NASCAR delivered an interesting playoff race at Las Vegas.
Joey Logano won Sunday’s South Point 400 NASCAR Cup Series race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, his third race of the season and second of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs. Logano advances to the Championship 4 automatically with the win. Other playoff drivers, including Tyler Reddick, Chase Elliott and Ryan Blaney, had plenty of issues after all three were involved in a lap 90 incident.
Here are winners and losers from Sunday’s NASCAR Las Vegas race.
PLAYOFF PICTURE: NASCAR playoff picture: Cup Series points standings after Las Vegas
HOW IT HAPPENED: Recap: NASCAR Cup Series at Las Vegas: Highlights, leaderboard of South Point 400
SUNDAY’S RESULTS: Who won NASCAR Cup race at Las Vegas? Winner is Joey Logano plus full results
Winners
William Byron
Byron has been a model of consistency this season, not having many bad days this season. Byron finished fourth in Sunday’s race, his 13th top five and 18th top 10 finish this season. He finds himself above the cut line with two races left in the Round of 8 and looking for his second Championship 4 appearance in as many seasons.
Denny Hamlin
Denny Hamlin had an adventurous day on pit road, including a pit stop where the No. 11 team didn’t get the left rear tire on all the way before dropping the jack. Hamlin stopped and backed his car into the pit box to get the tire on securely to avoid a penalty. Hamlin battled back through the issues and finished eighth but finds himself below the cutline with two races left in the Round of 8. He has success at both Homestead-Miami and Martinsville, however.
Joey Logano
Logano was technically out of the playoffs last weekend. He got back in after Alex Bowman was disqualified at Charlotte and made the most of it, especially with crew chief Paul Wolfe making the call to stay out and win Sunday’s race on fuel mileage. Logano earned his second win of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs, and his third of the season, to advance to the Championship 4 for the sixth time since the playoff system was instituted in 2014.
Losers
REDDICK’S BIG FLIP: Tyler Reddick flips at NASCAR Las Vegas race, damages Chase Elliott, Ryan Blaney
Christopher Bell
It’s hard to make the guy who finished second a “loser,” but Christopher Bell should have won this race. Bell led 156 laps Sunday and made a pit stop with 37 laps to go. Bell was able to drive his No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota back to a spot to challenge for the win, but lapped traffic held him up and prevented him from winning the race. Simply, a great effort came up just short for Bell.
Chase Elliott
Elliott had a tough day after getting caught up in Reddick’s wreck. Elliott had heavy damage to the right side of his No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet after Reddick drove into him in turn 4. Elliott cleared NASCAR’s Damaged Vehicle Policy by making minimum speed, brought the car to the garage to get it fixed and back out on the track. Elliott finished 33rd is now eighth in the playoff standings, most likely needing a win to advance.
Tyler Reddick
Reddick started second and was challenging Bell for the lead throughout the first stage. However, he got aggressive early in the second stage and tried to find a gap between Chase Elliott and the turn 4 wall. That gap vanished, quickly. Reddick got pinned into the wall by Elliott, sending Reddick’s No. 45 23XI Toyota into the infield grass, hitting the paved quarter-mile track and flipping the car near the start-finish line. Reddick finished 36th in Sunday’s race after he impressively drove the wrecked car to his pit stall.
Follow sports writer Austin Chastain on X, formerly known as Twitter, at @ChastainAJ or reach him via email at achastain@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: NASCAR Las Vegas winners, losers: Joey Logano beats Christoper Bell
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