Three spots were still open in Sunday’s Xfinity 500 at Martinsville for the taking for a trip to the Championship 4 next week at Phoenix. We already knew that Joey Logano was going to have one, but what about the other three to join him?

Joey Logano

It’s been an up-and-down year for the Team Penske driver. Logano won the season opener in the exhibition Busch Light Clash in the LA Coliseum and went through stretches of good and great weeks. In the playoffs, he’s had 5 finishes of 17th or worse. He was also 4th in Darlington, 2nd in Texas and won Vegas too.

2022 Stats:

• 3 wins
• 10 Top 5’s
• 16 Top 10’s
• 3 poles
• 597 laps led
• 5th Championship 4 appearance
• Phoenix 2022 Finish: 8th (Last 5: 1st, 3rd, 2nd, 11th, 8th)

Ross Chastain

The first trip to the final round of the Trackhouse freshman. Chastain has six top seven finishes in nine playoff races including a pair of runner-up finishes and a fifth place run in the last three. The 3rd seed has made the Championship 4 every year.

2022 Stats:

• 2 wins
• 14 Top 5’s
• 20 Top 10’s
• 0 poles
• 692 laps led
• 1st Championship 4 appearance
• Phoenix 2022 Finish: 2nd

Chase Elliott

For the third straight year, Chase Elliott has marched to the final round. The regular season champion has now made it to the final round in 5 of the last 6 years and the Round of 8 every year. However, this year’s playoffs have been far from perfect for Elliott as he’s had to rely more times than not on those playoff points. Elliott has been 14th or worse in six of his last 10 starts on the year. Also, just 3 times since 2016 did the #1 seed entering the playoffs win the championship. It happened in odd numbers years only too – 2017, 2019 and 2021.

• 5 wins
• 12 Top 5’s
• 19 Top 10’s
• 3 poles
• 857 laps led
• 3rd Championship 4 appearance
• Phoenix 2022 Finish: 11th (Last 5: 7th, 1st, 5th, 5th, 11th)

Christopher Bell

It’s been a breakout year for Bell. In his previous 72 starts, he had 1 win, 9 top 5 finishes, 23 top 10’s and 118 laps led. This season alone he’s trumped almost all those numbers and for Bell, he’s backed his way into this round the same way he did the last. He was 42 points down entering the Charlotte ROVAL and scored a walkoff win to the Round of 8. Last week, he was 33 points down entering Martinsville and made his way to Phoenix. Can he pull off a third walkoff moment of the playoffs?

• 3 wins
• 12 Top 5’s
• 19 Top 10’s
• 4 poles
• 573 laps led
• 1st Championship 4 appearance
• Phoenix 2022 Finish: 26th (Phoenix finishes: 24th, 17th, 9th, 9th, 26th)

Kyle Larson (Owners Title)

While it’s not the season (10 wins, 20 top 5’s, 26 top 10s, 2,581 laps led) that led Larson to a championship last year, he’s still in the Championship 4 albeit for a different reason. This time it’s the unique situation of the owners title to where there’s a chance the drivers champion and the owners champion are different. That hasn’t happened since 1963…

• 3 wins
• 13 Top 5’s
• 18 Top 10’s
• 4 poles
• 635 laps led
• 2nd Championship 4 appearance
• Phoenix 2022 Finish: 34th (5 top 7’s in his previous 7 Phoenix starts: 3rd, 6th, 4th, 4th, 7th, 1st, 34th)

Trends

• The ages of the drivers left? Joey Logano (32), Ross Chastain (29), Christopher Bell (27), Chase Elliott (26). The tide has shifted.
  • When digging through the stats on the NASCAR Cup Series champions, one three-year age window stands out above the rest when it comes to a driver’s age at the time of their first title – 28-30 years old. Of the 35 different series champions 10 of them (the most in a three-year span at 28.5%) have earned their first NASCAR Cup Series title between the ages of 28 and 30; including four active champions Joey Logano (28), Brad Keselowski (28), Kyle Larson (29) and Kyle Busch (30).
  • Looking at this year’s playoff drivers, 10 of the 16 drivers were under the age of 30. However, 3 drivers are currently in the window of 28 to 30 years old and looking for their first NASCAR Cup Series title and 1 of them is still alive – Trackhouse Racing’s Ross Chastain (29). Plus, keep in mind, Joe Gibbs Racing’s Christopher Bell and Stewart-Haas Racing’s Chase Briscoe (also a winner this season) are both 27 years old and will be turning 28 at the end of this year in December.
• Playoff points during the regular season matter – 3 of the top 4 in playoff points entering the 2017 season made the Championship 4. In 2018, it was the top 3 making it to the final round. For 2019, all four in the top four of playoff points accumulated entering the playoffs made it to the Championship 4. 2020 saw 4 of the top five. Last year it was 4 of the top 7.
• Ranks of Championship 4 drivers in playoff points entering the postseason:
  • 2017: 1st, 3rd, 4th, 6th
  • 2018: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 7th
  • 2019: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th
  • 2020: 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th
  • 2021: 1st, 3rd, 5th, 7th
  • 2022: 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 10th
• 3 times since 2016 did the #1 seed entering the playoffs win the championship. It happened in odd numbers years only – 2017, 2019 and 2021.
• The regular season champion has made it to the final round in 5 of the last 6 years and the Round of 8 every year.
• The 3rd seed has made the Championship 4 every year.
• Parity – We’ve had this playoff format since 2014. In the 8 years of this, we’ve seen 7 different champions. By those accounts, that means Kevin Harvick, Kyle Busch, Martin Truex Jr., Joey Logano, Chase Elliott and Kyle Larosn won’t win the title at Phoenix this November. Jimmie Johnson is the only other driver to win a title in this span but he’s since retired.
• Champion likely won’t have won most races during the season — 5 of the 8 champions in this era has won five times during the season that they were crowned. One of them won just three times. Only three times in eight years did a driver that won the most races during the course of a season actually win the title itself.
• Eventual champion has actually started each season off slow – It actually pays to have a slower start to a season for some reason. Last year Larson had 1 win in the 1st 14 races. In 2020, Chase Elliott had just one win through the first 22 races. He won the title. In 2018, Joey Logano had one win in the first 32 races but won the championship. Martin Truex Jr. had one trip to victory lane in the first 17 races of the 2017 campaign. He won the championship still. Jimmie Johnson in 2016 was 2-for-29 in 2016 and Harvick 1-for-30 in 2014. They both were champions in those seasons.
• In 5 of the last 6 years we’ve had teammates in the Championship 4
  • 2016: JGR (Busch, Truex Jr.)
  • 2018: JGR (Busch, Truex Jr.)
  • 2019: JGR (Hamlin, Busch, Truex Jr.)
  • 2020: Penske (Keselowski, Logano)
  • 2021: JGR (Hamlin, Truex Jr.), HMS (Larson, Elliott)
  • This year, we have HMS (Elliott), JGR (Bell), Penske (Logano), Trackhouse (Chastain)
  • JGR has had a driver in the Championship 4 every year.