LAS VEGAS – When it comes down to crunch time, you can never count out Joey Logano finding a way to get a strong result in the ‘Round of 8’. Only this time, it wasn’t a race victory for the three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion.
Logano struggled throughout most of the weekend, but managed to salvage himself a sixth-place finish in Sunday’s South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. Perhaps the only positive note Team Penske was able to find in the 267-lap contest.
That was a result of Logano’s teammate, Ryan Blaney, finishing in last after a flat tire sent him into the Turn 4 wall at Lap 73. As far as the defending series champion is concerned, he wasn’t a threat for the win until a late-race caution changed the complexion of the race.
Paul Wolfe, a 43-time NASCAR Cup Series race-winner as a crew chief, decided to have the No. 22 Shell-Pennzoil Ford Mustang Dark Horse team change only right-side tires during the final pit stop of the event, and exited the pits in second.
“At the beginning of the race, we were decent but had to get some track position,” Logano said about the afternoon he was having prior to the pit stop. “Our long run haul was decent, but we just got loose in the third stage. We didn’t get our track position back once we tightened up until [Paul] took two [tires] there.”
The only driver that Logano had to deal with on the restart was race-leader Chase Briscoe, who also took right-side tires at the discretion of crew chief James Small, and it took him until Lap 244 to take over the race lead.
Logano’s moment up front was short-lived, as Briscoe quickly regained the lead one lap later. While Briscoe ended up being passed by Denny Hamlin for the victory, the Middletown, Connecticut-native managed to leave Las Vegas with a top-10 result.
RACE RESULTS: 2025 NCS South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway
“We were not good enough. That’s the facts,” Logano said post-race.
When it comes to the final restart of the event, just having an opportunity for the victory in the first place was all he could’ve asked for.
“I just didn’t get the right push on the backstretch,” said Logano. “The No. 48 [Alex Bowman] kind of had an option of going three-wide or push the No. 19 [Chase Briscoe], and he pushed unfortunately. That’s what put us in a bad spot.”
Consequently, not winning the race means Logano will have his work cut out for him if he wants to make a sixth Championship 4 appearance. Logano is 24 points below the cutline, held by Briscoe, heading into Talladega, a track the Team Penske driver has won three times, but not since 2018.
“The closer we get, the more we’ve got to win. I think we closed the gap a little bit today,” Logano commented. “It’s still possible to point in, but one of the spots is obviously taken up now.”
In the last seven races in Alabama, Logano has finished outside the top-20 in six of them. Additionally, his last top-five result was a third-place outing in the Fall 2021 race.
Coverage of the YellaWood 500 will commence Sunday, October 19 at 2:00 p.m. ET on NBC. Motor Racing Network (MRN) and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will provide the radio broadcast for the event.
