There were a lot of unknowns coming into the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season regarding how Chase Briscoe would perform in his first year driving the No. 19 Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing. After all, he was taking over the ride that was piloted by 2017 champion Martin Truex Jr., who won 15 races during his six-year stint with JGR from 2019 to 2024.
Briscoe had spent his previous four seasons at the Cup level driving for the now-defunct Stewart-Haas Racing, where he was a two-time winner.
Now in the best car he has ever had in the Cup Series, Briscoe is showing why Joe Gibbs gave him this opportunity, winning a series-high seven poles this season and adding a pair of race wins at Pocono Raceway in June and the playoff-opening Southern 500 at Darlington Raceway in August, when he led a commanding 309 of the 367 laps.
The wins and the speed have been impressive, but Briscoe's consistency has elevated him to another level. While teammate Denny Hamlin faced a lose-lose situation when he got into Bubba Wallace on the final lap at Kansas Speedway and continues to put himself in these types of precarious positions when racing for a championship, Briscoe keeps hitting the ball down the fairway and staying out of the headlines, which could ultimately benefit him in the end.
Chase Briscoe's consistency can put him on exclusive list this weekend
As the round of 12 cutoff race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval approaches on Sunday, Briscoe is seventh in the standings, 21 points to the good. That is by no means a comfortable position to be in, but with top 10 finishes in each of the three most recent road course races this season, Briscoe has to feel pretty good.
Even more impressive is his streak of top five straight top 10 finishes to open the playoffs. With a sixth consecutive such result on Sunday, Briscoe would join 2026 Hall of Fame inductee Kurt Busch (2004), Hall of Famer Jimmie Johnson (2008 and 2009), three-time champion Joey Logano (2015) and 59-race winner Hamlin (2021) as drivers with six consecutive top 10 finishes to begin the postseason, per NASCAR.com.
Busch and Johnson each won the title while Hamlin made the Championship 4 and Logano was ousted in the round of 8, so there is certainly a path to the championship round at Phoenix Raceway for Briscoe, especially considering his consistency anywhere the series goes.
Briscoe has led laps in all five playoff races, with a worst finish of 10th at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, and was a solid fourth at Kansas as the drama unfolded ahead of him, with Chase Elliott taking advantage of the contact between Hamlin and Wallace to pick up the thrilling win.
As Hamlin and Wallace proved most fans wrong who believed the two would not race each other as hard as their competitors, given the driver/owner role that Hamlin has with JGR and the 23XI Racing team he co-owns with NBA legend Michael Jordan, it was Briscoe once again lurking close behind.
Briscoe may not have as many wins as Hamlin (five), Christopher Bell (four), Kyle Larson (three) or Ryan Blaney (three), all of whom are ahead of him in the standings, but his consistency should not go unnoticed.
While a win on Sunday would guarantee him a spot in the next round and a round of 8 win would lock him into the Championship 4, there will be at least one spot available on points for the drivers left fighting for the title when the Martinsville Speedway race rolls around in late October.
Even if he does not win again, Briscoe has proven he can lock down a top 10 finish on any given weekend during the playoffs and score stage points in the process. His first Cup win also came at Phoenix in 2022, proving he knows his way around the one-mile oval.
He might just add his name to that illustrious list on Sunday with a sixth consecutive top 10 finish and go on to join Busch and Johnson as champions by season's end if his consistency remains over the next five weeks.