The 75th NASCAR season has come to a close as the checkered flag flies in Phoenix. NASCAR has a new champion to reign supreme through the offseason and into next year and his name is Ryan Blaney. This marks the first championship victory of Ryan Blaney’s career. So, what did the championship path look like for Blaney and who fell just short of being able to hoist the trophy? Let’s talk about it.
2023 marked the first year in his career that Ryan Blaney qualified for the Championship 4. Heading into Phoenix, there were a lot of eyes on Blaney as he’s currently in the middle of the hottest streak of his career and he is notoriously fast at Phoenix Raceway. In 2022, he led a lot of laps but then, possibly because of team orders, fell behind his teammate Joey Logano who would eventually go on to win the Cup. And, he finished runner-up there earlier this spring.
To start the race, Blaney rolled off in the 15th position, the worst of the Championship 4 drivers. While he hung around the back half of the top 10 for much of the first stage. After a fast round of pitstops, Blaney found himself racing solidly inside the top 5, overtaking Championship 4 rival, Christopher Bell. Struggling with loose conditions, Blaney would finish the second stage in the 6th position.
For much of the race, Blaney was frustrated. He battled loose conditions all day and was met with stark competition from non-playoff contenders. About halfway through the final stage, in a battle with Ross Chastain for the lead, Blaney fell down to third, dangerously in the clutches of championship rival, Kyle Larson. Able to regroup, Blaney started to work his way back up to battle with leader Chastain, who dominated the final stage of the race. In the end, Chastain was able to stretch his lead to win the race…but it was Ryan Blaney, in his No. 12 Menards Ford, who captured the crown as the checkered flag flew.
Blaney was in a bit of a unique situation today as his sister is dating fellow Championship 4 competitor, William Byron. The two of them spoke with Sirius NASCAR Radio about which driver she was rooting for today.
Ryan Blaney ends his season with a 2nd place finish and your 2023 NASCAR Cup Series Champion. In 2023, he scored 3 wins, 8 top-5s, and 18 top-10s. Oh, and his first Bill France Cup!
As with any sport, while one team hoists the Bill France Cup, victorious and on top of the world, three other teams are left on the outs, so close to tasting victory but not close enough.
In 2022, Christopher Bell entered the Championship 4 as an outside pick. It was his clutch wins at the Charlotte Roval and Martinsville to put him in the position to steal one after a decent but not great season. But many saw that step forward as a massive leap as, all of a sudden, Christopher Bell became a week-in-week-out race-win contender.
Christopher Bell was hot in the Round of 8 which put him in prime position to contend for a championship at Phoenix. Heading into the Valley of the Sun, strangely enough, Bell struggled with loose conditions in qualifying, leading him to spend much of the first stage battling in the bottom half of the top 10.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t meant to be for Christopher Bell. His race ended about halfway through the second stage. Moments before the incident, Christopher Bell came on the radio complaining about his brakes overheating. Shortly thereafter, he found himself slamming hard into the outside wall, ending his championship hopes for another year.
Below in footage provided by NASCAR on NBC, you can see the full incident that ended Bell’s 2023 championship dreams.
Christopher Bell ends his season with 2 wins, 10 top-5s, and 19 top-10s.
2023 was the first year William Byron qualified for the Championship 4 in the NASCAR Cup Series. The 2017 Xfinity Champ finally started to come into his own in 2022 and was the most consistent driver from the Hendrick Motorsports stable in 2023. He started his ’23 Championship Weekend with a statement pole position and, once the green flag flew in the Valley of the Sun, Byron rocketed out front and didn’t look back for most of the first half of this race. He dominated the first stage and captured the green and white checkered flag.
The second stage saw Byron fade some as he fell as low as 4th, racing practically under a blanket with the other championship contenders, fending off a hard-charging Ryan Blaney. He would ultimately end the stage in the 4th position.
Willy B would end up finishing 4th, 3rd out of the Championship 4. He ends his season with 6 wins, 15 top-5s, and 21 top-10s. He took a big step forward this season. Maybe he can give it a better run in 2024.
Heading into Phoenix, Kyle Larson was the only Championship 4 contender who had won the cup before. Firing off loose, Larson ran around the top 5 for much of the first stage before ultimately fading to the upper half of the top 10. He finished the second stage in the 7th position.
Like in 2021, a lightning-fast pit stop got Larson up front for the final run of the race. Unfortunately for him and the No. 5 crew, he just couldn’t hold off the No. 12 team of Ryan Blaney. He finished the race in the 3rd position.
It has been a largely inconsistent year for Larson and the No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevy team. They’ve been fast pretty much all year but mistakes had hindered them in their ability to finish off races. To end the 2023 season, Kyle Larson is credited with 4 wins, 15 top-5s, and 18 top-10s.
Another race weekend in the books. While Ryan Blaney battled back from several pit road setbacks to win his second straight race at Phoenix, other drivers were much to be desired. It was a big win for Penske but for several others, they leave the first “real” race of the season scratching their head with a lot that they need to figure out. Here are the biggest losers of NASCAR’s Spring 2026 Phoenix race weekend.
I’m afraid that this is starting to be habitual. Another race weekend at RCR for Kyle Busch, another terrible result. Well, the finish wasn’t exactly awful. While 17th is hardly up to Kyle’s standards, it’s about as good as it gets anymore for the two-time champion who hasn’t won a race in nearly a hundred starts.
To start things off, there was a reason to be cautiously optimistic about the future of that RCR No. 8 Chevy. New crew chief. Personnel changes. A new Chevy body. He even scored the pole for the 68th running of the Daytona 500 last month. But, since then, it has been a sharp slope downward. He was mostly a non-factor in the first three races. And, today, it seemed like the No. 8 Chevy was out to lunch. They unloaded slow. They qualified in the back of the pack. And, before Stage 1 even ended, Kyle was running 34th with no apparent issues and went a lap down to leader Ryan Blaney. To add insult to injury, Kyle Bush had a tire go down on him three times today. More than any other driver. It appears to be back to the drawing board for team No. 8.
You could say that the Hendrick No. 48 team had a rough weekend in general. But I think it would be more accurate to say that the entire start to 2026 has been catastrophic. Heading into today’s race, even with Bowman starting the first three races of the season, the No. 48 team was 36th in points, last among all full-time drivers. Even Cody Ware was ahead of him. If that’s not bad, I don’t know what is.
To rub salt in the wound, their driver missed today at Phoenix due to showing symptoms of vertigo. So, Anthony Alfredo was into sub and…it went about as well as you’d expect. He went a lap down early and never recovered. He got caught up in the incident involving Joey Logano and DNF’d. Officially, they scored a 33rd finishing position. This is the worst start Bowman could ever imagine, considering that he’s in a contract year.
I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking that I’ve lost my marbles. “Come on, dude! Penske just swept the weekend! How can they be losers?” Hear me out. Let’s start first with the two other Penske drivers, shall we? Joey Logano caused not one, but two multi-car pileups, one involving his Penske teammate, Austin Cindric. Cars were utterly destroyed. Before that, both Cindric and Logano were running solidly in the top 10.
So, it’s not for a lack of speed that they make our Biggest Losers list. The reason they’re listed here is that a lot of their problems today, if not all of them, were self-inflicted. Logano was driving sloppily and that took out Cindric. And even race winner Ryan Blaney almost lost this race on pit road numerous times. Rookie mistakes by the pit crew constantly had him charging from behind. Pit road penalties. He was like a yo-yo going back and forth throughout the field. What saved him in the end was that, on that last restart, Blaney took two tires and Christopher Bell took 4. If that had not happened, it is extremely possible that Blaney ultimately would have lost the race and it would have been because of their numerous mistakes in the pits.
They got lucky this week. They probably won’t get that lucky again. They need to clean up those nagging, senseless mistakes.
Ole, Danny boy. If Alex Bowman’s seat is the hottest in the series, Daniel Suarez has to be the second hottest in the garage. That No. 7 car has been a revolving door of drivers for the last several years and it looks like Suarez is shaping up to be Spire’s latest victim. It’s the same old story with the team: they show impressive speed in qualifying and even early on in the race. But rarely do they ever put a full race together. That criticism isn’t just for Suarez, it applies to the team across the board.
But Carson Hocevar is the team’s golden child. He’s not going anywhere. And the team seems pretty high on Michael McDowell at the moment. That leaves Suarez looking like the odd man out, a seat-warmer, if you will. He needs to perform. And, he’s done well to start, admittedly. But he qualified 5th for today’s race. He even earned a few stage points in the opening stage. Then, he faltered and left the race with an unceremonious whimper. Ultimately, after he was no longer a factor, he was caught up in a mid-race wreck. He finished 30th. That’s a tough pill to swallow for the Mexican-born driver. If he wants to keep his ride next year, he needs to show stark improvement in the coming weeks. I have a strong feeling that that ride is about to be a highly sought-after commodity once silly season rolls around.
What do you think about this? Let us know your opinion on Discord or X. Don’t forget that you can also follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
The first checkered flag of the 2026 rendition of the NASCAR West Coast Swing (as abbreviated as it is) has officially flown. It was an exciting race, full of close, tight-cornered racing, a plethora of tire issues littered throughout, and a couple of heartbreaking, hard hits. Surviving it all was Ryan Blaney, who captured the flag in the Straight Talk 500 at Phoenix Raceway. He survived pit road mishaps and passed a total of 49 cars to win the race today. It marks his 18th career victory, sweeping the weekend for Team Penske. So, for Blaney and Team Penske, the race was the highest of highs. Not everyone escaped unscathed, though. Here are the key takeaways from NASCAR’s spring date at Phoenix.
What do you think about this? Let us know your opinion on Discord or X. Don’t forget that you can also follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
Following a relatively clean first stage, Stage number 2 and beyond was littered with cautions. Most of these cautions were a result of tires going down after only about 20 laps or so of use. But the caution on Lao 216 was purely driver error. Joey Logano, who was running 7th at the time, made a move down on the apron approaching the finish line. Chaos ensued. Here’s what happened.
What do you think about this? Let us know your opinion on Discord or X. Don’t forget that you can also follow us on Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube.
