Dillon fails to advance in Chase due to tiebreaker

Logano leads the pack at Talladega

Facing an overtime restart with two laps left in the Hellman's 500 on Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway, crew chief Slugger Labbe reminded driver Austin Dillon of the relevant numbers. Dillon had to finish no more than five positions behind Denny Hamlin to secure a spot in the Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup's Round of 8-as long as Hamlin didn't win the race.

Dillon had done everything right to that point. He had earned a bonus point by staying out for an extra circuit and leading Lap 117 under the second caution of the afternoon. He gained three spots after a restart on Lap 186 and was 11th when the green flag waved for the final time on Lap 191. On the final two laps, he worked his way forward to ninth before the checkered flag ended the race. Only one problem. Hamlin beat #41-Kurt Busch to the stripe by 0.006 seconds-approximately two feet-to finish third.

The two drivers finished the Round of 12 tied for eighth with 3,078 points, but Hamlin won a tiebreaker for the final Chase spot because his third-place finish on Sunday was better than Dillon's best Round-of-12 finish of sixth last week at Kansas. NASCAR Wire Service