Chase Briscoe

LONG POND — Chase Briscoe got the cold facts when the third-generation driver’s career took an unexpected turn, leaving his lame-duck NASCAR team for the sport’s most coveted available seat with powerhouse Joe Gibbs Racing.

The message was clear at JGR — home of five Cup driver titles and a perennial contender to win another one.

“You don’t make the playoffs,” Briscoe said, “you don’t race in this car anymore.”

The Toyotas were better at JGR, sure. So were the championship standards set by Joe Gibbs and the rest of the organization.

“It’s been a lot of work,” Briscoe’s crew chief James Small said. “From where he came from, there wasn’t much accountability. Nobody was holding his feet to the fire. That’s probably been a big wake-up call for him.”

Briscoe’s eyes are wide open now, a first-time winner for JGR and, yes, he is indeed playoff bound.

Briscoe returned to victory lane Sunday at Pocono Raceway, stretching the final drops of fuel down the stretch to hold off Hamlin for his third career Cup victory and first with his new race team.

“I’ve only won three races in the Cup Series, right? But this is by far the least enjoyable just because it’s expected now,” Briscoe said. “You have to go win. Where at SHR, you really felt like you surprised the world if you won.”

Briscoe raced his way into an automatic spot in NASCAR’s playoffs with the win and gave the No. 19 Toyota its first victory since 2023 when Martin Truex Jr. had the ride. Briscoe lost his job at the end of last season at Stewart-Haas Racing when the team folded and he was tabbed to replace Truex — almost a year to the day for his win at Pocono — in the four-car JGR field.

Hamlin, who holds the track record with seven wins, appeared on the brink of reeling in Briscoe over the final, thrilling laps only to have not enough in the No. 11 Toyota to snag that eighth Pocono win.

“It was just so hard to have a guy chasing you, especially the guy that’s the greatest of all time here,” Briscoe said.

Briscoe made his final pit stop on lap 119 of the 160-lap race, while Hamlin — who returned after missing last week’s race following the birth of his son — made his final stop on 120. Hamlin’s team radioed to him that they believed Briscoe would fall about a half-lap short on fuel — only for the first-year JGR driver to win by 0.682 seconds.

“The most nervous I get is when two of our cars are up front,” Gibbs said.

Gibbs now has Hamlin, Bell and Briscoe in the playoff field.

“It’s definitely more work but it’s because they’re at such a high level,” Briscoe said. “Even racing with teammates that are winning has been a big adjustment for me.”

Briscoe, who won an Xfinity Series race at Pocono in 2020, raced to his third career Cup victory and first since Darlington in 2024.

Briscoe has been on bit of a hot streak, and had his fourth top-10 finish over the last six races, including a seventh-place finish in last week’s ballyhooed race in Mexico City.

He became the 11th driver to earn a spot in the 16-driver field with nine races left until the field is set and made a winner again of crew chief James Small. Small stayed on the team through Truex’s final winless season and Briscoe’s winless start to this season.

“It’s been a tough couple of years,” Small said. “We’ve never lost belief, any of us.”

Hamlin finished second. Ryan Blaney, Chris Buescher and Chase Elliott completed the top five.

Briscoe, raised a dirt racer in Indiana, gave JGR its 18th Cup victory at Pocono.

“I literally grew up racing my sprint car video game in a Joe Gibbs Racing Home Depot uniform,” Briscoe said. “To get Coach in victory lane after them taking a chance on me, it’s so rewarding truthfully. Just a big weight off my shoulders. I’ve been telling my wife the last two weeks, I have to win. To finally come here and do it, it has been a great day.”

The race was delayed 2 hours, 10 minutes by rain and the conditions were muggy by the time the green flag dropped. Briscoe led 72 laps and won the second stage.

Briscoe wrote before the race on social media, “Anybody going from Pocono to Oklahoma City after the race Sunday?” The Pacers fan — he bet on the team to win the NBA title — wasn’t going to make it to Game 7 of the NBA Finals.

He’ll certainly settle for a ride to victory lane.

Elsewhere:

n Alex Palou won the IndyCar XPEL Grand Prix in Plymouth, Wis., on Sunday with Felix Rosenqvist second.

n Shawn Langdon won the Top Fuel division, and Austin Prock won Funny Car in the American Rebel Light Virginia NHRA Nationals on Sunday.

n Connor Zilisch, with Dale Earnhardt Jr. filling in as his crew chief, won the NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Pocono on Saturday.

LONG POND, Pa. (AP) — Dale Earnhardt Jr. might already be NASCAR’s most popular crew chief.

He’s certainly an undefeated one.

Pressed into unexpected service, Earnhardt called the shots for 18-year-old prospect Connor Zilisch in the No. 88 Chevrolet and they landed in victory lane Saturday in the second-tier Xfinity Series race at Pocono Raceway.

“It felt good to have some input and decision-making power,” Earnhardt said. “And then helping Connor understand what our plan was so he knew when to push and what he was expected to do.”

Earnhardt — who won NASCAR’s most-popular driver award 15 times — made a pit stop from his day job as team owner at JR Motorsports with normal crew chief Mardy Lindley suspended one race because of a lug nut infraction this month at Nashville.

Aside from his duties as team owner, Earnhardt also was at Pocono for his role on the Prime broadcast for the NASCAR Cup Series race Sunday.

“Lot of fun for me today,” Earnhardt said. “I missed the thrill of competition. I love broadcast, don’t get me wrong. But nothing compares to driving or just being part of the team. Being an owner doesn’t really deliver like this. This is a lot of fun.”

Earnhardt had his wife and two young daughters in tow with him as he made the celebratory walk to victory lane. Oldest daughter Isla Rose clutched the checkered flag while youngest Nicole Lorraine soaked in the scene from her dad’s arms.

“I love that they just get to experience things about NASCAR,” Earnhardt said. “I had such a great time growing up as a kid in this sport, just running around here. I want them to have that opportunity and understand that this is a place where they could create opportunities for themselves down the road.”

The win continued a banner season for the NASCAR Hall of Fame driver — who swept two races at Pocono as a driver in 2014 — after JR Motorsports and reigning Xfinity Series champion Justin Allgaier qualified for the season-opening Daytona 500 and secured their Cup Series debut.

Earnhardt won two Daytona 500s, in 2004 and 2014, and 26 races overall.

His side hustle Saturday was made a bit easier with Zilisch behind the wheel. Zilisch, who turns 19 in July, raced to his second Xfinity victory of the season and third of his young career. He won his Xfinity debut last year at Watkins Glen International.

Earnhardt even pitched in during the race and tossed tires over the wall during pit stops.

“Midway through the race man, I was feeling it,” Earnhardt said.

Zilisch took the win down to the wire and finally passed Jesse Love with five laps left in the race. Love finished second.

“Dale Junior, not too bad on the box,” Zilisch said. “Pretty cool to have him up there. Getting him a 1-for-1 win as crew chief is pretty awesome.”

Even with the victory, it just might be one-and-done on the pit box for Earnhardt.

“I don’t know that I see myself doing it again,” he said.

It was nervous times atop the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing pit box as Chase Briscoe worked diligently to save enough fuel while leading the NASCAR Cup race at Pocono. He had left his box before the team was done filling up his Toyota Camry, leaving Briscoe to sweat as he tried to both save enough fuel and hold off teammate Denny Hamlin.

But it all worked out in the end, with Briscoe winning the race and teammate Hamlin finishing close behind. Briscoe ended up leading 72 of 160 laps, and was well aware of who was behind him.

“It was a lot,” said Briscoe when asked about the pressure. “It was kind of weird. I wasn’t driving hard. It’s not like I was on the ragged edge. It was so hard to have a guy chasing you, right, probably the guy that’s the greatest of all time here. Trying to save fuel and everything else.

“Thank you to all you race fans. It’s sold out every single time we come here. Unbelievable racing in front of a sold-out crowd. Amazing day for our race team. Really the first race we’ve kind of executed truthfully all year long … Joe Gibbs Racing took a big chance on me. Like, I wasn’t everybody’s first choice I think. Yeah, but for me to be able to get here and finally deliver a win is just an awesome feeling.”

Behind the JGR duo, Ryan Blaney finished third, Chris Buescher fourth, and Chase Elliott fifth. John Hunter Nemechek, Kyle Larson, Ryan Preece, Brad Keselowski, and Austin Cindric filled out the remainder of the top ten.

The run to the finish

Brad Keselowski, Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing Ford

Photo by: Meg Oliphant / Getty Images

After the first two stages featured several incidents, including multiple brake failures, things got a bit cleaner for the final 60 lap run to the finish. By this point in the race, two of the 23XI Racing drivers crashed out with brake failures, while Tyler Reddick went behind the wall in attempt to fix the issue and avoid a similar fate.

Briscoe started the final stage out front as everyone raced towards the final fuel window. Once there, Briscoe was one of the first to dive to pit road with 40 laps to go. Most of field followed suit, but there were a handful of drivers who gambled and chose to push the run long.

Among those running long was Brad Keselowski, who appeared to be fast all day but never could catch a break. He was leading earlier in the race, but made a shocking mistake as he dove to the pits before pit road was open. But later in the day, he found himself out front again when misfortune found him once more.

Shane van Gisbergen, who won last weekend in Mexico City, went for a spin, triggering the final caution of the race with 35 laps to. Keselowski lost all of his track position as a result while Briscoe cycled back to the front.

But things weren’t all positive for Briscoe. He did not wait on fuel during his stop, leaving the box right as the jack dropped, forcing him to go full fuel-save for the final 30-lap run.

His JGR teammate was right behind him, but Hamlin could never quite get to him. Struggling to do anything in dirty air, this allowed Briscoe to save plenty of fuel and make it to the checkered flag.

Pocono ended up being Briscoe’s third career win and his first since joining JGR ahead of the 2025 season. Briscoe is now the 11th different winner this year, taking victory in the final NASCAR on Prime Video broadcast before the Cup Series shifts over to TNT Sports.

Photos from Pocono – Race

Q. Ryan Blaney, what a fight by you. The cool suit failing during stage one. How tough was that?

RYAN BLANEY: It was hot. Yeah, I flipped it on probably lap 15. I was like, Oh, it’s going to be a long day, so…

It was warm. Was able to just keep going. Really proud of the whole 12 guys from starting in the back, making good ground. Then me speeding set us back again. Having to come back up there.

Jonathan and the whole 12 team did a good job of kind of figuring out what to do from the start of the race and after my mistake. Yeah, just kind of stuck really there at the end, all three of us just kind of running the same pace.

Overall I appreciate Wabash, Ford Mustang Performance, Menards Body Armor, DEX Imaging, Advance Auto Parts. Really good day for us.

Q. Twice through the field, do you feel you made the most of your day?

RYAN BLANEY: Yeah. I mean, obviously I would have liked to have won. I think after having to start in the back, then the mistake I made, I feel like we were recovered really well. Our car was fast enough to do it.

Overall I feel we made the most of our day. Just a little extra would have been one or two spots team. Overall really proud of the effort of the whole 12 team.

NASCAR PR

Chase Briscoe — winner: “It was a lot of (pressure). It was kind of weird. I wasn’t driving hard. It’s not like I was on the ragged edge. It was so hard to have a guy chasing you, probably the guy that’s the greatest of all time here. Trying to save fuel and everything else. Really the first race we’ve kind of executed truthfully all year long. Joe Gibbs Racing took a big chance on me. I wasn’t everybody’s first choice. For me to be able to get here and finally deliver a win is just an awesome feeling. Anybody that has worked with me knows I’m normally overdriving, missing my marks all the time. My dad tells me all the time, ‘Slow down, you’ll probably go faster.’ It’s true there. Amazing day. To get Coach (Joe Gibbs) in victory lane after them taking a chance on me, it’s so rewarding truthfully. Just a big weight off my shoulders. I’ve been telling my wife the last two weeks, I have to win. To finally come here and do it, it has been a great day.”

Denny Hamlin — second: “When five cars pitted and then the caution came and (Briscoe) and a bunch of guys jumped in front of us, I knew it would be really hard to give that track position back. It was just so hard to pass, so we did all we could. We were just next best in line. It definitely was going to be difficult. There was a key moment when (Briscoe) and some other guys pitted, and the caution came out and leaped him in front of us. At that point, we knew it was going to be really hard to pass those guys back on the racetrack. Team did a great job, next best in line there of our strategy, it just didn’t work out. We’re really strong. Not showing up with any weaknesses right now. I’m really proud of the effort that we’ve put forth and yeah, just love to get more wins But still it was a good overall solid day for us”

Ryan Blaney — third: “It was hot (with a malfunctioning cool suit). I flipped it on probably lap 15. I was like, ‘Oh, it’s going to be a long day, so… ‘ Was able to just keep going. Really proud of the whole 12 guys from starting in the back, making good ground. Then me speeding set us back again. Having to come back up there. (Crew chief) Jonathan (Hassler) and the whole 12 team did a good job of kind of figuring out what to do from the start of the race and after my mistake. Yeah, just kind of stuck really there at the end, all three of us just kind of running the same pace. Obviously, I would have liked to have won. I think after having to start in the back, then the mistake I made, I feel like we were recovered really well. Our car was fast enough to do it. Overall I feel we made the most of our day. Just a little extra would have been one or two spots team. Overall really proud of the effort of the whole 12 team.”

The Joe Gibbs Racing driver became the latest to lock into the Cup Series playoffs.

Chris Buescher — fourth: “Everybody’s put so much work into it to get this point where we’re unloading cars that are just a pleasure to drive. So to be in the hunt was fun. The last restart, we started on the bottom, and I think I just got too low trying to defend and got in the marbles and slid up into the middle there and lost some time. I was running them back down there, but with as hard as it was to pass today, I don’t know that would have been plausible to get around everybody, but certainly had a really solid speed. But overall, a really solid day and fun to have fast race cars like this. We’re chasing wins. Still in that mindset if we go to the race track and do what we did today, we’re chasing a win. How do we set ourselves up to have track position at the end to fight for a trophy? And today, a place like this with the speed we had, that brought points with it. So it’s kind of my motto. I try to go by that. Fast race cars bring points with them, and I think if we stick with this over the next handful of weeks, that part will come with it, but again I think we figured for the last couple months, it’s going to be a must-win situation I feel like these playoffs constantly do that, and you get to the end and have one or two that slip in on points but you’ve got to win races.”

Chase Elliott — fifth: “We were just really loose in (turn) three. I felt like I could pace pretty good through turns one and two, but I just could not get turn three right all day. Certainly as the run went on, it became more challenging for me and I started making more and more mistakes over there. I thought Denny (Hamlin) and Ryan (Blaney) could do a better job of kind of stalking the person in front of them to get themselves opportunities. I was just a little bit too far back and I think it was mainly because of that. But overall, happy to get a fifth-place finish for this No. 9 Chevy team.”

John Hunter Nemechek — sixth: “Both cars had speed this weekend right off the truck and qualified really well. It was my best qualifying effort in the Cup series and we raced well also. I’m proud of everything they’ve put in at Legacy Motor Club, all the men and women with all the effort they’ve been putting in. Looking forward to continuing to come to the racetrack when you have the speed. Just a testament to this 42 team. Travis Mack (crew chief), and I have been working really hard and we’ve been communicating well. Sydney, our primary engineer, Dex, Carl, Josh, and everyone who works on this thing. I’m just proud of the effort.”

Kyle Larson — seventh: “It was an up-and-down day. It was really hard to pass. It was a good fight for the No. 5 Chevy team to get a seventh-place finish, and for three Hendrick Motorsports cars to get top-10 results. I just hope we don’t carry what we had the last few weeks into the rest of the season. Prior to the last few weeks, we’ve been really fast. It’s just been a rough stretch, but we’ll continue to go to work.”

Chase Briscoe won at Pocono Raceway to become the 11th driver to lock down a spot.

Brad Keselowski — ninth: “Yeah, we had a great car today. We got the lead there in the first stage and felt like we were in contro; and lost control of the race early with the pit road penalty. And I thought we recovered really, really well from that. Got up to third or fourth there. And we had kind of this strategy to run longer than the lead pack there, and the yellow came out in the middle of the cycle. And it came from 24th on that last run. I thought that was strong, but not enough. I’m just a big believer you can’t win by doing the same thing everybody else does. You got to be better than them and you can’t be better if you’re the same. So, we were in a little bit of a hole there. We’re trying to dig out of it and we were well positioned. I don’t know what that last yellow was for, but I wanted to strangle whoever it was, but you know, it is what it is. (on the penalty for pitting too soon) I just thought we made a really bad call. And I was right, but not for the reason I thought I was. And what was really confusing is the next lap when everybody else pitted, I was like, why would they do that? There are a couple of really interesting things from today. For whatever reason, and this is my fault, let me just be clear with this. We held pit road every pit cycle for three laps. And normally, they hold pit road for one lap. So when you get to lap two, it’s just automatic pit. And so when we were going down the short chute, the team said pit this time. And I had no reason to challenge them. And ultimately, I hold the steering wheel. And I’m the one that’s got to check. I didn’t check the crew chief and the spotter, and that’s my fault. I’ve got to give credit to my crew chief, Jeremy Bullins. He asked me to pit the lap before and I was in a clean air spot and I wanted to keep running, taking advantage of my tires. If I would have pitted the yellow came out while we were on pit road, we probably would have cycled inside the top 10 with new tires. Might have had a shot to win a race, so I feel bad about not taking advantage of that.”

Erik Jones — 13th: ““We had a really good No. 43 Toyota Camry XSE today, but it’s just frustrating how sometimes strategies can go your way and other times it doesn’t. Pocono is a track where strategy plays a big part in your finish more times than not. The team did a good job of bringing a car with a ton of speed, but that last caution caught us at a bad time in the middle of green flag pit stops. I think we were a top-five car, but we needed things to work out better. We’ll learn from it and move on to Atlanta.”

Daniel Suarez — 15th: “It was an average day for the No. 99 Chevrolet team. We started the race OK on the short run, but then in the final stage, we just lost the balance of the car a little bit. We were just way too tight and never got it back.”

Kyle Busch — 20th: “Our Chevrolet team worked hard today at Pocono Raceway to overcome obstacles. A speeding penalty on pit road put us behind at the end of Stage 1, then we ended up with heavy damage to our Chevy after spinning towards the end of Stage 2. We just lost the air racing in traffic. Crew chief Randall Burnett and the rest of the RCR team worked hard to keep us on the lead lap. Our Chevy was never the same after the spin, and handling was really bad in traffic. We’ll regroup and head to Atlanta Motor Speedway.”

Austin Dillon — 24th: “Our No. 3 Chevrolet team fought hard all race long at Pocono Raceway. We had a long delay from rain and that changed the way the track reacted. It was hot and slick. We fought a tight balanced Chevrolet. Crew Chief Richard Boswell made great strategy calls, and the car handled better towards the end. I tried to make a move to the top on a late restart, but the track was rubbered up more than I was expecting and it cost us a lot of spots. By the end of the race, our Chevy went back to the tight side, and we couldn’t recover. We will regroup and head to Atlanta Motor Speedway next week.”

Michael McDowell — 35th: “I had warning half of the race that the brakes weren’t going to make it. It’s unfortunate. It wasn’t what we needed for this No. 71 Chevrolet team. We came off a good weekend (in Mexico City), and this is the exact opposite of what we needed. But we have Atlanta, Chicago and Sonoma coming up, so we have a lot of good tracks on the horizon for our team. The season is grueling sometimes. I was just trying to nurse it there at the end on that last restart, knowing I was starting to lose my pedal a little bit. In the car, there’s not a lot you can do other than dial bias to the rear and hope and pray for the best. What put us behind this weekend was yesterday in qualifying. I just made a mistake there, and that kind of sets you up for the whole race starting 28th. We did some strategy there and we were going to give ourselves a fighting chance. But like I said, I knew we had an issue with the brakes and I was trying to get to a place where hopefully they would last, but they didn’t. … I’ve been telling you guys all year that I’m not planning on pointing my way in. I’m planning on winning a race because that’s the way I see us getting into the playoffs. You’re going to have weekends like this where you have issues, you get taken out or you have something happen. You can’t plan on pointing your way in, especially this early on because there’s still a lot of opportunities for guys below the cutline to win, as we saw last weekend. When you have places like Atlanta, Chicago, Sonoma, Daytona, you’ve got a lot of tracks that it could open it up for a new winner, like we saw with Harrison Burton last year. That last few years, there’s been a few surprise winners.”

Bubba Wallace — 36th: “I was going to battle the 17 (Chris Buescher) and the 2 (Austin Cindric) and by the time I was ready to touch the pedal it just went to the floor and the brakes exploded. I hate it, we’ve had two or three good races in-a-row and there goes the bad luck again. But hey, (Michael Jordan) told me there’s no such thing as bad luck. We create our own luck. I apologize to the racing gods. This weekend sucked aside from practice, but that pays nothing. I hate it for my guys. We knew it was going to be a grind and I was mentally prepared for that all day. Especially as frustrating as it gets not being able to pass here in Pocono, we were going to just take our lumps and march our way through and set ourselves up for the end of the race, but the brakes just didn’t want to hang on that long.”

Riley Herbst — 37th: “I’ve grown up watching these races at Pocono and seeing what happened to me happen to lot of other guys. It was a scary feeling for sure. I was just starting to get tight, just a bad adjustment on my part. Getting into (turn) one, the brakes just went to the floor. A brake rotor exploded and I was along for the ride with our Camry XSE.”

CONCORD, N.C. – The conclusion of Sunday’s race at Pocono Raceway also set the matchups for the first NASCAR In Season Challenge, set to kick off on Saturday at Atlanta Motor Speedway. 

The 32-driver field will be paired into a single-elimination bracket played out over the next five events. 

Instead of being based on the Cup Series points standings, the previous three races were used to determine seeding. Points accumulated over the three races were used to order competitors 1-32. 

Leading Hendrick Motorsports is Chase Elliott, who earned his second straight top-five finish at Pocono. He is the No. 5 seed and will match up against Austin Dillon at Atlanta. 

Next is Alex Bowman in the eighth position. He will tangle with 25th-seeded Joey Logano. Playoff standings leader, Kyle Larson, is seeded 10th and will face Tyler Reddick in round one. Finally, points leader William Byron is the 18th seed and will face the No. 15 seed, Ryan Preece. 

Check back at HendrickMotorsports.com for updates throughout the tournament. 

FROM WINNER TO CHAMPION, PART 5: Gordon vs. Earnhardt