Total Toyota Calamity! Watch as Half the Toyotas are Wiped Out in One Talladega Crash
On Sunday, with less than 40 laps to go, six of the Toyota drivers went to the pits together so they could continue to draft, optimizing everyone's position. One bad push in the middle of the Toyota-only packs led to four of those six Toyotas being done for the day at Talladega. Christopher Bell was already out of the race from an earlier crash.
On lap 156, the Toyota Tandem was running single file when Erik Jones went hard into the Safety Barrier with Bubba Wallace behind him. John Hunter Nemechek, who was ahead of Jones, was turned down the straight and clipped the back of Denny Hamlin at the same time.
When asked what happened first, Hamlin still didn't know; he could see his driver Wallace crashing behind him as he felt himself turned.
"I'm not sure. I just saw the No. 43 get turned, and then I got turned; I'm not really sure what happened first. I'm not really sure. obviously, there was a bad push-up near the front, and it wiped us all out. It's just poetic; that's all I got."
Clearly, Hamlin is into darker poetry.
Wallace, Jones, and Hamlin were all checked into the infield care center and released.
Jones complained about his back on his radio.
"I'm sore," Jones told Bob Pockrass, "It just really stretched it out a lot. It's going to be a long week. I'm just trying to recover and feel better for next week. I'm alright, and we're going to get better."
Update: As of 8:29 PM EST, NASCAR has reported that after being cleared Jones returned to the infield care center and has been transported to a local hospital.
UPDATE: Following his release from the infield care center, @Erik_Jones returned to the care center at@TALLADEGA and has been transported to a local hospital for further evaluation.
— NASCAR (@NASCAR) April 22, 2024
Only Ty Gibbs, Tyler Reddick, and Martin Truex Jr. made it through the entanglement and will be the only Toyotas to continue to battle for this year's Talladega Geico 500 victory. When asked about what caused the incident, Wallace, who was the most centered in the collision, said it was just a poorly executed plan.
"We were all pushing really hard to keep our line going," Wallace said, "We had a plan, and we just didn't execute it as well as we should. I hate it for our Leidos team, we look forward to running these places and you just get trapped in someone else's mess. It doesn't make us look good at all. We'll just reset and go to Dover; we have a long way to go. We're fine, just frustrating."
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