NASCAR title chase down to veteran drivers and owners
This year’s championship-eligible team owners — Rick Hendrick, Joe Gibbs and Roger Penske — have 22 NASCAR Cup Series championships among their teams. One of their drivers has hoisted the season’s most prized trophy for the last five consecutive years and 14 of the last 18 seasons.
As representatives from each organization spoke to the racing media on Tuesday afternoon, there was an unmistakable vibe that this is not their first time in the game. However, the excitement, anticipation and hope anticipating Sunday’s Championship Race at
Phoenix Raceway was equally as obvious.
They are energized about the weekend and each team — from Hendrick Motorsports to Joe Gibbs Racing to Team Penske — has high expectations and championship plans. Once again.
They are so used to competing against one another for the sport’s marquee trophy, they can practically interview each other. And on Tuesday, they did.
“We always text each other and congratulate each other after we win,” NASCAR Hall of Fame owner Rick Hendrick reminded fellow Hall of Famer Gibbs on the national teleconference featuring the three championshipeligible
For the late results of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series championship,
team principles.
“If I happen to win,” Hendrick continued, “are you going to text me and congratulate me Sunday?”
“I will be forced to, I feel like I need to do that, so yes I will,” a smiling Gibbs replied. “The problem is I’ve been having to text a whole lot more than you have.
Fans and competitors can expect a good one, all right. This weekend’s championship matchup is absolutely too tough to call with four drivers — all 31 years old or younger — competing for the 2023 title. And compelling cases can be made for any of the four.
Mathematically, Hendrick boasts the best chances for a trophy hoist fielding two of the Championship 4 Round drivers — 31-year-old Kyle Larson, the 2021 series champion, and 25-year-old William Byron, this year’s winningest driver.
For the second straight season, Gibbs will look to 28-year-old driver Christopher Bell to bring the NASCAR Cup Series trophy back to his team. And it’s up to 29-year-old Ryan Blaney — who earned a walk-off win of sorts last weekend at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway — to try and secure a second consecutive championship title for Team Penske, who won last year with Blaney’s teammate Joey Logano.
Hendrick, the 14-time NASCAR Cup Series championship owner, certainly likes his chances this weekend. Larson, driver of the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, won at Phoenix two years ago to claim the 2021 championship and Byron won at the one-mile track the last time the sport competed there, just this spring.
Larson is a four-time race winner this season and Byron’s six trophies are double what he’s earned any other single season.
Although the series Regular Season Champion —
Joe Gibbs Racing driver Martin Truex Jr. — was eliminated last week in an epic Round of 8 elimination race at the Martinsville, Va. short track, the remaining competitors all bring winning records and strong credentials.
Not only are all four drivers considered the sport’s best of the up-andcoming, there’s a good case to be made they are no longer “coming.” They are here.
The Penske organization is renowned in all forms of auto sport — from NASCAR to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar championship to IndyCars — but as with Hendrick’s Byron, this is Blaney’s first appearance in the Championship 4.