There was a moment during Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series championship-deciding race in Phoenix when Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron thought he might have a shot at holding his Penske rivals off, but it was fleeting.
Byron stayed out longer than Penske’s Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney before making his final stop on lap 247, which potentially set him up with tires roughly 15 laps fresher than his rivals for his final stint. That hope lasted all of one lap after Zane Smith crashed and triggered a caution, during which the two Penskes and fellow championship contender Tyler Reddick of 23XI all took the opportunity to make stops of their own under yellow.
They rejoined well behind Byron, who said he briefly thought he had enough of a gap to keep them at bay before the appearance of the Penske cars in his mirrors suggested otherwise.
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“I did,” he said when asked whether he thought he had them covered. “But just as good as they got through (Turns) 1 and 2, it was just like, man, now they’re right on me. I think going into the restart, I thought I had enough of a buffer and I didn’t really feel like one lap on tires was that big a deal. I don’t think it was.
“I just think that they were fast on the short run all weekend, and that was our struggle. We were decent throughout the run, but couldn’t really take off with a ton of speed. It wasn’t a huge surprise, but they were on me a little bit quicker than I thought they would be.”
Throughout the race Byron was fast enough to keep the Penskes in range, but not fast enough to engage them over a full run.
“I would just compliment Penske as a whole,” he said. “They had the two best cars today, and it was really a battle between them throughout the day. I was just hoping that they would make some mistakes and get up in there.”