“We needed just a good day”: Chase Briscoe content with runners-up finish at New Hampshire after closing the gap at playoff cutline

Chase Briscoe has expressed his delight after bagging his season-best finish at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway. With his runner-up spot in Loudon, the Stewart-Haas Racing driver has now inched closer to the playoff threshold.

The 1.058-mile oval welcomed the 19th Cup Series battle on the 2024 calendar. Due to inclement weather conditions, the 305-lap run was halted for over two hours before action resumed. Christopher Bell led a race-high 148 laps and swept the field for his third win this season and ninth Cup triumph overall.

For SHR's Chase Briscoe, the New Hampshire outing ended on quite a dominant note. He started his run from 23rd place on the grid but stooped to a 27th-place finish in Stage 1. Moreover, the second stage didn't see much improvement from the #14 Ford driver as he finished 22nd.

Nonetheless, Briscoe geared up during the final stage and swooped past his rivals to correspond with the frontrunners, Christopher Bell and his SHR teammate Josh Berry. But the podium place didn't arrive in a readily served platter for the #14 Ford driver.

After catching up with the pack, Chase Briscoe ran in fifth place when a caution prompted by Michael McDowell's spin promoted the former to fourth. A few laps later, Brad Keselowski spun out bringing another yellow flag moment that propelled the Indiana native into second place.

From there, until the checkered flag dropped, Briscoe chased for the pinnacle spot while guarding his season-best place from slipping away and finished second. With that, he's climbed one spot up to 18th in the playoff rankings as he overtook Kyle Busch. However, he has to place himself in the top 16 to advance to the Round of 16 in September.

Post his exhilarating run, the SHR driver highlighted his contentment, saying.

"It was important for sure. We were at sixty points below the cutline and now we're 25 points below. We needed just a good day you know, second [place] is great. Even if we were just running in the top 10 it was going to be a good way to kind of get back and stop the [points] bleeding," via Frontstretch on X (1.05).

"Hard for me to hold him off"- Chase Briscoe downplays him being the potential frontrunner as he stresses Christopher Bell's strong pace

Chase Briscoe's dominance became evident during the final stage but that wasn't the case with Christopher Bell. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver dominated shortly after kicking off his run from fourth place. He snatched the lead from Chase Elliott on Lap 42 and bagged the Stage 1 win.

Bell fell a few spots during the second stage but kept his ride in the top 5 while Denny Hamlin grabbed 1 playoff point from his Stage 2 win. Shortly after that, on Lap 219, the race was red-flagged and the action resumed after two hours and fourteen minutes. From there, the JGR driver took charge and reigned supreme.

Despite a superior comeback run by Chase Briscoe, he sounded off about the notion of him being the race leader. While outlining Christopher Bell's fast-paced performance all day long, the SHR driver said.

"I don't think I could have got to him [Bell]. Even if I think I was in the lead, it would have been probably hard for me to hold him off. He was just really good all day long and the wet and dry [tires] didn't matter."

Chase Briscoe is placed 16th in the Cup Series standings with two top-5s and six top-10s.