{"id":250220,"date":"2025-10-30T14:16:33","date_gmt":"2025-10-30T14:16:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/250220\/"},"modified":"2025-10-30T14:16:33","modified_gmt":"2025-10-30T14:16:33","slug":"the-case-for-william-byron-to-earn-his-first-nascar-cup-series-championship-at-phoenix-on-sunday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/250220\/","title":{"rendered":"The case for William Byron to earn his first NASCAR Cup Series championship at Phoenix on Sunday"},"content":{"rendered":"

CONCORD, N.C. –\u00a0Sometimes, it just takes a little spark to start a championship run<\/a>. For William Byron, that spark very well could have been ignited at Martinsville Speedway.\u00a0<\/p>\n

RELATED: Paint schemes for Phoenix<\/a><\/p>\n

After tough outings at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and Talladega Superspeedway, the No. 24 team<\/a> entered last weekend in a virtual must-win situation. They responded by claiming the pole, leading 304 laps and sealing the day with a trip to victory lane.<\/a><\/p>\n

But the job’s not finished.\u00a0<\/p>\n

RELATED: Check out the images from victory lane at Martinsville<\/a><\/p>\n

Sunday will mark\u00a0Byron’s third consecutive Championship 4<\/a> appearance. But in a year full of twists and turns, a walk-off victory might just be what the team needs to break through and leave Arizona with a championship trophy.<\/p>\n

Take a look at that stats that point to Byron being crowned the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series champion:<\/p>\n

William Byron
\nPhoenix starts: 15Phoenix wins: 1Phoenix poles: 2Phoenix top fives:\u00a03Phoenix top 10s: 9\u00a0Career laps led at Phoenix: 288Average finish at Phoenix: 10.8<\/p>\n

The case:\u00a0Since the Next Gen car was introduced in 2022, Byron’s average finish at Phoenix\u00a0is eighth, the best of the Championship 4 drivers.\u00a0Last season, the No. 24 entry qualified on pole and paced the field for 83 laps before finishing sixth.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Byron also enters this weekend having scored stage points in the last 19 segments at Phoenix. The last time he was outside of the top 10 to end a stage was the opening stage of the 2020 championship race. He’s also accounted for four stage victories in that timespan.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

But the final factor, one not controlled by statistics, is the exclusion of Team Penske in the final round. By virtue of a pass in the final stage at Martinsville, Byron knocked Ryan Blaney out of the Championship 4. For the first time in three years, a different team will raise the championship trophy.<\/p>\n

RELATED: What makes Phoenix so tough?<\/a><\/p>\n

While anything can happen on\u00a0Sunday night, Byron and the No. 24 team are poised to make a run for the title on Sunday evening.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Catch the race at 3 p.m. ET on NBC.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CONCORD, N.C. –\u00a0Sometimes, it just takes a little spark to start a championship run. For William Byron, that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":250221,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[446],"tags":[49,48,634,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-250220","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nascar","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-nascar","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250220","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250220"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250220\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250221"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250220"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250220"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250220"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}