By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor
(NASCAR)—Austin Dillon has emerged from the rain and the wrecks at Daytona to claim the last NASCAR Cup playoff spot by becoming the sixteenth winner of a race this year. Dillon survived unscathed a multi-car crash with fifteen laps to go when rain suddenly struck the Daytona Speedway Sunday afternoon. After the restart, he bumped Austin Cindric out of the way with three laps left and was protected from a last-lap surge by the few other surviving cars by teammate Tyler Reddick, who finished second. 
Because Kurt Busch, one of the other winners this year, has withdrawn from the qualified finalists for the ten-race championship runoff, non-winner Ryan Blaney (right) will join the playoff field. Blaney finished third in the regular season points chase. But Dillon’s victory kept fourth-place regular season points-finisher Martin Truex Jr., from a run for the title.
The sixteen-driver field is made up of drivers who won races. If there are fewer than sixteen drivers eligible with victories, remaining playoff slots are filled on the basis of regular season points. Dillon finished nineteenth in regular season points but made the field of sixteen with his win. Dillon will start the first runoff race next week at Darlington seeded 16th. Blaney is seeded seventh because he got bonus points for winning stages of five races.
Rain Saturday night caused the race to be postponed until Sunday. The rainstorm that winnowed the field with the big crash late in the race Sunday caused a three-hour, 20-minute delay until the track was dry enough to finish the race.
(INDYCAR)—INDYCAR President Jay Frye is watching a heated battle for the championship play out as the season moves toward its last two races.
Frye, who played tight end and offensive tackle for the Missouri Tigers, 1983-86, under coaches Warren Powers and Woody Widenhofer, has been with INDYCAR since 2013 and has been the series President since 2018. He posted this picture from those days on Twitter recently. (There are some folks who think the uniforms of those times are much preferable to today’s outfits).
We talked with him in his mobile INDYCAR office while he was at World Wide Technology Raceway a little more than a week ago, just before the INDYCAR race won by Josef Newgarden.
AUDIO jay frye 2022 17:51 mp3
Frye and other INDYCAR officials enjoy being out of the office on race day, often being seen mingling with fans and often on the starting grid during pre-race ceremonies coordinating events and, in the case of the race at WWTR, checking the weather. The start of the race that night was moved up by half an hour in an effort to avoid approaching rain. It almost worked. The race was stopped with about 40 laps left and resumed more than two hours later after the storms had moved on and the track had been dried.
INDYCAR races at Portland next Sunday then finishes its season with the Grand Prix of Monterey on the Laguna Seca road course a week later. Will Power clings to a three-point lead over Newgarden heading into these last two races. Six-time champion Scott Dixon is just 14 points back as he tries to equal A. J. Foyt’s record of six series championships. Indianapolis 500 winner Marcus Ericsson is fourth, trailing Power by only 17 points.
(FORMULA 1)—Max Verstappen has started the second half of the F1 season with a statement victory at the Grand Prix of Belgium at Spa-Francorchamps. He started 14th, took the lead on the 12th lap, and finished a full 17 seconds in front of his nearest challenger, Sergio Perez.
Verstappen’s qualifying speed would have put him on the pole but he was set back in the field because his team put a new engine in his car.
Lewis Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, a pair of former F1 multiple champions, tangled on the first lap, the impact sending Hamilton’s Mercedes into the air. Alonso was able to continue but Hamilton’s car was too badly damaged to go on. Hamilton said Alonso was in his blind spot. Alonso had far less charitable remarks about Hamilton. Alonso recovered to finish fifth.
(Photo credits; Jay Frye Twitter, Rick Gevers, Bob Priddy)