VIDEO: Pace Car Crashes Into Pit Road Barrels Before Stage 2 at Phoenix

That’s definitely a new one…

In Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race at Phoenix Raceway, the second incident of the afternoon didn’t come from one of the 40 drivers competing in the event, but rather, the driver who is supposed to safely pacing the field.

As the field was coming to take the green flag in the second stage, the pace car driver slightly missed his mark, turning in too late to make it onto pit road. The turn-in was slightly too sharp, and the driver of the Toyota Camry XSE pace car lost control, sliding directly into the sand barrels that sit at the blunt of the pit road wall.

— NASCAR on TSN (@NASCARonTSN) November 10, 2024Fortunately, the pace car driver was able to avoid contact with race-leader Chase Elliott, and the contact with the barrels didn’t severely damage the pace car, or the pit road barrels. In the aftermath of the incident, NASCAR elected to roll out the backup pace car, which will lead the field under caution for the remaining laps in the NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race.