William Byron leads Hendrick podium sweep for Elliott

With Chase Elliott out as he begins his recovery from a broken left tibia, his Hendrick Motorsports team-mates decided to give him a get-well-soon present in the form of a 1–2–3 finish in Sunday’s Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway. William Byron led Kyle Larson and Alex Bowman in overtime to his fifth career NASCAR Cup Series win.

Byron dominated on Sunday as he led 176 of 271 laps, the most of his career on an intermediate track, and won both stages with either Larson or Bowman in tow. The win nearly slipped away for him in the final stage as pit strategies meant the lead traded hands between multiple drivers before settling on Larson. Things took a turn when Aric Almirola hit the wall with two laps remaining to trigger overtime, from which Martin Truex Jr. elected to gamble by staying out on older tyres.

The move seemed to work at first for Truex before Byron and his team-mates quickly coasted ahead to lead both overtime laps.

“If you can somehow get a good restart, get to the white flag and they crash, then you win the thing,” Truex explained. “It almost happened. We were second at the white, we were second going into turn one on the last lap and just got tight and got in a bad spot coming off of turn two and lost momentum down the back.”

The Hendrick podium sweep marked the team’s strongest outing since all four cars were atop the leaderboard in the 2021 Drydene 400. Elliott’s substitute driver Josh Berry led 1–2–3 finishes for Hendrick affiliate JR Motorsports in his two Xfinity Series wins at Las Vegas in 2021 and 2022. Hendrick also notched a 1–2 with Bowman and Larson in last year’s Pennzoil 400.

“I think I speak for everyone in the fact that we miss Chase out here,” said Byron. “He’s a big contributor to feedback and our debriefs and he’s a great race car driver. Has a lot to offer there. I think there was a void there, but I think we were able to fill it with just kind of coming together as a team, and having Josh come on board, he’s obviously a great race car driver, too, and I know him from the past.”

Berry finished twenty-ninth in Elliott’s #9 after struggling with throttle problems. Hendrick president Jeff Andrews stated afterwards that “Josh did an amazing job for us given the circumstances, and given the fact he’s not ever been in one of these Next Gen cars before, really happy with what he did for us today.”

Pole winner Joey Logano was the lone retirement after contact with former Penske team-mate Brad Keselowski on lap 184 sent him through the grass and caused him to briefly go airbourne. It is the first Las Vegas Cup race with just one non-finisher since Kurt Busch crashed out of the 2019 fall race.

Race results

Finish	Start	Number	Driver	Team	Manufacturer	Laps	Status
1	2	24	William Byron	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	271	Running
2	6	5	Kyle Larson	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	271	Running
3	11	48	Alex Bowman	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	271	Running
4	13	23	Bubba Wallace	23XI Racing	Toyota	271	Running
5	10	20	Christopher Bell	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	271	Running
6	9	2	Austin Cindric	Team Penske	Ford	271	Running
7	15	19	Martin Truex Jr.	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	271	Running
8	27	31	Justin Haley	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	271	Running
9	14	4	Kevin Harvick	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	271	Running
10	24	99	Daniel Suárez	Trackhouse Racing Team	Chevrolet	271	Running
11	12	11	Denny Hamlin	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	271	Running
12	8	1	Ross Chastain	Trackhouse Racing Team	Chevrolet	271	Running
13	3	12	Ryan Blaney	Team Penske	Ford	271	Running
14	5	8	Kyle Busch	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	271	Running
15	34	45	Tyler Reddick	23XI Racing	Toyota	271	Running
16	21	10	Aric Almirola	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	271	Running
17	7	6	Brad Keselowski	RFK Racing	Ford	271	Running
18	23	16	A.J. Allmendinger	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	271	Running
19	22	43	Erik Jones	Legacy Motor Club	Chevrolet	270	Accident
20	19	7	Corey LaJoie	Spire Motorsports	Chevrolet	270	Running
21	18	17	Chris Buescher	RFK Racing	Ford	270	Running
22	4	54	Ty Gibbs	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	270	Running
23	31	41	Ryan Preece	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	270	Running
24	16	47	Ricky Stenhouse Jr.	JTG Daugherty Racing	Chevrolet	270	Running
25	17	34	Michael McDowell	Front Row Motorsports	Ford	270	Running
26	35	21	Harrison Burton	Wood Brothers Racing	Ford	269	Running
27	26	3	Austin Dillon	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	269	Running
28	20	14	Chase Briscoe	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	269	Running
29	32	9	Josh Berry*	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	269	Running
30	25	42	Noah Gragson	Legacy Motor Club	Chevrolet	269	Running
31	28	38	Todd Gilliland	Front Row Motorsports	Ford	268	Running
32	36	78	B.J. McLeod	Live Fast Motorsports	Chevrolet	266	Running
33	29	15	J.J. Yeley	Rick Ware Racing	Ford	265	Running
34	33	77	Ty Dillon	Spire Motorsports	Chevrolet	265	Running
35	30	51	Cody Ware	Rick Ware Racing	Ford	259	Running
36	1	22	Joey Logano	Team Penske	Ford	183	DVP

Italics – Competing for Rookie of the Year
* – Ineligible for points