NASCAR doesn’t usually race on Easter weekend—it’s never been a scheduled weekend before this year—but this year a special TV-friendly dirt race was set up at Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee. Sunday night’s rainy cup race actually had an exciting finish, but it was something that happened in the trucks race on Saturday that really caught my attention.
About two-thirds of the way through that race, Austin Wayne Self’s No. 22 car hit the back of Matt DiBenedetto’s No. 25. And then… got stuck. Seriously. The two trucks got stuck together and could not get apart, and they had to wave the caution flag and get an even bigger truck (a tow truck) out onto the dirt to pry the two trucks apart.
The announcers are not being over-the-top here. I asked around every racing journalist and fan I know, and no one could remember this ever happening before in a race. Bozi Tatarevic, a racing mechanic who writes for NASCAR.com, explained how it happened.
It looks like the No. 22 might have gotten jammed into the rear bumper structure of the No. 25. pic.twitter.com/zIYw6M7PJa
— Bozi Tatarevic (@BoziTatarevic) April 17, 2022
Hilarious. While they did wind up separated, the two drivers ended up together in the end, too: DiBenedetto finished 35th, while Self finished 36th. They should’ve just let them cross the line stuck together!
