Staying out wasn't the right call in All-Star Race - Logano

Joey Logano felt he had the best car again at North Wilkesboro Speedway, but on Sunday night, his chance at victory was undone by the wrong strategy call.

Logano, the defending winner of the All-Star Race, lost the lead with nine laps to go. Christopher Bell, who had new right-side tires, muscled his way around Logano, who stayed out and was on older tires. The final stretch of racing was 28 laps after the race restarted on lap 223.

“Obviously not,” Logano said of staying out being the right call. “Duh. We got beat by that.”

The final caution occurred on lap 216. It was the Promoter’s Caution, a new procedure for this year’s race. By the parameters of the caution, it could have been used between lap 100 and 220, but if a natural caution occurred after lap 200, then the Promoter’s Caution would be taken out of play.

Logano was holding off Bell for the race lead when the caution came out. He was one of five drivers who then stayed out.

“I felt like it was 50/50,” Logano said. “We were going to put two (tires) on, and then at the last minute we decided to stay out. I thought six cars was going to be enough. It was a similar situation to what Brad [Keselowski] had in the heat race – 30 or so laps on the tires, he stayed, he was able to manage. But the difference is it’s a heat race to the feature, and what are people willing to do in a heat race versus a million dollars for the win of the All-Star Race? It changes the game a little bit, and we didn’t fire off as fast as we needed to in the first eight laps of that run. 

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“We didn’t make the right call. We go down together. We do all this stuff together. We had the best car and we did most everything right. We just made one decision off, so we’ll take second. What does second pay? Not a million, I guess.”

He fired off well on the restart and cleared Team Penske teammate Ryan Blaney. However, Blaney got out of shape off Turn 4 with 27 laps to go, and that opened the door for Ross Chastain to clear him on the outside and Bell to go by on the inside.

Bell took second position from Chastain with 24 laps to go. He was on Logano’s bumper a lap later, and it became a battle of lanes and blocking until the winning pass was made. The battle saw Bell try both the outside and the inside of Logano, and he prevailed on the inside lane and by running Logano wide in Turns 3 and 4.

“It is what it is,” Logano said. “He did it good enough that I couldn’t get back to him because I was going to show him what fair was, but I just couldn’t get there. I just couldn’t get there with the tires. I couldn’t get away fast enough. It took me six or seven laps after that restart to get rolling again, and then he passed too many cars there in the first couple laps, and then he was there. I was doing all I can to play defense until my rear tires would come in and it just took too long, and then he was gone. I couldn’t catch back up. 

“Frustrating when you lead that many laps, you had the fastest car, and a gimmick caution beats you. It just sucks, but it is what it is. You move on, and we’ll be happy that we had the best car the last two times that we’ve been here. I wish we had two wins, though.”

Logano led a race-high 139 of 250 laps.