Ross Chastain Disrupts the NASCAR Playoffs Again, Wins at Kansas Speedway

In the fourth race of the NASCAR Playoffs, a second non-playoff driver has pulled into Victory Lane, first Chris Buescher at Watkins Glen and now Ross Chastain at Kansas Speedway. Chastain narrowly missed the Playoffs in 2024 after making it the past two seasons; a win evaded the No. 1 driver in the regular season, and the parity currently on display in the NASCAR field made all the difference.

This isn't the first time Chastain has succeeded as a disrupter to the NASCAR playoff system; last year, he won the championship race at Phoenix Motor Speedway after he missed out on the Championship Round of four. Chastain finished ahead of Ryan Blaney, who clinched his first championship with his second-place finish.

"This is what cup racing is all about; this is what Justin Marks bought into NASCAR with Trackhouse to do stuff like this and disrupt," Chastain told NBC Sports. "Look, there have been times this year that we couldn’t disrupt the little pond outside of Darlington, let alone a Cup Race. It’s hard, it’s really tough."

Chastain and Trackhouse have been in the disruption business when it comes to the NASCAR Playoffs for years, including his infamous wall ride at Martinsville in 2022 which propelled him into the round of eight.

At Kansas, Chastain held off another one of 2023's Championship four, William Byron, in the final stage to ultimately win; Byron collected the most points of the remaining 12 playoff contenders. Byron believes that with more laps, he had the speed to get to Chastain's rear bumper and make a move for the victory but lost too much time coming from the second row on the final restart.

"Just clean air," Byron told Kim Coon of NBC Sports what he was missing. "I feel like he got the restart he needed to, and I was in the second row, just trying to clear those guys. Once I got cleared of them, my balance was okay, a little bit tight.

I was inching up on him, I needed for it to be a longer run being in second. Damn it, I wanted that one really bad. It just sucks, you’re so close and going to Talladega you know what that is."

Chastain's was trailing Kyle Busch, another driver to miss the playoffs without a regular season win, with 32 laps remaining. When the leader got to Chase Briscoe and attempted to lap the driver, who's still in playoff contention, he was pinched into the wall, spinning out from the lead.

With damage, Busch fell back to 19th as he desperately tried to extend his race-win streak to 21 straight seasons.

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