DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Who in the world is Austin Cindric?
As the 2022 Daytona 500 ground its way to the checkered flag, finally ending a 3½-hour enduro race that put a dozen cars behind the wall and saw 25 of the 40 cars in the field caught up in accidents (that’s just per the official box score, as pretty much every car ended the night with damage), the American auto race that draws more eyeballs than any other had a lot of people screaming at their TVs for the names they knew.
Bubba Wallace, Kyle Busch, Brad Keselowski, Chase Elliott, even defending race champion Michael McDowell — plenty of recognizable racers were in the mix for the victory.
But Elliott finished 10th, Keselowski ninth, McDowell seventh and Busch sixth. Wallace, for the second time, came up one spot short of glory. The winner? A racer all those casual Daytona 500-only NASCAR viewers likely had never heard of. Now they have.
So, who in the world is Austin Cindric? He’s the 2022 Daytona 500 champion, that’s who. But don’t be ashamed or confused if you’d never heard of him before Sunday night. Avid NASCAR fans have been hearing about him since he was a kid. But for the rest of you, here’s what you need to know now for how he has made himself known.
Cindric is funny: “I didn’t pack an extra pair of underwear, and now I have to go do media for a few days, so I must not have been that confident today.” Cindric talks super fast. He said that last underwear sentence in 1.2 seconds flat. He loves his mom: “She’s the backbone of my career. She made brownies for my crew, and she tucked me in still in my firesuit after I’d wrecked out for the third race in a row.”
He is a 23-year-old NASCAR Cup Series Rookie of the Year contender. That’s right, he’s a rookie. On Sunday, he was making his eighth Cup start. Ever. When they engrave his name onto the Harley J. Earl Trophy, he will be there…
Source : espn
