NASCAR takeaways: Bubba Wallace can forget about playoff cutline after Indianapolis win

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4 days ago

Bubba Wallace doesn't have to worry about the bubble now.
With his Brickyard 400 win at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on July 27, Wallace entered himself into the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series playoff field. It was his third career victory and first at a crown-jewel event.
And it sends him and his No. 23 Toyota of 23XI Racing to the postseason for the second time.
'It's been getting old running on the cutline,' said Wallace, who arrived in Indianapolis in the 16th and final playoff position, 16 points into the positive.
He led 30 of the 168 laps, capturing the front spot with 17 laps to go in regulation. He held onto it through a late rain stoppage and two overtimes.
Kyle Larson, Denny Hamlin, Ryan Preece and Brad Keselowski followed Wallace to the stripe, filling out the top five.
Here are three takeaways from Sunday's race:
1. Bubba Wallace makes NASCAR playoffs with Brickyard 400 win
The victory was Wallace's first regular-season win ever. His first two triumphs — in October 2021 and September 2022 — occurred during the playoffs.
His Indy performance snapped a 100-race winless streak since the 2022 Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas. The 31-year-old took the checkered flag by 0.22 seconds.
While leading after the short rain delay, Wallace elected not to pit for gas before either of the overtime restarts. His team wasn't sure he had enough fuel to hang on and outduel Larson. But he didn't want to surrender the lead, either.
'Unbelievable,' Wallace said. 'To win here at the Brickyard, knowing how big this race is, knowing all the noise that's going on in the background, to set that aside is a testament to the people here on this 23 team.'
Wallace last made the playoffs in 2023.
2. Ty Gibbs earns $1 million prize for first NASCAR In-Season Challenge
The championship battle of the inaugural in-season tournament wasn't as dramatic as the rest of the Brickyard 400.
Ty Gibbs, the sixth seed, beat Ty Dillon, the 32nd seed, to claim the $1 million reward. Though Gibbs' 21st-place finish was his worst of the five-race challenge, he cruised past Dillon, who ranked 28th Sunday.
Dillon suffered significant damage during a Stage 2 restart and never recovered. He finished three laps down.
In his No. 54 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, Gibbs ousted Justin Haley, AJ Allmendinger, Zane Smith and Tyler Reddick over the last month to reach the finals.
3. Next race on NASCAR schedule: Is it Heaven? No, it's Iowa
After hopscotching from one coast to another, NASCAR spends yet another weekend in America's Heartland.
Race 23 on the Cup Series schedule will be Year 2 of Cup racing at Iowa Speedway, with the Iowa Corn 350 (corn, of course!) set for next Sunday as NBC takes over from TNT and keeps its cameras focused through season's end. The green flag will fly shortly after 3:30 p.m.
The Xfinity Series will join the Cup teams on the oval that measures seven-eighths of a mile.
Before that, the calendar turns to August and we officially have just a month of Sundays (and a pair of Saturdays) left in the 26-race regular season. Playoff berths are on the line. Jockeying for points picks up the pace, as does dreams of a victory and the playoff entry that comes with it.
— Ken Willis contributed to this story
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: NASCAR results today: Bubba Wallace is Brickyard 400 race winner