Start: 7th
Finish: 5th

Stage One: 11th
Stage Two: 14th

Points: 13th

Joey Logano fought his way to a top-five finish in Sunday afternoon’s Bank of America ROVAL 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, marking his tenth top-five finish of the 2023 season. After taking the green flag from the seventh position, Logano reported issues with front turn during the first run of the afternoon before bringing the Shell-Pennzoil Ford Mustang to pit road for a scheduled green flag stop on lap 20. Logano rejoined the field with four laps remaining in Stage 1 and raced to an 11th-place finish in the opening segment. Logano lined up to take the green flag for Stage 2 from seventh and settled into eighth in the running order as the field worked its way to single-file racing. After reporting a tight-handling condition throughout the 17-turn road course, Logano was brought to pit road on lap 43 for a scheduled four tire stop and a round of adjustments. Just as he was beginning to make a charge back towards the top-10, the caution flag flew with two laps remaining in the stage, resulting in a 14th-place finish in Stage 2. Several of the leaders hit pit road during the stage break, but the No. 22 team’s green flag stop allowed Logano to stay out and take the green flag from the outside of row three for the final stage. After battling with the Nos. 24 and 17 through the winding turns of the infield, Logano settled into sixth in the running order while struggling with rear grip to begin the run. The leaders made their way to pit road for scheduled green flag stops on lap 71 for four tires and fuel in which Logano found himself seventh in the running order by the time the pit cycle completed. The No. 22 team showed a strength in long run speed all afternoon, but several cautions in the latter stages of the 109-lap event prevented Logano from putting that strength on display. Logano took the final restart from fifth with ten laps to go and held steady the rest of the way in the top-five effort. With the result, Logano has now recorded top-10 finishes in five of his six career starts at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course, contributing to an average finish of 8.7.

“We executed a decent race for the most part. We could have gotten maybe a couple more [positions] on being a little quicker on some other things, but, overall, we had the speed to win if you would have put us first but I’m pretty sure anybody in the top seven would say the same thing. It was whoever was out front goes there. We ran fifth most of the day and we finished fifth and that’s just what it is.”

 

WHAT’S NEXT: The NASCAR Cup Series heads to Las Vegas Motor Speedway for the first race in the NASCAR Playoffs Round of 8 where Team Penske driver Ryan Blaney stays in the hunt for a Championship. Coverage of the South Point 400 begins at 2:30 pm E.T. on NBC, PRN Radio and Sirius XM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.