William Byron hoping to 'fine-tune' his performance for Texas Playoff race

Despite a quiet performance in the Round of 16, William Byron is still one of the favorites to win the championship in Phoenix. Finishes of P4, P15, and P9 in the first round of the NASCAR Playoffs aren’t going to cut it moving forward. So, the plan for Texas is simple.

Get the car right, get the adjustments made that need to be made. In other words, William Byron and his tea mare going to try and “fine-tune” what they’ve done through the first few races.

Talking with Bob Pockrass of Fox Sports, Byron gave his outlook on the Texas weekend. This track isn’t really a favorite of drivers or fans. But, it is tough as hell.

“I’m definitely intrigued to see how the track has evolved and changed. I look at the IndyCar race there, they had a really racy racetrack to drive on — you could use both grooves. We haven’t seen that track widen out more than two grooves. And I don’t think it will. But it is really nice to see that there are two grooves to race on.

“So I feel like we just have to improve what we did at Kansas a little bit. We’ve had a good foundation for the mile-and-a-half tracks. But recently, I feel like we’ve just needed to fine-tune our balance. We’ve been a little bit too loose on those tracks. So hopefully we fine-tune that and have something really fast for Texas. We have a lot of good notes to look at and we were fast there last year, too.”

In the course of his Cup Series career, William Byron has four top-10 finishes and a single top-5 finish. Is this the year that he gets the job done in the Lone Star State?

William Byron back on top after points reset

Look, Byron wasn’t electric in the first round. However, he performed much better than other drivers at the top of the playoff standings to start out. Martin Truex Jr., more specifically. Truex was tied with Byron in the first round and almost found himself eliminated

Now that the Round of 12 is here, the points reset, and the two drivers are back on top. William Byron has a real shot to make a run here. The thing I worry about, he’s disappeared many times at this point in the year.

While Byron broke his usual summer slump with wins at Atlanta and Watkins Glen, it feels inconsequential, to be honest with you. Between Atlanta and Watkins Glen, the results fell off hard. A year ago, in the Round of 12, Byron fell back into mediocrity.

In 2022, Byron’s Round of 12 races were P7, P12, and P16 results. Texas, Talladega, Roval. He followed that up with finishes of P13, P12, and P7 in the Round of 8 races. He had just a single top-5 finish, and he looks to be headed for the same kind of performance.

That is, unless William Byron and his team find what they need to “fine-tune.”