Bubba Wallace breaks down wild late surge at Iowa Corn 350: 'Hell of a team effort'

Fresh off a win at Indianapolis that sealed a spot in the playoffs, Bubba Wallace came into Iowa with significantly less pressure. But for a long while it looked like the success of the previous week was about to be followed with a disastrous result.

At one point, Wallace fell two laps behind the field into P32. Somehow, despite damage to his car’s toe link at another point, he managed to work his way all the way back to the lead lap and ultimately to a sixth-place finish in the Iowa Corn 350.

Bubba Wallace was cool as a cucumber after the race. The win a week prior seems to have worked wonders.

“I was just relaxed the whole time, really,” Wallace said. “And it’s interesting how things shake out. We had a up-and-down day, as you mentioned. Was ready to just debrief the whole car mid-race and just figure out what we need to do to wholesale it. Had our damage, had our issues and just really fought hard to get our All True Camry back in the top 10.”

Somewhere midway through the race how the car was responding to Wallace changed. He got much more out of it and was able to drive it back near the front of the field.

“Felt really good firing off and I was a little hesitant on how that was going to last. Here we are,” Bubba Wallace said. “P6 after that, after the middle way of the race if you would have told me we would have finished sixth I would have said, ‘Yeah right.'”

There was clearly some early frustration with the car at Iowa. Interestingly enough, a whole slew of cautions left Wallace earning a free pass while two laps down, putting him only one down. He got to work after that.

As for a takeaway from the weekend, results were mixed for Bubba Wallace. That’s the nature of an up-and-down day like that.

“It was interesting because I told them, man, don’t bring this setup because this was a little reminiscent of Richmond,” Wallace said. “We’ve always said that every time we come here. I mean it ran good at the end, so there’s some things to take from there.

“I thought our crew did an amazing job, fixing all the repairs. I said earlier this weekend we’ve got to expose our weaknesses, and I think we put everybody to the test here today. And it’ll be nice to see where we did fall, because I didn’t see anything there. But hell of a team effort all day.”