NASCAR Power Rankings After Denny Hamlin’s Impressive Victory In Las Vegas

The Pennzoil 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on Sunday marked the first 1.5-mile track on the 2026 NASCAR schedule, making it an important indicator of things to come on tracks that make up the majority of the season.

If that’s the case, future Hall of Famer and 2025 series Cup Series runner-up just put everybody in the field on notice.

Hamlin led a race-high 134 laps en route to a dominant victory despite an early pit road speeding penalty that sent him to the back of the pack. In the process, he vaulted himself into the top five of the early-season standings and into our NASCAR Power Rankings for the first time this season after holding down the No. 1 spot for several weeks a year ago.

2026 NASCAR Cup Series Power Rankings: Week 5

Much like Ryan Blaney a week ago at Phoenix, Hamlin showed off impressive speed early in the race and then ripped his way back through the field after his issues on pit road.

Hamlin dominated at the same track on the way to a victory in the 2025 Fall race, so it should come as no surprise that he had so much success on Sunday, especially after qualifying on the front row.

Even more telling were the drivers who joined Hamlin in the top 10, as he was flanked by all three of his Joe Gibbs Racing teammates as well as three Hendrick Motorsports drivers, each of whom is expected to contend for a championship in 2026.

The results of Sunday’s race could well lay the groundwork for what to expect in the coming months of the season, as well as what the power rankings could begin to look like on a more regular basis.

10) Joey Logano

After a strong start to the season, this marks the third straight week that Logano has dropped down both the standings and the power rankings, and this week was by far the most concerning.

Not only did Logano struggle immediately to find speed, landing back in the 30s in practice and then qualifying outside the top 20, but he never really sniffed a top-10 finish on Sunday.

Of course, not all of Logano’s problems are down to him and crew chief Paul Wolfe. Every Ford team struggled mightily at Las Vegas and has done so for the last couple of years at similar tracks. But Logano badly needs to get things back on track next week at Darlington.

Last Week: 7th NASCAR Point Standings: 11th (-120)

9) Chris Buescher

On the flip side of things is Roush Fenway Keselowski driver Chris Buescher, who was the top-finishing Ford in the field on Sunday with a sixth-place finish.

The buzz around the NASCAR garage was that the series’ new points format would benefit Buescher, who has lacked top-end speed at times in recent years but is remarkably consistent, and that seems to be proving true.

Buescher still does not have a top-five finish through five races this season. But he’s slowly worked himself inside the top 10 in points and seems to be headed in the right direction when it comes to week-to-week speed.

Last Week: UR NASCAR Point Standings: 9th (-109)

8) William Byron

William Byron has won three or more races in each of the past three NASCAR Cup Series seasons and finished no lower than fourth in points in each of those seasons. So you had to know this was coming eventually.

After a tough start to the season, Byron has now strung together back-to-back top-10 performances and added to his third-place finish on Sunday with a victory in stage two, hauling in 10 important points in the process.

He now heads to Darlington, a track where he’s won on before and finished second a year ago, full of confidence and surging forward in both the standings and our power rankings.

Last Week: UR NASCAR Point Standings: 8th (-98)

7) Kyle Larson

After finishing second in each of the first two stages and finishing in seventh on Sunday, Larson takes a step up in our power rankings that some may argue should have been even larger.

Larson also led the second-most laps of the day behind Hamlin at a track that has been one of his best throughout his entire career. Like Byron, Larson is a former Darlington winner who has a lengthy history of success at the track, so it wouldn’t be at all surprising to see him pick up his first win of the season next week.

Last Week: 8th NASCAR Point Standings: 7th (-98)

6) Denny Hamlin

Nothing was going to prevent Denny Hamlin from picking up his 61st career NASCAR Cup Series victory on Sunday. Not a speeding penalty, not his teammates, not Larson, or Byron, or anyone else.

Hamlin led for a significant portion of the opening stage on Sunday before fading late and finishing it in third. He was then sent to the back of the pack due to the penalty. But even then, he managed to fight back to finish fifth in stage two.

Come the final stage, Hamlin would not be denied, taking the lead on the final restart of the race and not looking back, grabbing the victory and vaulting himself up into the top-five of the point standings and serving notice that he’s very much a competitor for a long-coveted first championship.

Last Week: UR NASCAR Point Standings: 4th (-78)

5) Christopher Bell

For the second week in a row, Christopher Bell failed to win a race where it looked as if he had a car with race-winning speed. Bell chased down and passed Hamlin for the lead to claim victory in the opening stage, then backed it up with a third-place finish in stage two.

However, on the final restart of the race, he failed to wrestle the lead away from Hamlin and eventually fell back to fourth behind Elliott and Byron as well.

Ultimately, Bell has had a pair of extremely productive weeks that have seen him fly up the standings and power rankings. But you have to wonder if not finishing off wins might come back to bite him at some point throughout the season.

Last Week: 6th NASCAR Point Standings: 6th (-91)

4) Chase Elliott

With another 10 laps in Sunday’s race, we may well have been talking about Elliott, not Hamlin, as the race winner.

After a pair of solid, albeit underwhelming, opening stages at Las Vegas, Elliott’s car came to life in stage three, and he was slowly but surely reeling in Hamlin as the laps went down.

The second-place finish not only continued Elliott’s impressive run of consistency to begin the new season, but it showed that when he and crew chief Alan Gustafson get on the same page, they can produce race-winning speed.

Last Week: 5th NASCAR Point Standings: 5th (-87)

3) Ryan Blaney

It looked for much of Sunday’s race as if Blaney would maintain his second-place spot in the power rankings. He qualified in the top 10, finished the opening stage in ninth, and worked his way up to sixth mid-way through stage two.

Things began to come unglued a bit when crew chief Jonathan Hassler opted to run long into a pit cycle in the second stage, which failed to pay off as Blaney dropped from sixth to 11th, missing out on any points in the stage.

He rebounded to run inside the top 10 late in stage three, but an untimely caution immediately after Blaney pitted for new tires completely undid all his hard work, putting him a lap down.

Blaney fought back for a 16th-place finish, which isn’t back-breaking, but it’s a good bit worse than what he and his team would have hoped for.

Last Week: 2nd NASCAR Point Standings: 3rd (-67)

2) Bubba Wallace

Five races into the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season, Bubba Wallace has yet to finish outside the top 11 in a single race. Especially under this season’s new points format, that type of consistency can carry you to a championship-contending season.

Wallace didn’t have quite as much speed as some fellow Toyota drivers on Sunday, but he maximized what he did have, finishing fifth and fourth in the opening two stages before coming home in ninth, ahead of championship-leading teammate Tyler Reddick.

His 41 points on the day were fifth-most of anyone in the field and moved him back above Blaney in both the point standings and the power rankings.

Last Week: 3rd NASCAR Point Standings: 2nd (-61)

1) Tyler Reddick

It wouldn’t quite be fair to call Tyler Reddick’s 13th-place finish on Sunday a sign that he’s coming back to earth. After all, Reddick ran in the top 10 for most of the day, finishing there in both stages one and two and only dropping out in the closing lap of the race.

But it did seem to represent a chink in the armor of the man who has otherwise dominated the Cup Series to start the season.

Reddick didn’t have the speed of his Joe Gibbs Racing affiliates a week ago in Phoenix, and he certainly didn’t have the same level of speed in Las Vegas. But all in all, he had a fairly productive day and heads to Darlington, a track where he finished fourth and second a year ago, with a load of confidence and a still sizable points lead.

Last Week: 1st NASCAR Point Standings: 1st