JOLIET, Ill. — It was an astute strategy that gave Chase Briscoe the lead in the final stage of Sunday‘s eero 400 at Chicagoland Speedway.
It was sheer determination that kept him there in a triumphant return to the 1.5-mile intermediate speedway after a seven-year hiatus.
In the closing laps of the 19th NASCAR Cup Series race of the season, Briscoe stayed off the charge of his equally determined Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, Christopher Bell, to win for the first time this season, the first time at Chicagoland and the sixth time in his career.
RELATED: Race results | At-track photos: Chicagoland | NASCAR video highlights
Bell‘s pursuit of Briscoe fell short when his No. 20 Toyota tightened up in dirty air on the final lap, allowing Briscoe to power his No. 19 Toyota across the finish line 0.276 seconds ahead of his teammate.
With pole winner Denny Hamlin running third, Joe Gibbs Racing fashioned a 1-2-3 finish for the eighth time in organization history, most recently this season at Nashville Superspeedway. Seven Toyotas finished in the top 10—a high-water mark for the manufacturer in a Cup Series race.
“I feel so American winning in the Bass Pro Shops red, white and blue car, Fourth of July weekend, 250 years,” an elated Briscoe said after climbing from his car. “Man, just what an unbelievable race car. (Crew chief) James (Small) did a great job. Team did a (great) job. Honestly did not see this coming.
“I kind of felt like I was struggling in practice, in qualifying, but James and the group did a great job. Man, just so cool to get this paint scheme back in Victory Lane.”
In the fight for the win, lapped traffic helped Briscoe maintain his edge over Bell.
“I kind of got lucky having lapped cars,” Briscoe said. “I was struggling pretty bad. Christopher was certainly coming. Out of all the people to race against, I knew Christopher was going to be clean with me.
“I thought that was about as good a race as you could get. The cat-and-mouse game, and we were slipping and sliding around. Hopefully, you could see it on TV. So excited to be back in Chicagoland. Hopefully we can be back.”
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Bell has led 417 laps this season but has posted four runner-up finishes without a win.
“Yeah, it was a great day,” Bell said despite the obvious disappointment of finishing second. “First race with (sponsor) Saia on the Toyota. We almost went to Victory Lane. Yeah, Toyotas are fast. It seems like a monkey can drive them, so it’s just disappointing when you get beat by another monkey …
“I’m just a second-place driver. That’s what I am.”
Fourth-place finisher William Byron held the lead, with Briscoe running second, when Briscoe steered his car to pit road for his final stop on Lap 215 of 267. Byron followed suit a lap later, but the driver of the No. 24 Chevrolet lost the lead in the exchange.
Briscoe held the top spot for the final 46 laps, as both Bell and Hamlin passed Byron for position in the closing laps.
“A win would have been awesome,” said Byron, who posted his fourth top-five finish of the season. “We‘ve been craving that for a long time and working really hard to get there. We could kind of taste it there with a couple runs to go.
“We got jumped by the No. 19 (Briscoe) there on that last green flag pit cycle, but I just didn‘t quite have the pace that last run to keep up with him, and then those other guys had fresher tires at the end.”
The final stage ran caution-free from a restart on Lap 172.
Alex Bowman ran fifth, his first top-five result since finishing third at Texas in May. Bubba Wallace, Ryan Blaney, Ty Gibbs, Corey Heim and Riley Herbst completed the top 10.
MORE: In-Season Challenge hub
Advancing to the quarterfinals of the In-Season Challenge were Briscoe over Gibbs, Byron over Larson, Bowman over Austin Cindric, Chase Elliott over Michael McDowell, Hamlin over Erik Jones, Bell over Chris Buescher, Todd Gilliland over Carson Hocevar and Blaney over Shane van Gisbergen.
The race featured 28 lead changes among 13 drivers, with Byron leading 91 laps, Briscoe 51, Wallace 35 and Hamlin 30. There were seven cautions for 43 laps.
The In-Season Challenge continues in next Sunday‘s Quaker State 400 Available at Walmart at EchoPark Speedway near Atlanta (7 p.m. ET, TNT Sports, truTV, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Stage 2 recap
William Byron won Stage 2 of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Chicagoland Speedway, making it a sweep of the first two frames.
Chase Briscoe finished second, Denny Hamlin third, Ty Gibbs fourth and Ryan Blaney fifth. Christopher Bell, Chase Elliott, Alex Bowman, Austin Cindric and John Hunter Nemechek completed the top 10 and points earners.
MORE: Stage 2 results | Watch Byron sweep the stages
On Lap 93, just moments into the second frame after a brief repair for a pothole, Kyle Larson went for a single-car spin exiting Turn 4 while running third. He got stuck in the infield grass, and safety crews needed to pull him out, ultimately resulting in the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports driver falling multiple laps down.
The race returned to green-flag conditions on Lap 99 and headed into the longest run of the night, as teams began peeling toward pit road for service. But on Lap 131, Tyler Reddick reportedly ran over a splitter stay from another car in his No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota, which destroyed his radiator. Fluid began spewing out of his car, forcing a caution as he went behind the wall for repairs.
Reddick fell several laps down, and it marked a significant issue for the fourth time in the last five races for the five-time 2026 winner. He led the series by as many as 129 points after Watkins Glen, but with a power steering issue last weekend at Sonoma, Hamlin took the points lead for the first time all year.
Hamlin had pitted just before the yellow, along with the likes of William Byron, Ty Gibbs, Chase Briscoe and Bubba Wallace. Other contenders like Ryan Blaney and Christopher Bell needed to pit as track crews cleaned the racing surface.
Stage 2 ended with a 22-lap green-flag run.
Stage 1 recap
William Byron won Stage 1 of Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Chicagoland Speedway in an 80-lap segment that featured a pair of renewed rivalries.
Kyle Larson finished second, followed by Bubba Wallace, Austin Cindric and Chase Briscoe. Chris Buescher, Riley Herbst, Denny Hamlin, Ty Gibbs and Tyler Reddick completed the top 10.
MORE: Stage 1 results | Watch Byron capture Stage 1 dub
On the opening lap, Ryan Preece went spinning off Turn 2 after contact from Erik Jones following a stackup. Preece slid in front of rookie Connor Zilisch, who veered left down the backstretch to avoid the crash, but lost control and nosed into the inside wall. The crash marked Zilisch’s seventh DNF of the season and his fifth over the last seven races. He earned a top 10 last weekend at Sonoma Raceway — the 19-year-old’s first in Cup competition. He was evaluated and released from the infield care center.
Meanwhile, Preece fell multiple laps down for repairs, losing crucial points as the No. 60 RFK Racing driver entered Sunday 15th in the standings, 13 markers above the provisional Chase cutline.
On Lap 32, Zane Smith bumped Carson Hocevar in Turns 1 and 2, resulting in both drivers contacting the outside wall and causing the second yellow of the evening. Both drivers made their 100th Cup starts on Sunday and faced off in Round 1 of the In-Season Challenge last weekend. They have history, too, dating back to an incident at Iowa Speedway last summer.
For the third caution of the race, Austin Hill crashed in between Turns 3 and 4 after contact from Shane van Gisbergen on Lap 48 — an incident Hill believed was intentional. At both Pocono Raceway on June 14 and Naval Base Coronado on June 21, the drivers were involved in crashes together, with the latter coming during a battle for the lead.
During the caution, Hamlin had a slow pit stop and dropped outside the top 20, but clawed back for stage points. Of note, Cindric stayed out during that yellow and held on with older tires to earn seven key points in his postseason quest.
Note: Inspection was completed in the Cup Series garage with no issues, confirming Briscoe as the Chicagoland winner. The Nos. 11 and 48 will return to the NASCAR R&D Center in Concord, North Carolina, for teardown inspection.