Brad Keselowski was responsible for two spin-out incidents near the end of the Daytona 500 on Sunday, and one of them may have cost Ricky Stenhouse Jr. what would have been his first ever win at the biggest race of the year.
Stenhouse was near the front of the field with five laps to go when Keselowski got into his bumper with an aggressive push. Stenhouse ended up in the wall, and rookie Austin Cindric went on to take the checkered flag. You can see what happened below:
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. into the wall. pic.twitter.com/oqaL7bzPMK
— FOX: NASCAR (@NASCARONFOX) February 20, 2022
Stenhouse made it clear after the race that he was not happy with Keselowski’s driving. He said there are spots on the track that you want to push and not push, but Keselowski “tried to wreck everybody in the field until he won.”
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. was critical of Brad Keselowski pushing in the corner. Stenhouse: “I guess he just tried to wreck everybody in the field until he won. I guess his other car won that he gave up. So kudos to him.” pic.twitter.com/lf5QMX0Tn4
— Bob Pockrass (@bobpockrass) February 21, 2022
Earlier in the race, Keselowski was trying to give Harrison Burton a shove, but Burton’s No. 21 car spun out and took out William Byron, Denny Hamlin, Alex Bowman, Kyle Busch and others. Keselowski admitted he may have been overly aggressive.
https://twitter.com/bobpockrass/status/1495553797061554176
“Whenever somebody spins out obviously there’s somebody over-aggressive, but in the moment I didn’t,” he said. “I was just pushing. We weren’t even all the way up to speed, so I feel like it was a crazy time to be pushing, but obviously, the results say different.”
Cindric finished the race just barely ahead of Bubba Wallace in a fantastic photo finish. Had it not been for Keselowski causing a couple of wrecks, the results may have been different.
