NASCAR at Pocono results: Chase Briscoe overcomes pit road miscue for his first win with Joe Gibbs Racing

Briscoe left his pit stall before his car was full of fuel but was able to save enough gas to make it to the checkered flag

By Steven Taranto

Jun 22, 2025 at 8:34 pm ET • 4 min read

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Despite a miscommunication that left his car short on the amount of fuel they needed to make it to the end of the race, Chase Briscoe executed a successful economy run by saving as much gas as he needed to hold off Denny Hamlin and win The Great American Getaway 400 at Pocono Raceway on Sunday. Briscoe's win is his first as a member of Joe Gibbs Racing, and the third of his Cup career.

After catching a well-timed caution during an earlier cycle of green flag stops, Briscoe was able to assume the lead and control of the race for much of the second half of the day. But Briscoe's chances of winning took a serious hit on his final stop of the day when he left his pit stall before getting the go-ahead from crew chief James Small, which meant he left pit road before receiving the amount of fuel Small had calculated was necessary to make it to the finish.

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Steven Taranto

Despite catching a break when Shane van Gisbergen spun to bring out a caution in the middle of green flag stops, Briscoe had to aggressively save fuel over the final green flag run to the end, and he had to do so with both Denny Hamlin and Ryan Blaney running just behind him and pushing him to run harder. Ultimately, Briscoe's fuel-saving tactics worked, as he was able to both hold the lead and conserve more than the gas he needed for his first win of the season and the latest milestone win in his Cup career.

After it was announced that Stewart-Haas Racing would shut down at the end of the 2024 season, Briscoe was tabbed by Joe Gibbs Racing to be the one who would take over the No. 19 for former Cup champion Martin Truex Jr. upon his retirement at season's end. Now, Briscoe has rewarded Gibbs for giving him the opportunity to drive their cars with his first win as a member of the team.

"It was kind of weird. I wasn't driving hard, so it's not like I was on the ragged edge, but it was just so hard to have a guy chasing you, right?" Briscoe told Prime. "Especially the guy that's probably the greatest of all-time here [at Pocono]. ... An amazing day for our race team. This is really the first race we've kind of executed, truthfully, all year long.

"To get Johnny Morris, Bass Pro Shops in Victory Lane, to get Toyota in Victory Lane, Joe Gibbs Racing -- they took a big chance on me. Like, I wasn't everybody's first choice, I think, but for me to be able to get here and finally deliver a win is just an awesome feeling."

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Hamlin, in his first race back after missing Mexico City due to the birth of his son, ran second ahead of Blaney, Chris Buescher and Chase Elliott. John Hunter Nemechek, Kyle Larson, Ryan Preece, Brad Keselowski and Austin Cindric rounded out the top 10.

With Briscoe having become the fourth different driver to win in the last five races, 11 drivers have now earned a spot in the NASCAR playoffs, leaving five available spots and increasing the amount of pressure on drivers below the cut line. Preece now trails Alex Bowman by 20 points for the final spot above the cut line, with Bubba Wallace now feeling the heat with just 29 points to the good on the cut line.

After mechanical problems prevented him from making a qualifying lap, Wallace would be ensnared by a rash of brake failures that plagued 23XI Racing, as a brake rotor explosion sent him into the turn 2 wall and ended his day after 54 laps. Wallace's crash came just after a similar brake failure for teammate Riley Herbst, and Tyler Reddick would finish a lap down in 32nd after his own brake issues forced him behind the wall in the middle of the race.

While nine races still remaining before the start of the playoffs, Sunday's race marked the last before the first NASCAR In-Season Challenge, a new tournament which will pit 32 drivers throughout the field in head-to-head matchups with each other over the next five races. The in-season tournament will begin next weekend at EchoPark Speedway in Atlanta, and then conclude with the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis, with the winner receiving a $1 million bonus.