What The Metrics Had To Say About Phoenix
The world of sports data is constantly changing, with more information available to teams, athletes, and even the common fan that can be used to predict performance trends. NASCAR is no different, and the author of this post has built several analytical metrics to help give race fans a more advanced view of the action on the track—because, as any driver can attest, auto racing isn't always a fair sport.
The following numbers—explained in full detail here—are designed to measure driver performance in various aspects of each race, many of which come from NASCAR’s Loop Data. They are ranked by True Driver Rating (TDR), a variation on NASCAR’s Driver Rating, which incorporates factors such as speed, track position, passing, luck, and equipment strength to best estimate how well each driver performed during an event.
The metrics from Sunday's Cup Series Championship Race at Phoenix Raceway are as shown below:
Joey Logano won the race at Phoenix, as well as the Cup Series title, and -- at least within the context of Sunday -- he earned it. He tied for the best Expected Average Running Position (XARP) and scored the highest Weighted Percentage Led (WPL), and that gave him the slight edge in TDR. It's Logano's first and only TDR win of the season, and it came at the perfect time.
Logano had to hold off his teammate and fellow championship contender Ryan Blaney for the win, and Blaney had an impressive race as well. His passing marks were even better than Logano's after starting deeper in the field, but he ended up behind both Logano and Christopher Bell in the metrics. Bell finished fifth and was not part of the title race, but he led the most laps on Sunday and had the best Average Running Position. Additionally, Bell led the field in Equipment-Adjusted Running Position Score (EARP).
All three of those drivers earned TDR scores of well above 200, while a surprising name ranks a distant fourth. That's rookie Carson Hocevar, who finished 18th but ran near the top 10 for most of the way, and significantly outperformed both his Spire Motorsports teammates. Hocevar is one of the most promising young drivers in the Cup Series, and yet seems to still be underrated due to the middling equipment he drives. He was crowned the 2024 Rookie of the Year, and rightfully so.
The remainder of the top 10 on the metrics chart is mostly in line with how those drivers finished. Additional title contenders William Byron and Tyler Reddick placed fifth and seventh respectively, with Denny Hamlin sandwiched in between. Daniel Suarez, Bubba Wallace, and Kyle Larson all rounded out the top 10, all three of whom finished there on the track as well. In fact, aside from Hocevar, each driver in the top 15 in TDR also finished in the top 15.
As a result, the 2024 Cup Series season concluded with one more impressive Fairness Rating of .867. Fairness will be a big offseason topic of discussion this winter after Logano's title, coming in a year in which he placed 12th in full-season points but took advantage of NASCAR's playoff format. Logano may not have been the best driver all season (more on that later this week), but he did step up when it counted.
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