NASCAR Power Rankings: Ross Chastain leaps to No. 1 after Dega win

With his second career win, Ross Chastain jumps from outside the top five to the No. 1 spot in this week’s NBC Sports NASCAR Power Rankings.

Talladega Superspeedway added an unsurprising shuffle to the list, but many of the same weekly contenders found their way to the front of the field when the checkered flag waved in Alabama.

See whether your favorite driver is ranked after the 10th race of 2022:

1. Ross Chastain (Last week: No. 7) Chastain had a couple of down weeks in between his two victories, but the No. 1 Chevrolet is back atop the list. Chastain has two wins and six top-five finishes in his last eight races, the lows being a 19th-place finish at Richmond and a 33rd-place result after a blown engine at Bristol dirt. His momentum seemed to have cooled, and it’s hard to glean much of anything meaningful following a superspeedway race. But Chastain has shown speed at every track type on the schedule.

2. Ryan Blaney (Last week: No. 1) Blaney left Talladega with an 11th-place finish, his first outside the top 10 since placing 17th at Atlanta in March. But the No. 12 Ford found its way to the front, as it usually does on a superspeedway, leading 23 laps and coming across the line well inside the lead pack. Blaney’s lone finish outside the top 20 remains a 36th-place finish at Las Vegas, the result of his only DNF of the year.

3. William Byron (Last week: No. 2) The No. 24 Chevrolet led a race-high 38 laps at Talladega and entered the tri-oval 10th on the final lap, but a block from Bubba Wallace and contact from Alex Bowman sent Byron into the wall en route to a 15th-place finish Sunday. Byron is the only other multi-race winner this season alongside Chastain, but Byron’s latest problem has proven to be consistency. In