NASCAR Cup drivers see 2025 Playoffs as a wide-open affair
CHARLOTTE, N.C.— Unlike in previous years, none of the frontrunners competing in this season’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs could—or were willing to—name an absolute favorite to hoist the champion’s trophy Nov. 2 at Phoenix.
In fact, Joe Gibbs Racing’s Christopher Bell, a three-race winner, said he’s feeling as calm as he’s ever felt entering the 10-race Playoff stretch that begins Sunday in the Cook Out Southern 500 at historic Darlington (S.C.) Raceway (6 p.m. ET on USA, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
That was a pervasive vibe throughout Wednesday’s Playoff Media Day among the 16 drivers who will race for the 2025 title.
Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin was first to meet with reporters at the Charlotte Convention Center. His 19-year string of Playoff appearances is the longest in the series. Hamlin’s four victories this season are also tied for most in the series, but the 44-year-old insisted his expectations are no different this year as he tries once again to secure a first championship.
“It’s too hard to predict because it’s unpredictable,” said Hamlin, who goes into the championship run ranked third in the points standings, three points behind the co-leaders, Hendrick Motorsports teammates Kyle Larson and William Byron.
“Our average finish drops every year in the Playoffs,” he continued. “We run better in the final 10 (races) than we do the rest of the season. It’s just a matter of all the other variables. Does someone below the cutline win and get in and knock us out, or does someone ride the wall and knock us out?
“I’m so tainted that I’m just very nonchalant and like, ‘Let’s just win races and see where this thing ends up.’”
Although he has qualified for the Playoffs for seven straight years, 2025 Regular Season Champion William Byron is also looking to land his first NASCAR Cup Series title after finishing third the previous two seasons.
The driver of the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet won his second consecutive Daytona 500 in February, added a win at Iowa earlier this month and ultimately wrapped up the regular-season title with one race still remaining.
“I think in our position, we’ve had that conversation of just trying to stack some more points and stack some more race wins,” said Byron, 27. “We’ve been in this position before and feel like we kind of understand the cadence of this first round.
“It’d be really nice just to go out there and win one of these just to take the pressure off and have some forward momentum as well. They are good tracks for us.”
Defending champ Joey Logano exudes confidence as Playoffs begin
Three-time and reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion Joey Logano seemed almost ready to dare someone to doubt his chances at a historically significant fourth NASCAR Cup Series title.
The Team Penske driver won at Texas back in April but has only three top-10 finishes in the last 12 races. His only top-five in that span was a fourth-place effort at Richmond Raceway two weeks ago. But Playoff time has been Logano time.
The 35-year-old fully acknowledges—and his title record would indicate—his pace picks up when it matters most. With this Playoff format, Logano was asked if the sport would ever see another driver win back-to-back titles, given that the feat hasn’t been done since seven-time champion and NASCAR Hall of Famer Jimmie Johnson’s five-consecutive championships from 2006 through 2010.
“Yeah, this year,” he said grinning but completely serious.
“You can’t just BS yourself,” he said of the confidence he’s acquired through the title runs. “You know the truth. The whole fake-it-till-you-make-it doesn’t work with yourself. … Earlier in my career, I had no reason to really have confidence; I’d just be lying to myself and everyone else. But I do feel like our team is really, really strong this time of year, which makes me feel good about it, no matter where we start the Playoffs.
“I feel like we can rise to the occasion better than any other team out there. That’s why most of our wins come at this time of year. It doesn’t mean that just because you did it last year you can do it again. You have to find more. You have to find that next piece.”
NASCAR Playoffs feature a “different” Bubba Wallace this year
The Bubba Wallace who takes the green flag in the Sunday’s Cook Out Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway won’t be the same Bubba Wallace who eked out a Playoff berth two years ago.
How do we know? Wallace says so.
“I don’t feel like 2023 Playoff Bubba, where like, ‘Oh man, it’s cool to be talking to you guys for Playoff Media Day,’” Wallace said on Wednesday at the Charlotte Convention Center. “I feel like I belong here and want to continue this trend and have the utmost confidence in our team and our ability and potential to carry this into making a deep run into the Playoffs.
“It all started back in February, but everything just ramps up another notch for the next 10 weeks.”
In 2023, Wallace qualified for the Playoffs on points in the regular-season cutoff race. This year, he won at Indianapolis Motor Speedway—the first regular-season victory of his career—and enters the Playoffs after four relatively stress-free weekends.
Unlike two years ago, when he was bounced from the Playoffs in the Round of 12, Wallace projects an air of confidence entering the postseason.
“I look at the schedule and there’s a lot of good tracks for us coming up,” he said. “We’ve had speed at almost every track on the circuit for the next 10 weeks, so it just takes that little bit more. It takes beating out the 5 (Kyle Larson), the 24 (William Byron), the 11 (Denny Hamlin).
“It takes beating the other 15 guys you’re racing against to do that. And, yes, we’ve had the speed to do that. We’ve got to clean up the execution standpoint and go capitalize on that.”
Before the victory at Indianapolis, Wallace’s previous two wins had come during Playoffs he had failed to make—at Talladega in 2021 and at Kansas in 2022. Both tracks are in the Playoffs this year.
“Hell, I’m good at winning in the Playoffs when I’m not in the Playoffs,” quipped Wallace, who clearly hopes he can win races in the postseason now that he’s eligible for the NASCAR Cup Series title.
Ryan Blaney hopes to extend Team Penske streak in NASCAR Cup Playoffs
When it comes to the NASCAR Cup Series championship, Team Penske is undefeated in the era of the Next Gen race car, which debuted in NASCAR’s top division in 2022.
Joey Logano won his second championship that year and added another in 2024, thanks in part to a reprieve that resulted from Alex Bowman’s disqualification at the Charlotte ROVAL in the Round of 12.
Blaney won the 2023 title and finished second to Logano last year, when Team Penske wrapped up its third straight championship.
Now it’s time to try for a fourth, and with Austin Cindric qualifying for the postseason with his win at Talladega in April, Team Penske has all three of its drivers in the Playoffs. The objective for every Playoff driver is to advance to the Championship 4 Race on Nov. 2 at Phoenix Raceway.
“We’ve got to get there first,” Blaney said Wednesday during Playoff Media Day interviews at the Charlotte Convention Center. “It’s a gauntlet to get there. Everyone thinks it’s easy to get to Phoenix and go win Phoenix.
“You go through nine weeks of hell to get there. It’s tough. But I do think it’s nice to have all three of our cars and the 21 car (Josh Berry of Penske affiliate Wood Brothers Racing) in it. So, it’s just how do we execute week-in and week-out through the rounds? And how do you minimize your mistakes and don’t put yourself in a hole and things like that?”
Blaney won his second race of the season at Daytona last Saturday. He’s one of six drivers who collectively have accounted for 18 victories in 26 regular-season races.
“I’m a believer in momentum and things like that, and in confidence and being in good moods, for everybody on the team,” Blaney said. “I can’t say like, ‘Man, we won at Daytona so we’re going to be so fast at Darlington.’ They’re two different places, right?
“I feel like also what was a great confidence-booster for us is we came into Daytona with the goal of getting to second in regular-season points… We did that, and winning the race was just like the cherry on top, to be honest with you.”
Will Shane van Gisbergen be the surprise of the 2025 Playoffs?
While this is Shane Van Gisbergen’s first NASCAR Cup Series Playoff appearance, the 2025 Rookie of the Year candidate is certainly used to Playoff pressure.
He qualified for the 2024 NASCAR Xfinity Series Playoffs and won three championships in the Australian Supercars Series (2019, 2021 and 2022) before arriving in the U.S. to compete full-time in stock cars.
The Trackhouse Racing driver’s four wins are tied with veteran Denny Hamlin for most in the series this year. He goes into the Playoffs ranked sixth among the 16 drivers, with a 16-point edge above the current elimination line entering the first three-race Playoff round.
The pressure of a championship run is not new to Van Gisbergen. But this year’s push to a trophy in NASCAR’s premier series is.
“It’s confusing,” Van Gisbergen said of the Playoff format. “But the better you do, it just looks after itself, so I try not to get all caught up in ‘how many points’ and stuff like that. I know if I just do my best, it will all look after itself.
“I remember last year (in the Xfinity Series) the way it was approached was different than the way of the rest of the season, and we got caught up in the moment a little bit too much. Like we did a silly strategy at the (Charlotte) ROVAL, an unexplained mistake, really.
“This year has been good just staying level-headed and taking it week-by-week. We’re in an amazing spot to be here, and we have no expectation to make it through the second round, right? No one knows what we can do. If we go and perform, we can surprise some people, right?”
On possibly being under-estimated in his Playoff debut, Van Gisbergen smiled, “Doesn’t worry us and puts no pressure on us…. Hopefully, be nice to prove some people wrong.”
After a stressful night at Daytona, Alex Bowman is ready for a Playoff run
Alex Bowman didn’t know until the absolute last second whether he would have a Playoff spot or not.
On the final lap of the final NASCAR Cup Series regular-season race last Saturday at Daytona International Speedway, two winless drivers—Cole Custer and Justin Haley—alternately surged ahead. A victory by either driver would have eliminated Bowman from the Playoffs.
Ultimately, it was Ryan Blaney, a previous winner this season, who took the checkered flag and preserved Bowman’s berth in the postseason.
“It was a very uncomfortable situation,” Bowman said. “Your anxiety and stress are spiked through the roof at that point. Past that, it kind of was what it was, like it was so out of your control.
“Those last couple laps, there was so much going on… our (Hendrick Motorsports) teammates were leading, and then they got shuffled back, and then the 12 (Blaney) was in the picture.
“With all that going on, it was such a range of emotions that made it a lot more so than if it had been just one non-winner leading the whole time. That made it kind of up and down. Yeah, it was a weird thing to have to sit through.”
Now Bowman has to look ahead to the Playoffs. As the last driver in, he’s the 16th seed, and he starts the postseason five points below the elimination line for the Round of 12. The good news is that the bottom 10 drivers on the Playoff grid are covered by a spread of only 12 points.
“If we can just put together solid weeks through this first round, we should be OK,” Bowman said. “The lack of Playoff points is tough, but we’ll continue to work hard at it.”
Odds and Ends…
*Chase Briscoe has turned in a personal best season in his first year driving for Joe Gibbs Racing, claiming a series-high six pole positions (including the Daytona 500), winning at Pocono Raceway this summer and eclipsing all his season-best marks in top-five (10) and top-10 (12) finishes with 10 races remaining.
“I was telling my wife, this is really the first time I have legitimately thought I could win a Cup championship,” Briscoe said. “In the past I could make the Playoffs, and that was exciting, but down deep you kind of know the odds of you winning are pretty slim.
“Now, not to say I’m the favorite by any means, but I feel like I have a legitimate chance to go do it. … definitely feels different this time around just knowing you have a shot. I would say this Playoffs just feels different because of that.”
*A year ago. 23XI Racing’s Tyler Reddick headed into the Playoffs as the Regular Season Champion and advanced all the way to the Championship 4 Round. This go-round, the two-time NASCAR Xfinity Series champion is ranked 14th among the 16 drivers and has yet to score a race win.
Although he safely “pointed” his way into the championship chase, Reddick conceded Wednesday his No. 45 Toyota team needs to step it up for the Playoff run.
“I was on the good side of it last year,” Reddick acknowledged, “It’s just all experience. Last year was a little nicer one because we were able to have those Playoff points to fall back on. … This year we’ve got to be much more on top of it. We don’t have a lot of room for error. But that’s OK, there’s some good tracks.”
— NASCAR Wire Service —