NASCAR: Driver Ratings for Verizon 200 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course

Crash NASCAR journalist Chad Smith goes through the field to hand out driver ratings for the Verizon 200 at Indianapolis.
Michael McDowell, Front Row Motorsports at Indianapolis
Michael McDowell, Front Row Motorsports at Indianapolis

Michael McDowell: 10

A dominant win to lock his teamꩲ into the Playoffs.

Chase Elliott: 9

The win Chase needs to ge🐠t into the Playoffs was right there, but he just came up one spot short.

Daniel Suarez: 6

A great weekend for the pole sitter was ruined with o𓆏ne small mistake on a pit stop, but he salvaged a 3🦹rd place finish.

Tyler Reddick: 8

The s🦩trongest Toyota driver scored another top-five finish as they head into another road course race.

Alex Bowman: 9

This was a surprising, but much needed, top-five result for Bowman, who♛ still needs to win to get into the Playoff🎃s.

Chase Briscoe: 7

B🐎riscoe had a great run to 6th, while♚ the rest of the Stewart Haas Racing cars finished 23rd, 31st, and 39th.

Martin Truex Jr: 7

T🥂ruex had a typical quiet, but solid afternoon yet 🐬again.

Kyle Larson: 7

This has been an extremely b♚u🌳sy week for Larson, so scoring a top-ten after an issue early in the race was quite impressive.

Christopher Bell: 7

Bell didn't really go forward but he did spend some time up front and had a ಞdec꧅ent afternoon.

Shane Van Gisbergen: 8

The Supercars ace followed up his Chicago street course win with a solid top-ten result toda♎y in a different envi💯ronment.

Shane Van Gisbergen, Trackhouse Racing
Shane Van Gisbergen, Trackhouse Racing

Chris Buescher: 7

Buescher followed up his two straight victories with an 11thܫ place 🍸result and kept it clean.

Ty Gibbs: 6

Gibbs won the Xfinity race yes🦩terday but had a much tougher time today, getting roꦕughed up a couple of times by other drivers.

Ryan Blaney: 6

It was an eventful day for Blaney, who was rammed by his teammate, then dumpꦚed AJ Allmendinger for some reason.

William Byron: 9

No one will talk about it, but this was a sensational drive by Byron, coming🌟 from the very back of the field to finish inside the top 15.

Austin Cindric: 7

Cindric has always been good on road courses but he didn't hဣave the speed to showcase it today.

Ross Chastain: 6

Two of the Trackhouse cars were very qu💧ick, and yet 🃏again, Chastain was not one of them.

Bubba Wallace: 5

From a race perspective, Wallacꦰe did okay by keeping it clean, but others around him fared much better and made up a bunch o🐓f ground.

Denny Hamlin: 4

Hamlin led laps today but it 🧔was off sequence, and he was never a factor for much of the weekend.

Brad Keselowski: 4

A top 20 finish forꦿ Brad on a road course wasn't terrible, but he won't be happy about it.

Brodie Kostecki: 8

Brodie had an impressive weekend, showing speed and the ability to recover after bad f🍒ortune in his first ever NASCAR start.

Kevin Harvick: 5

Not the way t✅he three-time Brickyard 400 winner wanted his final race to go but he d♊id improve 15 positions on the day.

Kevin Harvick, Stewart Haas Racing
Kevin Harvick, Stewart Haas Racing

Mike Rockenfeller: 7

Aggression was not an issue for Rockenfeller, who was using up his fellow competitors 🥀when the oppo▨rtunity presented itself.

AJ Allmendinger: 3

The inau𝄹gural race winner had a weekend to forget, which is a shame 𒅌considering how much he looks forward to this stop on the calendar each year.

Jenson Button: 3

Button got into it with several drivers on Sunday, and often times he ♒got the short end of the stick.

Kamui Kobayashi: 3

Kobayashi was another dri💝ver that got run into as other drivers made mistakes.

Joey Logano: 2

Logano made a fool of himself in this race last year with his dive bomb maneuver, and today was just as bad, taking out multiple drivers, including ramming the back of his teammate on the way to a 34th plac꧅e finish.

Kyle Busch: 5

His great day went south late in the race, which will only motivate him even more ♕headin🌼g into next weekend at Watkins Glen.

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