Since the CROWN JEWEL PRODUCES FIRST RACING LEAD CHANGE GOOSE EGG, the regular season finished with some interesting twists. Richmond saw a controversial finish with Austin Dillion pinballing his way to a race win, only to have NASCAR determine that his slamming of leader Joey Logano and right hooking of Denny Hamlin for the win crossed a “line” and threatened the legitimacy of the Playoffs. The result was he would keep the win, but it would not count toward Playoff eligibility. The resulting hailstorm and denied appeals totally overshadowed Goodyear’s dual tire experiment.
Michigan saw Tyler Reddick take the win, while Corey LaJoie’s disturbing single car blow over grabbed everyone’s attention as NASCAR jumped into to action to resolve this situation.
At Daytona, NASCAR required the teams to add a shark fin to the right side of their cars to keep them planted on the track only to see not one, not two but three cars take air as Harrison Burton nipped a winless Kyle Busch in his first career win. Burton, who will be out of the ride next season, gave the Wood Brothers their long awaited 100th win.
It was a feel-good, popular win in so many ways and a major financial boost to the team as they vaulted from P34 in points into the Playoffs guaranteeing a finish no less than P16 in the year end standing. That brought with it a level of scrutiny of the Playoff System it had never faced before. Coupled with the displeasure Chevrolet driver Parker Retzlaff received from his manufacturer for helping push Burton’s Ford past Busch’s Chevrolet for the win further overshadowed the popular win.
Chase Briscoe made everyone forget the GEN 7 Air Force, the Playoff eligibility controversy, and Manufacturer’s “orders” by scoring his second career win at the Lady in Black. It was a popular win for the lame duck SHR team, who is closing their doors at the end of the season. The win punched SHR’s ticket into the Playoffs, while closing the Playoff door to the winless Kyle Busch, who finished second. Since Briscoe was below the Points Cutoff Line, his win immediately evaporated the points battle between Chris Buescher and Bubba Wallace, who both had solid seasons but were eliminated from the Playoffs under its “Win and you’re in” format. Tyler Reddick edged Kyle Larson for the Regular Season Championship by a slim 1-pointmargin, resurfacing Larson’s unsuccessful attempt to run the “Double” that resulted in zero points at the season’s longest race.
Though the Playoff field was set, there were still plenty of “fairness” questions raging on about the system that qualifies a P34 team (Burton), that is over 300 points behind teams (Briscoe and Wallace) that it disqualified to compete for the Playoffs. However, before that controversy could settle and when you think it couldn’t get much crazier, NASCAR stirred things up again by giving the teams a 105-page take-it-or-leave-it final version of the Charter Agreement, six hours before a drop-dead signing deadline.
Whew!
Through it all, Denny Hamlin held onto his position atop the Racing Lead Change Leaderboard to finish the Regular Season as the RLC Regular Season Champion. Here is how the Regular Season finished out:
RICHMOND 2
A lot of anticipation and hope went into the summer race at Richmond. Goodyear was introducing a softer “Option” tire into the mix in hopes that the increased speed vs less durability would create an additional strategy option that would improve racing there. As mentioned earlier, that effort was totally overshadowed by Austin Dillion’s slam and run of leader Joey Logano and then a right hook of Denny Hamlin to take the win. Dillion got to keep the win but was not allowed to advance to the Playoffs.
The race that usually sees at best a couple of Racing Lead Changes saw a jump up to 8 Racing Lead Changes, vaulting it up to eighth overall and second among non-superspeedway package races. Here is a breakdown of the Passes and Lead Changes that saw Christopher Bell take the high for RLCs.
MICHIGAN
Tyler Reddick took the win at the Irish Hills, but it was Air LaJoie’s single car flip that was the talk of the race. Corey got sideways exiting turn two while inside Noah Gragson and the resulting blow-over had everyone’s attention. Lost in all aerodynamics talk was the fact that Martin Truex, Jr. and Kyle Larson picked up RLCs to go towards their totals.
DAYTONA 2
Normally, Daytona is the end of the Regular Season, but due to the Olympic break it was moved up to the next to last race, making Darlington the Cutoff Race. It produced its normal wildness expected at a superspeedway package track with the addition of a mid-race Air Show that saw three different cars get off the ground. Harrison Burton beat the winless Kyle Busch to the line for his first Cup win and the Wood Brothers’ 100thCup win and advancing to the playoffs.
The race produced the second highest number of Racing Lead Changes for the season with 13 different drivers racing their way to the lead the old fashion way – passing the leader under green without benefit of bunching at the restarts or the leader pitting under green. Joey Logano collected 8 RLCs, greatly improving his position in the RLC Standings.
Darlington 2
The 2024 Regular Season wrapped up at the Lady In Black with Chase Briscoe taking the win for the iconic #14 of the SHR stable. It was a bittersweet win as SHR announced that team would be closing at the end of the season and Briscoe would find himself in another ride for 2025. But they proved they still had fight left in them as with the win they now find themselves in the 2024 Playoffs.
The race, which fans ranked as a 90.1% on Jeff Gluck’s “Was it a Good Race” poll saw a single Racing Lead Change by Kyle Larson at Lap 56 of the race. With this single RLC and another Lead Change on a restart, surprisingly, the remaining 16 Green Flag Lead Changes came because of differing pit stop strategies as shown below.
After the Checkered Flag fell on Chase Briscoe and the RLC numbers were tallied, Denny Hamlin finished the regular season with 22 Racing Lead Changes, the most among the 32 drivers who were able to make a lead change under green without benefit of a restart or leader pitting. This is more than double of what he scored in the last Regular Season (10).
A full breakdown of the standings is as follows-
Kyle Larson, who finished second behind Hamlin, scored his 20 RLCs in 11 of the 26 Regular Season Races. Hamlin got his 22 RLCs in 9 Races. Larson is on a three-race run to close the gap, where Hamlin hasn’t made a RLC since Richmond 2.
Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano scored the highest RLCs in a single race, each getting 8. Hamlin got his at Bristol, while Logano got his at the second Daytona.
Fifteen of the sixteen Playoff Contenders scored RLCs with seven contenders being in the Top 10 RLC drivers. Harrison Burton is the only Playoff Contender to not score a single RLC in the regular season.
Finally, 2024 saw a total of 220 RLCs which is up 49% over last season’s 148 RLCs and 2022’s 146 RLCs. This includes the Indy Goose Egg.
FINAL THOUGHTS
It was interesting to see the Regular Season Breakdown and the ebb and flow throughout the season as well as the differences in the Teams from last season to this season. Some that grabbed my attention was Ross Chastain had 10 RLCs last season but could only find 5 this season. Erik Jones is on his second season without an RLC. Without Richmond 2, Austin Dillion would be in the same shape. On the other end of the spectrum, Hamlin more than doubled his RLC production, Kyle Larson was there week in and week out, Truex Jr. and Logano put up impressive numbers while Christopher Bell put together an impressive string of races going to the front.
Will RLCs be an indicator of Playoff success? Only time will tell.
Atlanta should be up as soon as I get through the replay. Watkins Glen will be on its bumper.
Till then, tune in and find out!
Thunder On… and Stay Safe!
David Nance
Photo Credit (cover): Meg Oliphant/Getty Images