Week 17 NASCAR Power Rankings

Honorable Mention: Tyler Reddick is on the biggest slump of his career since he started winning races. He hasn’t won since October of last year, and only has 3 top 5s on the year. The only reason he’s even getting a mention is because of the speed this team showed last year. It’s panic time for Tyler Reddick, and if a few more people below the cutline win races, it’s a legitimate possibility that Reddick could miss the playoffs. 

10. Ryan Preece has to be the surprise of the year so far. Many, including myself, an RFK fan, labeled him at most as a top 20 points finisher and a possible winner at a short track. Now? Preece looks like a threat almost every week, and it’s not that impossible to believe that he could make the playoffs with a win before the playoffs. RFK has struggled at Atlanta, but Roush Yates engines are always a playing factor at superspeedways.

9. Chris Buescher is going to win sooner rather than later. Book It. (Not biased). He may have had the fastest car on Sunday, but dirty air mired him back in 4th. Chris might be the hottest driver right now who hasn’t won a race, other than one other driver. Buescher hasn’t found success at Atlanta recently, although he does have a superspeedway victory at Daytona in 2023.

8. Ever since his Coke 600 victory, Ross Chastain has cooled off tremendously. He was a relative no-show at Pocono, finishing 26th and collecting no stage points. Chastain needs a shake up to break this slump, and he might be getting exactly what he wants. Since the superspeedway repave, Chastain has 2 runner ups at Atlanta, both in 2022, and other than a wreck in 2023 that relegated him to 35th, he hasn’t finished worse than 13th. He’s also led laps in 5 of the 7 Atlanta superspeedway races. 

7. As I mentioned last week, the qualifying speed for Chase Briscoe has faltered a little. Also as I mentioned, this seemed to be a good thing. And a good thing it was. Briscoe picked up his first black and white tablecloth of the year at Pocono, holding off the track’s best to do it. It’s the first time the 19 team has celebrated since 2023. They may as well keep celebrating all week and forget about Atlanta, as Briscoe has only one top 15 there since the repave, a measly 15th in the inaugural race. He’s only led 10 laps total, and I don’t see him being a factor at all.

6. Chase Elliott’s problem is he’s good…when everyone else around him is great. He captured his first back to back top 5s of the season and finally looks to have competitive speed. He’s arguably the hottest guy in the sport right now, and he heads to a place he’s all to familiar with. Elliott will be back at his home track, a place that shined brightly on him back in 2022. His worst finish since the repave has only been 20th, and he has 5 top 15s and 3 top 10s. Elliott looks to lock up another win in front of the hometown crowd come Saturday.

5. Kyle Larson is in a long slump right now…or at least a long slump for him. Larson hasn’t won in a whole 5 races. Like I said, a long time. With that being said, it’s been a minute since he’s even had a race winning car, and I don’t see that changing Saturday. Other than a bronze medal in the spring, Larson hasn’t finished better than 30th but once, a 13th place run in 2022. Atlanta has not been kind to the 5 team. 

4. Ryan Blaney looked back to normal after a few weeks off. Twice on Sunday, he drove from deep in the field to the front. If dirty air wasn’t such a factor, it’s very possible that he’d have Pocono win #3 of his career. Instead, he had to settle for 3rd. Blaney has 4 superspeedway wins, with one at Daytona and 3 at Talladega. Other than his first outing at the track with a 17th place run, Blaney has a worst finish of 9th at Atlanta. You heard me: 9th. Blaney last 3 finishes at Atlanta have been 2, 3, 4 in that order, and he’s looking for Atlanta win #1.

3. Christopher Bell is an oddity. He started off hot and has dramatically cooled off. Every couple of races, he brings a race winning car sandwiched between a few mediocre runs. Sunday was a stale piece of bread in that sandwich, as he came home in 17th. Bell was quoted earlier in the year, saying, “I hate superspeedway racing.” His opinion changed, however, after he won at this track earlier in the spring. While he’s not my first pick at Atlanta, he is the most recent winner.

2. William Byron just came off the most disappointing weekend of his life. Rumblings were that this car was bad fast, and it showed in practice. He was top of the charts, and he looked to do the same in qualifying…until he spun out and started 31st. An up and down day resulted in a 27th place finish. An untimely caution trapped them deep in the field late in the race, and unlike Brad Keselowski, who restarted next to him, Byron couldn’t make up hardly any spots. He does have a few wins at Atlanta, though, and could easily turn around his luck this weekend. 

1. It's hard to miss a race and go to #1 on the rankings, and yet, that’s exactly what Denny Hamlin did. He picked up where he left off at Michigan with a pole. He led every lap of stage 1 and worked his way back to the front late. This race seemed on lock as Chase Briscoe, who leapfrogged him on pit road, was going to run out of gas, until a caution came out, giving Briscoe just enough gas to get to the end. Hamlin finished P2, and he heads to a superspeedway, something he’s very good at (although, his Atlanta finishes don’t inspire much confidence).