Posted on by Zach Sturniolo

AVONDALE, Ariz. — Even with Christopher Bell parked squarely in Victory Lane, the dust settling after a dominant showing in the desert, the results from Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Phoenix Raceway don’t tell the full story of Toyota’s impressive day.

The Camry XSE shined in the debut of the latest short-track package with Toyota drivers leading 298 of 312 laps around the 1-mile oval. And for as strong as Bell was, his 50 laps led were just fifth-most of the six different leaders, trailing Denny Hamlin (68 laps led), Tyler Reddick (68), Ty Gibbs (57) and Martin Truex Jr. (55) but ahead of Ford’s Todd Gilliland, who led the 14 laps that Toyota didn’t.

“For Toyota, this was a momentous win,” said David Wilson, president of Toyota Racing Development USA.

MORE: Full Phoenix recap

Eight months from Sunday, a Cup championship will be awarded at the same track. Last November, Bell was the only Toyota in the hunt for a title and had plenty of long-run speed — but hardly got to show it after a brake rotor exploded at Lap 109. The good news? The team didn’t seem to lose any of that speed in the four months since.

“It’s a little bit cathartic,” crew chief Adam Stevens said. “We felt like we were going to be really competitive in the race last time. We again started just missing the balance a little bit. Had one attempt to fix it, then blew that rotor just a few laps later.

“If anything, we built off that this weekend. We were definitely, definitely better this week. But everything is so new, a new tire combination. We were fortunate enough to be part of that test in December. It’s a new aero package for the field. A new body for Toyota. There’s just a lot of ‘new’ in there. It took a lot of different setups to really get the balance back.

“Credit to my guys. My new engineer William (Hartman) really dug in there along with myself and Bell, came up with something we thought was going to work, and it did. We’re pretty pleased.”

A pack of Toyota cars lead the NASCAR Cup Series field at Phoenix.
Alejandro Alvarez | NASCAR.com

Phoenix has historically been a dismal track for the Toyotas in the Next Gen era, with the automaker leading a total of 15 laps in the four Cup races since 2022. That changed in a big way Sunday, with the manufacturer sweeping the top five best average running positions, per NASCAR’s loop data.

Reddick (4.75) and Hamlin (5.98) led the field in that stat through Sunday’s race, but the two nearly converged at Lap 215 in a battle for the lead. On Reddick’s left, Hamlin washed up the track, bounced off Reddick’s door and spun. Ultimately, Reddick finished 10th and Hamlin 11th. But Chris Gabehart, crew chief of Hamlin’s No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, left plenty content with what he saw.

“Realistically, I thought we made bigger jumps on Friday and bigger jumps on Saturday than I thought was attainable for Sunday,” Gabehart told NASCAR.com. “I thought a clean Sunday (would be) if we could compete inside the top five — about what you saw. If we could do that, that’s as much as I can realistically hope for where we’ve been at this track. So I hate seeing that we made the mistake, but we did make the mistake racing for the lead.”

WATCH: Hamlin spins in battle for lead

Despite celebrating the win, Bell cautioned that what we see come November may be a different picture. Hendrick Motorsports’ Kyle Larson and William Byron were two of the Championship 4 contenders last fall, with Byron qualifying on the pole position. On Sunday, Larson was the team’s highest finishing driver in 14th place while Byron, Chase Elliott and Alex Bowman finished 18th, 19th and 20th, respectively.

“The Hendrick cars clearly missed it this week, right? They’re not going to miss it in November whenever a championship is on the line and they’ve had however many races to get their setup dialed in,” Bell said. “Clearly the JGR cars and the Toyota group hit on the setup the best. We saw that in 2022 whenever Next Gen was first introduced, the Fords smoked everybody this race. It just takes time with these changes to optimize it.

“We’re on the winning side of it this time. But the field is going to be tighter, and I would expect the favorites to be up front whenever we come back in November.”

Phoenix is not the only 1-mile oval on the NASCAR calendar — but no other track truly replicates it, giving the spring race a unique level of importance. World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway — at 1.25 miles — has two asymmetrical corners but not a distinct tri-oval. New Hampshire Motor Speedway is a flat mile-long track with symmetrical corners and straights. The 0.75-mile Richmond Raceway looks closest to Phoenix, but its tri-oval sweeps as opposed to Phoenix’s steeply-banked dogleg.

“There’s no doubt it’s the closest thing you have to compare to,” Gabehart said. “Because people will talk about Gateway and Richmond and Loudon, but there’s no Phoenix. And certainly, those that are behind will want to look towards the Gateways and the Loudons to say, ‘Ah, maybe this will work for Phoenix.’ And those that did run well today know that while they’re similar, they’re not the same. So everyone’s gonna look at this race really close and go to work and figure out how to get better at it. We’ll be no different.

“Certainly we overachieved as the 11 car most of the weekend, and the 20 was excellent in the race just like he was in practice. So Joe Gibbs Racing has a lot of good data leaving here for sure.”

Christopher Bell and Denny Hamlin race at Phoenix.
Meg Oliphant | Getty Images

Gabehart’s surprise in the gains made throughout the weekend came partially due to the fact that the team took a drastically different approach into the weekend.

“I was purposeful about keeping the setup on a certain side of the balance and forcing him (Hamlin) out of his comfort zone and just try to race a race that way,” Gabehart said. “And while it was unfortunate that we had to go to the back, I actually saw it pay a lot of dividends when we did because we could pass a lot of cars and drive back up through there. So I know it’s the right direction.

“It is out of his comfort zone a little bit and we still have some things to refine. You know, took a pretty big step to get to where we were. And that’s the great thing about NASCAR racing, right? So I look at Christopher Bell and what they ran and it’s just a different driver and it’s a different team and they look at it slightly different way. And while we all have the ‘same car and the same parts,’ there’s infinite amounts of combinations to put them all together, and they’re just putting them all together a little bit better at this track.”

Better indeed. Bell has had plenty of speed since the start of the 2023 season, but execution, luck or a combined lack of either often sank their results before the checkered flag. The No. 20 team performed at maximum potential Sunday — and that could be dangerous for the field.

“I just hope that this gives a little bit more insight to the world the capability that the 20 team has,” Bell said.” I feel like the last two years through the Next Gen era, myself and everyone inside of our team have seen glimpses of the potential, but haven’t really been able to live it to fruition yet.

“I mean, I say this a lot, and the rest is up to us to make it happen, but I feel like this is just the beginning. Making the final four and winning one or two races a year, that’s not our final goal. We don’t want to be a one- or two-win team a year. We want to be the championship contender year after year, multiple race wins year after year.”

Win No. 1 is in the books for 2024.

Posted on by Cameron Richardson

AVONDALE, Ariz. —  Sunday’s 312-miler around Phoenix Raceway proved a monumental one for the Toyota camp as Christopher Bell cruised in the closing laps to nab the manufacturer’s first Cup Series victory of 2024, temporarily ceasing Chevrolet’s stranglehold.

Toyota’s roster was the class of the field with five of its drivers leading 50 or more laps underneath the desert heat.

Two of those drivers were Ty Gibbs and Denny Hamlin, who appeared to be the frontrunners for the race win in the opening stage. But pit-stop miscues and a spin while battling for the lead eliminated the chance for either driver to go for the win.

Gibbs was able to rebound and maximize his day with a third-place result after split strategies jumbled the field with just under 100 to go.

RELATED: Phoenix Cup results | At-track photos

“Yeah, it was a good day for our 54 team,” Gibbs said. “Just needed a little bit more, kind of in a hole there a little bit, [lost] a couple points on pit road and got back to it. Good recovery, really good recovery.”

After a second-place finish in Stage 1, Gibbs fell out of the top five after the first pit stops and ran into some handling woes while trying to fight his way back to the front.

“I felt really good early in the run but just in that middle section, we just struggled really bad,” Gibbs said. “But we got it figured out and we had a great strategy call by my crew chief. We just got to get a little bit better, but we kind of know where we need to get better at.”

Gibbs’ crew chief Chris Gayle has sat atop the box for the 21-year-old since he broke through in the Xfinity Series in 2021 on the Daytona road course.

With the synergy the two have developed in Gibbs’ rapid rise to the top level of NASCAR, the No. 54 Joe Gibbs Racing team is elevating itself into a serious playoff contender, able to manage its way to a bronze finish despite minor setbacks throughout the day.

“The balance wasn’t probably where it needed to be,” Gayle told NASCAR.com. “But the first run, we were able to hold on because we had clean air a little longer than we had any other point in the race, so you could start to see towards the last 10 to 15 laps of that first 60-lap run the 45 was a little better and obviously he got us there towards the end.

“Then we lost track position just with a couple pit-stop issues that got us further back in. I think that just magnified our problem, and honestly we were OK for 20 laps. We were just falling off too far after that and so I think there’s some that just happens when you get back in traffic and everything’s a little worse than what it needs to be, and then some we need to get the balance better for being that far back in traffic … But you know, the 20 car was just better. Bell was just able to run through the field and pass us with four tires.”

Phoenix did not serve Gibbs well last season, as the then-Cup Series rookie could only muster a best finish of 21st at the 1-mile Arizona oval. With drivers still learning and adapting to the Next Gen Cup car, Gibbs is on the upward trend and has already amassed two top fives and three top 10s to start 2024, compared to his highest finish of 16th after four races in 2023.

“You have something to build from and he pretty much carried us those last couple restarts,” Gayle said. “He kind of basically got us back from 15th, 16th to the top 10 and then the strategy got the rest but he was able to get us close enough to even use that strategy. I think it speaks well for his perseverance and staying strong minded through the whole thing and just keep focused on ‘race is not over. It’s a long race. Something can change here that helps me get back in the race.’ Him just staying focused on that. Once we did put him out there with two tires, he did a good job of not over-running the tires. He did a better job of making it last, kind of looking at the bigger picture racing-wise.”

As both JGR owner and grandfather of Ty, Joe Gibbs had an all-around positive day watching his organization and grandson shine at Phoenix.

While Ty still seeks his maiden Cup victory, his grandfather understands that there is still work to be done for Ty to reach that milestone.

“I think it’s anybody out there with kids or grandkids knows what I’m talking about, no matter what the sport, whether it’s baseball … hitting, pitching, or basketball, you know, it’s part of your family, and you love them to death,” Joe Gibbs said.”You want them to be successful at what they want to do. This is Ty’s dream. I think from the time he was two he’s been on something with wheels, eight hours a day. It’s a very tough climb. Tough world. He’s got to really work hard. We’ll see if he can get it done.”

Posted on by Reid Spencer

AVONDALE, Ariz. — There were so many variables in Christopher Bell’s victory in Sunday’s Shriners Children’s 500 at Phoenix Raceway that it’s difficult to pinpoint the determinative factor.

First, Toyota introduced a new body style in the NASCAR Cup Series this season. Second, NASCAR debuted a new short-track competition package in Sunday’s race. Third, the Toyotas unloaded for Friday’s 50-minute practice with consistent speed — allowing them to test their long-run prowess.

That combination of factors conjured up a decisive victory for Bell at a track where Toyota drivers had led a total of 15 laps in four Next-Gen-era races combined.

RELATED: Official results | At-track photos

Bell and his Camry compatriots turned that statistic upside down on Sunday, combining to lead 298 of 312 laps. After Denny Hamlin started from the pole position, all four Joe Gibbs Racing drivers led significant numbers of laps — Hamlin with 68, Ty Gibbs with 57, Martin Truex Jr. with 55 and Bell with 50.

Tyler Reddick, a 23XI Toyota driver, contributed 68 laps led, as Bell ended Chevrolet’s three-race winning streak to start the season.

And while some drivers had difficulty in dirty air, Bell’s No. 20 Camry had no trouble passing cars, coming from 20th on a restart on Lap 221 to claim the lead and beat Ford driver and runner-up Chris Buescher to the finish line by a distant 5.465 seconds.

“Man, this one feels really good,” said Bell, who was eliminated from last year’s Championship 4 race at Phoenix when a brake rotor exploded. “Just a credit to (crew chief) Adam (Stevens), man. Adam, my engineers… all the mechanics on this thing.

“You don’t get cars like that very often, as you know. Just super, super proud. Proud to be on this 20 car. This Rheem Camry was amazing today. I feel like we have capability of running races like this a lot. Hopefully, this is the first of many this year.”

The victory was Bell’s first at Phoenix and the seventh of his career.

SHOP: Race winner gear

Divergent pit strategies under the sixth and final caution for Hamlin’s spin in Turn 2 on Lap 215 — as he broke loose to the inside of Reddick’s car while fighting for the lead — scrambled the running order, with Truex and eight other drivers staying on track while the rest of the field came to pit road.

With the final 92 laps running caution-free, Truex had to pit for fuel and tires on Lap 272, surrendering the lead to Bell, who held it the rest of the way.

After crashing out in 37th place last Sunday at Las Vegas, Buescher was happy with his solid second-place run.

“I didn’t quite see the 20 (Bell) there at the end, so I know they were lights-out,” Buescher said. “We have some work to do to get to that point. What thrills me is we were by no means perfect on balance, so we have a lot of room to make this thing better, which is awesome.”

Gibbs, who regained track position with a two-tire pit stop on Lap 218, came home third, a career-best finish. Brad Keselowski ran fourth, two spots behind his Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing teammate; and reigning Cup Series champion Ryan Blaney drove home fifth, ending a streak of three straight runner-up finishes at the 1-mile track in the Sonoran Desert.

Ross Chastain, a Phoenix winner last November, was sixth, and Truex worked his way through the field on fresher tires to finish seventh. Michael McDowell, Chase Briscoe and Reddick completed the top 10. Hamlin finished 11th after his Lap 215 spin.

Blaney overtook 14th-place finisher Kyle Larson for the series lead. He leaves Phoenix 10 points ahead of Larson and Truex, who are tied for second in the standings.

The Cup Series’ next race is the Food City 500, scheduled Sunday, March 17 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Notes: No issues were found in post-race inspection in the Cup Series garage, confirming Bell’s first victory of the season. Two cars – the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet and the No. 6 RFK Racing Ford – will be brought to the NASCAR Research & Development Center for further inspection. … Chastain was the only Chevrolet driver to finish in the top 12… The only non-Toyota driver to lead laps was Todd Gilliland, who ran long in his Front Row Motorsports Ford during a cycle of green-flag pit stops in Stage 2 and held the top spot for 14 circuits. … Reddick won the first stage, and Bell claimed victory in the second stage.

Contributing: Staff reports

Posted on by Staff Report

A Lap 204 crash sidelined three-time Phoenix winner Joey Logano early from Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Phoenix Raceway.

Logano was running outside the top 20 in Sunday’s Shriners Children’s 500 when contact from John Hunter Nemechek’s No. 42 Toyota sent his No. 22 Team Penske Ford into the outside retaining wall. The cars of teammates Corey LaJoie and Carson Hocevar, plus rookies Derek Kraus and Josh Berry, were also collected in the stack-up.

Logano exited after completing 203 of a scheduled 312 laps. He will be credited with 34th place in the 36-car field.

MORE: Unofficial results from Phoenix

“Obviously I just got hit from behind,” Logano said after being evaluated and released from the infield care center. “Just overdrove the corner behind me and wrecked us. It’s a shame. We weren’t running any good at all anyways, but, doesn’t make it better. Just fighting for lucky dogs, which, you get back there and everyone’s racing not real good and I got caught up in it.”

Nemechek radioed that he didn’t mean to get into Logano and felt the No. 22 Ford slowed early upon entry to Turn 1. Logano disagreed.

“You’ve got to lift to make the corners,” he said. “You can’t hold it wide-open around Phoenix, and maybe he should take a look and realize he can’t do that, too. He drove straight in the back of me, and he needs to be man enough to own that.”

Nemechek indeed took accountability for the incident upon exiting his No. 42 Legacy Motor Club Toyota with a 25th-place finish.

“It’s my fault. I apologize to Joey and those guys,” Nemechek told NASCAR.com. “I’m gonna reach out to Joey. Probably gonna reach out to (Logano’s crew chief) Paul Wolfe and also to Roger Penske. I guess I just misjudged it.

“I hit the brake pedal really hard and I didn’t really slow down and got in the back of him. It’s my fault. Made a mistake. Gotta learn from it, own it and hopefully him and I can have a conversation this week.”

Logano entered Sunday’s event ranked 24th in the Cup Series standings. His best finish in the Cup Series this year has been ninth, last weekend at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. He leaves the site of November’s title race with three finishes of 28th or worse after four races.

A two-time Cup champion, Logano was fastest in Friday’s practice but only qualified 23rd. He remained unsure why he and the team were so far off Sunday.

Posted on by Staff Report

Editor’s Note: This story was updated after Friday’s practice and Saturday’s qualifying sessions:

After initially predicting Ryan Blaney would give Ford its first victory of the 2024 season, Racing Insights has switched its pick to Chevrolet’s William Byron after Friday’s practice and Saturday’s qualifying sessions. If true, this will keep Chevrolet’s streak of wins to start the season in tact and give Byron his second victory this year.

Despite his starting position of 16th, Blaney didn’t drop too far from the top spot as he comes in second place in the reworked advanced metrics for Sunday’s Shriners Children’s 500 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). After Blaney comes Kyle Larson, Joey Logano and polesitter Denny Hamlin to round out the top five.

RELATED: Set your Fantasy Live roster | Weekend schedule

Ross Chastain, Martin Truex Jr., Christopher Bell, Chase Elliott and Tyler Reddick complete the top 10 as the Toyota teams tended to work their way up the charts this weekend.

Still, anything can happen in the Wild West, but expect this race to hold a great deal of weight despite it being just the fourth race of the 2024 season and the site of the finale down the road. Teams and drivers who have title hopes will get their first chance to cut their teeth into this year’s new short-track package and have an idea of what to expect if they find themselves contending for a championship come November.

OTHER DRIVERS TO WATCH

KYLE LARSON: Shocker, right? Larson has been scary consistent on the 1-mile oval. In his last 10 races at Phoenix, he has netted nine top-10 finishes. There’s no doubt he will be a major player this weekend, aiming to earn back-to-back wins.

ROSS CHASTAIN: Chastain won last year’s season finale at Phoenix and led more than half the race, upsetting the Championship 4 drivers en route to Victory Lane. Additionally, he has finished in the top three in all but one Phoenix race in the Next-Gen era.

BRAD KESELOWSKI: While Keselowski is off to a cold start and has an average finish of 22.8 in the last four races at Phoenix, consider this to be more of a wild-card pick. The desert has proven to be a place where drivers can end dry spells, and given the unpredictable nature of the Cup Series, you never know when it could be your week.

CHASE BRISCOE: This is a sneaky-good pick to watch. Briscoe won the Phoenix spring race in 2022 and has turned in two additional top-10 performances in his last three Phoenix races. He also ranks fifth in most laps run in the top five at Phoenix Raceway in the Next Gen era.

ERIK JONES: He was one of the Toyota drivers who showed remarkable speed over the weekend and is lining up fourth. His odds to win the race have improved from 100-1 to 28-1.

RACING INSIGHTS’ PROJECTIONS FOR THE SHRINER’S CHILDREN 500

Racing Insights’ advanced statistical formula includes current track, current track type, recent performance, team data and pit-crew data to arrive at a projected winner and full race results.

FinishCar NumberDriver
124William Byron
212Ryan Blaney
35Kyle Larson
422Joey Logano
51Ross Chastain
619Martin Truex Jr.
711Denny Hamlin
820Christopher Bell
99Chase Elliott
1045Tyler Reddick
1123Bubba Wallace
1214Chase Briscoe
138Kyle Busch
146Brad Keselowski
1548Alex Bowman
1641Ryan Preece
174Josh Berry
1810Noah Gragson
1917Chris Buescher
203Austin Dillon
2154Ty Gibbs
2299Daniel Suárez
232Austin Cindric
2443Erik Jones
2534Michael McDowell
2647Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
277Corey LaJoie
2831Daniel Hemric
2977Carson Hocevar
3051Justin Haley
3121Harrison Burton
3238Todd Gilliland
3371Zane Smith
3442John H. Nemechek
3516Derek Kraus
3615Kaz Grala
Posted on by Cameron Richardson

AVONDALE, Ariz. — Four races into a rookie campaign should come with its learning moments and an abundance of room for growth and improvement.

At just 19 years old, it only took a month into the 2024 Xfinity Series season for Jesse Love to score his first top-five finish: a runner-up Saturday afternoon at Phoenix Raceway.

Love nearly ran all 200 miles inside the top 10, making a beeline for his first milestone result. But then two golden opportunities sprouted for him to turn an almost guaranteed top 10 into an even better finish.

RELATED: Phoenix results | At-track photos

With 57 laps to go, a multicar wreck down the backstretch collected heavy hitters such as John Hunter Nemechek, Sam Mayer and Riley Herbst. Love was able to squeak by the melee and found himself immediately inside the top five.

As the race wound down, Love was in a hotly contested tilt for third place with Sheldon Creed, Love’s predecessor in the No. 2 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet.

With Love and Creed going 12 rounds for a podium spot, then-leader Justin Allgaier cut a left-rear tire, flipping the script of the race.

Starting on the second row behind Creed, Love said he had a race win in sight, but by the time the field entered Turn 1 on the overtime restart, Chandler Smith set sail for the eventual race victory.

“I thought I had it 100 percent. I have a lot of confidence on restarts and when that caution came out I was like ‘it’s mine,’ ” Love said. “I just got a little hitched up into [Turns] one and two there. I just didn’t have the real estate I needed to get to the 18 (Creed) or 81 (Smith). And yeah, we were able to get by the 18 there, which was good for our guys and morale, but I wanted that one pretty bad. So I’m trying to be genuine about it and express some of my frustration, right? But at the same time I’m, I’m pumped to be here and I’m pumped to have had a good run. It’s something to build off.”

Love’s first month has been a whirlwind and he’s been thrown into the fire immediately in dealing with multiple scenarios. He put the No. 2 on the pole in his first two career Xfinity starts at Daytona and Atlanta, and led a whopping 157 of 169 laps in the Peach State.

However, those races only amassed a best finish of 12th after Love ran out of fuel in the closing laps at Atlanta.

After pit-road mistakes at Las Vegas last weekend resulted in a pedestrian 17th-place result, Love took a more conservative approach for Phoenix.

“I think that’s that my 90 percent’s enough,” Love said. “I try to just race that 90 percent today and have a good day and maybe if I was rambunctious, I probably could have had a better shot to win, but we needed to have a good run and have a drama-free day.”

At such a young age where growing pains are bound to happen racing at a high level, Love kept his poise all afternoon around the 1-mile Arizona oval and was awarded with the second-place result over Creed on the final lap.

“I think it’s pretty obvious to say I wanted to get that position,” Love said. “I thought my car was better than his. “I just could not pass and he’s hard to pass. Sheldon is really good at being a race-car driver, as everybody knows, right? He’s hard to pass and he puts his car in good spots that are bad for me. So it took me a while and I knew that restart came out that I was at least going to be second, I just. … I wanted to win it.”

MORE: Xfinity Series standings

Love’s rapid maturity can be credited partly to his crew chief Danny Stockman. A longtime veteran atop the box for many drivers who have come through the ranks at RCR, Stockman said he’s been impressed by what Love has been able to do with just four races under his belt.

“He’s incredible. I like the way he races these guys,” Stockman told NASCAR.com. “He could’ve moved Sheldon out of the way a few times, and he didn’t. He chose to race and clean, and those are the guys I want to be surrounded by. Such a hell of a race-car driver, and he’s got a bright future for sure.”

Since rolling off the hauler at Daytona, Stockman knew how fast the No. 2 was going to be with Love behind the wheel but understood the natural adversity that came with developing a teenage driver and getting them in the right mindset.

“Everywhere we’ve been, we’ve had speed capable to run in the top five,” Stockman said. “Last week, we had a really good car. We just had some pit road issues that we fixed this last week, and we came here this weekend and executed and it all worked out. We’re having a lot of fun right now. I got a heck of a team behind me and a lot of guys that know the talent that we have sitting in this race car. So I think we hold our expectations within ourselves really high, and when you can do that you have a team that believes in what we got going on, the sky’s the limit.”

In his long tenure as a crew chief, Stockman has created separate categories for drivers and puts Love in one where he sees him making it to NASCAR’s highest level.

“There’s guys that can do this and there’s guys that are going to do this, and he’s one of the guys that are going to do this,” Stockman said. “He’ll be racing on Sundays someday, and in my career, I’ve been fortunate to work with some really talented kids, but this one’s pretty high up on my stature for sure. We’re having a lot of fun right now. I mean, last week at Vegas, we had a few pit road issues and we’re learning from it, right? We’re not keeping up making the same mistakes and today we had a flawless day. We had great pit stops. We had good execution. We made good adjustments, and the driver drove his ass off, so that’s all you want these days.”

Posted on by Zach Sturniolo

AVONDALE, Ariz. — For as well as Justin Allgaier runs at Phoenix Raceway, some days the 1-mile tri-oval is just cruel to him.

Leading by a three-second margin with five laps to go, Allgaier suffered his latest catastrophic fate Saturday: a suddenly flat left-rear tire entering Turn 1. The trouble sent the No. 7 JR Motorsports Chevrolet into a slide 180 degrees backward and left-side first into the SAFER retaining barrier.

RELATED: Chandler Smith prevails in OT | At-track photos

Allgaier was fine physically and was evaluated and released from the infield care center. But the disappointment shrouding the 37-year-old’s face said more than any words ever could.

“Not a lot of good emotions to be honest with you at the moment,” Allgaier said. “Just proud of the effort. Proud of everybody at JR Motorsports. I mean, everybody at GM and Chevrolet have been working really hard and everybody at JR Motorsports is working really hard. It just seems like this is the story of our year so far.

“We’ve had really fast Camaros every week and just nothing to show for it. I think the heartbreaker from today was being that far out, knowing that we had the car to win at the end there.”

The tire appeared to go soft upon exit to Turn 4, but upon braking for the entry to Turn 1, the tire completely flattened and nearly ripped off the rim, erasing any chance Allgaier had to save his car. Instead of celebrating a win, Allgaier was relegated to a 29th-place finish in the blink of an eye.

“I definitely had to have run something over,” Allgaier said. “I mean, wear-wise, there’s no way we were wearing the left-rear far enough to do that. Going through the dogleg, I felt it wiggle a little bit — and I kind of knew what that already meant. But at that point, there’s quick (five) laps to go and you’ve got to hope that it holds on. And unfortunately, it just blew out. As soon as I soon as I lifted, it blew out. That was the end of it.”

Allgaier has won twice at the Arizona oval but could arguably have at least a few more trophies for his efforts. His last triumph here came in the penultimate race of the 2019 season, the year before the championship finale shifted to Phoenix. In the nine races since then, Allgaier has led at least 20 laps six times. Unfortunately, he has just three top-five finishes in that span to show for it, bested by a pair of third-place finishes.

“I feel like we’ve had really good race cars here. It just seems like it’s stupid stuff like today happens,” Allgaier said. “I wouldn’t have done anything different today. I felt like I was patient. I felt like I raced people really cleanly — and got raced not so clearly in some aspects — and just tried to do everything I could to manage the day well.

“You never know when a tire is going to blow out like that if you run something over. I mean, there’s debris everywhere on the race track, so you never know where you pick it up from or whatever. But it’s just so frustrating to come out of here with a finish like we’re gonna come out of here and know that our car was that good.”

Through four races in 2024, Allgaier sits eighth in points, 64 markers back of series leader and eventual Phoenix winner Chandler Smith. The opening month has been a tale of two seasons for the veteran racer with two top 10s — eighth at Daytona; 10th at Las Vegas — to pair with finishes of 28th at Atlanta and 29th at Phoenix.

The series returns to action on March 23 at Circuit of The Americas (5 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), where Allgaier has two top fives in three starts.

Posted on by Reid Spencer

AVONDALE, Ariz. — Chandler Smith had a message for his Joe Gibbs Racing team after taking the checkered flag in overtime in Saturday’s Call811.com Every Dig. Every Time. 200 NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Phoenix Raceway.

“We’ll take ’em when we can get ’em,” Smith radioed before celebrating his second career victory with a burnout near the start/finish line.

It was good fortune — combined with Justin Allgaier’s disastrous bad luck — that put Smith in Victory Lane after 205 laps at the 1-mile track in the Sonoran Desert.

RELATED: Official results | At-track photos

Allgaier held a lead of nearly three seconds after crossing the stripe on Lap 195 of a scheduled 200. But as the driver of the No. 7 JR Motorsports Chevrolet approached Turn 1, his left-rear tire went flat.

Allgaier’s car turned sideways and smashed into the outside wall, ending the race for the veteran driver from Illinois.

On the subsequent overtime restart, Smith pulled away from teammate Sheldon Creed and reached the finish line 0.365 seconds ahead of Sunoco rookie Jesse Love, who edged Creed for the runner-up spot by 0.019 seconds.

“Going through the dogleg (on the front stretch), I felt (the tire) come apart, like I ran something over, and at that point you’re just a passenger,” Allgaier said. “I just hate it that we tore up a race car. We didn’t go to Victory Lane. I hate it for all the guys and gals at JR Motorsports.”

Allgaier’s ill fortune was determinative, but it wasn’t that Smith didn’t deserve the victory. He won the first 45-lap stage wire-to-wire and led a race-high 88 laps to Allgaier’s 52.

“We just lacked a little bit on the 7 (Allgaier),” Smith said. “I hate that happened to him — he had that in the bag. I’m so proud of everybody back at Joe Gibbs Racing. It’s good finally to get this first win off our back for these guys.

“So let’s go keep racking ’em up.”

Stage 2 winner Cole Custer led 61 laps, but his car suffered from a loose handling condition during the final run.

With Custer fading badly, Smith was in the lead, more than 2.5 seconds ahead of Allgaier, when Hailie Deegan brushed the Turn 2 wall on Lap 137. To that point, Smith and Custer had combined to lead all the laps.

The relatively innocent-looking fourth caution, however, set the stage for the chaos that followed. Smith lost three spots on pit road as John Hunter Nemechek took the lead.

On the subsequent restart on Lap 144, Smith and Nemechek were racing in close quarters when contact from the right-front of Smith’s Toyota turned Nemechek’s Supra in front of the field.

All told, 11 cars sustained damage, with Nemechek, hard-luck Sam Mayer (third DNF in four races), Hailie Deegan, Parker Retzlaff and Jeb Burton unable to continue.

MORE: Lap 144 pileup thins field | Weekend schedule: Phoenix

Smith’s No. 81 Toyota was none the worse for wear and restarted next to Allgaier, the race leader, on Lap 152. On the longest green-flag run of the day, Allgaier pulled away and was cruising toward a comfortable victory when disaster struck, opening the door for Smith to secure his first victory since last April’s win at Richmond for owner Matt Kaulig.

Austin Hill came home fourth, with Custer, the defending series champion, claiming the fifth spot. Sunoco rookie Shane van Gisbergen, Brandon Jones, Parker Kligerman, Sammy Smith and Anthony Alfredo completed the top 10.

The Xfinity Series will take a week off and return to action March 23 at the Circuit of The Americas (5 p.m. ET, FS1, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

Notes: Post-race inspection in the Xfinity Series garage was complete without major issue, confirming Smith as the race winner. The No. 2 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet of Jesse Love and the No. 48 Big Machine Racing Chevy of Parker Kligerman were each found with one unsecured lug nut, which will result in a fine for each team’s respective crew chiefs in the midweek penalty report. … Chandler Smith jumped into the Xfinity Series points lead, leapfrogging Austin Hill by one spot in the standings. … Richard Childress Racing and Joe Gibbs Racing have two victories apiece in the early stages of the season.

Contributing: Staff reports

Posted on by Reid Spencer

AVONDALE, Ariz. — In some cases, statistics can be deceptive — but not when it comes to the quality of racing on display in the first three NASCAR Cup Series races of the season.

The average margin of victory so far is 0.222 seconds, fourth closest in that category since the advent of electronic timing and scoring in 1993 and just behind the series record of 0.136 seconds through three races in 2022.

RELATED: Top Phoenix story lines | Phoenix starting lineup

Foremost among the close races was the Cup Series event at Atlanta Motor Speedway, where winner Daniel Suárez and runner-up Ryan Blaney were separated by 0.003 seconds at the finish line.

It was the third-closest finish in series history, and with third-place Kyle Busch just 0.007 seconds behind the winner, it also stands as the closest finish among three cars in the history of auto racing.

Other important milestones include a record 407 green-flag passes for the lead through three races (based on loop data that debuted in 2005), obliterating the previous mark of 302 set in 2022.

Overall, the young season has produced 23,027 green-flag passes, surpassing the mark of 21,245 set last year. A total of 28 different drivers have led races in 2024, the second largest number in the Modern Era (1972-2024). Only 2011 had more (32).

The average number of lead changes per race is 37.7, second in the Modern Era to 2011, which averaged 41.0 through three events.

The NASCAR Cup Series has also produced three different point standings leaders in the first three races of the season for the first time since 2017.

The bottom line is that the first three races of 2024 have produced compelling racing, as increased fan interest and television ratings will attest, too.

Posted on by Zach Sturniolo

Shriners Children’s 500

(⏰ Sunday, 3:30 p.m. ET | FOX | MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio)

Weekend schedule | TV schedule | Weather tracker | NASCAR 101

Location: Avondale, Arizona
Track length: 1 mile
Cup Series race purse: $7,806,252
Race distance: 312 laps | 312 miles
Stages: 60 | 185 | 312
—
Starting lineup: Hamlin charges to 41st career pole
Pit stall assignments: Where drivers will pit Sunday
Defending winner: William Byron, March 2023

Key things to watch

Friday and Saturday sessions

Toyota shined in Friday’s extended 50-minute practice session, with six Toyota Camry XSEs claiming top-10 spots in single-lap speed and posting five of the seven best 10-lap averages. Fastest overall in the session was Joey Logano, whose No. 22 Team Penske Ford Dark Horse Mustang has qualified on the front row in each of the three NASCAR Cup Series races so far this season. | Read practice recap 

Toyota’s speed carried into Saturday’s qualifying session as Denny Hamlin rocketed to his 41st career pole and the manufacturer’s 150th at the Cup level. The No. 11 car was P2 in Friday’s practice and will be joined by sophomore teammate Ty Gibbs on the front row. Toyotas make up four of this week’s top six starters. | Read qualifying recap

Big story line

Will Sunday provide a preview of the 2024 championship fight?

Exactly eight months from Sunday, the NASCAR Cup Series will return to the Arizona desert with a championship on the line. But will anything teams learn from a race in March apply when they return for the season finale on Nov. 10?

Joey Logano, the 2022 Cup title and finale race winner, argues there is a “fair amount” that teams can take from Sunday that could inform what we see come November.

“The cars don’t change that much,” Logano said Saturday. “Obviously, with the new rules package, we’ll take more from it. And you have practice at both of these races, so you take some of that with you throughout the year, but I don’t think it’d be that different when we come back.”

In the spring race of 2023, all of the eventual Championship 4 finished sixth or better: William Byron won ahead of Ryan Blaney with Kyle Larson fourth and Christopher Bell sixth. That wasn’t lost on Tyler Reddick, who finished third — the only top-four finisher that day who didn’t return to Avondale in the title hunt.

“I was in the mix,” Reddick said. “I was excited about that if we could make it back here in that fight. We obviously didn’t but yeah. … If you looked at the closing laps of this race, you know, three of the top four were the championship contenders.”

Even with 245 days between Phoenix races — the most between a track’s two events on the schedule — 2012 champion Brad Keselowski believes data learned from the spring is perhaps more valuable now than ever.

“With this car, a lot more translates than what translated with the old car,” Keselowski said. “With the old car, I felt like you were always in a development cycle … and things were always changing. … With this car, just by the nature of how its governed and amalgamated and so forth, you don’t have that, at least especially not in the third season of this car. So I think it’s probably a better indicator than it used to be and what to expect.”

Denny Hamlin celebrates his pole win at Phoenix.
Getty Images

History tells us…

Ryan Blaney will be one to watch this weekend. The defending Cup champion has been runner-up in each of the last three Phoenix races but has yet to visit Victory Lane — though he enjoyed the spoils of the championship celebration on Phoenix’s frontstretch some four months ago.

The No. 12 Ford will take the green flag from 16th position after Saturday’s qualifying session but that shouldn’t sound too many alarm bells. Blaney fired off from 15th back in November before charging to the front and putting himself in position to bring home the title. Maybe he can leave with another trophy on Sunday.

He may not be the betting favorite to win, but watch out for…

Chase Briscoe. At 20-1 odds, the driver of the No. 14 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford makes for a sneaky pick this weekend. Briscoe earned his first career Cup win in the 2022 spring race at Phoenix and showed speed again Saturday, placing his car eighth on the starting grid. The Indiana native has finished inside the top 10 in three of his four Phoenix starts as well as in each of his four Xfinity Series starts. Briscoe hasn’t visited Victory Lane since that win in March 2022 and could use another trip. | Phoenix odds

Speed reads

Our biggest pieces of the week — get covered for race day from all angles. 

• Turning Point: Trends from Vegas, heading to Phoenix | Read article
• Why ‘representation is so important’: Caruth’s win, interview highlight  | Read article
• Elliott eyes return to Victory Lane: 2020 champ “willing to take however many steps it takes” | Read article
• New short-track package: Drivers react after Friday practice | Read article
• RFK Racing appeals penalty: No. 17 team penalized after lost Vegas wheel | Read article
• NASCAR Classics: Picks to click from our video library for Phoenix viewing | Read article
• 36 for 36: NASCAR survivor pool selections for Phoenix | Read article
• Memory lane: Through the years with Phoenix Raceway’s biggest moments | See the photos
• Inside the numbers: Racing Insights projects the final race results | Read article
• At-track photos: Scenes, sights from the desert | Photo gallery
• Fantasy Fastlane: Lineup advice for Phoenix | See fantasy tips
• Paint Scheme Preview: Painting the Phoenix desert | Pick a favorite
• Power Rankings: Chastain looks like big-time force | Latest driver rankings

Fast facts ⏩

Race-relevant statistics, brought to you by the experts at Racing Insights.

• Hendrick Motorsports is three laps led away from 80,000.
• There were 10 speeding penalties at Phoenix last March, the most in a race last season.
• 23XI Racing is the only team to have a car finish in the top five in each of the first three races this year.