The final transfer spot into the Round of 12 of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs came down to the wire between Austin Cindric and Alex Bowman – right down to a frantic final few laps at Bristol Motor Speedway as each driver fought through their own struggles.

Cindric, for instance, saw his car catch on fire. Bowman tried to make a run at the win, which was his path to advance. In the end, an eighth-place finish wasn’t good enough for Bowman, and Cindric prevailed.

“I don’t think the stress was there; I think everyone was pretty well prepared with the transfer of information once I got back out on track,” Cindric said of his late-race issues. “With a scuffed right front tire, old … left side tires, and an old right rear tire, I got a handle on the car, got all the fire extinguisher stuff burnt off the tires and dripping everywhere, and was able to finish the race.

“Yeah, it was hectic, and I’m sure it was crazy for a little while on paper, but credit to the team for being that well prepared.”

Cindric was forced to pit road with just under 50 laps to go because of a fire under the right front of his machine. He stayed in the car, and the team and safety officials eventually put out the fire and sent him back onto the racetrack.

“I was going to wait until I saw a color other than smoky grey,” said Cindric of staying in the car, given what was at stake.

“As crazy as it sounds, we were fortunate the [No.] 21 had the same problem because I think the lesson learned there was to try to minimize the laps run,” Cindric said. “The moment I smelled something, I said something and confirmed it. We pitted and the guys were ready. It was really well executed for something that tragic.”

Bowman, meanwhile, was making a run at the front on his tire strategy. He was running second when he pitted for fresh tires with 29 laps to go. It might have been the right call to get Bowman back to the front if the race stayed green, but a final caution with 12 laps to go provided the opportunity for others who had a set of tires left to pit for them.

There were 13 cars on the lead lap for the restart. Bowman restarted fourth, the second driver on the outside lane, but he went nowhere when the green flag fell with four laps to go.

“I thought our car, when we had some green flag running, was really good,” Bowman said. “It just cycled really poorly for restarts, so I would drive off into Turn 1 and just hope to make the corner. For whatever reason, it just wouldn’t take off. Then after five laps or so, it would go again, and I couldn’t figure out if it was something that I was doing by not cleaning the tires off enough, but I felt like I was cleaning the tires off too much at some points.

“So, I don’t know what we lacked there, but I’m proud of everybody at Hendrick Motorsports for the fight. Obviously had a shot at it if it would have gone green to the end, but it didn’t, and the last restart was ugly. A good Ally Camaro compared to yesterday; we made some gains on it, but still have some gains to make.”

Cindric entered the weekend 11 points ahead of Austin Dillon for the final spot and 15 points ahead of Bowman. The final margin was 10 points between Cindric and Bowman.

“I feel like our team can do a lot of great things,” Cindric said, “There’s no reason why we can’t reset and [give it to ’em].”