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We are seeing an incredible amount of parity and new faces leading the way in the Cup series.
By now everybody knows the deal - six winners in six races, including three first-time winners. While some people had Austin Cindric, Chase Briscoe and Ross Chastain getting wins, nobody could have seen all three coming in the first 1/6 of the season.
With six different winners, the question has inevitably been thrown out - can we see more than 16 winners before the Playoffs start? Just looking at the names that haven't won, including Chase Elliott, Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski, Joey Logano, Ryan Blaney, Kurt Busch, Aric Almirola, all of Joe Gibbs Racing and others, there seems to be a great case to exceed 16 winners.
However, we said the exact same thing in 2021.
Through six races last year, we saw two first-time winners in Michael McDowell and Christopher Bell, a second-time winner in William Byron and Kyle Larson, who was seen as a relative surprise that early in the season. We asked the same question as we are now. Even with 10 drivers scoring wins in 11 races, just three more drivers locked in a Playoff spot before the Playoffs kicked off.
This is a question that comes up almost every year, but every single time the series comes back to Earth, and a few drivers start reeling off wins, like Larson did last year.
Even with all this being said, this year feels different.
It all goes back to the parity. We haven't seen this much of it in a long time and it goes way beyond the six winners. Just look at the laps led. Blaney is the only driver with over 200 laps led. At this point in the season, we would usually have seen someone lead that many in a single race. We've already seen 30 drivers lead a lap on the season, with each race averaging over 27 lead changes. With this many new faces at the front, how long until they pull it all together and score a win?
There are still so many question marks for the rest of the season, including the first Bristol Dirt night race and the inaugural race at World Wide Technology Raceway, not to mention races at Talladega, Atlanta and Daytona. We're nowhere near done adding winners. The only questions are how many and who are left?
So to answer the question, will we see 16 or more winners? I just don't know if I can see it. Sooner or later somebody is going to figure this car out and take the series over. We saw it last year with Larson and while I don't see that level of domination, I definitely see some drivers going on some runs. It's not even just Larson, as I don't think Alex Bowman or William Byron are done winning. Joe Gibbs is just waiting to pounce as they head to one of their best tracks in Richmond. Sooner or later, I see the big guys taking their place back. But I've loved everything I've seen so far?
Do you think we'll see more than 16 winners? Feel free to leave a comment or tweet me @HBLoomis. Let's talk racing!
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