Joey Logano left Bristol Motor Speedway on Saturday with the 40th NASCAR Cup victory of his career and a substantially different place in the 2026 championship fight. The Team Penske driver gained four positions in the standings, rising from seventh to third with seven races left in the season.
His third victory of 2026 brought 73 points and left him 16 behind new leader Kyle Larson. Logano’s brief postrace message matched the defiant mood surrounding his latest milestone.
“For the haters, baby.”
Logano reaches 40 Cup victories
Logano led 93 of the 500 laps at Bristol and completed the race in 3:02:19.380. He took control with approximately seven laps remaining after passing Carson Hocevar and Ty Gibbs, who had led 120 laps and controlled the final restart.
The victory gave Logano his third win this season.
Reaching 40 career victories adds another round number to a Cup career conducted entirely within a series whose roots extend to 1949, when the top division began as the Strictly Stock Division. Logano now enters the fourth Chase race as the highest-ranked driver to win the latest round.
The result also marked a sharp points swing. Bristol awarded 73 points to Logano, compared with 47 for runner-up Larson and 41 for third-place finisher Hocevar. That return moved Logano ahead of Christopher Bell, Ty Gibbs, Ryan Blaney and Tyler Reddick in the standings.
A rapid rise through the Chase
The Bristol event was Race 29 of 36 and the third round of the 10-race Chase. Sixteen drivers began the championship phase at Darlington on September 6, where Bell passed defending champion Larson to win the Southern 500.
Larson then won at World Wide Technology Raceway on September 13, ending a 51-race winless run that had lasted 16 months. His overtime victory led a Hendrick Motorsports 1-2 finish and was the 33rd Cup win of his career.
Logano answered one race later.
After Bristol, Larson leads with 2,206 points. Denny Hamlin has 2,205, while Logano sits third on 2,190. Bell is one point behind Logano on 2,189. The gap from first to fourth is 17 points.
Logano’s advance is the largest positional gain among the top four after Bristol. He arrived at the Tennessee short track seventh in the standings, then departed as one of four drivers confirmed with at least three wins this season. Tyler Reddick, Hamlin and Blaney are the others.
A different path from Larson and Hamlin
Larson’s rise to first followed consecutive results that included his Gateway victory and second place at Bristol. Hamlin took the opposite path, losing a championship lead he had held from Race 18 through Race 28.
“We have to get to running a little bit better.”
Hamlin’s assessment came after Bristol reduced the fight for first to a single point. Logano, meanwhile, cut into both drivers’ advantage by maximizing the points available from his victory.
Blaney is sixth with 2,154 points, 36 behind his Team Penske teammate. Hocevar occupies eighth on 2,121, leaving 69 points between Logano and the final position listed inside the top eight.
Kansas starts an intermediate-track run
The next phase begins Sunday, September 27, at Kansas Speedway. The fourth race of the Chase is also the 30th points-paying event of the 36-race season, with the start scheduled for 3 p. m. ET.
Kansas is a 1.5-mile track and opens a run of three consecutive events on circuits of that length. Las Vegas follows from October 1 through October 4, with Charlotte scheduled for October 8 through October 11.
Chase Elliott is the defending Kansas winner. Logano will arrive 16 points behind Larson, one behind Hamlin, and one ahead of Bell as the Cup field moves from Bristol’s short track to the first of those three consecutive 1.5-mile races.
