The 10 Best Cars You Should Buy

Hello, and welcome to the Truth About Cars podcast. I am Tim Healy, the managing editor,

and this week we chat with Consumer Reports about their annual top 10 picks.

Alex and Isaac from Consumer Reports is our guest for that, and TTAC contributor Matthew

Guy joins us for our discussion about break repair tools. We also recap a wild day to

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This week on the Truth About Cars podcast, we are talking with Alex and Isaac from Consumer Reports

about their top 10 picks. We'll get to that in just a moment. Alex is the auto test editor or

development editor for Consumer Reports. How are you doing today, Alex?

I'm doing really well. Yeah, thanks for having me on again.

Cool. Yeah, so let's go through this list. The official name for our listeners is Consumer Reports

10 Top Picks, the Best New Cars of 2026. So we're going to roll through the list,

and then I'll have a few questions, Alex, about methodology and categorization and sort of

things. So just for our listeners' sake, just so they know, the list goes like this. Best

small car, Honda Civic, best midsize car, Toyota Camry, best subcompact SUV, Subaru Cross Track,

best compact SUV, Subaru Forester, best midsize SUV, Toyota Grand Highlander, best luxury compact

SUV, Lexus MX, best small pickup truck, Ford Maverick, best luxury midsize SUV, BMW X5,

best electric vehicle, Tesla Model Y, best full size pickup truck, Ford F-150. So Alex, walk us

through your methodology. Please keep in mind that we do have limited time today. Sure. Yeah,

so as you mentioned, this is indeed new cars. So we're just talking about 2026 models, yet some

of these are cars that we maybe have tested in the past. So this isn't just cars that came out

only for this 2026 model year. And what it really is is you can think of it as a tool, and we did

all the heavy lifting for you, right? We test a bunch of cars here at the track. So this list

really incorporates the results from all of that testing, whether it's on the track, on the road,

or in our garage doing usability testing, handling fuel economy, we do a bunch of different things.

So that's all rolled in here. And then also we incorporate the information that we get from

our member survey. So we ask every single year, CR members basically, about the reliability of

their vehicles, and then the owner's satisfaction or the satisfaction of their vehicles. So how

likely they are to buy them, and then also the problems that they had with their vehicles in

the last 12 months. And then on top of that, there's some safety information that's worked into

basically like whether they have standard automatic emergency braking or blind spot

warning, things like that. And essentially, all of this information coming together. And that's

how we produce what's called our overall score. And then we look at the essentially the top overall

scores in these various categories, you know, the small sedans that you mentioned, the midsize SUVs,

so on and so forth. And so these are really just the cream of the crop, the vehicles that are

the best of the best when it comes to these different categories. And I will say when it comes

to choosing those categories, it's really the list is trying to recognize the fact that, you know,

vehicles, there's a lot of different needs for people who are shopping, you know, for a new car.

That's why you see trucks, SUVs, sedans on there, and a lot of different price points, right?

Vehicles, people are paying on average today, somewhere around $50,000 for a new vehicle.

But there's cars and SUVs on this list that start well, well below that. So we want to make sure

that we're covering a lot of ground, both in terms of vehicle type, but then also price point. So

yeah, listen, is doing a lot of heavy lifting for you, but it's a great place to start if you're

looking for a new car. How do you do the categories? Because looking at it, there's no like, for example,

there's no best midsize pickup truck now, there's not really any midsize trucks on the market.

But there's also not really a best luxury, large SUV right now, you've got compact and midsize,

but there are large seven row SUVs that are luxurious. Lexus makes a few, right? So

so how do you kind of narrow this down to 10 categories? And

and also some vehicles kind of could overlap one category to another. So how do you sort of sort

it all out? Yeah, it's a good question. You know, even though it's quite regimented in terms of how

the vehicles are chosen in terms of being at the top of their categories, there is some flexibility,

so to speak, in the categories themselves. And that's just to acknowledge the fact that

what people are looking for changes, right? Sure. Large luxury sedans, for example, yes,

there are still some on the market, but not really the the heart of the market, right? It's more about

SUVs and trucks and things like that. So just we give ourselves some flexibility there just to

make sure that we're creating a list that speaks to the most amount of people, I suppose, if that

makes sense. And I would say, you know, while these 10 vehicles are, you know, top in their

category, you could so very easily make a list of runner ups that's full of also really good vehicles,

right? So this really is a starting place. But if there's a vehicle or there isn't a vehicle on

here that really fits that need, you can easily go onto our site and find information about other

cars that maybe are more suitable for you. That makes sense. Yeah. And of course, categories too,

like I said, you don't necessarily have control over it because, for example, right now, there

really are no midsize trucks, right? Exactly, right. There may be in the future, we've been hearing

rumors forever of a Dodge Dakota return, and we don't know if they're midsize or compact. But,

you know, so I get it. There's probably more than 10 categories. So if you want to restrict it to 10,

you kind of have to sacrifice a little bit. So that makes sense. Now let's go through the individual

cars themselves just a little bit. So to me, looking at the list, very little surprising,

the Crosstrek and Forrester have good interpretations. I've driven the new versions.

I liked both of them, even though they weren't heavily redesigned, they are more refreshes.

I like both better than the Outback. In fact, the Outback I don't think is nearly as good.

Yeah, they're quite refined now compared to their previous generations. And I think what's also cool

here, particularly at the Forrester, in this case, is the addition of that hybrid option, right?

Yeah, yeah, that's huge. Crosstrek gets the hybrid too. We just, you know, it hasn't gone

through our testing. It came out a little bit later. So we're working through that now. But

yeah, it's a nice addition to those two. Yeah, and looking at the list, the how to Civic and

Toyota Camry are not at all surprising. They're stalwarts of the industry, very, very popular

cars that sell very well for a reason. And the Civic itself offers performance models for the

enthusiasts, as well as community cars. Yeah, yeah, it is. Go ahead, I'm sorry.

Oh, I'll just say, I mean, as sweet as the Civic hybrid is, actually, if you go watch our podcast

on like the year end kind of show that we do, people give their favorite cars of the year and

things like that and least favorite and Civic kept coming out as people's, you know, kind of thing

that stood out. But even cooler, I think on the list than the Civic hybrid itself, which is a great

car is the fact that the SI is also on the list. So it's fun to be able to say like, yeah, there's

a car with a manual transmission on our top list. Yeah, probably only one. Yeah, for sure.

Yeah, and I'm a little surprised the Accord didn't make it, but also not that surprised

because Accord and Camry are always at each other's throats. Yeah, just right there, you know,

like one thing could have tipped it on the Accord's favor versus the Camry, but it just,

it squeaked it out a little bit. Yeah, I think Camry's a little bit newer and it's part of it,

probably. I think what really surprises me here, maybe Lexus next a little bit, but the F-150 now

surprised. So I don't want to talk about my opinion too much, though. This is your, you're the guest.

So I want to hear what surprised you or vice versa. Maybe nothing surprised you.

Sure. No, I think there's some surprises here. I think, you know, zooming out just for a second,

this is the first time we've had a list where every vehicle is either offered as a hybrid or

the top picks itself as a hybrid, right? Or an electric vehicle in the case of the Model Y. So,

and then, you know, we didn't curate the list to make that happen. It just happened more organically.

I mean, I know we're talking about categories and things like that, but it just, it just goes to

show that the technology when it comes to these hybrid vehicles is getting better and

they're not what they used to be in the sense of kind of a weird driving experience and things

like that. Generally, most of these hybrids are refined and really good cars. So I think that kind

of looking at the whole list is what stands out. But definitely the F-150 specifically surprised

me, right? We haven't really had a full-size truck on the list for quite some time now,

quite a few years. And when you look at the category as a whole, you know, reliability

plays a huge part in this whole thing, right? We know that it's really, really important to

people when they're shopping for their next car. So we weigh it quite heavily. And that category,

the full-size truck category just has never, or at least for a while now, hasn't had anything that

really broke into that average reliability kind of field. And the F-150, you know, as we typically

see as a generation of a vehicle ages and is on the market longer, they tend to at least

generally get more reliable. So that's what we're seeing here. So both the F-150 hybrid and the

regular gas-powered version basically managed to squeak out that average reliability, so making

them eligible to be on the list, which I think is awesome because, I mean, there's no denying the

popularity of the F-150 or just trucks in general, right? So it's nice to be able to point people

towards, at least if you're going to go that direction, here's a reliable option within it.

So that one really stuck out to me in particular. Yeah, the F-150 also sticks out to me a little bit

too, just because I'm not seeing one truck as better than the other. I think they're both within,

it is almost like, almost like Camry and Accord, they're both within splitting distance of one

another. The Ram though is so close to the Ram interior. I know. You know, I think the Ram

interior is a little bit better than the F-150, but we also know the F-150 is one of the biggest,

not biggest best-selling models on the market for a reason. So yeah, I mean, if you, if you were to,

not, I don't have the numbers right in front of me, but if the Ram itself was able to get to a

reliable place, I wouldn't be surprised to see the position on the list potentially changed,

right? Because the Ram, like you're saying, it's incredible, it's super quiet, it's comfortable,

it's well put together on the inside and the ride is really good for a pickup truck. So

yeah, but again, it's another one of those cases where they're, it's almost splitting

hairs, right? A lot of really good options. So yeah, and just looking through the list,

I'm sure that once this podcast episode goes live and the list is out there for the public to read,

it is, it is not quite public as we record, but looking at the list, it is pretty clear that you

guys take into account all the available powertrains, whether it's an internal combustion, hybrid,

electric, so if a model offers both or more, you know, that plays a part. But the light,

we also know the Ford F-150 Lightning is dying. So just got to curious, was the lightning involved

in this at all? I mean, it wouldn't make a difference, I don't think, but just was it included

in the F-150 evaluation or was it kind of separated? Yeah, I mean, it's separate here. I

mean, we test all of these cars separately. So like when you see F-150 and F-150 hybrid, we tested,

you know, it purchased and bought and tested two different F-150s, right, to come to that result.

And same thing, we did fully test a lightning. I believe it's the reliability on the lightning that

kept it off this list. It's not quite there with the rest of it. And it is also, as you

pointed out, going away as we learned not too long ago for the following model year. So, you know,

since this is a new car list and that one's going away. But yeah, so same thing with something

like the Civic. When you see regular Civic, SI and hybrid, that's coming from test results and

experience with each individual one of those cars. Got it. And so the Civic is another one of those.

So the Civic has SI and the hybrid and the gas only, but the Type R not part of it because it's

just to be sure. Yeah, we didn't, you know, we're always kind of, you know, balancing which cars

we're going to buy. We buy all these. We're non-profits. So you're always kind of up against

like, okay, here's what makes sense. Here's a volume vehicle. I would love, absolutely love,

to buy and test that Type R. But just didn't quite make the cut. So, hey, maybe if we did,

it would be on here too. And we'd be able to show four versions. But those are the three that we

tested. Now, just to remind for our listeners, I think a lot of our listeners know this already,

but Consumer Reports is famous in the industry for buying its test cars as opposed to

loaning from the manufacturers. Now, I know that there may be an ethical component to this and

we run up against the ethics of it. I think every automotive publication does. But

I think also, do you buy the cars in order to avoid quote unquote or ringer? I'm sort of laughing

as I say that, because I don't know if the automakers can really go to the assembly line and

give you the best possible car. They can, of course, ship you one with the best, you know,

the top trim level. A lot of the cars that I test are high trim levels. Sometimes I'll have to ask

for the mid, for the best selling trim level or the base car where all that's in the press

fleet is the high Zoot one. But, you know, is that part of why you buy the cars or just mostly

for ethical reasons? Yeah, I mean, there's definitely the ethical side of things and it just,

you know, really helps us just maintain that unbiased, neutral position, right? And I don't

think it's happened anytime recently, but there's been situations where, yeah, the car from a press

fleet or not even a press fleet just from the manufacturer isn't necessarily representative

of what an actual person would get. So it's really just to ensure that that happens, right?

Yeah, makes sense. And yeah, so that's really what we're trying to do. And

beyond that, honestly, I think my favorite part about it, aside from all those facts, is the

fact that we get to keep the cars then for so long, right? We own at least the models at least for

a year, sometimes longer. So I mean, if I were to walk out into our lot right now, we've got,

I think the last time I checked is somewhere near 70 cars. So what's nice is if we're testing

the Civic, you know, we likely have the Corolla on hand as well or other competitors, right? So

you can kind of hop in each one, compare, look at the test results and everything kind of more in

real time rather than trying to recall from the past what you might have experienced in a different

car. So it's nice to have everything on hand or at least most things on hand so you can do more

of a comparative test. Yeah, and I think you also have the advantage too that we don't, you know,

a few car magazines can do long term testing. The first place I worked at in the business had

long term test cars for a year, a year and a half, but most places just don't have the ability.

You get a chance to probably see reliability or pick up on small little things that I just don't

get the chance to experience in a week or even two weeks of a press group. Yeah. Yeah. I mean,

yes, we do. I mean, we're servicing the cars, right? Full on ownership experience. I will

just clarify that when we're talking about reliability results, right, when if you're

researching cars in our site, our sample, the particular car that we bought does not influence

that result, right? That's coming from. Oh, yeah. No, I was thinking more like totally,

like things you might experience. You might pick up on little things that you wouldn't notice in

a week. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's a huge, huge benefit. I mean, we actually recently just a

little inside peak, I suppose recently kind of changed how we schedule ourselves in the cars,

right? To make sure that people are in them a little longer, at least someone is in it

much longer so that those things start to pop out, right? Because as you're pointing out,

there's like a honeymoon period with these cars. You're in it for a couple of days and

everything's great or everything's terrible. One way or the other, some combination of that.

But then when you're really living with it longer, that's when you start to kind of settle in and

maybe that thing that was really great is kind of less great now or seemed really bad at first,

isn't so bad once you get used to it or kind of just live with the vehicle a little longer.

So yeah, I think that's a huge, huge component, making sure you kind of

represent it the best that you can. I want to do everyone's favorite automotive pun and shift gears

for just a second and talk about safety results. So you have a new safety verdict, which basically

you have three scores now. You have basic, which means the vehicle must meet all of the, I sometimes

call it NHTSA, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, and they have what they call the

FMVSS, the Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards. So I'm sure our listeners know what those

acronyms mean, but so the vehicle must meet all those standards. That's basic.

Better is basic, plus you have average or higher score in all your testing. So it's

braking, emergency handling and routine handling. So emergency handling, I imagine is like swerving

around an object, routine handling, roll away. In this case, the car needs to have automatic

emergency braking, which a lot of cars have now, and be standard across all trims. And then a

detection on the AEB, the insurance institute for highway safety needs to have a good or

acceptable rating in certain crash tests, like the overlap front. And then you have the best,

which is a cumulative, so basic and better. Plus it cannot have the lowest visibility rating in

your tests. All trim levels must have, in addition to AEB blind spot warning and rear cross traffic

warning. I can speak to the rear cross traffic warning from personal experience when I was much

younger and older car didn't have that and had a low speed parking lot damage because I was back

out of space and couldn't see the person coming across. Thankfully, it was very minor damage,

two mile an hour, but definitely have that's one, that's, I'm always a big fan of blind spot and

rear cross because those are really practical in real life, even though I don't always love

all the other ADAS systems. And then you also require a good rating in the side crash test from

IIHS and at least acceptable rating your overlap crash test. And I'm skipping a few things here

just just in the interest of time. So you have this news, these new safety scores in your press

release has Mazda Genesis and Acura among the highest along with Hyundai and Lincoln. So walk

us through that a little bit. Yeah, I mean, I think what's really cool about the safety verdict

here is there is so much safety information out there when you go to research a car. I mean,

we're guilty of it too, right? Go onto our site and start researching, reading out the cars and

it's blind spot this and AEB that and FCW, blah, blah, blah. And there's just between those features

and the crash test results and then perform like there's so much that can really kind of start to

ideally paint the picture of the safety of the vehicle but can also muddy it because it's so

so much to keep track of. So it's really just distilling that down kind of in a similar way

that the top picks list that we went through does a lot of that lifting for you and just presents

it in an easily digestible way. Safety verdicts really doing that same thing. So and what I think

is really my favorite part about it personally is that it incorporates our testing data, right?

There's a lot of those things you mentioned are features on the car or results from crash

testing which full disclosure like CR doesn't do crash testing, right? It's I imagine that would

be quite expensive. It would be quite expensive. Yeah, we like to sell the cars at the end not

destroy them. But yeah, so but then like you mentioned all of the testing information coming

into so making sure you know it's got to be above the threshold when it comes to our breaking tests

or yeah the handling just some of these performance metrics that are really happening here at the

track or out on the roads around where we test here finding the way into there to really give you

a more comprehensive look at safety and pull out the things that really make a difference

based on on our experience and also what we know just industry wide and one just to pull out one

specific example I know you mentioned it but the the usability right so we test the usability of

the controls in the car. One of those things that we're looking at is is really the distraction

of the controls as we move towards touchscreen everything right and away from more physical

controls hopefully that seems to be turning around at least in some ways but yeah so just a

cool way that we can kind of incorporate our testing into into the the safety verdict and just

in this case take out the vehicles that are the worst performers when it comes to usability in

this case and use it almost as a way to filter out some of those cars so yeah we're really excited

about it and and you can definitely when you go on to cr.org slash cars go look up a vehicle you'll

see the safety verdict right there in the with the rest of the information. Yeah that's cool and

the reason I brought up the blind spot in the way across is just because when I I'm old enough to

have started out with cars that didn't have these things they didn't exist until I was in my mid

until I was into my mid to late 20s right so I don't know if I've ever had a an actual collision

involving blind spot but definitely like I said very minor damage just you know two mile an hour

just a few dents but backing out of a parking space in a crowded restaurant once the cars on

either side that were bigger than my car blocking the visibility yeah you know I

saw I didn't see someone coming across and it was stupid and embarrassing and again no big deal just

to minor damage to the minor cosmetic damage but you know you feel awful afterwards and that's

why I've been I've ever ever since we're cross traffic hit the market especially living in a

dense urban area where there are a lot of big trucks in SUVs and sometimes I'm in a pressed car

that's a smaller car having rear cross traffic has been with God sent and same thing with blind

spot you know you're crowded crowded highway you think you you turned your head and you think

you're clear every once in a while it happens to me I think I'm clear change lanes and also

the light flashes and you're like oh there's a car I didn't see and you don't know how well

you have your mirrors set up so the reason I brought up is a little bit of a personal hobby

horse and I'm not necessarily a fan of all the a-dash stuff if I was buying a new car

there are certain things I probably wouldn't buy I probably wouldn't spend the money on

but those two I would yeah I'm glad to hear you say that I mean I am right there with you and

also when we do various surveys and things like that we see I mean there's data out there to show

which of these systems are truly effective from a safety perspective and those two are

really pop out and then when we ask ourselves through surveys like which a-dash features

people are most satisfied with those two along with AEB always rise and stop and I think part of

the reason for that is they don't annoy you right they're only there they're passive need it and

something like lane keep assist for example can easily get whether you consider that a safety

feature or not is debatable but something that can kind of annoy you right because it's just going

off when you don't want it whereas blind spot and rear cross traffic for the most part anyway

are really only there when they need to be cool and then let's carry it all let's bring it all

full circle did any of the safety scores affect how you put together the top 10 pick list uh

no not in this case um so yeah really debuting it and um and I'll say it's it's also separate from

the overall score itself so uh and really the reason for that just to I guess maybe a little

nuance but because some of those test results are represented in that score the safety verdict

itself and also separately in the road test score you know keeping them separate for now so

more to come on that in the future and then also similar to the way that we break out

various brand lists right we'll do best or most reliable brands for example or

uh brands with the best road test score these various things uh there'll also be um a similar

thing for the the safety right safest brands and kind of a ranking as far as the safety

verdict goes so we're excited about that too will the safety score affect grade next year

or is it too early to tell uh yeah too early too early to tell right now cool all right we have a

few minutes left so I is there anything else about the list you wanted to go over the one I

think the only car it really surprised me was the Lexus NX not that it's a bad vehicle I just

don't know if it's as good as the competition but on the other hand the the accurate RDX and MDX

are getting along in the tooth so sure I could see that but yeah yeah if you want to if you

I'll go ahead I'm sorry oh just to say on the NX I think reliability is really coming into play here

um because yeah I mean there's it is a very broad category too right yeah something like

a BMW X1 for example yeah I would look at like X3 or X1 for sure yeah probably a little bit higher

road test score right if you look at strictly the testing in terms of handling and performance

and all of those things right but then factoring in a lot of these other factors that we're talking

about um is where the the NX is kind of edging it out okay and what's cool about the NX I guess just

from a speaking to different people type of mindset is uh it's another one of those examples

where there's a plug-in hybrid there's a regular hybrid and then there's the regular gas version

so kind of choose your flavor on that one cool all right so and we have about five minutes left I

wanted to um give you the chances to talk about anything that you haven't had a chance to um

to just to go over yet uh well I think one thing on the list here that again kind of just like

taking a step back and looking at the whole thing that I find interesting is a lot of the cars on

here are actually either I mean they're either from a an American brand or built in the US

um because we get the question a lot like or the the ass is I want to buy an American car and it's

like well do you mean a car that's from an American brand or built in America and by who and and all

that or like where the part's coming from gets it's actually kind of a more complicated question

than it seems um so it's just kind of cool to to look at this list and and realize that if that

is something that's important to you a lot of these are actually assembled here in the US um so

yeah just kind of a neat little tidbit I think that stands out to me cool all right so we've

been with Alex and Isaac here on the truth about cars podcast he is the associate director of

auto test development at consumer reports is that uh it's a mouthful but titled I get it right I know

I know but you got it you're good awesome yeah so he's been walking us through consumer reports

new safety scores as well as their top 10 top picker ups I I use top twice as we're done it

it's consumer reports 10 top picks the best new cars in 26 thank you so much for your time Alex

sure yeah and I'll just uh before I go one real quick I'd be remiss if I didn't mention if you go

to um cr.org slash ttac we have a promo for your listeners there we'll look at $10 off a membership

on cr and you get access to all the car information and everything else that cr does outside of cars

that's awesome good looking out thank you so much sure and thank you so much for your time

much appreciated thank you thanks for having me again

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tossing it in your in your in your toolbox and having it there when you're doing a rear brake

job on a car yeah and remind us again with the official name for these tools there well i would

call them a i think it's listed as a universal rear disc brake piston tool right so these universal

ones are pretty handy because they can the chevies are different for example like with a forward with

most small forwards you can get away with using a set of needle nose pliers because most forwards

there's a couple of notches in there that are pretty well defined so you can manage to to

squeeze in or wrench in a set of needle nose pliers and just crank it you know like that with

the with the needle nose pliers open as far as they can go but a tool like this a universal

disc rear disc brake piston tool makes life a heck of a lot easier just because yeah and as well

with the the size of this thing you can usually get around you can picture the the caliper and

generally is you know like a has a u shape in it once you take the once you take the pads out

and you can easily fit this in there just makes life life really really really really simple not

with sanding any rust or anything you live in chicago too you know what i'm talking about right

yeah but sanding any of that stuff this just makes life as good as possible i've also seen some other

ones um under the term wind back tool w i and d wind back okay that's another good that's another

good way to do it um you know other than that i think they're pretty simple to use not much in

terms of safety other than normal car normal brake normal brake safety yeah yeah exactly yeah well

you know the first name's a bit of a mouthful and the second name doesn't necessarily describe the

tool but both i think are better than brake pusher anything so i think you know an official name

is is good help people searching on ebay for sure wind back tool look for that piston caliper wind

back tool look for that search that on ebay and you'll find what you're looking for yeah absolutely

and with that do you have anything else to add Matthew or should we go ahead and wrap our segment

no wrap our segment man this is really good and i think um a task like this is a great way for some

of our listeners if they're just getting into it uh to start wrenching on their car absolutely so

with that we'll go ahead and close out our stuff we use segment here on the truth about car segment

brought to you every week by ebay motors thank you so much for your time Matthew thanks for having me on

this message comes from ebay the worst part about loving cars might just be buying them

and all the parts from toiotas to astin martin's ebay has thousands of cars

and the largest online selection of vehicle parts and accessories ebay things people love

if you like what you hear on the t-tech podcast please go ahead and leave us a review you can

also find us online at t-tech dot com that is t-t-a-c dot com or the truth about cars all spelled

out dot com we are your home for car reviews car news opinions and so so much more here on the

truth about cars podcast we talk mass car just about every week and the hooray hooray the season has

finally started so the day 200 500 is in the books for 2026 and there's a lot to cover and so

Matthew guy we're gonna jump right into it t-tech contributor Matthew guys with me

Matthew how are you doing great man just fresh off the Daytona 500 it's a good day yeah yeah

sorry about that i didn't mean to cut you off for you to add something there no not at all man

yeah so for those who didn't see it it was a bit of a crazy final lap so we'll do a quick

recap and then we'll get into it Matthew i want to hear your opinions but um so the race was actually

fairly clean throughout i saved for an early wreck uh no one's fault car a guy's car broke one of the

newer drivers i don't remember who it was um something on the car broke he spun we had a bit

of a wreck early then it was fairly clean racing throughout i hit the big one about halfway through

and we'll talk about that a counter zillage made a kind of a maybe a rookie mistake or maybe this

guy behind him that and it kind of went uh sideways there was this decently big wreck

before that and then it was fairly clean to the end and the end was oh my gosh i don't even know

how to describe what happened so at the end i forget who was starting i actually don't remember

who led the um we'll get into this man through who led the final lap starting it but we know who

finished it in first was Tyler retic so uh so what happened was um with the last lap

starting i believe it was uh either chase Elliott or or Joey Logano one of those guys was either in

the front or right up at the front i had to go back and watch replay my my my brain is kind of

blinking in it but about halfway through the lap retic got a bit of a push from his teammate Riley

Herbst and then kind of push past chase Elliott and made a great move kind of a kind of a left to

right or kind of left down the track and then sort of back i'm trying i think it's kind of a

little bit backwards on the broadcast as to what it would be uh if you're in a driver's seat and

so the retic ends up taking the lead and then of course retic and Logano crash out right behind

him as they cross the finish line there it actually was um a crash to start the final lap

so i now i have it in front of me it was Carson Hosevar who who uh was leading the look i forgot

that it was Hosevar i thought it was chase Elliott but it was it was Hosevar he was um he

had the lead at the white flag and as we all know the next yellow after the white flag ends the race

so there was a spin in but Hosevar spawned in turn one it took out Eric Jones and Michael

McDonald with him so now Elliott's in charge and you think NASCAR is going to run the yellow and

Elliott wins for whatever reason i and i didn't see it on the broadcast i didn't get a chance to

watch the post-race replay it looked like that wreck must have gone off the track and down it

into excuse me down into the infield because NASCAR kept it green so then of course we have retic

kind of pushing his way up front and like we said like i just said a minute ago retic gets a push from

Herbst works his way around Elliott he's in first place and then a couple other cars just um it just

you know uh what's his name uh excuse me Brad Kastalowski tries to get by Herbst Herbst tries

to block him that starts the wreck that involves Elliott and Logano and it's just a mess and then

all ends up with like a hundred yards from the finish 200 yards from the finish and retic breezes

through so uh i had said last week in our preview that i didn't want the big one i think we kind of

mostly avoided that but Matthew i want to hear i want to hear your thoughts on the race i think

you're right and it was a real to use a basketball term because MJ is involved in it was a buzzer

beat her you know that's right Michael Jordan was the owner of the winning team yes and how great

is it we were joking at the end of last year that imagine if someone from 2311 had won the

championship after in my opinion beating NASCAR in court um if you force NASCAR to settle on anything

NASCAR as a as an entity to settle on anything i think that's a win so Michael Jordan and his team

you know beat NASCAR in in in court and then they go on to win the Daytona 500 and there's

has to be presented with the early jay herald trophy yeah i hadn't even thought about that

aspect a huge amount of irony right i'm sure that was not lost on on a lot of people so

i mean it's just as you think about any sort of you know basket in the final seconds right

you know right in the last court that type of thing and Tyler Reddick got the job done in

number 45 and and there were some also observations i mean Denny Hanlon himself has won the Daytona

500 three times as a driver and now he has won it as an owner so that is something that is pretty

unique in this sport for a driver to be able to do that and have wins both as a driver and as

an owner of a team so i think that that speaks to the team itself it speaks to how well

that organization has gelled since it has been created you know what i'm saying

and i mean reddick is not exactly you know we would say that he's i don't know if you say

he's a veteran or not but i mean the man is 30 right so he's he's a young man he's been around

for a few years now been around for a few years though you know what i'm saying right so he's

usually in the mix he he's in that top half of drivers or top tier drivers very much so and that's

sort of um that sort of performance just seems to be popping out more and more often so i think

that we can now especially with 2311 with um four cars uh and having more resources and such

i think that those results are going to keep happening and don't i think we haven't slept

on most of our all no he's got a ton of talent he just needs to bring in his emotions we have

been for real right um and he's just you know just an excitable driver right i mean he's and an

exciting driver too so i think that he'll get his first win before the end of this year i mean

just so close leading the final leading to leading through the white flag and all of the success he

had in some of the other races as well and he got a lot of points he got a lot of points on sunday

because you get a bunch of points for leading these stages and such like that so i mean he's

he's doing pretty well in the standings just one race into it even though he finished i want to say

in the teens somewhere eventually once everyone stopped reckoning right yeah we still he must be

top 10 of points can't be um with the number of points that he got in the other stages yeah and

i haven't looked at the standings yet so i'm not quite quite familiar with that that's kind of

on me i probably should look at him but i don't want to race in i kind of figured it wasn't really

worth um you can't read too much in the standings one weekend to the season you're right especially

now that they've changed and they fixed it that it's no longer this win in your in stuff and we're

back to seeing what it used to be like where you see cars running around making minimum speed which

is which is important but you know with damage out there right and you know with no front like

the three was running around with no front on it we're seeing that stuff again people working hard

because it's not a win in your in type thing looking for points anyways i'm excited and i'm

yammering away go ahead man who cut you off no you're good you didn't come me up at all um i was

gonna say you raised a good point with people raising for points william byron had a rough day

he got caught up in that and that early wreck the first truck in the fifth lap when i again i forget

the driver i don't think it was first i was a younger guy um gentleman who doesn't who's kind

of in the back back of the pack his car broke he didn't he was not for every error he wasn't hit

it just a tolling broke or a tire went down or something like that he spun and collected a

couple cars and byron was one of them and byron had a rough day hit the wall a few times trying

to come back uh he had a not a very good day but he's out there you know it's the two he won two

in a row and this was his shot at three and he kind of lost that early so he's out there trying

to get points i was watching the bubble Wallace had a disappointing day because he was in the mix

at the very end and he uh he backed off the throttle to avoid hitting somebody in fact i

believe it was Byron uh and that final wreck and he probably cost himself four or five spots but he

also probably avoided wrecking further so that may be discretion of being the better part of

valor right you better finish better off finishing ninth as opposed to wrecking and finishing 19th

um you know so Wallace had a rough day he he had a shot the legit shot to win at the end

i forget what happened to hamlin he was in the mix for a while and then he had an issue and i want

to say i think he was caught up in the big one wreck that happened about halfway through with

counter zillich zillich made zillich is a young guy 18 years old 19 years old

basically a rookie more or less and i think he made i don't know if it's really his fault or

not but he did but he lost kind of sort of lost control and it was kind of funny the broadcast

was highlighting him and and saying he was having a good run and then right as they said it as the

announcer jinx right is one of the announcers i'm not sure if it was mike joy or one of the or one

former drivers that work with him um and he said something to to the effect of all zillich was

having a great run and zillich kind of lost control started the big one so that was a

unfortunate that i think collected nine or ten cars that was a was a rough one there so but then

we had a lot of clean racing and we didn't have the overtime um which made me happy i don't i don't

see overtime especially when driver airs what leads to it um i give nascar credit and again i

didn't see it or see a replay of it it wasn't on the broadcast because it happened behind where the

camera was but that the first wreck on the final lap stained green and obviously chas zillich

it's probably pissed off because that would be a win for him but um keeping it green and letting

letting uh letting them race that final two and a half miles i think was was huge um

obviously the wreck must have been off the track and it must have had no debris damage

and the nascar probably felt you know because it was in i think the first turn first or second

turn so they're gonna have the race end anyway because once once the drivers cross start finish

they'll be off the gas and and slowing down so credit nascar for figuring that out on the fly

and having to make a difficult call with only seconds to do it um obviously chas zillich probably

disagrees with me any chas zillich fans probably not very happy uh and obviously tyler retic you

know benefits from that i also want to say um it was nice of nascar on a little more serious now

to a few drivers had the greg biffle font uh and his number on their car so that was a nice tribute

to the greg who passed away in a uh aircraft crash in december and then of course we had the

usual salute to dale erhardt on the third lap so that was always nice to to to see the kind of

respect for the departed but um yeah it was a good race it was an interesting race it was a fuel

strategy race a lot that was the the broadcast was talking a lot about fuel strategy um and i

learned something that i don't think i learned i don't think i knew about nascar before if i did

know what i'd forgotten about it maybe they mentioned it last year during some of the races but

they mentioned on the broadcast they being like july and former driver clinton poyer that um

these cars because the drivers want to say fuel on caution laps like i highly doubt they can do

this at speed if they can then they're superhuman but on caution laps they shut the cars off all

the way and they and anyone who's driven a stick shift knows you can kick start a stick shift if

you push it in neutral put the clutch in put it in gear and then dump the clutch you can start the

car when i own my Mustang i used to do it for fun sometimes on a hilly driveway i would do it in

reverse just for fun just just because it's something kind of fun to do if you want a manual

well you can do the nascars of course these are all manual transmissions so a lot of these

drivers are popped in the clutch they shut the engine off let it coast for a couple hundred yards

and they pop the clutch it's however whatever the speed is on a caution 55 60 miles an hour

to save fuel and apparently this works so keep that in mind if you're someone who has a stop start

feature in your own car and there's been some talk about that about that feature in production

cars and the government talking about it maybe we'll cover it in t-tech this week but uh yeah

so that's kind of a funny thing i learned that that was that was really unique and interesting and

i thought the race broadcast was overall was overall pretty good because

there were times during the race where it was not i don't want to say boring but it was

it was a little bit you know there are times in a super speedway race where it's basically a

high speed parade right it's very processionary in some yes and sometimes the broadcast needs

to fill that time especially in a race like the Daytona 500 that has new fans who've never seen

the racing world before uh so the broadcast is a nice job of teaching both myself who follows the

and and new fans a few things so i was really really excited to see that how the broadcast

did a good job so overall i thought it was a pretty good race i was you know the last wrap

excuse me the last lap i did send a text to some people with um what the hack except i didn't say

hack what the heck was that and i think i said something about freaking bumper cars but i think

it made that i'm freaking um yeah it was it was a wild last lap but i really can't you know i've

ranted before about the big one on the final lap or the final five laps being caused by drivers

being too aggressive or driver error i really can't fault anyone in this one there were a couple

moves that were questionable and i think herbs directing keselowski and collecting elliott and

legano is a little questionable there at the end of that second wreck on the final lap

and most of our being turned you could maybe make a case that i didn't i forget who caught

but you can make a case that maybe he should have been turned and maybe he should have had a shot

for the win but then again there's also the whole rubbing is racing thing and these guys

are allowed to bump each other a little bit i think it was mostly clean racing yeah i don't

like to see guys get wrecked out with a checkered flag less than a lap away um whether it's chase

elliott or carson house of fire i think both have good cases to be angry and and maybe might

never maybe might not be talking to somebody else in the garage for a few weeks but um that being

said i didn't see anything that was highly unfair highly illegal or even dumb you know it was just

guys going for the win and making it's hard i'm trying not to counter it myself here they made

mistakes because they were going for the win they weren't dumb mistakes i think that's probably the

best way to phrase it yeah well exactly and there were also i mean you you look at the number 40

car jr motor sports that was a fast hot rod and there's always going to be he you know who did

what and who caused the wreck and the 11 got into the back of that car yeah the yeah the right and

but i think that that may have been a miscalculation on the driver of the on auger's part because the

11 i had such a huge run on the outside that i think the block was just timed a little bit i mean

as much as everyone loves to blame someone else who's not their favorite driver and it is awesome

to see that 40 run so well they made it into the show they had to race their way in or get in on

on time right they mean they weren't assured a spot is what i'm trying to say so seeing that car

there seeing it there for the second time and seeing it do well until that happened was very

gratifying and i really hope you know that this is uh something that is more regular you know from

that from that team whether it's uh you know becomes something more permanent as a 40 uh car

that we see almost every week that would be super awesome or whether it's just an annual thing at

Daytona and time is going to tell but i really liked what you said too about the font for the

gray biffle right i mean the six and the 16 and the 60 um that looked really good because that was

his car looked awesome that was the best car of the day at the castrol with the with that six uh

that six car that looked really good and um shout out as well the number 60 ryan priest

finishing the uh finishing the race backwards after he got caught up in all that mess in the

last in the in the last little bit he just threw it in reverse and went across the line backwards

so that's that's a pure nascar right there that doesn't happen in f1 as an example so

yeah very glad that we're back to racing me too and that the all go all goreck with hamlin you

mentioned that was the one right before i was the logist right correct i believe yeah yeah there was

it was a near the end of near the end of stage two i think and then i want to say zilich was not

long after they went green again for stage because the with the seven laps to go they would i believe

they finished that stage under caution and bob the walls cut the stage went there and then um

i think zilich was early in stage three and again i have to go back and watch the zilich

i'm not 100 percent certain if it was a working mistake on the part of an 18 year old who's

still learning or if it was just one of those racing deals or the words a little bit of draft

and he was kind of kind of pushed from the car behind him i also was trying to watch chain van

gisburg and i got a little confused early because zilich is driving van gisburg and slippery from

last year here and van gisburg was in the 97 car but he had a good run near the end of the race

and he was caught up in one of the wrecks i want us i can't recall if top man if it was the zilich

wreck or or that last second the last excuse me second the last wreck on the last lap say that

five times fast um yeah but he was caught up in some of the shenanigans i think he did finish

the race but he didn't have a shot a realistic shot at winning but he did have a pretty good

run up until that point uh so again a lot of clean racing it was you know like you said

processionary which that's fine i don't think it's i don't find processional racing to be boring

but i do think if you're an educated nascar fan what i mean by that is someone who's watching

watch racing long enough to to know the basics and it's a little more advanced in their knowledge

i think what you would you have to look for when you're in the midst of one of the super speedway

races and it's uh 100 laps to go or 75 laps because it's almost like basketball in a way

Daytona in teledega it's almost like basketball particularly college basketball where it doesn't

get particularly interesting to the final two minutes right well super speedway racing a lot

of drivers are holding stuff back to the final 10 laps because they want to save fuel they want

to make sure they have enough fuel to finish the race they don't want to move too early and then be

passed by a car that can use the draft to blow by them that sort that sort of thing so what i'm

looking for a lot when i'm watching Daytona teledega uh what i'm looking for especially with 100 to

to 20 laps to go that 80 lap range i'm looking at pitch strategy a little bit and thank god fox

has larry macrinals on to do that because he's so good at it but i'm also looking at um uh who's

moving through the pack and it's hard to see in the broadcast you can't always see it because

where the cameras are but i'm looking to see who's moving up and down in the middle of the pack

you know i'm watching the ticker on the side as much as i'm on the actual race

because that can give you information the camera can't quite catch but that's what i'm really looking

for is not just not necessarily who's leading or or a battle between first place and second place

where cars might be swapping spots up until that final end of the race i'm watching for

cars in the middle of the pack moving up moving down seeing what they're doing watching individual

drivers who maybe you have a storyline like shane van gesbergen or um daniel soares with

a new team something like that jimmy johnson being in the race as he's pushing 50 counter zillage

up until he wrecked being you know one of the youngest guys in the field so stuff like that so

that's what i'm looking for and then that final the final time lapse that you started thinking

okay they're all going to go for it now let's just hope they don't wreck and we got that we got

those final final lap which is crazy and there are two other things i want to i want to mention

that i just noticed people mentioning things on social media a couple of notes there that they

were 25 lead i assume and this is correct i didn't fact check it through multiple sources just through

two sources so take this um but there were 25 leaders and 65 lead changes second most of all time

i think i saw it in the broadcast there are 65 lead changes yeah so that's that's that's really

good i don't know it just speaks to the package the car you know their dial in the end but something

else that i saw on social media and this was from the truck race i know that prices were a little

bit more for the um for the cup race but not so much um the the the food and the beer at the track

were not exorbitantly priced interesting yeah so um this was at the truck race and i'm gonna add

a couple dollars for the cup race but a beer you know whether it's a a bud or a bud light or bush

light or something like that four bucks right for a beer that's gross that's cheaper than a regular

bar here it is the same right and four dollars for nachos four dollars for a chili cheese that

that type of stuff so that's cool and that is absolutely awesome because we've been talking

about this so much that it's so expensive for a family to go in a race and for Daytona to do that

and i know that's not a nascar thing that's a promoter thing at the track level and i hope

we see a lot of that at other tracks too and that was off instagram someone's post i apologize for

not knowing oh that's okay for the name of i can't i can't shout out the person who posted it but

i think that that's pretty i think that's pretty awesome because stuff gets so expensive and just

given the mean cost of living and and you know the affordability crisis and stuff like that for

people to go out and take in these they don't have so much discretionary spending anymore yeah

and to price a beer at four dollars at the track i think that's excellent i think that's great i agree

yeah four dollars i mean my neighborhood tavern is probably five or six for a mellowad or

or bud light and that's just not a normal day um yeah yeah yeah so i also wanted to we only

had a couple on this up i wanted to touch on a couple things we need to get time to get to it

i was gonna poke fun a little bit at ryan blaney for his facial hair choices but we will

say that for another time um his bush broom yeah yeah he looks like a different person uh it took

me a second if he wasn't wearing the same driver suit as last year i wouldn't recognize him because

he's also grown his hair out a bit too and then um the other thing is i want to talk about the wind

a little bit we we know the race was pushed forward an hour to avoid incoming storms and uh so i don't

know if the rain hit after i didn't make i didn't change from mainstream fox to fox sports network

or to their app to watch post race i had to go get dinner basically so as soon as the race was over

i watched the the end of the post race on the regular fox channel and as soon as they switched

away to um whatever programming i think it was uh something i think the race ended

earlier than anticipated so they went to like in depth with graham bissinger before going to our

local news so i raced out to the grocery store pardon no pun intended i did not actually race the

grocery store um i drove out to the grocery store to get dinner and and put all that stuff but um

i long way of saying i don't know if i if it rained during during the post race stuff

or if the rain held off but the wind we we were concerned about wind being an issue i remember

in the pre race seeing the palm trees bending over halfway or so and during the broadcast it was

mentioned a few times how the wind was affecting cars but i don't think it caused it a wreck i

think a couple cars got sideways i don't think any of the wrecks were caused by the wind though

i think a couple drivers got sideways and saved it um there might have been a minor minor minor

bumper collision that i don't even think about about a caution but yeah the wind was um not as

bad of it was definitely a factor but i think we got we got lucky as fans that the race guy

didn't have any rain or any rain delays and the wind didn't seem it seemed like it was something

the drivers had to adjust to and pay attention to and think about and i heard the broadcast also

mentioned that the spotters had to make sure they could talk into their mics because the wind was

mumbling their voices so it definitely did play a part in the race but it didn't didn't seem to

overly impact the race i don't i don't i don't think any of the digrex can be blamed on the wind so

why don't you touch on that and then matthew we've got about a minute left if you have anything else

to add no just i'm i'm stoked for what seems like a really good i'm optimistic for a really good

season and good decision making by nascar because they moved it up like you said by an hour yeah

that was a really good decision and and they left it green on the final lap so those are two

really good decisions makes me optimistic for 2026 yeah again split second decisions where

cars are going 180 miles an hour so with that we will be back next week to talk about nascar

most likely what happens at atlanta um season is in full swing so most weeks will talk about

on track action but there will be some weeks we talk about off track stuff uh as we as pertains

to nascar it just depends on what is happening that given week so thank you again for tuning

into the nascar segment here on the truth about cars podcast and thank you matthew guy for your

time thank you for having me on this week the cars you'll find that ebay are just different

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tony healy the managing editor and you can find us wherever you get your podcast you can also find

us online at ttsc.com that's t tech dot com or the truth about cars all spelled out dot com we

thank alex nizek and matthew guy for their time and matt poskey for editing most of all we thank you

for listening we'll see you next time

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