprise. He's pretty good at these tracks. He's pretty good at these tracks. And that's where we needed to kind of get some more momentum going, heading into the chase. They had so much momentum early in the year. Fell off a cliff in the summer. And now they're kind of getting a couple of those results going into the chase. I know it's just a ton of it. And it's not going to be the norm of what we see in the chase. But it's definitely good to have some good results going into it.

4:04Daniel Swarris at number two doesn't surprise me, but I forgot all about them. I should have used some thing for this. I mean, I just completely spaced. Yeah, it's been a great season for Daniel Swarris, who people really kind of wondered about. If you would even have a ride this year after, you know, it was announced that he's leaving Trackhouse. He ends up going to Spire. People are like, well, that's a terrible call. That teams never made the chase. You're going to just kind of be out of this. Four in a couple years. Well, he goes out year one, wins the Coke 600 of all races, by the way. Makes the chase. So he had been locked in going into this race. And ends up finishing second in this race, which allowed him to secure the top birth, the top seed for a Spire car. So he was able to actually outpoint Carson Hosevar, who fell off a cliff over the last four races, much like Tyler Reddick had to happen early in the summer. Hosevar won five-th and points to what 12th or so. So Daniel Swarris getting it done with the second place, finishing the outpoints his teammate. And Ryan Priest heading to Victory Lane in that 60 car.

5:06That was kind of a shocker, wasn't it? Back against the wall he had to. So he had to point pill into the early in the year for intentionally crashing at least a NASCAR's opinion, tie Gibbs. That led to a 25 point penalty. They had the appeal. It was denied. And so he'd going into this race. He was 31 points outside the cut line. That 25 points looked pretty important. Well, so then Ryan Priest knew I got to maximize my performance here in this one race. Well, stage one's going right. It looks like great. He's sitting there in the top three, battling for the lead. On the last lap of stage one, gets spun out in a three car collusion there with his teammate Chris Buscher, Kyle Larson. And who wins the stage? The guy he's battling for that last playoff birth, the last chase birth, and that's SVG. And it's like, wow, that's disastrous. That is exactly what he didn't need to happen. Now he's probably going to have a hampered vehicle. SVG's got 10 points in the bank. It's over.

6:06Just call it. It's over. Well, that's why you don't ever call these things before the races are over. Because Ryan Priest has 60 team. They don't give up. They kept with it. He worked his way back up through the field. And in the closing laps, this thing, he finds himself in a position to possibly win this race. We go to overtime. He gets the lead, right? He's got the lead. He's working his way around. We get the white flag. They have a big crash going down the back stretch there. Tons of people keep piling into it. And it feels frozen. Ryan Priest is your race winner. SVG, by the way, going into overtime wasn't sure about his fuel situation. So we had to top off get more fuel that sent him towards the back of the pack. He was involved in the last skirmish there on the last lap. Then it's like 28th or something. And that was the difference. Ryan Priest advances to the chase with his first career and ask our cups. Here's points paying when any advances by a margin of 17 points. That was quite the race recap. I was enthralled. Well, it was an interesting storyline to keep watching.

7:08Because it looked so anti-climactic coming into the race. And then when the incident happened at the end of stage one, it was like, yeah, okay. Well, there goes any drama. And then the drama ratcheted it up real fast. And it was pretty impressive to see how things had kind of turned around. All these years of NASCAR chasing that game seven moment, we've got to have winning you're in. Maybe that's the only way you can do it. This is the only way it's exciting. Well, we ended up there anyway. The old naturally without having to do any kind of weird, convoluted stuff. Now we can have the other conversation about whether we should be resetting things and starting back over for a chase. I don't want to agree with that either. But it's still by the way we had before. And I think the cool thing is we saw this naturally play out into a game seven moment. Without people having to get involved with weird gimmicks. Saying if you win now, you're not 35th points anymore. You're in the chase. Good job. So I like this. It feels like the 16 guys who deserve to be there there. And it'll be interesting to see how it goes from here. Let's take a look at the five immediately outside.

8:09So the regular season for NASCAR is done. We are heading into the playoffs. And the five drivers on the outside looking in have no shot at winning the championship because they are not in the playoffs. Eric Jones at 21, Michael McDowell, 20, Ross Chastain, Brad Kislawski and Shane Van Gisbergen just outside at 17th spot. Like you mentioned with that battle during the race. So those are the folks that just are racing for wins at this point. I guess that's all it is. You just got to try to build momentum for next season. And hopefully you can hit the ground running at Daytona in 2027. As you battle for that chase birth. So that's just all there is to it. I look next to you guys. Any surprises besides Ryan Prius in the top 16 that you didn't see, making it into the playoffs at the beginning of the year? Sure. I think Spire, both their cars being in as a surprise. I think even one of them would have kind of been a mild surprise. I know that Hoesvar was pretty close in his rookie season to make the chase the playoffs.

9:10But I feel like that's a pretty big surprise that they not only got one in, which was already a big enough surprise, but they got two in. It was very, very surprising. And for Daniel Soares, the career rejuvenation that's going on is huge for him. I think as far as like people who are outside the chase that are surprising. And he wasn't even in the list of people you mentioned there. I don't think Ross Chastain. James was. Was he okay? I didn't hear how far up he was. But yeah, he didn't make the chase. And I feel like that's kind of surprising, especially how SVG was really in the mix for the integrity of the regular season. That's heartbreaking for SVG, by the way. To have a 31-point lead going in, you win stage one. You've had such a good season. He's improved so much on ovals. Got the road course wins this year. You know, just look like the momentum of this was, okay, SVG is going to make the playoffs, the old fashioned way through points.

10:10And it just wasn't meant to be for the New Zealander, but he'll try again next year. I like the ability that we're seeing of him adapting to these tracks the second, third, fourth time around Adam. I really feel good about where he's going and the trajectory there. Kind of a good mix inside the top 16 of manufacturers. I think we got five forwards, five Chevy's and six Toyota's. Yeah. And at Chase Media Day, this week at the Charlotte Convention Center, I will say this for being winless this year, there was nobody that I feel like was more confident at Chase Media Day than Christopher Bell, who's usually kind of an understated guy. He doesn't usually exude a whole lot of confidence. He's usually very kind of mild-mannered and not overly spoken about his chances. He seemed like a guy that was very confident in himself and his team, but overall, if he doesn't win the championship, he feels this is Toyota's championship to lose. It's hard to argue with X Toyota has been the class of the field, but as we've seen so many times,

11:13even in the old Chase, once we get to this last 10 races, you might have somebody who was kind of out to lunch that all of a sudden figures it out, or maybe it was kind of R&D-ing some things towards the end of the regular season and all of a sudden the Chase hits and they flip that switch on everything they learned and they come to life. So I'm not going to award it to Toyota just yet, but Christopher Bell sure seems to think they've got this one. And based on what we've seen so far, I'd be hard pressed to think anybody outside Ryan Blaney can possibly dethrone them. All right. You mentioned where you were, Chase Media Day. We're going to find out more about that coming up, but first, Roudy Dragon has your fantasy NASCAR picks heading into the Darlington race weekend and the beginning of the playoffs and all that fun stuff. Roudy, take it away. Hey, hey, what's going on everybody? Roudy Dragon back for another week of final app weekly fantasy racing. So did you survive Daytona? That track has a wonderful way of wrecking a fantasy score.

12:14Something you've worked so hard for all season long Daytona can close it out with fireworks. Well, we're headed off to Darlington this week, the Lady in Black, the track, too tough to tame. This will be our second visit to this track this season, the first race of the Chase. So before we look at Darlington, let's take a look at our stage winners for the week at Daytona. Our first stage goes to sobriety racing 25. Stage 2, tall fly boy. And this week's winner, losing makes my dick trickle, finishing the day off with 214 points, 31 stage points on the day, pretty good score. I saw the maximum score of 234 for the week. Taking a look at Roudy, Toby and Carrie as well as our sponsors to see how we did this week. Roudy Dragon finishing P53, it wasn't so bad for me. Daytona always worries me. It's very easy to come up with a double digit finish like I said, ruin your fantasy season. So that's a score actually pulls me up to the 10th position in the league. I cracked the top 10 finally, starting the chase off right. Toby Christy

13:18had a great run on the day, finished P23 at Daytona. That moves him up into the 45th position in the league, Toby making some ground. Carrie Murphy, Jimmy is back. Finishing P1 18 has him in the 79th position. Same spot as last week. Now taking a look at our sponsors, Devon, DL Racing King 11, he busted us all this week, had a great day finishing P18. He currently sits P51 in the league standings, trying to gun down Toby. Louisville Max finishing P107 slides right behind me in 2P11. And Quentin Whitaker, Ironhead fan number 3, he had a tough go at it finishing 238th on the day. He currently sits 87th in the overall standings. Now before we take a look at the featured picks for the week, I've got a few names to shout out to myself, some folks that have been sponsoring me through the whole season here. We've got Mike Scott Hamilton, Troy Clark, Robert Keen, Chris White, Louisville Max and Simon Green. I'll kick in down some of that green from week to week.

14:22Appreciate it fellas. Pitching into the beer fund. Okay, so let's take a look at Darlington for the week. We get to dive into some big guns again. No more mid-tier drivers. We all have a reset. Five uses of each driver with 10 races to go. So I'm going to start you off with the 11 carved Danny Hamlin. He's race 28 times at Darlington with an average finish of 8.0. He's got 14 top 5 finishes, putting him up in the top 5 and 50% of his races. 20 top 10s lands him in the top 10 71% of his runs. He's led quite a few laps at 1,022, averaging 36.5 laps lead per race. He has five wins at Darlington and quite a few stage points. He's racked up points 25 times in 34 stages and he is a three times stage winner. Now if Darlington raceway is too tough to tame, Danny Hamlin didn't get that memo. Danny enters the weekend as the active master of Darlington. When a driver boasts a 50% top 5 finish rate and finishes inside the top 10 and 71% of his 28

15:25career starts at a track this punishing, it isn't luck. It's pure craft and unmatched tire management. Look at the tracks that he tires for breakfast. Hamlin isn't just a three time winner at homestead and a multi time winner at Dover. He just proved it again. A few weeks ago with a P3 finish at the return of Chicago and Speedway. He's abrasive cheese grater surfaces, forced drivers to manage extreme lap time falloff and no one controls the pace on worn out asphalt better than the 11 does. Coming off a P11 finish at the Lady and Black in the spring, history is overwhelmingly on his side and he is absolutely due for that top 5 again. Across his entire 28 race Darlington career, Hamlin has only finished outside the top 10 in consecutive races a single time back in the 23 season. Every other time the Lady and Black pushed him back, he answered immediately with a top 10 or a top 5 or a trip to victory lane. Even when he is an out front taking the checkered flag, the 11 machine hordes stage points. In fact, he's collected the most stage points in the field. His driver rating consistently leads the entire garage because he manages long run falloff better than

16:28almost anyone on the track. Here's what to watch for in practice. That's on four o'clock eastern this Saturday. Look for that 15 to 20 lap falloff. Ignore single lap speed. Track is 15 and 20 lap consecutive averages during his practice session. If the 11 maintains lap times while the rest of the field falls off a cliff after lap 12, lock him in the near lineup with zero hesitation. Listen for his radio feedback regarding how well his nose cuts across those bumps on entry. If the balance is dialed in without chewing up that right rear, he's primed to contend for 500 miles. Don't ever think the chalk this week. When the chase kicks off at a tire eater like Darlington, he's started a guy who almost never strings together two bad runs here and dominates the driver ratings. Hamlin is your anchor for this one. So moving on to our second big gun, I've got the 45 of Tyler Reddick here. He's got 14 races run at Darlington with an average finish of 10.8. Six top five finishes lands in top five in 43% of his races. Eight top 10s puts him up in the top 10,

17:2957% of the time. He's got 399 laps lead. That averages 28.5 laps lead per race. He has one win at the track too tough to tame. Stage points, he's racked up a few as well, collecting 19 times out of 28 stages and he is a one time stage winner and he's bagged a second four times. So if we look at the only comparable track we ran this season, you can write off that 36 place finish at Chicago land immediately. Reddick was cycling through in 20th during green flag stops after grabbing a P10 stage one when a piece of stray debris pierced his nose, puncturing the radiator and oil cooler. It wasn't tire wear, driver error or lack of pace. It was a freak mechanical puncture. Yes, you're thinking we ran over the season, we did, but it was not a points paying race, so I'm not weighing too heavily on this track. But when we look at his career at Dover, he ranks seventh overall in driver rating, proving he has the discipline and the rhythm for high load tire shredding surfaces. When looking at comparable high fall off tracks, Reddick is elite. Take Miami for instance,

18:30at home state he flat out leads the charts in driver rating, mastering the transition from the outside fence better than almost anyone in modern NASCAR. At the Lady in Black, Reddick boasts the second highest active driver rating and has stacked up the fourth most stage points in the field. Across his 14 career, Darlington starts, Reddick has zero DNFs, matching Denny Hamlin's spotless survival record there. For a driver whose signature style is skimming centimeters off the outside wall on the cushion, he collects virtually zero Darlington stripes while still maintaining blinding speed. Tyler Reddick doesn't just run the high line, he owns the razor's edge, and at a place that ruins right sides, he makes it look effortless. So what to watch for with this guy in practice? Watch how early in a run he commits to turn three and four near the fence. If the car rotates effortlessly without him having to scrub off momentum, the 45 is dialed in. Let his tires warm up, then track his fall off between lap five and lap 20. If he's running consistent lap times up against the wall while others slip backward, he's primed for a win.

19:32If you're worried about Chicago and don't be, that was bad luck, not bad driving. Reddick leads the ratings at homestead, ranks top seven at Dover, and has never DNFed in 14 Darlington starts, despite riding the fence every single lap. The 45 is as close to guaranteed stage points and top five upside as you can get. Lock him in. Okay, moving on to our final pick for the week, I've got the five car of Kyle Larson. He's raced Darlington 17 times, average finish for him is 14.1. He's got seven top fives, landing him top fives in 41% of his races. Nine top 10s puts him in the top 10 in 53% of his runs. He's got 1,070 laps led, averaging 62.9 laps led per race, and he too has one win at the track. He's a stage point magnet collecting 21 times out of 28 stages and has six stage wins. If there is a cushion to ride or a fence to scrape, Kyle Larson will find it. He doesn't just run the high line, he lives it. Let's look at the tracks that reward pure

20:35car control right up against the wall. Homestead Miami completely owns the top spot in both driver rating and stage points collected there. Dover leads the field in driver rating and ranks second in stage points on the brutal concrete. And Chicago land, he qualified on the front row this season, led 23 laps and grabbed nine stage points before bad luck dropped him to a P-34 finish. Now don't let the box course from his last three dollar and ten races fool you. A suspension issue took him out early in the spring of the 25 season. He finished P-19 in the fall of the 25 season, while still scoring stage points in both stages. And the spring race this season looked bad only on paper. Larson started P-4, ran inside the top five all day, finished fifth in stage one, third in stage two, and he led 20 laps. A broken toe link with just 10 laps to go dropped him to P-32, but the Ross speed and execution were elite for 95% of that race. Even with that rough three race stretch, Larson holds on to the third best active driver rating at 100.9 at the track two tough to 10. He has led a massive 1,070 laps like you heard earlier and sits second only to Danny

21:41Hamlin in total stage points collected. Okay, so what are we going to watch for in practice for this guy? Momentum off turn two. Watch how close he gets to the wall exiting that corner. If the number five Chevy carries momentum off the corner without getting arrow tight against the fence, he will be unstoppable on those long runs. Listen to the communication between Larson and Cliff Daniels. If Daniels is actively managing Larson's pace early in a run to protect that right rear, it signals they're setting up for a dominant 500 miles. Now, Donut Kyle's recent finishes at the Lady in Blackscare you off. Larson started P-4 here in the spring grabbing those 14 stage points, and he led 20 laps before mechanical failure with that 10 to go. He's the ultimate rune rider and when you pair his Ross speed with dominated points, he's a must start to kick off the chase. If you finished the regular season with leftover allocations for guys like Larson, you left points on the table. I myself had three left going in the Daytona. We're not making that mistake in the chase. We're unleashing the five right out of the gate at a track built for him. Don't horde your heavy hitters. Play them where they have the highest ceiling and that is Darlington.

22:45The regular season is over and the allocations have reset. You get five uses for the next 10 races and then the chase, it's use them or lose them. Do not sit on guys like Larson Hamlin and Redick waiting for the perfect moment. Darlington is the perfect moment. Put your heavy hitters to work right now and start the playoffs with a massive points day. Okay, so there you have it, your three drivers for Darlington Raceway starting the chase off this weekend. Taking a look back at the final ep weekly fantasy league, we've got 459 registered teams, 291 points scoring folks at Daytona. We lost four more people giving into the super speedway. Now there was some shakeups in the top 10, but for the most part, there was just movement. Most of the folks that were in the top 10 still stayed there, including our leader, tiny Ocho racing. Only he has a small lead over our new second place team, what the F tiny Ocho is leading by a mere five points. So we have a pretty good chase shaping up points are pretty tight up front. Okay, well there you have it for the week.

23:50Thanks for hanging out for the final ep weekly fantasy segment of the show. I am R Audi Dragon. We'll see you at WWT for the enjoy Illinois 300 next week. There you go, R Audi Dragon with your fantasy NASCAR picks for this weekend. He's got Denny Hamlin in the 11 car, the 45 of Tyler Reddick and the five of Kyle Larson happy to see regular names here and not ones I have to look up on Google. Yeah, those are some solid picks. I'd probably had I'd probably had Chris Bushier and Brad Kizlowski as well. They've they've been very good at Darlington over the last few years. Okay, as well. They've been right there with the 45 and the 11 as far as being the standard bears as far as performance of the track. Larson, we know he's good there, but for whatever reason the next generic, he's had so much bad luck or he just loses control sometimes. So that's a bit of a risk for me. I know he's going to be good to this track because it's one of his best ones. But I've just seen too many times

24:54where Kyle Larson looks like, you know, oh yeah, this is going to be the week he snaps out of it and then all of a sudden he just loses control and lap three or lap five. And I could see that happening again. I just I'm apprehensive of putting Kyle Larson in my lineup. TobyCristy.com is the place for all the latest NASCAR news head on over to there and that same person with that domain name headed out to the NASCAR Chase media day. And what did you glean from there? Did you do any gleaning? I did. So I mean, you know, the team Penske number two, number 12 teams are swapping pit crews going into the chase. Okay. Okay. That was a decision that was made on Monday by team Penske. You know, Ryan Blaney's team has been very lackluster on Pit Road. They are the 30 second ranked pit crew this year. Well, Austin Cindrick's got the 10th ranked pit crew. Austin Cindrick comes into the chase the 15th seed Ryan Blaney comes in the second seed. So in order to give themselves the best chance at a championship over their team Penske, they've decided to swap the

25:57two pit crews. Ryan Blaney talked about this during his availability at Chase Media Day and explain that it was not his decision. He does not make the calls on changing pit crews. He thanked his crew for what they had done to get him to the dance and said ultimately all those kind of decisions are above his pay grade and out of his control. And for anyone asking if he asked for this change, he did not. So that's what he's saying. Austin Cindrick on the other hand, you know, kind of set all the right things. I said he didn't necessarily, you know, have to say that he likes the decision, but he understands it from a team perspective that they want to have the best chance at winning a championship as they can possibly have because a lot of people are thinking and a lot of the simulations that ask how we're ran kind of going into this thing showed the top five top six have a massive advantage in this 10 race chase due to the point differential they have on the rest of the field. And so, you know, you got to you got to car sit up there in the top five. You really want to give them a good chance at possibly winning this championship. So Austin Cindrick kind of understands that

27:03side of things, he understands the business side of things. And at the same time, he said this I asked him if it put a chip on his shoulder saying that his pick crew was the one swapped out. And maybe this gives him a reason to want to prove himself. So next time they're giving him the good pick crew in a chance to chase a championship. And he said he doesn't think about it that deeply. And so it seems like he's saying all the right things. He's going to try to, you know, gel with the former number 12 pick crew and try to see what they can do the rest of the way. How funny would it be though if we go out here at Darlington and that new number 12 team that was the former number two team has a hiccup of some kind. And Austin Cindrick's new picker doesn't. And somehow he ends up with the better finish. That would be just interesting. So that's a storyline to kind of follow as we go through this chase. Yeah, for sure. And this is kind of the team aspect that you're seeing a NASCAR where they do swapping of crew members and that kind of thing. So yeah, it's so it is. And so usually what we'll see in these situations is when this happens,

28:05it's usually when the other team has been mathematically eliminated from championship contention. You know what I mean? So a few years ago way back in the regular chase era when Jimmy and Jeff swapped pick crews. That was after Jeff had been eliminated and Jimmy was still chasing the championship. They swapped pick crews. And you know, now like usually it's, you know, either a team misses the chase or playoffs, right? And then they're like, okay, let's swap pick crews and give the guys in the chance or one of them gets eliminated in one of the rounds that we used to have, right? This is unprecedented to kind of see this. The chase has not started yet. Both of these teams are in the chase. And we're doing the pick crew swap before one of them's even been eliminated. Or at least looking like they're eliminated from mathematical contention for the championship. Interesting call. Very interesting call. Yeah, what else have you gleaned from the media day? I mean, there were tons of things. So, you know, Ryan Priest wins the race. And I don't know if you remember back to July, but he was pranked. They've got an ongoing prank war between him and

29:08Chris Bushier's teammate. And the latest prank in July was that as Ryan Priest was doing an autograph signing at Wilkesboro, North Wilkesboro Speedway, you know, he had ordered a 4-F-150 duly truck and Chris Bushier. He didn't realize it was going to be the guy delivering it, but he delivers it to him during this autograph session in front of all of his fans. And it's got, you know, purple accents down the side. It's got flowers all over it. And it's got, you know, butterflies and stuff like that. And so he gives Ryan Priestess truck and it's got eyelashes on the on the headlights and stuff like that just completely girlyed up, right? And Priestess like, man, you got me or whatever, right? Well, come to find out. This guy is still been using this truck the way it was given to him. And I mean, he's been really leaning into the bit. He went to go do the dirty mo studio interview on Dale Jr. Download for Wing the Race this week. He doesn't burn out

30:08in the Junior Motorsports Park in a lot in that truck. The way it was given to him with all the flowers, all the butterflies, all that stuff on it. And so I asked Chris Bushier by the layer, you surprise, he's still running around on this thing. And he said he is. But at the same time, he felt like that he had the situation on how the rap came to be made him believe that Priest would have to be forced to keep the rap on the truck. And I asked him what does he mean? He's like, well, I had his daughter help me design the rap. So now if he ends up peeling that thing off, his daughter's going to, it's going to be a huge thing because she helped design this thing, right? So diabolical just ability at finding a way to really get this prank to stick by Chris Bushier. I don't think I want to be pranked by that guy. And I don't want to know what he's got coming up next because they've kind of paused things as they were working on getting both of them into the chase. They knew it was a stake and didn't want to distract from it. But Bushier would say that, you know, it's very

31:12grueling being a NASCAR CUP series driver and high pressure situations each and every week, each and every year. And over the last couple of seasons, he and Priest have engaged in this little prank war. And he says it's actually provided a lot of levity for the two drivers as they've kind of been trying to navigate the stressful world being NASCAR drivers. So that's pretty cool to see. And it's funny to see that Priest is still running around that truck for sure. All right. Before we get back over to Toby Christie.com to find out about some some silly season stuff. Tom Cruise on site at Daytona. What what was the reason for that? What could it be? You know, the thing is going to remember it's like 10 years, huh? Days of Thunder 2. It's coming, man. Yeah. And it's coming summer of 2028. It will be starring Tom Tom Cruise and and halfway. We found out through the reveal will also be a co-star in the movie. Yeah. And I saw a quote that it's not exact. I don't have it in front of me.

32:17But Tom basically is somebody asked Tom, are you going to be driving the cars? And he says, well, when I do movies about airplanes, I fly the plane. If I'm doing a movie about race cars, I'm driving the car. Yeah. And he did drive cars the first time around in days of Thunder 2. And what I understand is he actually crashed one of them on his first lap. Wow. And so we'll see how that goes this time around. Let's see. I don't know. The picture that comes to mind. He was in the driver's meeting and he was sitting next to Kyle Busch's empty seat. And it was a cool photo. He understood it. Yeah. Well, and then Kyle, you know, really played into the whole rowdy burns situation with the 51. The Always Rain and the Truck Series. And was a huge fan of the Days of Thunder movie. And it's sad that Kyle is not going to be able to see the sequel or even have a cameo in it. But it is cool. It's finally happening. It was cool to see that Tom Cruise understood, you know, who publishes and how important he is to the sport. Now, what's the, I guess,

33:19level of involvement by teams, NASCAR, etc. It seems just by him being there and in the drivers meeting and all that stuff, there's going to be a lot of involvement. Yeah. Yeah. They're going to want it to be as authentic as possible because that's the thing. People are going to start, you know, tearing this thing apart once it comes out about inaccuracies and stuff that people always do, especially this fan base, right? So that's going to be crucial. They're going to have, you know, a lot of people to kind of lean on to kind of help make sure this looks authentic. I know Carson Hosevar is apparently involved trying to give them some story lines about things that have happened since he's been a fan of the sport. And he's very willing to be a cameo driver in this race. And he actually wants to be a rival to Cole trickle. He wants to spin out Cole trickle in the movie. So we'll see if they let that happen. Although it would fit the modern NASCAR Megas fear of Carson Hosevar get into somebody and spin it out. So yeah, I'm sure they can work it in. But it'll be interesting to see how it all turns out. It'll be interesting to see who all gets the cameo in the movie. And it's just cool to see that this

34:23is actually coming to fruition after so many years of rumors. And this should happen. It's going to happen. It's it's it's right around the corner. It's going to happen guys. And it just never did. And finally it's going over the going over the finish line. Yeah, for sure. I'm excited just as a you know, a fan of the original movie. But at the same time, I'm kind of wondering, are we in a place where this is going to be a popular movie? Is it going to be, you know, one of those will it flop? I mean, it's got Tom Cruise on it. So it's probably not going to flop. But at the same time, the sports not where it was back then, you know, I just my even my my 17 year old is like a 70 year old guy is going to drive NASCAR's. So okay. Well, in fairness, he does not look 70. So no, for sure. He's not 70. He's close to it. He's like 60. What is he 16? 44. Yeah, somewhere that. But so he looks younger than that. So that will be fine. I think he'll look much like a 50 year old driver kind of ending up his career in the movie, right? So I think that'll be fine. Yeah. The interesting thing you talked about, you know, the sports not where it was

35:27when days of Thunder 1 came out. I honestly think we're in a pretty similar situation, although we're on the downward slope as opposed to the upward slope. But as far as popularity, the sport at the time of the movies, I think we're pretty close to the same. I think the viewership numbers are about what they were in 1990 when the movie came out. So we didn't really hit that huge boom until after that movie and, you know, going into the early 2000s, I really think, you know, this could be a perfectly timed spot for this. If they're hoping to use this to kind of propel forward with it in pop culture status again. I think this could do it. And depending on how the driver performing their cameos, this could lead to some, you know, SNL appearances and stuff like that. You never know. Which would be huge. I'm thinking specifically of the non-NASCAR fan. Will they go see this movie? That's the audience that I'm wondering. I think, you know, and it's hard these days because even the box office is different, right? I don't think people go to as many movies as they used to. But I think as far as like the streaming aspect of things, I think it'll be a hit on the streaming

36:30platforms. I don't know if people are going to be forking over the, you know, 100 bucks it takes for two people to go to a movie these days. But I think, you know, this has a chance to be a thing that kind of marinades for years after it goes out. And I think naturally people will start seeing it. I hope it's a huge hit when it first comes out. And I think there is a chance that that is a possibility. Depending on how the trailer is looking stuff like that, if they show enough crashing action and stuff like that. And it looks like the story is going to be a really good story. I think that there's a chance. But even if not, I think naturally over the years of the streaming services the way they are, I think people start clicking into it. And I think they start seeing it. My concern with, you know, so we talk about Tom Cruise being the star and whatever in, you know, Marcus is right. You know, it's weird to see a 70 year old big and it's a car driver, right? My concern with that aspect of it is does that, is Tom Cruise able to get the younger fan to watch this movie, which is the whole point of what you want to do. You want to, you know,

37:34reach on to pop culture status here and work on the next generation with this movie. Or do they have like him kind of bridging the gap as the veteran and are they going to have a younger driver to kind of keep this thing going with, right? Like maybe he has a team 80s teaching or tutoring. I don't know. But we'll see. I think there's going to have to be a young star in there somewhere that the younger generation at least knows who that person is to kind of help resonate with that side of the the world as well. Well, Spider-Man is just across the two billion marks. So I kind of disagree with your people aren't going to the movies anymore. But I think, I think broadly, fall somewhere in between, I think. Now superhero movies for sure. Like those have been hits, you know, that's for everyone. You can take family. You can take, you know, just a guy who likes superhero movies, right? That's it's for everyone, right? And they already know going into what they're getting. It's a pre-packaged thing where it's a, say what fast and fierce people know what they're getting when they're getting fast and the furious. So it's one of those things where those are the pre-packaged things that do super, super well. But everything else, I feel like has not done as well.

38:36But I could be wrong. I'm not a huge movie buff at this point. But I feel like people aren't going to as many movies as previously, but I could be wrong. All right. Let's fly over to TobyCrissey.com. We've got a report. John Hunter Nima check out at Legacy. What's going on there? Well, the report has now been confirmed by the team. And John Hurnima checked himself. He is not going to be returning to Legacy Motor Club in 2027. Despite the fact that they had previously announced that he would be back in 2027. The team when they announced a sponsorship with Rexle that would be extending into 2027 announced that John Hurnima check would be back in the 42 with that sponsorship. But now they've had a change of heart. So, you know, the team didn't really give any, any real hints on what happened. I've been told that the decision was made around New Hampshire. So really quickly, like this just happened. I mean, it, yeah, it hasn't been brewing for very long. But Legacy Motor Club's statement to the media and to the public was quote, Legacy Motor Club

39:39has made the decision to part ways to John Hurnima check at the conclusion of the 2026 NASCAR Cup series season. We are grateful for John Hunter's contributions to Legacy Motor Club and appreciate his professionalism and commitment to the organization throughout his time with the team. We remain focused on finishing the 2026 season strong together and wish John Hurnima check the very best in the future. So that's the statement from the team. Niemechek also put out a statement saying that, you know, it's unfortunate. But, you know, he found out that they've decided to go a different direction. And he looks forward to what's next for him. It doesn't look like it's going to be with Toyota based on the statement he sent. But there's always a chance you never know. But it looks like, you know, I mean, the rally series ranks. It looks like Joe Gibbs race is completely full. Sam Hunt racing looks pretty full. As far as Toyota Routesco, he's kind of running out of options there. So it looks like he's going to probably be on the move to another manufacturer. Not sure, you know, at this point, Cup looks like not an option because the rides are pretty much full. The rumor around the garage is that Josh Barry will be the guy going into that ride. The John

40:44here, Niemechek is vacating. You know, both have kind of underperformed this year and both misled playoffs, the chase. You know, Niemechek's actually higher in points right now than Josh Barry is as funny as that is. But Josh Barry, since announcing he would not be back in the 21 car next year has gone on a tear and is one not one, but he's had five straight top 10 finishes going into this weekend's race at Darlington, which is the longest top 10 finishing streak of any wood brothers racing driver since Morgan Shepherd in 1994. So that's that's pretty significant that he's, you know, hitting that kind of a mark in the 21 car, which has not seen that kind of performance in a long, long time despite the underwhelming season he had going into that stretch. But I think that's enough if he ends up being the guy they announce to take over that 42 car. Let's take a look at Darlington this weekend race number one in the playoffs for NASCAR's Cup series on a 1.366 mile egg shaped oval. We have an equidistant alert to run and back stretches are both 1229 feet

41:52banking in the turns are 25 degrees in turns one in two 23 degrees in three and four crew chiefs going to have to, you know, swallow some ad villain thumbs at the same time. I don't know if those conflict or not. So don't quote me on that. Oh no. Races 501.32 miles or 367 laps stages are 115, 115 and 137 last year's pole sitter was Danny Hamlin and last year's winner was chase brisco. Yes. Take a look at drivers that do well there in terms of wins. We've got Tyler Rettich has a win there. We've got Kyle Larson with a win there. Joey Lugano has a win. We've got two wins from chase brisco. Eric Jones. Eric Jones. Where? Let me see if he's in the list too. Right, Danny? He's not on the list. Is that because he's not in the playoffs? Probably. Yeah, but he's got two wins at Darlington as well. Okay. Well, and then you got Danny Hamlin. He's got five. You're right.

42:55Yeah. Yeah. Danny's a Darlington master. I forgot about brisco by the way. We were talking about our picks. So that's another one. Well, that wasn't on Rattie's list, right? Nope. Really? He's won the last two southern five hundred. That's interesting. He's got Danny, Tyler and Kyle. Okay. Okay. Maybe he didn't want to be too toy or heavy. Yeah. Yeah, or too obvious. I don't know. Right. Or maybe he was stuffing that away in his final because you have to have a five driver lineup. Maybe he's. Yeah. Maybe he's holding back. Yeah. Take the take the bait here and all. We just figured him out. Yeah. Let's see why I suck at this game now. It stills other two. So there you have it. Getting you all set up for Darlington. I think we we should call this a show. Yeah. It's been a pretty good one too. I'm excited. The chase is about to start. And I'm just relieved to know we're not going to have resetting points every three races. I'm so pumped about that. We can actually let this this battle for the championship play out

43:58naturally. Kind of see who's the best over a 10 race stretch. It's going to be fun. Oh, it's still NASCAR. That's not going to be naturally. Yeah. We'll find a way to get him to get up. But it's still not getting nearly exactly. It's still not going to be nearly as bad as before. And I'm very thankful for that. And I hope that we keep making these changes to kind of go back to a more pure aspect of this sport that we all loved so much and and grew to love it for the pure racing side of things. So hopefully we get back to more of that. Checkered flag flying on this show. This has been the final lap. We'll catch us next week right here. We will recap the racing ad Darlington. And I got my little print out here and preview worldwide technology raceway in St. Louis. That's race number two. Wow. I would not have had that on my bingo card because I didn't check the schedule ahead of time. Now you now you have it on your bingo card. Toby, you and I will chat next week. We sure will. And we like to thank our current list of Patreon paying people. If you'd like to join in on the giving fun, we first of all,

45:00thank you very much for that. Patreon.com slash the final app is the link. Absolutely. And we've got, so we talked about Louisville Maxx top of shows, well, sponsors. Let's talk about the fact that he sponsors this show in two different sections. He supports ride dragons part of the show. He also supports the show as an overall sponsor. Thank you, Louisville Maxx. Really cool to see. We mentioned them at the top of shows. Well, Devon at the only match down level tier and one of our sponsors. Thank you, Devon and Quentin Whitaker as well. My buddy from Daytona, if they went into the track, Quentin, if you guys went this week, I hope you enjoyed it. I hope you had a good time. Really exciting way for that thing to conclude with a guy winning his way into the chase. Really cool to see. We've got Chris White on this list from down under. Thank you, Chris. We've got Ryan Moore. We've got Robert Keane, Jimmy B. Mr. Jimmy James, 1983. Thank you, Jimmy. We've got Simon Green from across the pod. Troy Clark from down under our long time buddy over there from down under Troy Clark. Thank you, Troy. We've got Peter Drehanson, Peter Johansson. Thank you, Peter. We've got David Reed, Evan Taylor, Mike Scott, Mike A. Old and them. Thank you, Mike. And of course, Charles came to the longest tenured listener in the show. The guy who was listening since before

46:01the chase was even a thing. Thank you, Charles. And thank you, everyone on this list. Back to you, Kerry Rap, things up. Let's get to Darlington for the Southern 500. Yeah, once again, patreon.com slash the final app and we up. Boom. Dramatic pause that time. Yeah, it was nice. I like that.