Ryan Blaney won at Martinsville to get back into the title race.

Last year, Blaney won on the half-mile short track a week before capturing the first Cup Series title of his career. Blaney won again at Martinsville on Sunday to clinch a spot in Championship 4.

Blaney passed Chase Elliott with 15 laps remaining and will race for the title with Team Penske teammate Joey Logano, 23XI’s Tyler Reddick and Joe Gibbs Racing’s Christopher Bell, who bounced off the wall on the final lap as he passed Bubba Wallace who was slowing down. sneak into Championship 4 ahead of William Byron.

At least that’s what we thought.

NASCAR took several minutes to determine the running order after the race, as the sanctioning body banned wall-riding drivers from gaining positions at Martinsville after Ross Chastain’s incredible ‘Hail Melon’ in 2022. Wallace said he slowed down in the final laps because he had a falling tire.

The Chevrolet guys behind Byron also made it clear they weren’t going to pass him. Byron had Chastain and Austin Dillon behind him for the final laps of the race and although it appeared both drivers had more speed than Byron, neither separated from each other to attempt to overtake Byron for sixth place.

Bell’s pass of Wallace meant that Bell and Byron were tied in the points standings for fourth and final place in the title race. But NASCAR ruled that Bell committed a “safety violation” by riding the wall as he did.

“I don’t know what to say, I don’t know. I don’t know what to say,” Bell said after NASCAR’s decision. “My gesture was completely different from Ross’s.”

He’s right. Bell was out of breath before hitting the wall. Chastain intentionally rammed him into the wall to go faster.

The moments of waiting – and the apparent race manipulation that preceded it – overshadowed Blaney’s victory. He passed Elliott nine laps after Elliott passed Hendrick Motorsports teammate Kyle Larson for the lead. Larson, who leads all Cup Series drivers with six wins, is missing from the playoffs along with Bell, Denny Hamlin and Elliott.

Bell was officially relegated to the last car a lap away, in 22nd, after NASCAR’s decision. Officially, he misses the title race by four points ahead of Byron.

NASCAR’s scoring decision is final and cannot be appealed or protested.

Blaney is clutch again

Blaney needed to win at Martinsville a year ago to have a chance at the title. He failed to gain points. He was in a similar situation on Sunday.

And he delivered. Blaney led only three times for 32 laps, but had a fast car all day and ran near the front of the field. He even overcame losing two spots during a bizarre late-race occurrence when NASCAR threw the green flag as a wheel from Kyle Busch’s car bounced across the track.

Busch’s wheel fell off before the race went green with less than 100 laps to go. But NASCAR still took the lead and resumed racing, apparently not seeing the steering wheel on the track. The race was green for a few seconds before NASCAR issued the caution again.

The easiest decision would have been to keep the same restart order and just start again. Instead, NASCAR declared that the order in which cars crossed the start/finish line was the official running order.

That didn’t matter to Blaney. He had stopped under the previous caution and his tire advantage proved crucial in the final laps.

Xfinity 500 results

1. Ryan Blaney

2. Chase Elliott

3. Kyle Larson

4. Austin Cindric

5. Denny Hamlin

6. William Byron

7. Austin Dillon

8. Ross Chastain

9. Brad Keselowski

10. Joey Logano

11. Noah Grayson

12. Shane van Gisbergen

13. Alex Bowman

14. Ryan Preece

15. Chase Briscoe

16. Josh Berry

17. Daniel Henric

18. Bubba Wallace

19. Erik Jones

20. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.

21. Zane Smith

22. Christopher Bell

23. Daniel Suarez

24. Martin Truex Jr.

25. Carson though

26. Todd Gilliland

27. Kaz Grala

28. Kyle Busch

29. Justin Haley

30. Chris Buescher

31. John Hunter Nemechek

32. Ty Gibbs

33. Michael McDowell

34. Tyler Reddick

35. Corey LaJoie

36. Harrison Burton

37. Josh Bilicki