Week Seventeen - 2026 StatChat Power Rankings After San Diego
- Adam Carabine
- 16 hours ago
- 4 min read
By Adam Carabine
The StatChat Power Rankings return in 2026! While finishing position is important, it’s not always indicative of the full picture. StatChat rankings are determined using a large number of statistical inputs. Let's look at the Top 10:
Chase Briscoe – This week: 10 – Last week: 9
Briscoe has struggled a bit on road courses in the Cup Series, considering what success he had on them in the O’Reilly Auto Parts (Xfinity at the time) Series. Briscoe had a few moments where he popped up on the TV screen, but he finished 17th in a fairly unremarkable day. He manages to stay in the Top 10 of the Power Rankings but will need a bounce back next weekend in Sonoma to stay there.
Erik Jones – This week: 9 – Last week: 10
Because the Power Rankings are more heavily swayed by the last five races, Jones gets to move up another spot, despite a not-so-great performance at the San Diego race. He finished P20 – a number which also happened to be his average finish over the first 12 races of this year. In the five races since? It’s been 10.4 – a marked improvement.
Chris Buescher – This week: 8 – Last week: 12
We shouldn’t be shocked by this by now, but Chris Buescher is pretty solid on road courses. We saw him beat SVG on speed at Watkins Glen two years ago, but he really showed up to play in San Diego. He led the field with 48 Quality Passes (Green flag passes in the Top 15), scored some stage points, and led 7 laps. P6 finish, and Buescher is comfortably in 7th place in the Season Standings.
Carson Hocevar – This week: 7 – Last week: 11
Many might have thought Carson Hocevar got a taste of his own medicine in San Diego this past weekend, as Corey Heim gave him an ill-advised tap on the bumper, sending him spinning. Hocevar was actually a decent sport about the whole thing, but it cost him a good run at the win. Despite some laps led, extra points in both stages, and a starting spot on the front row, he wound up finishing P19.
Daniel Suarez – This week: 6 – Last week: 8
Suarez has, sort of quietly, become the points leader at Spire Motorsports. Understandably, Hocevar gets a lot of the attention, but Suarez has been really solid lately, and is perhaps making Trackhouse second guess their decision to cut him. He scored some stage points in San Diego and looked like he made the most of a mediocre-to-solid car.
Ty Gibbs – This week: 5 – Last week: 5
Ty Gibbs continues to search for Victory Lane again after his win at Bristol earlier this year. He hasn’t found it yet, but he’s certainly been in the conversation quite a few times. While he didn’t lead any laps at San Diego, he was up front for a good chunk of the day. He earned some stage points, and was second only to Chris Buescher in Quality Passes (45 total).
Ryan Blaney – This week: 4 – Last week: 3
When you’re at the top, it’s hard to stay there. Heavy is the crown, they say. Blaney scored the highest of any driver at San Diego when it comes to Power Rankings metrics. He won Stage One, earned an additional 6 points in Stage Two, led the most laps of anyone (12), but still managed to fall a spot in the Power Rankings.
Kyle Larson – This week: 3 – Last week: 4
Kyle Larson stole the spot from Ryan Blaney, as they swap positions in the Power Rankings this week. Larson had a great race in San Diego, ultimately finishing 3rd (to Ryan Blaney’s 9th). He also earned some stage points, led a lot of laps, but what set him apart was that he also had the best average running position (6th place) of any driver on Sunday.
Tyler Reddick – This week: 2 – Last week: 2
At first it looked like it was not going to be Tyler Reddick’s day. Then some things changed, and it looked like it really would be. And then more changed, and he unfortunately wound up with a flat tire on the second-to-last lap. He finished 25th after challenging for the lead a lap earlier. He showed some speed when he was in the lead, and he did manage to get there after starting in the rear. The points won’t show it, but Reddick made the most of a difficult day up until the end.
Denny Hamlin – This week: 1 – Last week: 1
It was a fairly underwhelming day for Denny Hamlin in San Diego, but he didn’t need anything too flashy to stay atop the Power Rankings. He merely needed to just hang on and have a solid, quiet day, which is what he did. No stage points, a negative pass differential, and really nothing too exciting through most of the race. But he’ll be thrilled that the young driver of his 67 car got to victory lane, and even happier that he already had locked the kid up to join them full-time next season.
Biggest Movers
SVG – This week: 21 – Last week: 6
Falls 15 places
Brad Keselowski, Chris Buescher, Josh Berry, Joey Logano, Bubba Wallace, and Carson Hocevar
They all each gained 4 spots.
Rest of the List
11. | Christopher Bell | LW: 7 | -4 |
12. | Chase Elliott | LW: 13 | +1 |
13. | Bubba Wallace | LW: 17 | +4 |
14. | William Byron | LW: 14 | -- |
15. | AJ Allmendinger | LW: 16 | +1 |
16. | Riley Herbst | LW: 18 | +2 |
17. | Joey Logano | LW: 21 | +4 |
18. | Ricky Stenhouse Jr. | LW: 15 | -3 |
19. | Todd Gilliland | LW: 22 | +3 |
20. | Michael McDowell | LW: 19 | -1 |
21. | SVG | LW: 6 | -15 |
22. | Ross Chastain | LW: 25 | +3 |
23. | JH Nemechek | LW: 20 | -3 |
24. | Zane Smith | LW: 24 | -- |
25. | Ryan Preece | LW: 27 | +2 |
26. | Austin Cindric | LW: 23 | -3 |
27. | Ty Dillon | LW: 28 | +1 |
28. | Brad Keselowski | LW: 32 | +4 |
29. | Josh Berry | LW: 33 | +4 |
30. | Alex Bowman | LW: 31 | +1 |
31. | Cole Custer | LW: 29 | -2 |
32. | Cody Ware | LW: 34 | +2 |
33. | Austin Dillon | LW: 26 | -7 |
34. | Noah Gragson | LW: 30 | -4 |
35. | Connor Zilisch | LW: 35 | -- |
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