What’s Happening?

For the first “real” (or typical) race of the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season, the greatest drivers in the world headed out west to Phoenix Raceway for the Shriners Children’s 500. The 500-kilometer (or 312 laps/miles) race marked the first time all season long that we headed to a normal oval. This meant that today, we saw who was a legitimate contender early this season and who used the superspeedway and road course styles as a crutch. We learned a lot while watching this race. So, with no further ado, here are the 3 key takeaways from today’s race in the Valley of the Sun.

Things of Note

• Impressing in qualifying on Saturday were the three Spire entries. All three drivers of Carson Hocevar, Michael McDowell, and Justin Haley all qualified in the top 10. That momentum carried into the opening laps of Stage 1 as all three remained in top 10 through the first couple of cautions. However, for McDowell and Haley, their tires faded and they sank through the field like a stone as the stage wore on.
• A big topic this weekend was Goodyear tires. Like they typically do nowadays for the short, flat, oval races, Goodyear brought two different tires for teams to use. The teams were given 7 sets of primary tires and 2 sets of red-walled option tires. The options were softer and quicker to wear but were faster in the short run. It was interesting to see the kind of wrench this threw into the teams’ strategy.
• William Byron and Christopher Bell were extremely fast in qualifying on Saturday. Byron scored the pole and Bell rolled off in the top 10. Both of them were looking to add to their win count on the year. The former won the 2025 Daytona 500, while the latter won two races in a row at Atlanta and COTA, respectively. Thus far in the year, they collectively have a stranglehold on their competition.

Christopher Bell Threepeats

This race was really the story of 3 different drivers. The opening stage of the race was dominated by polesitter William Byron following an unfortunate penalty for Joey Logano. After jumping the restart on Lap 15, Logano had to serve a pass-through penalty; As a result, Byron inherited the lead and never really looked back. He went on to win the opening stage, scoring him 10 stage points and a Playoff point.

The heavy hitter of the second stage was Christopher Bell. Following 3 straight weeks of wildcard races, it became very clear that Byron’s and Bell’s early season successes were not flukes. They went into this race looking to horde all the wins for themselves. Bell went on to win the stage, collecting 10 stage points and 1 Playoff point

Though in the final stage, he surrendered the lead to the Fords of Joey Logano and Ryan Preece for a spell, Christopher Bell could not be denied. In a thrilling 2-lap shootout, Bell battled hard against his teammate Denny Hamlin, but the 11 of Hamlin just didn’t have enough left in the take. Christopher Bell won his third win in a row, and he earned it outright.

Seriously, Don’t Cross the Yellow Line

Another week in the NASCAR season, another controversy. At least this one came at the beginning of the race rather than at the end. The controversy of question involved 4-time Phoenix winner, Joey Logano, who led the field to take the green on the restart of Lap 15. As you can see in the video below, Logano cuts the dogleg just a smidge sooner than NASCAR would have liked. The rule in which he violated states that no driver is allowed to go below the inside yellow line prior to crossing the start/finish line. Logano was guilty of that…barely, which made it all the harder for the Team Penske driver to swallow.

Logano then had to serve a passthrough penalty. Subsequently, he came down pit road and fell one lap off the pace. Clearly, he was not happy over the radio. This felt like NASCAR was trying to make an example out of Logano. It certainly set the president that NASCAR was not playing around with this rule change.

As we reached the end of the stage, Logano was able to get his lap back via the free pass. In the second stage, methodically worked his way back up through the field. Then, during the stage break, he was able to cycle his way back up to the lead by utilizing the red-lined Option tire.

Big Ones Can Happen on Small Tracks

Though it’s hardly unheard of, Big Ones rarely happen on shorter ovals. But today, down in Phoenix, we got a multi-car pileup worthy of Daytona or Talladega. The whole mess was triggered by driver error. Ty Gibbs, who had been running in the 20s and 30s all day long, drifted up the track on Lap 99 and there were cars there. The 54 of Gibbs made contact with Just Haley in the Spire 7 car.

Out of room, Haley got into Chase Briscoe whose car briefly hopped up and into the air. To Briscoe’s outside was Carson Hocevar who had been running well all day but found himself with nowhere to go. Briscoe sandwiched Hocevar hard into the outside wall. From then on we were off to the races. Haley slid down the track and collected Shane van Gisbergen who then turned and tagged Brad Keselowski. Somewhere amidst the smoke and debris, someone tagged Cole Custer who plowed into the outside SAFER barrier on the backstretch. Noah Gragson was also involved.

When all was said and done, 9 cars were involved in this completely avoidable incident. Check out the carnage in the clip below.

FOX Sports’ Bob Pockrass caught up with the drivers involved as they were checked and released from the infield care center. Here is Chase Briscoe’s point of view:

Justin Haley gave his thoughts on the primary vs. option tires.

Here’s what Cole Custer had to say:

Jamie Little caught up with Carson Hocevar after his brutal hit.

Bell and Byron Are Elite

By far and away, the two drivers with the best cars all day long just so happened to be the two previous winners of the 2025 season. Byron in particular started off hot as he was able to take advantage of Logano’s penalty to win the opening stage. Then Bell rose to the occasion, taking control of the race during the second stage. For a large chunk of this race, these two drivers set the pace. Which stands to reason that Christopher Bell and William Byron are two of the best drivers the sport has to offer today.

In recent years, we’ve seen a shift away from the old guard of NASCAR toward the new. Bell is now arguably the franchise driver of Joe Gibbs Racing. Meanwhile, Byron has taken up the mantle for Team Hendrick. With how good these two drivers are, it wouldn’t be far-fetched to say that they’re going to battle one another for the NASCAR Cup Series Championship for years and years to come.

Byron fell behind some at the end of this race as he was caught on pit road when a caution came out for Bubba Wallace blowing a tire. But that had less to do with the performance of that 24 car and more to do with bad timing. That said, some appropriately timed cautions allowed him to regroup and work his way through the field and back into contention. In the end, he didn’t have the time to get there. His 6th place finish does not reflect how good he was here today.

Meanwhile, Christopher Bell was looking to make it 3 wins in a row as the laps wound down in the final stage. He ultimately achieved that but he had to earn it. After teammate Ty Gibbs got into the wall causing a caution, the race restarted with 2 laps to go. Denny Hamlin tried his darndest but couldn’t clear the 20 of Bell. Christopher Bell became the first driver to win 3 races in a row since Kevin Harvick in 2018. He’s clearly a championship favorite starting off this year.

Conclusion

That does it for us, Daily Downforce readers. What do you think? Are you impressed with Bell’s late performance? Let us know what you’re thinking! And be sure to keep checking back here at DailyDownforce.com throughout the week for all the latest news and stories in the world of NASCAR. Next week, we’re off to Sin City!