NCS: Chase Briscoe plays playoff spoiler in victory in Cook Out Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway - Speedway Digest

For the 75^th time the Southern 500 would get underway but this time the regular season ending event with the unlikely duo of Wallace and Hocevar on the front row.

Shortly after taking the green flag with just three laps in the books Truex would break loose running up the track into the path of Blaney to collect him in the incident. Blaney’s car would come to a stop at the bottom of the track before Blaney would exit, ending his night.

Truex would drive back to pit road but after checking the damage James Small radioed to Truex letting him know to get out of the car ending his night early adding drama early into the 500-mile race. NASCAR would announce later in the night following the conclusion of the second stage that Truex had clinched a spot in the playoffs.

The first pit stops of the night would come with just 30 laps complete with the battle for the lead between Wallace, Reddick and Larson leaving would hand the lead over to Larson who beat the first wave of a dozen-plus cars off pit road.

After a long 115 lap opening stage with 109 straight green, Larson would take the opening stage win of the night over Wallace, Briscoe, Reddick and Bell rounding out the top-five.

As the stage would come to an end, Reddick would radio his team letting them know he was getting sick inside the car. The team would pit the car under caution and send him back out with Tums to take.

Reddick would instead drop most of the pills given to him, forcing the team to come up with a plan to mix them in a water bottle under the next stop.

Stage two would go caution free with Larson taking home the second stage win of the night over Briscoe, Hamlin, Byron and Bell.

The first legitimate attack on Larson’s dominance would come on the restart of the final stage when Briscoe and Larson would run side by side for over a full lap before Larson would finally clear away from the No. 14 machine.

With laps winding down in the final stage, Hocevar would go for a spin off turn four with just 53 laps remaining.

On the restart Hamlin would challenge Larson for the lead before Larson would finally break free of the battle nearly a full lap later.

Caution would come out again when Gilliland and Buescher would make contact going down the back sending Gilliland spinning back to the inside wall and causing slight damage to Buescher car who was racing for the final transfer spot into the playoffs.

As Larson and Briscoe would fight up front for the lead on the restart, Hocevar would blow a tire dropping debris to bring out the sixth caution of the night.

Busch, who was on new tires, was able to work himself up into the top-five with Buescher closing the four spot gap to Wallace as the two continued to fight for a transfer spot.

On the restart Chastain and Larson would battle for the lead before Chase Briscoe who had hounded Larson multiple times for the lead would take it three wide around the pair to take the lead.

But it wouldn’t last when a multi car wreck would break out the next lap when Berry would ride up the track into Gibbs collecting, Byron, Wallace and others in the melee.

Byron would drive back to pit road before the team would send him to the garage joining both Berry and Gragson who were involved ending their nights.

The final 17 laps would be a battle for the ages as Busch would work himself from the fifth spot up behind Briscoe. The pair would battle within just tenths of each other with Chase Briscoe crossing the line just 0.361 over Kyle Busch who came up second two weeks in a row, Bell, Larson and Chastain would round out the top-five finishers.

“For all 320 employees, everybody, to be able to race for a championship in their final year, man, unbelievable. God is just so good. It’s like déjà vu there at the end with Kyle, with the Xfinity race here in 2020. Obviously I didn’t know if I was going to be able to do it.” Said Briscoe

“This group, the day that we found out that the team wasn’t going to exist any more, we went over to the shop floor, we all looked at each other and said, We’re in this till the end. We’re not going to give this up. We kept saying all week we got one bullet left in the chamber. That’s bullet hit.” Continued Briscoe

Reddick who battled sickness all night long would finish in 10^th to claim the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series Regular Season Championship by just one point over Larson who led a race high eight times for 263 laps.

“It’s just a testament to all the hard work that everyone at 23XI, here at the racetrack, week in and week out, back at Airspeed, puts into this. We’re on year four of their goals, right? It’s just been really, really fun the last two years to be a part of this process, building up to where we want to be.” Said Reddick

NOTE: The 16 drivers vying for the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series Championship, Tyler Reddick, Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, Ryan Blaney, William Byron, Christopher Bell, Brad Keselowski, Denny Hamlin, Alex Bowman, Joey Logano, Daniel Suarez, Austin Cindric, Harrison Burton, Martin Truex Jr., Ty Gibbs and Chase Briscoe.

The NASCAR Cup Series now moves onto Atlanta Motor Speedway for the first round of the Playoffs next Sunday, September 8^th at 3:00 p.m. ET on USA Network.