MARTINSVILLE, Va. \u2014 The back-to-back heartbreaks William Byron had suffered in NASCAR\u2019s semifinal playoff round would have doomed some drivers and teams.<\/p>\n
But instead of letting it defeat him, perhaps as it would have in his younger days, the 27-year-old Byron embraced the setbacks.<\/p>\n
He walked into the Martinsville Speedway media center on Saturday and declared he wasn\u2019t ruing the lost points from incidents at Las Vegas and Talladega because he liked the thought of being in a clear must-win situation.<\/p>\n
Byron preferred to be on offense, he said, instead of trying to race for points \u2014 which he had done the last two years at Martinsville and nearly coughed up a championship berth both times.<\/p>\n
He also took a stoic\u2019s approach to the whole thing: Byron needed to win at Martinsville to advance to the championship race, and if he wasn\u2019t good enough to do so, then Phoenix next week wouldn\u2019t matter anyway.<\/p>\n
But as it turned out, he was more than good enough to do so.<\/p>\n
Byron ran the race of his life on Sunday, putting together the kind of perfect weekend no playoff driver had done before<\/a>: He won the pole, swept both stages and won the race<\/a>. He led a career-high 304 laps in the process and thrust himself into position to win a first career championship one week from now.<\/p>\n \u201cFrom start to finish, it\u2019s the best I\u2019ve ever felt in the race car. And that\u2019s a damn good feeling,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n WILLIAM BYRON WINS AT MARTINSVILLE! \ud83c\udfc1 pic.twitter.com\/bCutRmWGXA<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 NASCAR (@NASCAR) October 26, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n The NASCAR regular-season champion began the playoffs with a lack of performance and appeared vulnerable, making his third straight Championship 4 appearance less likely. In the playoff opener at Darlington, for example, Byron finished 21st with a slow car; no one was talking championship then.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re embarrassed,\u201d crew chief Rudy Fugle said on the team radio after that race. \u201cWe didn\u2019t do s\u2014 today. We\u2019ve got to improve and get better and race our a\u2014 off every week or it\u2019s going to be a long offseason.\u201d<\/p>\n But the No. 24 team did improve, advanced to the semifinal round and appeared to have a great chance \u2014 until the lapped car of Ty Dillon inexplicably slowed without warning at Las Vegas and Byron smashed into his car, destroying both.<\/p>\n As if that wasn\u2019t bad enough, Byron was in position to get a top five at Talladega on the last lap until Carson Hocevar spun him just before the finish line and cost Byron 20 points \u2014 enough to make Martinsville a must-win.<\/p>\n And how did Byron respond? By showing up with a winner\u2019s mentality at Martinsville, determined to execute on what he could control and hope that was good enough.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s been a lot of heartbreak this year,\u201d he said. \u201cYou just channel those things, just learn from them. And if you can learn from them, they become positives. They become things you lean on in the moment.<\/p>\n \u201cFor some people, they become like scars and things you can\u2019t get past. But I found a way to flip that script, either this week or sometime during these playoffs, and it went the other way.\u201d<\/p>\n Hendrick steps up<\/p>\n Hendrick Motorsports ended up taking up half of the Championship 4 spots and Team Penske got zero \u2014 this despite Penske having a notable edge on shorter, flatter tracks entering the playoffs.<\/p>\n In fact, the playoff schedule lined up better than ever for Penske\u2019s strengths with the addition of New Hampshire and Gateway, plus Talladega in Round 3 as an opportunity for the superspeedway aces Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney.<\/p>\n Hendrick, meanwhile, had shown a weakness on the types of tracks that mattered. It was Blaney who won the last two fall Martinsville races, and Penske had won three straight championships at Phoenix despite Hendrick\u2019s best efforts.<\/p>\n But on media day before the playoffs began, when I tried explaining to Byron why I had no Hendrick drivers in my Championship 4 picks, he brought up an interesting point: The increase of those tracks actually could provide extra test sessions for Hendrick to work on their setups and improve.<\/p>\n So after Sunday, I had to know: Did he really believe that at the time, or was that just long-shot optimism that coincidentally came true?<\/p>\n \u201cThose things are real,\u201d Byron said. \u201cThe notes are real. When I got out of the car after we finished third (at New Hampshire), I was like, \u2018Man, that was awesome.\u2019<\/p>\n \u201cI had what I needed in the car. (Blaney) was just a little bit better, but I knew that was a good step. I was hoping that applied to this weekend.\u201d<\/p>\n These #NASCARPlayoffs<\/a> have tested @WilliamByron<\/a>.<\/p>\n Today, he rose to the occasion. \ud83d\udc4f pic.twitter.com\/Qgbc0F3Ctj<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 NASCAR (@NASCAR) October 26, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n And it did. In the end, Byron went heads-up with a Penske car to battle for the win and prevailed, showing Hendrick erased whatever deficit it may have had. Now the question will be whether that shows itself at Phoenix as well.<\/p>\n \u201cLast year we stepped it up, and it still wasn\u2019t enough,\u201d Hendrick vice chairman Jeff Gordon said of getting better on the shorter tracks. \u201cThis year, it became a much bigger priority.\u201d<\/p>\n Larson was speaking about his own team specifically and not Hendrick as a whole, but he summed up the turnaround when he said: \u201cI didn\u2019t think that we could kind of flip that switch in the playoffs, but it just proves 10 weeks is a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n A win for the playoffs<\/p>\n Martinsville, for once, played out straightforwardly and without drama or controversy. There was no \u201cHail Melon\u201d this year, no race manipulation, no drivers vowing revenge for perceived slights.<\/p>\n The drivers who didn\u2019t advance \u2014 Blaney, Logano, Christopher Bell and Chase Elliott \u2014 said they simply got beat by better cars. They didn\u2019t make mistakes or choke their opportunities away; their teams just weren\u2019t good enough.<\/p>\n That helped produce one of the strongest Championship 4 fields yet \u2014 a highly credible group which includes the season wins leader (Denny Hamlin), laps led leader\/regular-season champion (Byron), top-fives leader\/poles leader (Chase Briscoe) and another driver who ranks second in three major categories (Larson).<\/p>\n Of course, this happened in a year when NASCAR is almost certainly moving away from this format. Go figure.<\/p>\n \u201cUltimately, the format has a lot of positives around it, and this year, four of the right guys ended up making it,\u201d said Bell, who has been an advocate of scrapping the playoffs and returning to a 36-race system. \u201cWhoever the champion is out of those four is going to be a deserving champion. This year, the format worked out, and I\u2019m content with the results.\u201d<\/p>\n That doesn\u2019t mean it deserves to stick around. From this view, the one-race playoff has done more harm than good (though others may debate that). But in this case, a year in which six drivers had a legitimate case for being among the final four, there will be no argument over whether someone was a worthy champion or not \u2014 at least in the Cup Series.<\/p>\n Xfinity Xcellence<\/p>\n With the exception of Sam Mayer (what are you doing, Sam?), the Xfinity Series had a far more respectable race at Martinsville than the ugly show in the spring.<\/p>\n No one, including the drivers, seemed to have much faith Saturday night would be significantly cleaner than the one we saw earlier this year \u2014 especially considering the stakes.<\/p>\n And when three drivers in desperate, must-win situations lined up in the first two rows for the overtime restart, there was an understandably ill feeling for many in the stands.<\/p>\n Nothing tastes as sweet as your first career win!<\/p>\n This Victory Burnout for @Taylor_Gray<\/a> is presented by @krispykreme<\/a>. pic.twitter.com\/5fHnRxhjKN<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 NASCAR Xfinity (@NASCAR_Xfinity) October 26, 2025<\/a><\/p>\n Instead, Taylor Gray got away cleanly and never gave anyone a chance for any shenanigans \u2014 and maybe there would not have been any, based on how spring race bulldozer Sammy Smith responded to a question from Fox Sports\u2019 Bob Pockrass about the last lap.<\/p>\n \u201cI wasn\u2019t close enough to move him the right way, and if I move him like I did in the spring, I\u2019m going to get blackballed and get thrown out of the playoffs anyway \u2014 and probably parked,\u201d Smith said.<\/p>\n That shows NASCAR\u2019s deterrent message is working. Now we\u2019ll see how officials respond to Mayer, who destroyed another car out of anger after the checkered flag \u2014 historically a big no-no in NASCAR\u2019s eyes.<\/p>\n Mayer caused approximately $30,000 of damage to Jeb Burton\u2019s Jordan Anderson Racing car; would a points penalty for the season finale or a monetary fine really send any sort of a message? It will be interesting to see how NASCAR handles it, and the result could set another precedent for the next situation.<\/p>\n Championship 4cast<\/p>\n Each week during the playoffs, we took a look at the projected Championship 4 drivers. With the field now set, here\u2019s a look at how my pre-playoffs picks performed:<\/p>\n 1. Joey Logano: Eliminated at Martinsville. Logano needed to win and ran as high as second during the race, but felt he lost control of a restart and then was thwarted by the timing of Erik Jones\u2019 caution during green-flag pit stops.<\/p>\n \u201cBummed,\u201d Logano said. \u201cI don\u2019t know if there\u2019s another word for it. I\u2019m just bummed one of us (Penske cars) didn\u2019t make it. We just couldn\u2019t get the job done today, or really the last three races. The four there deserve to be there. That\u2019s how I always look at it, and this year we didn\u2019t deserve to be there.\u201d<\/p>\n 2. Ryan Blaney: Eliminated at Martinsville.\u00a0Blaney led a season-high 177 laps and had control of the race after driving through the field from 34th place, but ultimately didn\u2019t have enough to hold off Byron for the win and claim a walk-off Martinsville victory for the third straight season.<\/p>\n \u201cGoing into this weekend, I just wanted a shot to win the race, and we had that tonight, and it just didn\u2019t really play out,\u201d he said. \u201cThe 24 was just a little better than us, and they got the job done, so props to them.\u201d<\/p>\n 3. Denny Hamlin: Won at Las Vegas to advance to the Championship 4. Hamlin\u2019s other finishes in the round were 24th at Talladega and 35th at Martinsville (with a blown engine), so it\u2019s a good thing he won Vegas. Now he will have a very good chance to finally claim his first career championship at Phoenix.<\/p>\n \u201cI think I\u2019m going to have to win (the race) next week if I\u2019m going to win the championship, and we\u2019re going to come prepared for that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n 4. Chase Briscoe: Won at Talladega to advance to the Championship 4. Briscoe could very well become a champion in his first year at Joe Gibbs Racing, completing NASCAR\u2019s modern rags-to-riches story. And it\u2019s a good thing he won at Talladega, because he blew an engine and finished last at Martinsville.<\/p>\n \u201cThat win last weekend feels so much better now,\u201d he posted on X afterward.<\/p>\n Championship predictions<\/p>\n NASCAR Truck Series: It had better be Corey Heim, he of the most dominant season in Truck Series history. Should something happen to Heim in the final race or he fails to finish it off, the amount of power used by fans to write angry posts on NASCAR X will make AI\u2019s power usage look tame.<\/p>\n NASCAR Xfinity Series: Justin Allgaier goes back-to-back, thwarting JR Motorsports teammate Connor Zilisch in this all-Chevrolet final. But Aric Almirola wins the owner\u2019s championship for Joe Gibbs Racing, somewhat dampening the celebration.<\/p>\n NASCAR Cup Series:\u00a0I can\u2019t believe I\u2019m typing this, but Denny Hamlin finally outruns his bad luck and wins his first championship at age 44 \u2014 in a year when he\u2019s suing NASCAR<\/a>, of course.<\/p>\n