There’s no better place than a short track to settle a score with someone who’s recently wrecked you, so are AJ Allmendinger and Alex Bowman primed to pay Ross Chastain back for wiping them out while battling for the win on the final lap of last weekend’s race at Circuit of The Americas in Austin? Bowman, for his part, didn’t seem too upset about the contact, but that’s likely because Chastain didn’t run into him directly (contact with Allmendinger sent Allmendinger’s car into Bowman) and because he held on for a second-place finish.
Allmendinger, however, was scored with a 33rd-place finish on a day when he had a car capable of going to Victory Lane. So it’s not all shocking that Allmendinger didn’t have a lot to say after the race when asked to give his viewpoint of the contact with Chastain. Allmendinger certainly didn’t guarantee any type of retaliation this weekend at Richmond, but from the look in his eyes and the brevity of his comments, it was clear that he was very unhappy with Chastain's aggression at the end.
So while it’s possible that Sunday’s race at Richmond will come and go without any kind of incident involving some combination of Chastain, Allmendinger and Bowman, don’t bet against it happening either. Drivers often wait for opportune times to carry out revenge on fellow competitors who they believe have done them wrong, and there’s seemingly no more opportune time than the first short track race of the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season.