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Daytona 500 winner William Byron found himself in the unlikeliest of situations when a flying trash bag got stuck to the front of his car during the NASCAR Cup Series race in Las Vegas.
The bizarre incident unfolded during the first stage of the race when Byron found himself leading the pack. Suddenly, a trash bag, presumably dislodged from the SAFER barrier in Turn 4 on Lap 20, latched onto the front grille of his Chevrolet.
As the race progressed, the trash bag stubbornly clung to the car, hindering Byron's performance and causing his car's temperature to soar. The race took an unexpected turn as he grappled with escalating temperatures inside the cockpit.
William Byron spoke to Fox Sports journalist Bob Pockrass after the Cup Series race, where he elaborated on the situation. He said:
“It seemed to get stuck somewhere underneath. I don’t really know. I just know my temps went from 200 or whatever to 350 in like, 10 seconds. I never had that happen. I think it was on the front of the nose at first and got a black nose. So it’s probably really hard to tell that. And then once it got kind of farther up the nose, then it overheated.
"It normally runs like low 200 or whatever and it got to like 290 pretty quick and then just would climb one degree every half second and got to like 350 so nothing we could do about that."
The obstructive trash bag forced Byron to make an unscheduled pit stop to rid his car of the nuisance and prevent further overheating.
William Byron's crew chief Rudy Fugle reacts to the trash bag incident
William Byron's crew chief, Rudy Fugle, shed light on the peculiar nature of the intruder. Fugle revealed on “The Morning Drive” on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio:
"The thing was like a 55-gallon trash bag, you know, for those big trash cans you see at the infield of the racetracks. It got loose."
He further quipped:
"Even worse than that, or even funnier than that, I’m pretty positive it had a beer can in it because that beer can got stuck in our air filter. So after the race, there was a Silver Bullet in our air filter somehow.
"Never seen anything like that before ... so quite the day."
Despite the incident, William Byron managed to salvage a top-10 finish as he ended the race in 10th position. The outcome leaves the Hendrick Motorsports driver in fourth position in the NASCAR Cup Series standings.
