NASCAR Championship: Full Driver Standings After Darlington

The driver playoff standings did not change much after today's race at Darlington, aside from William Byron reclaiming the top spot with the race win. It is the third victory of the season for the Hendrick Motorsports driver, who leaped teammate Kyle Larson, who has just two wins.

Larson was seemingly on the way to his third victory this year, but a late caution flag stacked up the field, and chaos ensued from there. After surviving one big crash, Larson met his demise while battling Ross Chastain for the win. The two came together with five laps remaining, and they finished 20th and 29th today. Those two were not the only title contenders that had trouble in this race.

Kyle Busch was in contention for the win, but another costly mistake by the veteran driver on pit road ended his hopes. He still sits third in the standings with his two race wins. Christopher Bell is in fourth place, but he too had a stroke of bad luck that took away his chances of winning. After completing his final pit stop, Bell was set to restart on the front row, but a loose wheel forced him to come back to pit road.

Bell's teammate Martin Truex Jr dominated the race, leading the first 145 laps and nearly winning the first two stages. His day went south after battling Ross Chastain for the Stage 2 win on the final lap, as the two made contact and Truex went spinning. He fought his way back to 4th place late in the race, but a crash with 12 laps remaining ended his day in 31st position. The 2017 Cup champion remains sixth in the playoff standings.

The rest of the top-ten playoff drivers all had trouble today as well. Tyler Reddick got ran into early, then collected in a crash late. Joey Logano simply didn't have the pace, and Ricky Stenhouse Jr was running inside the top-five most of the day before a flat tire sent him spinning. Chastain finished 20th after his crash with Larson.