Finally, after 6 months, William Byron did it again. The Hendrick Motorsports faced a particularly difficult race at Iowa Speedway. Featuring 11 caution flags, which scattered strategies in stage 2 and an exhilarating fuel mileage approach, the Iowa Corn 350 was not devoid of drama.

However, William Byron was cut out to handle that drama after his recent experience of misery. In doing so, he reclaimed his throne from Chase Elliott, his teammate, in the championship standings.

William Byron stretches it to the last drop

Well, that last drop did not appear in a few earlier races. William Byron ran out of fuel in the races at Michigan and Indianapolis, where his dreams of winning were shattered. After NASCAR embarked on its Iowa event, Byron faced fierce competitors in the form of Brad Keselowski and Chase Briscoe. But neither of them could topple him in the last stretch, where Byon made a gamble. Byron made his final pit stop on Lap 206 of 350 on the 0.875-mile oval, where the pit window is about 110 green-flag laps. However, Byron made it work.

The Hendrick Motorsports driver led a race-high 141 laps to clinch his first victory since winning the Daytona 500 season opener. In a post-race interview, William Byron shed light on his fuel efforts finally paying off: “Man, that was a, how about that for some fuel mileage? Was just a bout of fresh air after things not going our way with the fuel mileage. Just super thankful for Rudy, all these guys, all the engineers back in the shop, this whole race team…A lot of growing pains, it’s been tough on us, but it feels really good today to get a win. Honestly, I felt like we had a good car and just kind of braced it…Luckily, the fuel was enough there in the end. I think I ran out right there, that’s why I stopped.”

The No. 24 Chevrolet had been in the doldrums for quite some time. William Byron encountered multiple DNFs since Pocono, but all the while, he was working on himself. Now, Chase Elliott is no longer No. 1 on the championship standings. He continued, “Yeah, I think our confidence got better…I feel like our speed’s been better than it’s ever been; that’s a big reason why we stay confident. I feel like every week we work really hard together and show up prepared, show up fast. And yeah, we needed just one to go our way…Honestly, they haven’t, but today, they did.”

Indeed, it was a sweet culmination of all the hard work that William Byron’s team put in recently. That is what his crew chief also agrees with.

Pacing themselves for the next glory

The night is the darkest before dawn. Things were somewhat like that for William Byron in the past month. At Dover Motor Speedway, the No. 24 was a fixture in the top five all day. But that lasted until he was collected in a crash with just a handful of laps to go. In Michigan, Byron ran out of fuel after leading 98 laps. The same mishap occurred in Indianapolis, where Byron put up a solid chase for Bubba Wallace’s lead. These repeated failures put Byron at a disadvantage. He lost the points lead to Chase Elliott, who performed spectacularly at the Brickyard 400. The No. 24 crew chief, Rudy Fugle, lamented a day earlier, “Honestly, that’s the summer in NASCAR.”

At the same time, however, Rudy Fugle had immense faith in his team’s people. He said just before the Iowa Corn 350 race was flagged off: “It’s been rough, but I think we’re resting on the fact that we’re showing up with really fast cars every week.” He continued, “The pit crew is operating at its highest level of the year the last couple of weeks. They’ve been working really, really hard. They don’t get to show it at the road courses a lot of times. But as we’ve gone to Dover and Indy, it’s showed up. And I think the driver and the road crew are doing a great job driving the cars and building the cars.”

All that hard work finally paid off in Iowa. William Byron is now a solid contender in the playoffs, so let us wait and see what he will do next.