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William Byron had to wait 35 races to get his first win of 2026, but he left an impression on the field Sunday.
On a Sunday afternoon when the final four Chase contenders were average at best, the Hendrick Motorsports driver dominated the field and repeated as the winner of the Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway in Martinsville, Va.
The 28-year-old Byron won for the fourth time on the half-mile short track. He led 362 laps and beat teammate Chase Elliott by 2.049 seconds.
“We’re always pretty good here,” said Byron, whose previous win was one year ago at the iconic Virginia track. “We’ve had our struggles, but today feels good. … We never quit, and there’s something to be said about that.”
Chevrolet recorded its third straight Martinsville victory and eighth in the past 13 starts there. Ty Gibbs, Josh Berry and Shane van Gisbergen completed the top five.
Points leader Kyle Larson finished ninth and could not clinch the championship. He will take a 67-point margin over Christopher Bell to Homestead for the NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race next Sunday.
Denny Hamlin, who started on the pole but came in sixth, is the only driver other than Larson and Bell able to win the title. He’ll enter the season finale trailing Larson by 70 points. Chase Briscoe’s 14th-place finish eliminated him from contention.
Bell suggested no thought of winning his first championship in South Florida.
“It’s just another race, another opportunity to fight for a win, but I think we know,” he said.
Hamlin’s team chose to stay out from his pole position in Stage 1 to capitalize on stage points, but the strategy backfired, sending him to the field’s middle and forcing him to play catch-up all day — never earning the bonus points.
“It really came down to Stage 1,” he said. “We ran the no-stop strategy and lost all of our track position there. When we got to the back, then you’ve got all those incidents and cautions.
“We just lost our track position, and it’s hard to drive back to the front.”
While much of the field came in for pit service at the midpoint of Stage 1’s 130 laps, every Chase contender except Bell chose to stay out.
Byron won Stage 1 with Gibbs, Ryan Preece, Bell and Berry next in line. Bell earned seven stage points and eight overall on the day, but Hamlin (17th) and Briscoe (21st) failed to take advantage of Larson’s No. 5 Chevrolet finishing 23rd.
Midway through Stage 1, Bell’s No. 20 Toyota was running third to leader Byron and Preece with Larson one lap down in 10th and Hamlin heading to pit road. Carson Hocevar soon spun, though, and only six cars were left on the lead lap.
Also one lap down, Hamlin’s team decided to keep him out on tires that had seven laps on them. But Hamlin restarted in 13th, one spot ahead of Bell after the Oklahoma native’s untimely pit stop and a penalty despite staying on the lead lap. Larson restarted one lap down in 15th.
On Lap 216, Joey Logano charged hard into Turn 1 and started a wreck that sent Bell into Hamlin. Both Toyotas slid backward into the wall, which allowed Larson to get back on the lead lap as the third caution waved and lined up the three title chasers in order.
For nearly 200 laps, Hamlin and Larson ran one position apart while Bell managed to run a few spots ahead of the two.
Holding a five-second lead over Elliott, Byron pitted for the final time with about 80 laps left and sailed on to the win.
–Field Level Media
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