MARTINSVILLE, Va. — For seven of the drivers and teams in NASCAR’s final Round of Eight, Sunday’s Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway is going to be stressful.
Some drivers have to think win and get in, while others may be playing the points game to make the Championship Four group of drivers that advance to the November 6 championship race at Phoenix Raceway.
The only driver locked into the championship race is Team Penske’s Joey Logano, whose victory at Las Vegas on October 16 assured he would be in the championship race.
Last Sunday at Homestead-Miami Speedway, last year’s Cup Series champion Kyle Larson easily won the race, but he had already been eliminated from this year’s championship in the cutoff race at Charlotte Motor Speedway on October 9.
If one of the eight drivers in the Round of Eight wins Sunday’s race, then two drivers will have to advance based on points. If Logano wins, then three drivers have to make it in on points.
If a driver outside of the Round of Eight wins, three drivers will have to make it on points.
As the only driver guaranteed of racing for the championship, Logano is the only driver in the Round of Eight that isn’t feeling the pressure.
“Like I told the guys, this is just one step closer to the ultimate goal,” Logano said Saturday at Martinsville Speedway. “That’s all Vegas was. It was great. It gets us there and gives us a chance, but that’s all it was. It is not the goal yet and so I just said that to keep the pressure on my team, keep them looking for more over the next couple weeks and keep that intensity up because it is gonna be on when we get there, so there’s no need to get relaxed now.
“I’m glad we are locked in. It’s been a nice couple weeks to be able to focus on Phoenix, not that we’ve been relaxed, but there’s been added focus towards Phoenix already, where no one else has had the privilege to really do that, so we’re using that to our advantage, as we should. We earned that right, so we’ve really focused on those ones and making sure that we’re ready when we get there while everyone else has got the pressure on them this weekend. For us, we can go out there and race, have some fun, try to improve on our race team and learn some things for the next time we come to Martinsville and hopefully get a trophy out of it.”
As the only driver guaranteed to be in, Logano understands the delicate nature the other seven drivers and teams feel.
Logano leads the driver points by five over Ross Chastain, 13 over Chase Elliott and 19 over William Byron. The four drivers below the cutline are Denny Hamlin, who is 24 out, Ryan Blaney, minus-37, Christopher Bell, minus-52, and Chase Briscoe, who is 63 points back.
For Briscoe, Bell and Blaney, they have to pretty much win to get into the Final Four. But for Chastain, Elliott, Byron, and Hamlin, each could make it in based on points, depending on what happens in Sunday’s race at Martinsville.
“Well, it’s tricky and this is what the playoffs are all about,” Logano said. “It gets harder and harder every round to do it. Think about it. You had to finish eighth the round before and now you’ve got to finish fourth after three races and it gets harder and harder to do that. It’s tough.
“It’s a lot of stress on those crew chiefs. I’m telling you, the playoffs are the most stressful time of the year, but I always say you want that. I always say it. As many times as you feel stress and you feel the pressure, you’d rather have the pressure than not have the pressure. If you don’t have the pressure, you’re out, you have no chance of winning. You want to keep that pressure on for 10 weeks. That’s the goal when you start the playoffs is how do I keep the pressure on for 10 weeks and, thankfully, we’ve been able to keep the pressure on for 10 weeks and hopefully have a championship at the end of it. It becomes more and more stressful as the playoffs go.
“As you get through the first round it’s usually fairly smooth as long as you don’t have any mistakes and then each round just gets more and more intense and harder and tougher for the crew chiefs, tougher for the drivers, tougher for the pit crews. You’re getting closer to the goal, and it gets harder and harder as you go along.”
Hamlin felt a little relief because he qualified 11th and the driver he has to beat in points, Byron, qualified 25th.
“That’s a small victory right there,” Hamlin said. “I want to get as many points as I can in Sunday’s race, including stage victories and points in case I don’t win the race. But if I win the race, then that will take care of itself.
“I just want to be in a position to be into the Final Four depending on the scenario.”
Of course, if Logano wins at Martinsville, he is into the Final Four leaving two more drivers that have to worry about the points.
But for someone like Briscoe, he knows that victory at Martinsville is the only thing that will give him a berth in the championship race.
“Definitely knowing that you have to win if you’re in second, you’re gonna know if you have to be aggressive in the final laps,” Briscoe said. “If you were in a different points position, running second might put you into the final four, where, for us, you’re gonna have to win the race. I don’t know what you’re willing to do. I think it’s different for everybody and until you’re in that moment it’s hard to say.
“We’ve just got to go try to get a win.”