LAS VEGAS – Dating back to mid-summer, William Byron’s 2025 statistics are full of waves. The bright spots include stretching his fuel tank at Iowa Speedway en route to his second victory of the season and clinching his first Regular Season Championship.
A deeper dive, however, shows more. Byron’s 11.17 average finish so far during the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs ranks fourth among the eight remaining postseason drivers, despite having just one finish better than ninth in that span. That result was a third-place effort at arguably his worst circuit on the schedule at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
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The No. 24 team’s highs haven’t been too high and its lows haven’t been too low — he’s playing on a level field. In the 17 events since Byron led a race-high 98 laps at Michigan International Speedway (only to run out of fuel in the closing laps), he’s led in just three races. He paced the field for a total of 147 laps in that span, with 141 coming in his Iowa triumph.
Byron isn’t concerned, however, shrugging off the possibility that the No. 24 team isn’t hitting its stride.
“All that is behind us,” Byron said Saturday at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. “We’ve done what we’ve needed to do. We haven’t done what we’ve wanted to do, but we’ve done what needs to be done to get to this point. The real race starts [in practice] and [Sunday]. Not really looking much at the past, but feel like we’re right where we need to be, at least from a preparation standpoint, going into Vegas. I’m pretty optimistic about today and tomorrow.”
Byron is a former winner at Las Vegas (spring 2023) and enters the weekend with five straight top-10 finishes in Sin City, the longest active streak in the series. With the points resetting, he drops to fourth, four points above Christopher Bell and the cutline.
The most recent intermediate track race at Kansas Speedway in the Round of 12 was disheartening for the No. 24 team. A late two-tire call by crew chief Rudy Fugle jumped Byron up the scoring pylon, gaining crucial track position and scoring a ninth-place effort. But the majority of the race was spent throwing “Hail Marys” to have a respectable showing.
The last 1.5-mile track before Kansas came at Charlotte Motor Speedway in May, when Byron crushed the field by winning the opening three stages and leading a career-high 283 laps. Ultimately, Ross Chastain got by in the closing laps to secure the victory.
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After dissecting the Kansas performance, Byron feels like the No. 24 team can conquer Las Vegas (Sun., 5:30 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App) and advance to the Championship 4 for the third consecutive season. He believes that it’s his best intermediate venue.
“This is a totally new beast now that we’re at the race track and see what we unload with,” Byron said.
Byron has pointed his way into the Championship 4 in each of the last two seasons. His average finish of 8.9 on 1.5-mile tracks is the best in the Next Gen era, according to Racing Insights. During Saturday’s practice session, Byron topped the scoring chart in five, 10, 15, 20, 25 and 30-lap averages. He’ll roll off fifth in Sunday’s 267-lapper after Joe Gibbs Racing swept the top three starting positions.