Chris Buescher cruises in RFK masterclass at Richmond

23XI Racing and RFK Racing were the stars of the show in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series action at Richmond Raceway, but the latter ultimately stole the spotlight. While the 23XI duo of Tyler Reddick and Bubba Wallace dominated the first stage to finish 1–2, the latter never recovered after a slow pit stop while his team-mate suffered a commitment line violation penalty to drop him out of contention too.

Their team owner Denny Hamlin tried for one last gasp on the final restart with three laps remaining but ran wide while trying to chase down RFK’s Chris Buescher. With Hamlin left to fend off those behind him, Buescher drove off to his first win of 2023 with his boss Brad Keselowski finishing sixth, completing a banner day for the team.

Like 23XI, the RFK duo occupied the top two spots at the end of Stage #2. Keselowski also led the most laps with 102 while Buescher had the second highest at eighty-eight. Buescher enjoyed his third career Cup victory and second at RFK after Bristol, another short track, in 2022. While the team has particularly excelled on short tracks, Buescher feels they have taken strides in their second season under the RFK identity at all track types.

“What I’m proud of at RFK as a group is we don’t have to just talk about short track racing,” Buescher said in his post-race press conference. “We can talk about superspeedway racing and know we’re going to be up front battling for wins, leading laps. We can talk about road course racing and know that we’ve been very competitive at a lot of those and been battling for wins. We can talk about some mile-and-a-halfs and be in the conversation there, as well. Maybe not quite as strong and not have the results, but we’ve had moments at a lot of different styles of race tracks. That’s what I’m most proud of. It would be great if we just stepped up our short track programme and we were competitive at these styles of race tracks. That would put you in a place where we’d be leaving Richmond saying we don’t have another shot until Bristol maybe. I don’t know what the first one would be. That’s not where we’re at.

“We have race tracks that we’re going to be competitive at every week. We do not have to circle race tracks as our chance or this is where we’re going to be really good and we’re going to have to get through this week. We haven’t had that this season. Really didn’t have a whole lot of that last season as well.

“Last season was a building season. It took a lot of work to get there. To see results from all that work is big for us.”

The race was remarkably clean, going without a caution through the first two stages. The lone incident which set up the last restart came with eight laps remaining when Daniel Suárez spun after contact with Noah Gragson. Still, Suárez reached the finish as did all thirty-six cars; it is the first Cup race since 2018 at Homestead where every car completed the race, while the last at Richmond was the 2016 fall event.

While on-track drama was probably scant, plenty took place in the pits. Besides the aforementioned 23XI blunders dooming their day, Aric Almirola suffered a pass-through penalty for a commitment line violation but rebounded for eighth.

In a “continuation” of their clash at Pocono last Sunday, Kyle Larson bumped past Hamlin, though the latter had the last laugh again as he finished second while Larson and Hendrick Motorsports struggled mightily. Chase Elliott was the highest finishing Hendrick driver in a paltry thirteenth while Larson was nineteenth. Regardless, Hamlin expressed understanding for Larson’s action as he was on newer tyres.

Race results

Finish	Start	Number	Driver	Team	Manufacturer	Laps	Status
1	26	17	Chris Buescher	RFK Racing	Ford	400	Running
2	3	11	Denny Hamlin	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	400	Running
3	2	8	Kyle Busch	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	400	Running
4	23	22	Joey Logano	Team Penske	Ford	400	Running
5	11	41	Ryan Preece	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	400	Running
6	13	6	Brad Keselowski	RFK Racing	Ford	400	Running
7	10	19	Martin Truex Jr.	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	400	Running
8	24	10	Aric Almirola	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	400	Running
9	17	3	Austin Dillon	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	400	Running
10	8	4	Kevin Harvick	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	400	Running
11	20	14	Chase Briscoe	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	400	Running
12	5	23	Bubba Wallace	23XI Racing	Toyota	400	Running
13	4	9	Chase Elliott	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	400	Running
14	25	12	Ryan Blaney	Team Penske	Ford	400	Running
15	7	54	Ty Gibbs	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	400	Running
16	1	45	Tyler Reddick	23XI Racing	Toyota	400	Running
17	9	47	Ricky Stenhouse Jr.	JTG Daugherty Racing	Chevrolet	400	Running
18	15	48	Alex Bowman	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	400	Running
19	14	5	Kyle Larson	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	400	Running
20	29	20	Christopher Bell	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	399	Running
21	6	24	William Byron	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	399	Running
22	18	34	Michael McDowell	Front Row Motorsports	Ford	399	Running
23	27	43	Erik Jones	Legacy Motor Club	Chevrolet	399	Running
24	19	1	Ross Chastain	Trackhouse Racing Team	Chevrolet	399	Running
25	16	38	Todd Gilliland	Front Row Motorsports	Ford	399	Running
26	30	2	Austin Cindric	Team Penske	Ford	399	Running
27	36	16	A.J. Allmendinger	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	399	Running
28	12	42	Noah Gragson	Legacy Motor Club	Chevrolet	398	Running
29	32	51	Ryan Newman	Rick Ware Racing	Ford	398	Running
30	28	31	Justin Haley	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	398	Running
31	22	21	Harrison Burton	Wood Brothers Racing	Ford	397	Running
32	31	7	Corey LaJoie	Spire Motorsports	Chevrolet	397	Running
33	33	99	Daniel Suárez	Trackhouse Racing Team	Chevrolet	396	Running
34	34	77	Ty Dillon	Spire Motorsports	Chevrolet	396	Running
35	35	15	J.J. Yeley*	Rick Ware Racing	Ford	396	Running
36	21	78	B.J. McLeod	Live Fast Motorsports	Chevrolet	395	Running

Italics – Competing for Rookie of the Year
* – Ineligible for points