1 week Ago By Anirban Aly Mandal
Joey Logano made history at the Phoenix Raceway last Sunday when he drove the #22 Ford Mustang to victory road and clinched the third NASCAR Cup Series title of his career. On paper, it was an utterly dominant win from the Team Penske driver — having led 107 laps out of the 312-lap event. But in reality, this would be one of the most hard-fought victories in the sport’s history.
The 34-year-old, who’s made it a habit of winning the Cup Series titles in even years, started from P2, behind pole-sitter Martin Truex Jr. But after a tussle worthy of a Grand Finale, he zipped past and won the first stage. That’s when it started to go awry for the #22 driver .
The stage caution saw the leading pack jump into pit road and Logano’s crew serviced him with a pit stop that was far too long for today’s standards — 11.9 seconds. Logano lost the lead after that and knew his work was cut out when his teammate, Ryan Blaney took the lead.
The #12 driver was part of the championship 4 battle and the favorite to clinch back-to-back titles (which would have been a first since Jimmie Johnson). Things got trickier for the Penske crew when their jackman Graham Stoddard suddenly fell ill. This prompted the team to sub Austin Cindric’s jackman into Logano’s corner.
But as we know, pit stops are as much about efficiency as they are about chemistry. It wasn’t looking too good for the then-two-time champ. That said, Pat Gray proved his salt as he commandeered Logano’s stops thereafter.
It wasn’t until lap 260 that Logano would see the lead of the race again. But once he did, there was no looking back. Looking at the Grand Scheme of things, it was only Logano and Blaney who looked like they were in a championship fight.
William Byron led the race momentarily and 23XI’s Tyler Reddick had a finale to forget. With 62 laps to go, the #22 driver had to dig deep into his resolve as Blaney was on a charge. It took the #12 driver a while to clear cars before it was a straight showdown between the two teammates.
As the white flag was waved, Logano embarked on a historic lap. With his win at Phoenix, not only did he clinch yet another title for himself and Team Penske but also etched its name in the NASCAR history books becoming tied for the 5th most Cup Series Championships ever..
