The story began with the season-opening race at Daytona International Speedway in February. The winning chapter wrapped up within the next seven races, with a special view on the Circuit of The Americas and Martinsville. Yet even in October, William Byron is still stoking the flames of passion in his story based on a points dominance. And the Hendrick Motorsports driver is nothing less than a championship-hungry speed beast.

As the spotlight shines mainly on Joey Logano’s fuel mileage glory, HMS drivers were mostly struggling. Kyle Larson suffered a pit stop mishap and Chase Elliott faded to 33rd after getting caught in a rollover accident on lap 89. Only William Byron and Alex Bowman achieved top-five finishes – but the former is not satisfied.

William Byron blames himself despite a good run

When the postseason began, all HMS drivers were confident. However, the ravages of the Round of 16 caught up to them, including William Byron. After a top-ten run in Atlanta, Byron would finish 34th after a chaotic Watkins Glen engulfed most playoff drivers. However, after his average 17th-place run in Bristol, the No. 24 Chevy driver turned his fortunes around. Byron got on a rollercoaster ride of top-five finishes, and that glorious ride did not stop, even in Las Vegas. But being in Rick Hendrick’s team, which owns 10 wins in Las Vegas, Byron chided himself for missing the South Point 400 win.

William Byron and his team added 15 stage points, steadily improving the car throughout the event’s 400.5 miles. But in a post-race interview, Byron said dejectedly, “Yeah, it’s good, you know. But we need to win.” He acknowledged the decent run despite the setbacks: “I think that we improved a lot as the race went on, and really, really proud of my guys…the adjustments and keeping up with the car at the racetrack. It was pretty dire there at the beginning of the race, Then we got a two-tire call and a bunch of stage 1 points.”

Eventually, they had to bow to Joey Logano‘s fuel mileage game and Christopher Bell’s indomitable speed. So William Byron hailed his rivals and lamented his lost chance to win again in Las Vegas. “We really managed our race well – had a really good shot at winning there in the last stage. The 20 was really good – came down to fuel mileage there. Yeah, just a bummer ’cause we scored a lot of points in the hunt for the win and didn’t get a chance to fight for it there at the end.” Despite Byron’s sagging mood, he finished the race with a 27-point advantage over Denny Hamlin, the first driver outside the elimination cutline.

Then again, it was always in Byron’s plan to salvage the best points advantage.

Byron had his goal cut out

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The No. 24 Chevy’s glorious run may have ended at Martinsville in April. But William Byron’s drive to stay up front did not end – he collected 10 more top-five finishes since then. Before the 10-race playoffs began, Byron was confident especially with his runner-up finish in Michigan. After a tumultuous Round of 16, he was back on track in Kansas. He won the first stage after Christopher Bell spun out. Then in the penultimate laps, he hounded Ross Chastain’s back bumper several times. Eventually, Chastain beat Byron by 0.388 seconds to the finish line.

However, William Byron stuck true to his intentions before the postseason. “I think once you win two or three races early in the season like I said this week, the goal is to try and stack playoff points. If you can’t do that, then the goal is to try and position yourself well for the fall and all the tracks in the playoffs. So, I feel good about that,” he said. Byron has the best average finish of 9.9 at intermediate tracks – he won the 2021 Homestead-Miami race after starting 31st. So he looks forward to his future chances: “We’ll go to Homestead, it’s a really good track for us…work on a few things, and should be able to have a really good day there.”

Evidently, William Byron is in a better place than he would allow himself the luxury to believe. Let us wait and see how the Hendrick star performs next.