DARLINGTON, S.C. — William Byron tried to focus on the bright side of a profoundly disappointing outcome Sunday at Darlington Raceway.
Byron led the first 243 laps in the Goodyear 400 before pitting. His car was rivaled in speed only by the No. 12 of Ryan Blaney, but pit road snafus and the vagaries of yellow flags kept Blaney at bay until the final laps of the race.
Byron lost positions to Tyler Reddick, Joey Logano, and Christopher Bell by running long during a cycle of green-flag pit stops midway through the final stage of the race, and his car wasn’t as effective in traffic as it had been in clean air.
“First off, really proud of my team, bringing that level of effort and preparation, have a car like that,” said Byron, who took advantage of an overtime restart to finish second to race winner Denny Hamlin.
“For us to execute like that, it was looking like it was going to be a perfect race. We were going to lead every lap. Was really proud of that.”
As it turned out, however, those who pitted earlier in the final cycle used their fresh rubber to their advantage and gained track position on the driver of the No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.
“Those guys could be aggressive on the other side of the green-flag cycle, we lost control there. Once we lost control, too late in the going to kind of get back up there.”
Byron relinquished the lead to Hamlin. Hamlin came in for service three laps later. After Byron’s pit stop, he cycled out to fifth-place behind Reddick, who inherited the lead from Hamlin on Lap 248. In clean air, Reddick was able to extend his advantage to over six seconds after 10 laps with Byron stuck behind Bell.
On fresher tires, Ryan Blaney made a late race charge. He passed Hamlin for sixth-place on Lap 266. Over the next 12 laps, Blaney moved by Logano, Byron and Bell. He was running second on Lap 278 and was finally able to pass Reddick on Lap 290.
Moments later, Reddick tagged the wall and Kyle Larson checked up to avoid hitting the No. 45. When Larson slowed, Bubba Wallace turned the No. 5 Chevrolet on the backstretch to ignite the eighth and final caution.
