AVONDALE, Ariz. — The battle to get into this weekend’s Championship 4 field at Phoenix Raceway has been a claws-out, stress-filled contest the last two weeks, with ramped-up pressure at Homestead-Miami and Martinsville. Joey Logano, though, has been above that whole fray, ever since his victory in the Round of 8 opener at Las Vegas.
“Not my deal,” Logano said with a laugh. “I don’t have to worry about it. My batteries are recharged. Everyone had their tongues hanging out trying to get in.”
RELATED: Championship Weekend schedule | At-track photos
Logano and fellow title hopeful Tyler Reddick enter Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series season finale (3 p.m. ET, NBC, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, Peacock) with teams that have relished the extra time to focus on their Phoenix game plan. Those two will face off against Ryan Blaney and William Byron, who clinched their Championship 4 slots with clutch performances just last weekend at Martinsville.
Logano has had the longest runway, thanks to his Vegas victory on Oct. 20 that made him the first to clinch. He and his No. 22 Team Penske Ford group have used that formula before, advancing from the Round of 16 this year with a playoff-opening win at Atlanta, and using a Round of 8-opening triumph in 2022 to seal a Championship 4 berth, one that he converted into his second Cup Series title.
The extra lead time has been valuable for No. 22 crew chief Paul Wolfe, a meticulous veteran who joined Team Penske in 2010.
“I think it’s definitely real. I like where we’re at,” Wolfe said in a pre-Martinsville interview. “We did it two years ago, and really it’s all about preparation and making sure we’ve done everything we know possible when we unload in Phoenix, and it just gives you a bigger time frame to go through all that and go over that and focus on that so mentally, you’re not drained when you get to Phoenix. We’re two weeks ahead of where a lot of guys will be. I mean, everyone that’s made it this far in the playoffs has people working in the background preparing, whether they know that they are yet or not.
“So to say that no one else is thinking about Phoenix, that’s not true, but as our team directly, we’ve been able to spend the time and know that when we load up, I can kind of sit back and know that we’ve looked at everything, we feel confident with what we have, and you’re not mentally drained when you get there on Friday and you’re ready to go and feel fresh. I think that’s the biggest thing.”
Reddick rolled into the Phoenix field by virtue of his compelling last-lap dash on Oct. 27, snatching a Homestead-Miami victory from fellow playoff drivers Blaney and Denny Hamlin, his team co-owner at 23XI Racing. The title shot is the first for Reddick, who is an Xfinity Series champion twice over, but it’s also the first for his 23XI group.
With the bonus preparation time has come additional resources, with Toyota-affiliated Joe Gibbs Racing offering assistance in the days leading up to the Phoenix finale.
“Knowing we’re in, knowing that this car right here that we’re working on is going to be a Championship 4 car, just gave us extra time to really focus on that car and understand what the work going into that car, what it means, what it’s going to be racing for,” Reddick said during Thursday’s Championship Weekend Media Day. “It’s been really cool over, I’d say, the last week to see everyone from JGR chipping in and helping and coming by the shop, going over the car with our folks at Airspeed. It just feels like everyone has really banded together and made sure we have everything we need on the car, that it’s as fast as it can be when we get here.”
MORE: What to Watch: Phoenix
That optimism came with a slight note of caution from No. 45 crew chief Billy Scott, who signaled last week that he hoped the team could keep its successful stride. Martinsville, however, was a wash for Reddick, who retired short of last Sunday’s finish with a brake issue. The team will aim to make that result a forgettable blip on its season-long journey this weekend.
“Most of our team, and Tyler, myself, we’ve not been a part of a Cup final four,” Scott said. “So just trying to get ahead of it, trying to understand what surprises we’re in store for, trying to already act like we’re going to Phoenix instead of Martinsville, I feel like has been helpful. Working on our car more, getting ahead of time on that, making sure we go over everything a couple times, being prepared for practice changes out there with a different schedule. I think all that’s beneficial. We just have to make sure we don’t lose our kind of flow we’ve got. We’ve had a few good weeks of really competitive racing that we don’t want to lose track of that and get out of the rhythm, and momentum is a real thing. So it’s kind of the fear in the background.”
Logano, for one, is using the advantage as motivation. The No. 22 team started out slowly this year, but ratcheted up its performance when it mattered with all three wins in the second half of the season. Two of those have come in the playoffs, providing the luxury of breathing room for crucial stretches of the 10-race postseason.
“I mean, it just gives you more time, right?” Logano said. “Give this team time, we become pretty dangerous pretty quickly.”