Sunday’s wild NASCAR Cup Sequence race at Michigan Worldwide Speedway felt extra like a superspeedway occasion with all the chaos and carnage. Solely 24 drivers reached the checkered flag, and eleven cautions eclipsed a file that had stood for 20 years.
Denny Hamlin gained the day, driving away from the sector throughout the last run of the race. The victory was his 63rd in Cup, tying him with Kyle Busch for ninth on the all-time wins checklist.
However that is solely scratching the floor of what went down at MIS, so let’s check out the most important winners and losers from the NASCAR Cup race within the Irish Hills of Michigan:
WINNER: Denny Hamlin is at his finest, and honors each Rowdy Busch and Gentleman Ned
Watch: ‘We’re nonetheless pondering of Kyle’: Hamlin honors Busch in Victory Lane
We’re witnessing the perfect model of Denny Hamlin, and at 45 years previous, he is solely getting sooner. He is now tied Kyle Busch with 63 profession wins, and honored the fallen NASCAR legend with a custom-made flag combining the JGR trademark #11 and the RCR trademark #8 to make a Kyle Busch #18 on a black background. He additionally remembered legendary driver Ned Jarrett, who died this previous weekend and was the unique ‘badass’ driver of the No. 11 in NASCAR. Additionally, Hamlin managed to win from the again of the sector for the second consecutive week, and it seems like nothing can cease him at this level. NASCAR now heads to Pocono, the place Hamlin has been dominant since he was a Cup Sequence rookie 20 years in the past.
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LOSER: Tyler Reddick reveals a crack within the armor with first DNF
Austin Dillon, Richard Childress Racing, Tyler Reddick, 23XI Racing, Denny Hamlin, Joe Gibbs Racing
Picture by: Brett Farmer / Getty Photographs
Reddick entered Michigan with no finishes exterior the highest 15 this 12 months, and regardless of shedding a piece of his lead at Nashville, he nonetheless held almost 100 factors between himself and his closest challenger within the championship. However the stress is on now after getting wrecked in a mid-race restart pileup. Reddick completed thirty fifth, recording his first DNF of the 12 months. With Hamlin’s win, that 97-point lead is now immediately all the way down to 51 factors. No driver apart from Reddick has led the standings but this 12 months, however at this price, that reality may change very quickly as his boss closes in.
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WINNER: Spire Motorsports with one other spectacular displaying
Watch: Hocevar explains transfer resulting in Lap 83 Michigan crash
What extra will be mentioned about Spire? They’re far exceeding all expectations. Carson Hocevar began on the entrance row and scored a prime 5 end, whereas teammate Daniel Suarez completed proper behind him in sixth. Each drivers moved deeper into the highest ten within the championship standings, and Spire was the one workforce with a number of drivers ending inside the highest six, and bested each different Chevrolet driver excluding Kyle Larson. Hocevar ruffled a couple of extra feathers after all, however his tempo stays one thing few different ‘Bowtie’ drivers can match.
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LOSER: Ford was nowhere to be present in Michigan
Joey Logano, Crew Penske
Picture by: Brett Farmer / Getty Photographs
This was stunning. Ford has gained 9 of the final 12 Michigan races, however the ‘Blue Oval’ didn’t even lead a single lap at Michigan Worldwide Speedway. None of them certified inside the highest ten, and their top-finishing drivers had been Penske teammates Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney in seventh and eighth, respectively. Ford solely has one victory this 12 months, and that got here in early March, so one thing has to alter if they need one other crown this 12 months.
WINNER: Erik Jones surprises as the perfect of the remaining
Watch: Jones laments P2: ‘It simply did not work out excellent’
Whereas Hamlin gained Sunday’s race by over eleven seconds, there was an exciting battle for second far behind him. However the winner of that battle to be the ‘better of the remaining’ was fairly the shock — Legacy Motor Membership driver Erik Jones and the No. 43 Toyota. That was no fluke both, as Jones was working down Chase Elliott for the Stage 2 win earlier in the identical race. That is the Michigan native’s first prime 5 of the 2026 season, and his finest end since successful the 2022 Southern 500 at Darlington.
LOSER: Bell & Elliott’s good day goes very mistaken in vicious crash
Firstly of Stage 3, Chase Elliott and Christopher Bell had been battling side-by-side on the entrance when Elliott’s automobile snapped up the monitor. Each vehicles pounded the surface wall in a violent crash that compelled a pink flag for wall repairs. The factors impression is clear, however Bell is now nursing a potential wrist and ankle damage, based on workforce proprietor Joe Gibbs. He has been winless since final September, and driving harm — or worse — being sidelined, could possibly be disastrous for his Chase hopes.
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WINNER: Bubba Wallace, the most important mover in factors
Bubba Wallace, 23XI Racing
Picture by: Brett Farmer / Getty Photographs
After a streak of terrible finishes and unhealthy luck, Wallace slipped all the way in which all the way down to fifteenth within the standings. Nicely, although he was concerned in the identical restart pileup that eradicated teammate Reddick, Wallace was in a position to proceed, and surged to a third-place end on Sunday. That’s now his finest end of the 2026 season, and made him the most important mover within the championship this week, leaping 4 positions from fifteenth to eleventh.
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LOSER: Three consecutive DNFs for Preece and Zilisch
Connor Zilisch crash harm
Picture by: Prime Video
It is all going mistaken for Ryan Preece, and it simply retains getting worse for Connor Zilisch. Preece was the proper instance of consistency with eleven consecutive prime 20 finishes throughout the first a part of the season. He was edging nearer to the highest ten in factors, however the No. 60 RFK Racing Ford has taken a swing within the mistaken course in latest weeks. Three consecutive DNFs for incidents exterior of his management have cratered Preece to nineteenth within the standings, and his probabilities of making the Chase are fading. For Zilisch, the rookie’s hopes of a Chase berth ended many weeks in the past, and at this level, he simply needs laps. He has solely managed to finish 15% of complete laps run over the previous three races mixed, and was eradicated in early cautions in every of these occasions. At Michigan, he truly wrecked twice within the first ten laps earlier than exiting the occasion, recording three consecutive last-place finishes.
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