William Byron entered rarefied air in Sunday’s Goodyear 400 at Darlington Raceway. The No. 24 Jeff Gordon throwback scheme from a decade ago led the opening 243 laps from pole position, the most consecutive laps to start a NASCAR Cup Series race since Jeff Burton led all 300 laps at New Hampshire Motor Speedway in 2000.
Byron was attempting to become the fourth driver in NASCAR’s modern era – 1972 to present day – to lead every lap of a Cup race. In addition to Burton, the other two record days belong to Cale Yarborough in the 1970s; first at Bristol Motor Speedway in 1973 and again in 1978 at the Nashville Fairgrounds.
“Just try not to screw it up,” Byron said of his mindset after leading a plethora of laps on Sunday. “Just try to explain what my balance was in clean air, and it just changed a little bit.
“I felt like we were in position to have a perfect race there. That would have been pretty damn impressive.”
After locking up two playoff points by sweeping the opening two stages, Byron’s crew chief Rudy Fugle was focused on putting the most efficient race strategy together to secure the No. 24 team’s second victory of the season. He also knew how close his group was to history.
With other front-running drivers having pitted in the previous handful of laps, Fugle aborted the mission of the perfect race, calling Byron to pit road on Lap 244. Denny Hamlin became the second leader of the race.
Tyler Reddick was the first of the leaders to pit from fourth position on Lap 240. With Darlington being a surface that wears tires at a high rate, Fugle knew the No. 24 car would cycle out behind Reddick. It was paramount, though, that Byron re-entered the track ahead of Christopher Bell who pitted one lap prior. The No. 20 team executed perfectly, giving Bell a buffer on Byron.
“We had us coming out in front of [Bell],” Fugle told a group of reporters. “Our cycle didn’t work out the way it was supposed to; [Bell’s] cycle worked out good and we ended up on the back bumper instead of the front bumper.
“We have that stuff calculated out and we knew exactly what our gap was and what we were going to do. We just ended up on the wrong side of his bumper and that burnt our tires off, held us up some and got our car tight and it never went. I think it would have been a different race if that happened, but it didn’t work.”
Byron was able to pass Joey Logano easily on fresher tires. He couldn’t, however, pass Bell, allowing Ryan Blaney to rocket by both drivers on even fresher tires with 16 laps remaining in regulation.
“We just needed control of the race there under green and we lost that with the pit sequence,” Byron added. “[Reddick] went really short. We lost a few spots under the green flag sequence, and that was the difference. We had a decent run that time. [Bell] did a good job of air blocking and just keeping us behind him. It took me a long time to get by him.”
It wasn’t over, though. Bubba Wallace got into Kyle Larson with four laps remaining, fresh off Blaney taking the lead from Reddick. Byron exited the pits from third position, choosing the outside of the second row for the overtime restart.
As Byron and Reddick raced fiercely for the runner-up spot, Hamlin scooted away, earning his fifth career Darlington victory. The No. 24 car finished runner-up, with Byron leading a career-high 243 laps.
“It sucks, but nobody is at fault,” Byron said of not getting a second Darlington triumph. “Those guys could be aggressive on the other side of us and it was turning into a big strategy play. We just couldn’t keep control.”
By tallying 56 points, Byron extended his regular season championship lead to 49 points over Hamlin.