NASCAR at Indianapolis: Cars destroyed in two major crashes at Brickyard race

Edward Sutelan

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NASCAR at Indianapolis: Cars destroyed in two major crashes at Brickyard race image

The curbing in Turns 5 and 6 of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course had been an issue for most of the Verizon 200 at The Brickyard on Sunday. It finally gave way with five laps to go. 

The result was a massive crash with several cars, including those of William Byron, Joey Logano and Ryan Preece, flying into the tire barriers along the side of the course and many other cars spinning off the track. 

The wrecks forced NASCAR to bring out the red flag. 

That wouldn't be the end of it. During NASCAR's first attempt at overtime, Michael McDowell went airborne over the turn, igniting a crash that took out several other drivers. The crash ended McDowell and Austin Dillon's afternoons and the red flag was again brought out.

MORE: NASCAR at Indianapolis live updates, results, highlights

NASCAR crews addressed the curbing at the start of the second stage. A caution flag later came out when Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Aric Almirola spun early in the final stage. When crews went out to look at the curb, they found a radiator pan and splitter structure. 

More debris appeared at the turn with 10 laps remaining, which brought out another caution flag. 

When Byron went over the curbing with five laps to go, his car went spinning off course, followed by several more cars. Ultimately, the pileup took out Byron, Logano, Preece, Christopher Bell and Daniel Suarez.

When NASCAR crews finally removed what remained of the curbing, there's was a round of applause from the crowd.

It turned out, however, that simply removing the curbing wouldn't be enough to fix the problem as McDowell flew over the bare turn and brought out the second red flag. 

Safe to say, the first year of Cup racing on the Indy road course instead of the oval did not go quite as well as it could have.

Edward Sutelan

Edward Sutelan Photo

Edward Sutelan joined The Sporting News in 2021 after covering high school sports for PennLive. Edward graduated from The Ohio State University in 2019, where he gained experience covering the baseball, football and basketball teams. Edward also spent time working for The Columbus Dispatch and Cape Cod Times.