Aric Almirola celebrates in victory lane after winning Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series playoff race at Alabama’s Talladega Superspeedway.TALLADEGA, Ala. – Aric Almirola capped Stewart-Haas Racing’s absolute rout at Talladega Superspeedway with an overtime victory Sunday that earned him an automatic berth into the third round of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs.
It also snapped a 149-race losing streak for Almirola and atoned for his oh-so-close moment in the season-opening Daytona 500 at the circuit’s other superspeedway.
“I just love racing at Talladega, and I came to the track with the mindset that we were going to go race and we were going to go give them hell, and if we wrecked, we wrecked,” Almirola said. “And if we win, we win. And we won. What a cool time to do it, too.”
More importantly, it showed SHR arrived at Talladega prepared to work as a four-car team and ensure one of its drivers made it to victory lane.
The SHR Fords were untouchable all weekend. They swept qualifying, won every stage of Sunday’s race and used teamwork to pull away from the field. As the laps wound down, Kurt Busch led his three teammates in a straight line and pulled the train away from the pack, which couldn’t organize itself behind the SHR group to mount any sort of challenge.