Five weeks ago, Ryan Preece was spectacularly flying through the air in the Daytona 500. It was a frightening beginning to his tenure with RFK Racing. Fast forward to Sunday’s Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, and Preece was credited with his career-best finish (third) after a hard-fought day in Sin City.
RESULTS: Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas
Preece, who started 12th, dropped like a rock in the opening laps to the 20th position. Once he was mired in the muck of the field, he found himself trapped there for quite some time. While his car wasn’t to his liking in the early portions of the race, Preece and his crew chief Derrick Finley finally found something late in Stage 2, and his No. 60 Ford Mustang Dark Horse came to life.
“Yeah, I mean, the first half of the race it seemed whatever lane I picked, didn’t go my way,” Preece explained. “And then there right at the end of Stage 2, that last restart, I went from 20th to 11th, and then we just never lost track position from there on out. This Consumer Cellular No. 60 was good, and just really proud of everybody.”
The podium finish at Las Vegas matched Preece’s previous career-best finish in the NASCAR Cup Series, which was a third-place effort in the 2019 Spring race at Talladega Superspeedway. While his car was really good in the closing laps, he felt he lacked just a little bit of overall speed to be able to contend for the win against eventual race winner Josh Berry and runner-up finisher Daniel Suarez.
“They just seemed fast,” Preece stated. “I had to guard a little bit through the bumps. We were really good, but that was just robbing some of that speed, that raw speed that I think [Berry] and [Suarez had]. I just did my best to make sure I could push Josh to make sure he could stay there or at least keep himself in position. So, I’m happy he was able to go and do it.”
Preece, who was teammates with Berry a season ago at Stewart-Haas Racing, was happy that his former teammate was able to pick up his first career win, and he says he’ll have to turn a blind eye to his New Year’s resolution of not drinking beer to celebrate his friend’s triumph.
“I’m happy for Josh Berry. I told him, we said to each other before the season started that if he won, or I won, we were going to go drink a beer with each other,” Preece said. “I guess I’m going to have to break my New Year’s resolution and go have one with him.”
While the third-place finish may have been a surprise to many, it didn’t surprise Preece. He felt like he had a really good car following Saturday’s practice and qualifying efforts. In Sunday’s race, everything fell perfectly into place in the second half of the race, and the No. 60 RFK Racing team was able to enjoy its best finish of the young season.
“Going into the season, our motto was, ‘live by the fire, die by the fire,’ take chances, be aggressive, and be on the offense,” said Preece. “I’m really grateful to come out here and have a great day because, at the beginning of the season, this is really what sets the tone.”
Preece leaves Las Vegas Motor Speedway in sole possession of the 18th-place ranking in the NASCAR Cup Series championship standings, which puts hi
Next up for Preece is the Straight Talk Wireless 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway. At first glance of his stat sheet, Homestead doesn’t appear as a track that lines up well for Preece as he had finishes of 38th, 25th, 24th, and 21st through his first four NASCAR Cup Series starts at the 1.5-mile intermediate oval.
However, in 2023, Preece recorded a 13th-place finish in his first start behind the wheel of a Stewart-Haas Racing Ford, and he backed that run up with a 10th-place effort last year at Homestead. Perhaps Preece, who finished 15th at Phoenix Raceway, will look to record three consecutive top-15 finishes for just the second time in his NASCAR Cup Series career, and if he can land a top-five, it’ll mark the first time he’s ever had back-to-back finishes inside the top-five.
