Choose rule is here to stay. The Saturday’s race at Michigan International Speedway was only the first of the remaining races, except on road courses and superspeedway, to use the rule.
The rule lets the driver to either choose their favorite lane or give up their favorite lane to gain track position. One of the best use of the rule was provided by Chase Elliott, who was fifth before the restarted but restarted second. He led nine laps after the restart.
The race winner Kevin Harvick was happy with the rule.
“The best thing about it is they had a race with it (Friday) with the Truck Series, made a lot of adjustments or a few adjustments this morning to the process, and I thought it went well today,” said Harvick, referring to NASCAR’s decision to move the symbol from 100 feet to 200 feet from the finish line. “I think it definitely gave some guys a chance that were kind of buried eighth or ninth, and I think (Chase Elliott) was one of those and wound up racing for the win.
“Definitely a lot to think about right there and definitely some processes that you have to go through, but you can take a chance and gain some track position,” Harvick said. “So I thought it went well and did exactly what everybody thought it would do.”
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The same cannot be said about the second-placed Brad Kelewoski. While he was happy to race under a different dynamic, he was not sure whether the rule was good for the race or not.
“There were parts I liked and there were parts I didn’t like,” Keselowski said. “I thought at the front, it seemed to be a little fun, something kind of different. It’s one of those things where I think it’s just ‑‑ when you eat chocolate you want vanilla sometimes; it felt different and different was kind of fun. There was other parts where I was kind of a little questioning about it. Overall I’m kind of neutral on it.
“We’re all kind of learning together how that plays out,” Keselowski continued. “This was a first time on a bigger track or a 550 (horsepower) rules package track that we’ve seen this, and so it definitely changed a little bit of the race. I’m not confident to say whether it was better or worse, just felt a little bit different to me. Which it should feel different; that’s kind of the point. If it wasn’t a little different, then why would we do it?
“I thought there were times when it was interesting, there were times where I was kind of like, hmm, I don’t know.”
Third-placed Martin Truex Jr. felt that the rule is an interesting feature to have.
“I don’t know that it changed the race a whole lot, but it was interesting for sure,” Truex said. “We’ll see how it plays out ‑‑ we seen a lot of guys pick the outside, but a few guys were able to get the lead from the bottom, as well. Pretty interesting how it worked out, and definitely learned some stuff for tomorrow.”
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