William Byron wins Denny Hamlin's Bracket Challenge over Brad Keselowski

After a number of races and upsets, William Byron is the winner of Denny Hamlin’s first-ever NASCAR bracket challenge. The Denny Hamlin Bracket Challenge brought a little more drama and intrigue to the spring section of the schedule. It all came down to a one-on-one between two drivers.

Byron had to beat out Brad Keselowski to get the win. It also happened that Hamlin had Byron winning his own bracket. After the 11 got wrecked out of the race, hitting the inside wall on the front stretch, Hamlin watched the two finalists in the bracket battle it out.

For Denny Hamlin, the race got a little more intense than he expected.

“William Byron, the winner of the mid-season bracket,” Hamlin said on his Actions Detrimental podcast. “I’d like to say thank you, William Byron, you won my little golf league bracket for me. I had Willy B going the whole way. … William’s just been solid and I told him before the race, ‘Take me to the promised land, brother.’

“It was closer than anticipated like I was talking about after our intros were over, William was like, ‘Man, going into this week I felt pretty good about it, I feel like we’ll qualify up front and we’ll have Brad by a certain amount of speed. Next thing you know we qualified 25th, 26th and he’s right beside me.’ He says, ‘Yeah I’m a little nervous, myself.'”

So, what is Denny Hamlin going to give William Byron as his reward? Next week, Byron is going to be a guest on the podcast! All you Byron fans will want to tune in to hear your favorite driver chop it up with Hamlin.

Can the Denny Hamlin Bracket Challenge be official next year?

If you keep up with Denny Hamlin on his podcast, it is clear he has big ideas for this bracket challenge. Dirty Mo Media put it together this year. Thinking ahead to next year, could NASCAR pick it up as an official thing? Even though the broadcasts didn’t mention it much, if at all, we might see this get some publicity next season.

The one thing that it does is create a little more drama. It can make a casual race fan care about the battle between 19th and 20th place. It isn’t about points, it isn’t about winning necessarily. This bracket challenge is all about beating the other driver you’re matched up with and that alone.

This year, it was William Byron who made it through week after week and eventually won. Personally, I had Kyle Busch taking the win. However, even drivers with wins were unable to make it to the championship. Meanwhile, Keselowski and Byron kept at it week after week and pulled off some impressive performances.

Keselowski is still looking for a win this year, Byron has three. That’s just how the bracket challenge can play out, making it fun and interesting to follow. Byron wasn’t sure he could pull off the win over Brad at Sonoma, but it worked out in the end.