Is Harrison Burton a Dark Horse for the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series Title?

The biggest underdog heading into the 2024 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs is Harrison Burton. The 21-year-old shocked race fans everywhere when he took the checkered flag at Daytona a couple of weeks back to book his place. His qualification into the final 16 was looked at with some doubt since he had very few points on the board. But now that he’s in the round of 16, he will do everything in his power to go as far as possible into the playoffs.

Burton will be taking it round by round and the first one will see races in Atlanta, Watkins Glen, and Bristol. The Wood Brothers Racing driver is looking forward to two of those tracks in particular — Atlanta and Bristol. Speedway races are unpredictable and Burton’s last race win came at a speedway. Then at Bristol, if the the tire degradation situation is the same as the last time, he just needs to worry about being on a good strategy.

“I see the first round, just taking it one round at a time,” he said in a recent media interaction. “You just don’t know until the first people start having problems in that type of scenario, but we know how to build a fast race car for that racetrack and I know how to drive it well. That’s obviously another really important one being the last one in the round, so I think Atlanta and Bristol are really big opportunities for us.”

The 21-year-old has not yet made a name for himself in road course racing so Watkins Glen can be a bit of an issue. However, Burton believes that there has been some improvement in that regard as well. It will be interesting to see how the Wood Brothers Racing star gets through his first Cup Series playoff run.

Burton banking on Xfinity Series experience

Burton has some playoff experience thanks to his time in the NASCAR Xfinity Series. He finished eighth in that championship in 2020 and 2021 driving for Joe Gibbs Racing. Approaching races smartly will be key for the 21-year-old as he will look to score the most points on the tracks he will be most comfortable with. Wood Brothers Racing is the oldest team in the competition today. There will be people with a lot of experience among its ranks that will help Burton go as far as possible.

“I think it’s huge. I learned a lot of lessons in those of doing what I said, making it a really big deal,” he said of his Xfinity Series playoff experience. “You just don’t get chances, like I thought in those years in Xfinity I had real chances to win championships. You don’t get those very often, so I learned a lot from that and I think I can take that into this year in Cup.”

One advantage that Burton will have is zero pressure on expectations. He can go out there and race however aggressively or defensively he wants to. If he manages to qualify for the round of 12, fans might be pleasantly surprised and all this talk of whether he deserves to be in the playoffs may come to an end.