Event statistics following the 10th race of the 2018 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season, the GEICO 500 at Talladega Superspeedway in Alabama.
Joey Logano scored his first victory of the season in the 188-lap race, leading a race-high 70 laps, including the final 42 in his No. 22 Ford. Trailing by 0.127 seconds was Kurt Busch, with Chase Elliott, Kevin Harvick and defending race winner Ricky Stenhouse Jr. rounding out the top five.
GEICO 500
Talladega Superspeedway – Talladega, Alabama
- Winner (starting position): Joey Logano (9th)
- Top Five: Joey Logano, Kurt Busch, Chase Elliott, Kevin Harvick, Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
- Full Results: Joey Logano, Kurt Busch, Chase Elliott, Kevin Harvick, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., David Ragan, Aric Almirola, Alex Bowman, Ryan Newman, Daniel Suarez, Chris Buescher, Jimmie Johnson, Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin, Ty Dillon, Darrell Wallace Jr., Kasey Kahne, Ryan Blaney, Matt DiBenedetto, D.J. Kennington, Cole Whitt, Brendan Gaughan, Timothy Peters, Gray Gaulding, Ross Chastain, Martin Truex Jr., Joey Gase, Jamie McMurray, William Byron, Paul Menard, Clint Bowyer, Michael McDowell, Brad Keselowski, A.J. Allmendinger, Austin Dillon, Timmy Hill, Reed Sorenson, Trevor Bayne, Erik Jones, Kyle Larson
- Average Speed: 152.489 mph
- Laps Completed: 188
- Race Leaders: 16
- Laps Led: Joey Logano (70), Alex Bowman (26), Brad Keselowski (21), William Byron (14), Kevin Harvick (12), Denny Hamlin (11), Paul Menard (8), Matt DiBenedetto (6), Kurt Busch (5), Darrell Wallace Jr. (5), Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (4), A.J. Allmendinger (2), Daniel Suarez (1), Chris Buescher (1), Kasey Kahne (1), Brendan Gaughan (1)
- Pole Position: Kevin Harvick (194.448 mph; 49.247 seconds)
- Hard Charger: Aric Almirola (+33; 40th to 7th)
- Margin of Victory: .127 seconds
- Car Count: 40
- Cars Entered: 40
- Cars Running at Finish: 26 (of 40; or 65 percent of the field)
- Drivers to Finish on Lead Lap: 22
- Cautions: 6 for 29 laps
- Lead Changes: 25
- Stage Winners: Brad Keselowski (1), Paul Menard (2)
- Manufacturer Breakdown: Chevrolet (18); Ford (15); Toyota (7)
Notes of Interest – Race/Weekend Recap
- This was the 98th race at Talladega and the 117th Cup Series race in the state of Alabama.
- This is Joey Logano’s first Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory of the 2018 season and the 19th of his career. Overall, this is Logano’s 49th victory in NASCAR’s three national series (in 516 races).
- This is Logano’s third Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series victory at Talladega, all in the last six races. It marked Logano’s first win at Talladega in a spring race; he won the 2015 and 2016 fall races.
- Logano is the 11th driver with three or more Cup Series victories at Talladega. He tied David Pearson, Cale Yarborough and Davey Allison for eighth all-time. Overall, Logano has five victories at Talladega between the Cup Series and Xfinity Series.
- Logano has won at least one Cup Series race in each of the last seven seasons, and eight of his 10 fulltime seasons on the circuit.
- This is Logano’s first top-three finish of the season, but his fourth top-five and series-high ninth top-10 finishes (including sixth straight) in 10 races in 2018.
- This is Logano’s seventh victory on an oval track measuring two miles or more (eighth including the 2.45-mile Watkins Glen Circuit). Four of his last six victories have come on tracks of two miles or more, and in that same stretch, three of those wins have come at Talladega.
- Logano started from ninth, the first time he’s started ninth and won a race. Logano has started 10th or better in five of his last six victories.
- Logano is the second driver to win from the ninth position this season; Clint Bowyer started from ninth and won at Martinsville Speedway in March.
- Logano is the first driver to win at Talladega from the ninth starting position since Jamie McMurray won the 2013 fall race from that position.
- Logano’s ninth-place starting position dropped the average starting position for a winner just slightly, from 8.01 to 8.02.
- Logano won the race by .127 seconds over Kurt Busch, marking the fourth consecutive time the winner has had a margin of victory of less than a half second at Talladega.
- Logano averaged 152.489 mph, the fastest race at Talladega in the last three events at the track. The race included six cautions for 29 laps, both the fewest since the 2016 fall race.
- This is Logano’s 17th victory with Team Penske, as well as 17th career victory driving a Ford.
- Logano’s 70 laps marks the most he’s led in a victory since leading 138 laps in his victory at Michigan International Speedway in the first of two races at the track in 2016. It also marked the most laps he’s led in any of his three victories at Talladega (had led 20 and 45 in previous two wins for a combined 65 laps).
- Logano has now led 13 races at Talladega for a total of 266 laps.
- Logano now has an average finish this season of 6.7, the second-best average finish of a driver behind Kyle Busch. He has finished ninth or better in every race but one, when he finished 19th (ISM Raceway in Avondale, Arizona).
- This is Team Penske’s first victory of 2018 and has won five of the last six races at Talladega.
- This is Ford’s series-leading fifth victory of the 2018 season and the sixth consecutive victory for the Blue Oval at Talladega (Team Penske has five of those). Ford has now won 24 races at Talladega, second to Chevrolet’s 40.
- Logano has completed all but one of the 3,235 laps this season, the most laps completed by a driver this season.
- Kurt Busch finished second, a career-best at the track but his 35th race at Talladega without a victory. Busch now has eight top fives and 19 top 10s at the 2.66-mile track.
- While leaving the track without a victory again, Kurt Busch did record his best finish of the season (had finished third on four occasions), his first top five and fourth top 10, to move from an eighth-place tie in points to sole possession of fifth.
- Chase Elliott finished third, his second consecutive top-three finish and his third of the season. Elliott, in the highest-finishing Chevrolet, also notched a career-best at Talladega, with fifth being his previous best in 2016. Elliott started fifth, and has started eighth or better in all five Cup Series races at the track.
- Continuing Ford’s dominance was Kevin Harvick, who finished fourth after leading 12 laps (has led 25 races for 214 laps). It was Harvick’s fifth consecutive finish of seventh or better (leads all drivers over the span of last five races), and put him into a tie with Kyle Busch for most top fives this season with seven.
- Harvick was the polesitter, his first pole of the season, second at Talladega (first since 2005 spring race) and 22nd of his career. Harvick has earned the pole for a race in six consecutive seasons (hadn’t had a pole in six straight seasons before that) and 10 of his 18 seasons.
- Defending race winner Ricky Stenhouse Jr. finished fifth, his fourth top-five finish at Talladega and second top-five finish in the last three races. Stenhouse led four laps.
- David Ragan recorded his first top-10 finish of the season with a sixth-place effort, his first top 10 the 2017 fall race at Talladega. Each of Ragan’s last four top-10 finishes have been on restrictor-plate tracks (including each of the last three Talladega races).
- Aric Almirola advanced a race-high 33 positions, starting 40th (last) and finishing seventh, the sixth Ford driver in the top seven. Almirola has four top 10s in 10 races this season, and has advanced the most positions in a race four times this year, the only driver with more than one race as the hard charger.
- Alex Bowman finished eighth after leading 26 laps (has led two races for a combined 39 laps, both on restrictor-plate tracks). Bowman has three top 10s in the last five races, after a best finish of 13th (twice) in the first five races.
- Ryan Newman was ninth in his third top-10 finish of the season and second in the last three races. Like Kyle Busch, Newman is also an 0-for-30-something at Talladega, his being no wins in 33 starts. However, he’s scored 13 top 10s at the track, retiring nine of those 33 (six crashes, three engine-related).
- Daniel Suarez finished 10th for the second consecutive race (also 10th at Richmond), his third top-10 finish of the season and first top 10 at Talladega in three starts (has improved finishing position each race). Suarez drove the highest-finishing Toyota.
- Chris Buescher finished 11th, leading his first lap of the season. Buescher is the 29th driver to lead a race in 2018. Buescher was also one of four drivers to lead laps for the first time at Talladega, with Hendrick Motorsports teammates Alex Bowman (26) and William Byron (14) and Alabama native Darrell Wallace Jr. (5) pushing the all-time total of leaders to 189 drivers.
- Jimmie Johnson finished 12th, and remains one of five drivers to compete in every race this season and not lead a lap (others are David Ragan, Ty Dillon, Gray Gaulding and Trevor Bayne).
- Kyle Busch finished 13th, his first finish outside the top 10 since finishing 25th in the 500, and only his third finish of the season outside the top three. Busch’s three-race winning streak and season-best nine-race streak of laps led both came to a conclusion.
- Despite two pit-road speeding penalties under green-flag conditions, Denny Hamlin finished 14th.
- Drivers to record or tie their season-best finishes included: Kasey Kahne (17th); D.J. Kennington (20th); Cole Whitt (21st); Brendan Gaughan (22nd); Timothy Peters (23rd; only driver making his series debut this weekend); and Joey Gase (27th).
- Kyle Larson finished 40th, the first time he’s finished last since the penultimate race of 2017 at ISM Raceway.
- This is the second consecutive Talladega race in which the scheduled 188-lap distance was contested without being abbreviated or going into overtime.
- The 25 lead changes marked the fewest in a race at Talladega since the 1998 fall race, which featured only 20 lead changes. Races at Talladega average 39.47 lead changes per race.
- A total of 15 drivers led the race, one more than the average of 14.03 drivers coming into the race (average moved up to 14.04 following the race).
- A total of 25 drivers improved on their starting position in the race.
- A total of 22 drivers finished on the lead lap, the second most in a race this season.
- This is the sixth race out of 10 this season in which one driver has not led at least half of the race’s laps.
- A total of 26 cars finished the race, one more than the fewest of 25 that completed the Daytona 500.
- The next Cup Series race will be Sunday, May 6, with the AAA 400 Drive for Autism at Dover International Speedway in Delaware.
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