In the thick of fighting for a spot in the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs, Bubba Wallace is shifting his focus to having fun. Doing so, however, correlates to trying to secure his first postseason berth. Wallace enters the Indianapolis road course – his best road course on the schedule – with a 58-point advantage on the playoff grid cutline.
“Not locked in. Not safe,” Wallace said Saturday. “I was watching the race last night (from 2022) and I’m like, ‘I finished third in the second stage?’ Alright, [heck] of a strategy. My engineer was like, ‘And you ran second for a long time!’ I’m like, ‘Ha!’
“We’ll be fine. My main objective for these next two weeks, especially, is just to go out and have fun. It’s all going to go out the window lap one when I’m 2s off the pace, but I just want to get back to having fun. It goes away when you get to the Cup level, unfortunately.”
Wallace finished fifth on the Indianapolis road course last season. It was his first top-10 result on a road course in his Cup Series career and made his average finish through the first two Indianapolis races ninth.
The 23XI Racing driver is not yet in a position to mathematically clinch a playoff spot on points, which is something Kevin Harvick and Brad Keselowski can do this weekend if there is a repeat winner, or a winner who is not eligible for the playoffs. If that were to happen, it would leave two spots up for grabs over the final two regular-season races.
“When you don’t give a [crap] about things, that makes things fun,” Wallace said. “When you start thinking and overthinking, that dials you right out and that’s not fun. I’m a [really] good person at overthinking things, especially when it comes to road course racing, and taking the fun right out of it, so you just have to go out and get back to the basics.
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“I’ve hit sim a lot this week just trying to figure out where Tyler [Reddick] was fast, and I told him in our meeting Tuesday, ‘Hey man, to get the No. 23 locked in, you just go out and win these next two weeks. You’re the best road course racer — just go out and win and you’ll be fine.’ I put a little bit of extra pressure on him.”
In his previous five full seasons as a Cup Series competitor, Wallace never had a realistic chance at making the postseason like he does this year. He was always too far back in the championship standings to be able to point himself in, leaving him in must-win situations and usually counting on trying to pull it off at Daytona.
“We’ve been about three crashes, 10 loose wheels too late at this point,” he quipped. “Especially last year.”
Ironically, Wallace has never been a fan of having to race for points. This year, though, he’s been proud of how his No. 23 team has used strategy to capitalize on points to make the most of their situation.
“That’s been the biggest game changer,” Wallace said. “We started the year off not really a factor in the first two stages and rallying to get a top-five finish. Well, now we’re the opposite. We’re getting stage points, but we’re nowhere to be talked about in the final stage. That’s been frustrating the last couple of weeks, and we’ve got to figure out why we’re falling off the horse at the end when the pay window opens.”
Just like his mental approach, Wallace says sealing the deal is going to change this weekend in Indianapolis, too.
“I feel good about it.”