Ryan Preece continued his hot start to his first year with RFK Racing by scoring a career-high second place finish in Sunday's Jack Link's 500 NASCAR Cup Series race at Talladega Superspeedway, a finish that vaulted him up into 12th place in the point standings. He sat 28 points above Kaulig Racing's A.J. Allmendinger, the first driver below the playoff cut line.
But after the 188-lap race around the four-turn, 2.66-mile (4.281-kilometer) high-banked Lincoln, Alabama oval, technical inspection revealed three shims on the spoiler of the No. 60 Ford rather than two, and he was disqualified from the race.
As a result, Preece's 40-point outing turned into a one-point outing. He was officially scored in 38th place, rather than second, and he also lost the five stage points he scored with a sixth place finish in the second stage.
With Team Penske's Joey Logano also disqualified after his No. 22 Ford was discovered to be missing a spoiler bolt, the standings got somewhat of a reshuffle after the race.
Ryan Preece drops out of NASCAR playoff picture after Talladega disqualification
Most notably, Allmendinger gained three points: one for passing Preece in the finishing order and another for passing Logano, as he was officially scored in 24th place as opposed to 26th, and he also scored an additional point since his 12th place finish in the second stage turned into a 10th place finish, as Logano was initially second with Preece sixth before both were scrapped from the results table.
And Allmendinger passed Preece in the standings as a result, so he now finds himself as the final driver above the playoff cut line, while Preece dropped out of the provisional playoff picture entirely.
Preece finds himself in 18th place in the point standings, 14 points behind Allmendinger for the final spot in the playoffs. There are 16 races remaining on the 26-race regular season calendar.
It is worth noting that Allmendinger is 15th, not 16th, in points. The reason why he is the 16th and final driver above the cut line is because of the fact that Wood Brothers Racing's Josh Berry, who sits in 21st, presumably secured his playoff spot by winning at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in March.
Likewise, Preece is 19th in the playoff standings, not 18th. Between him and Allmendinger are Richard Childress Racing's Kyle Busch and Hyak Motorsports' Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Busch trails Allmendinger by six points, while Stenhouse trails him by seven.
The 11th race on the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Wurth 400 presented by Liqui Moly, which is set to be shown live on Fox Sports 1 from Texas Motor Speedway beginning at 3:30 p.m. ET this Sunday, May 4. Start a free trial of FuboTV today and don't miss any of the action!