Joey Logano won Sunday’s (July 19) NASCAR Cup Series race at North Wilkesboro Speedway, leading 323 of the race’s 450 laps en route to his first victory of 2026.
The first points-paying Cup race at the historic 0.625-mile short track since 1996, Logano held off Denny Hamlin over the race’s final run as the two managed lapped traffic. Only six cars finished the race on the lead lap.
“A win anywhere at this point would’ve sounded great,” Logano told TNT. “What a great car. Paul Wolfe, what a great car he put together for us today.”
Hamlin finished less than a second behind Logano and extended his points lead to 68 over Tyler Reddick, who finished 30th. Hamlin’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Chase Briscoe and Ty Gibbs finished third and fourth, while Shane van Gisbergen led 49 laps and came home fifth.
“You just got to compliment him on a great day, a great drive,” Hamlin said. “There was a lot of times where I felt my car was kind of close to where it needed to be, just a smidge off. It was a great battle.”
SVG turned in one of the best oval drives of his career.
“Awesome day, just amazing to get stage points both stages,” van Gisbergen said. “Just awesome racing up front all night.”
Bubba Wallace was the last car on the lead lap in sixth, while Brad Keselowski scored his first top 10 since April in seventh. Todd Gilliland finished eighth to advance to the final round of NASCAR’s In-Season Challenge. Daniel Suarez and Ryan Preece rounded out the top 10 finishers.
“No yellow-line infractions,” Wallace said. “We get to keep our finishing position. It sets us up nice for the Brickyard next week, which we have a lot of confidence and momentum going into one. Just another clean race.”
Ryan Blaney overcame a late speeding penalty to finish 11th, the first car two laps down. He will face Gilliland head-to-head next week in the Brickyard 400, and the highest finisher of the two will take home $1 million.
Gibbs led from the drop of the green flag, and John Hunter Nemechek brought out the first caution of the night after spinning on lap 40.
Hamlin stayed out on the ensuing restart but lost the lead to van Gisbergen, who took two tires on the first pit stop of the night. Gibbs got around van Gisbergen to win stage one after a heated battle for the race lead.
Christopher Bell began the first green flag pit cycle of the night on lap 173. One lap later, AJ Allmendinger came down pit road with broken right rear toe link after hitting the wall in turn 1.
The caution flew on lap 183 after a crash near the entry of pit road involving Alex Bowman and Reddick. That caution trapped many drivers one lap down, including Chase Elliott and William Byron. Gibbs was also one lap down after receiving a pit road speeding penalty earlier in the race.
The race didn’t run green for long after the ensuing restart, as Josh Berry hit the wall in turn 3 after Bell slid up into him on lap 199.
Hamlin began the final green flag pit cycle of the night, pitting on lap 359 and came out right behind Logano. Hamlin stayed within one second of Logano for the final 90 laps, but he was unable to catch the No. 22 as Logano broke a 45-race winless streak.
NASCAR Cup Series Window World 450 Results
Next up for the Cup Series is the annual Brickyard 400 presented by PPG at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Race coverage will begin at 2 p.m. ET July 26 on TNT, TruTV and HBO Max.
A member of the National Motorsports Press Association (NMPA), Samuel also covers NASCAR for Yardbarker, Field Level Media, and Heavy Sports. He will attend the University of Arkansas in the fall of 2025.