LONG POND, Pa. (AP) — Chase Briscoe got the cold facts when the third-generation driver's career took an unexpected turn, leaving his lame-duck NASCAR team for the sport's most coveted available seat with powerhouse Joe Gibbs Racing.
The message was clear at JGR — home of five Cup driver titles and a perennial contender to win another one.
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Chase Briscoe celebrates with a burnout after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
Chase Briscoe celebrates in Victory Lane after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
Chase Briscoe celebrates with a burnout after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
Chase Briscoe celebrates in Victory Lane after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
“You don't make the playoffs,” Briscoe said, “you don't race in this car anymore.”
The Toyotas were better at JGR, sure. So were the championship standards set by Joe Gibbs and the rest of the organization.
“It's been a lot of work,” Briscoe's crew chief James Small said. “From where he came from, there wasn’t much accountability. Nobody was holding his feet to the fire. That’s probably been a big wake-up call for him.”
Briscoe's eyes are wide open now, a first-time winner for JGR and, yes, he is indeed playoff bound.
Briscoe returned to victory lane Sunday at Pocono Raceway, stretching the final drops of fuel down the stretch to hold off Hamlin for his third career Cup victory and first with his new race team.
“I've only won three races in the Cup Series, right? But this is by far the least enjoyable just because it's expected now,” Briscoe said. “You have to go win. Where at SHR, you really felt like you surprised the world if you won.”
Briscoe raced his way into an automatic spot in NASCAR’s playoffs with the win and gave the No. 19 Toyota its first victory since 2023 when Martin Truex Jr. had the ride. Briscoe lost his job at the end of last season at Stewart-Haas Racing when the team folded and he was tabbed to replace Truex — almost a year to the day for his win at Pocono — in the four-car JGR field.
Hamlin, who holds the track record with seven wins, appeared on the brink of reeling in Briscoe over the final, thrilling laps only to have not enough in the No. 11 Toyota to snag that eighth Pocono win.
“It was just so hard to have a guy chasing you, especially the guy that's the greatest of all time here," Briscoe said.
Briscoe made his final pit stop on lap 119 of the 160-lap race, while Hamlin — who returned after missing last week's race following the birth of his son — made his final stop on 120. Hamlin's team radioed to him that they believed Briscoe would fall about a half-lap short on fuel — only for the first-year JGR driver to win by 0.682 seconds.
“The most nervous I get is when two of our cars are up front,” Gibbs said.
Gibbs now has Hamlin, Bell and Briscoe in the playoff field.
“It's definitely more work but it’s because they’re at such a high level,” Briscoe said. “Even racing with teammates that are winning has been a big adjustment for me.”
Briscoe, who won an Xfinity Series race at Pocono in 2020, raced to his third career Cup victory and first since Darlington in 2024.
Briscoe has been on bit of a hot streak, and had his fourth top-10 finish over the last six races, including a seventh-place finish in last week’s ballyhooed race in Mexico City.
He became the 11th driver to earn a spot in the 16-driver field with nine races left until the field is set and made a winner again of crew chief James Small. Small stayed on the team through Truex's final winless season and Briscoe's winless start to this season.
“It's been a tough couple of years,” Small said. “We've never lost belief, any of us.”
Hamlin finished second. Ryan Blaney, Chris Buescher and Chase Elliott completed the top five.
Briscoe, raised a dirt racer in Indiana, gave JGR its 18th Cup victory at Pocono.
“I literally grew up racing my sprint car video game in a Joe Gibbs Racing Home Depot uniform,” Briscoe said. “To get Coach in victory lane after them taking a chance on me, it’s so rewarding truthfully. Just a big weight off my shoulders. I’ve been telling my wife the last two weeks, I have to win. To finally come here and do it, it has been a great day.”
The race was delayed 2 hours, 10 minutes by rain and the conditions were muggy by the time the green flag dropped. Briscoe led 72 laps and won the second stage.
Briscoe wrote before the race on social media, “Anybody going from Pocono to Oklahoma City after the race Sunday?” The Pacers fan — he bet on the team to win the NBA title — wasn't going to make it to Game 7 of the NBA Finals.
He'll certainly settle for a ride to victory lane.
Carson Hocevar made a clean pass of Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and two feuding drivers battled without incident on restarts as they appeared to race in peace after a pair of recent wrecks on the track threatened to spill into Pocono.
Stenhouse’s threat to beat up his racing riva l after last weekend’s race in Mexico City but cooler heads prevailed back in the United States. Hocevar finished 18th and Stenhouse 30th.
There was a minor scare on pit road when AJ Allmendinger struck a tire in the carrier's hand with his right front side and sent it flying into the ribs of another team's crew member in the pit ahead of him. Jonpatrik Kealey, the rear tire changer on Shane van Gisbergen's race team, was knocked on all fours but finished work on van Gisbergen's pit stop.
Bubba Wallace, Michael McDowell and Riley Herbst all had their races spoiled by brake issues.
“It was a scary feeling for sure,” Herbst said. “I was just starting to get tight, just a bad adjustment on my part. Getting into (turn) one, the brakes just went to the floor. A brake rotor exploded and I was along for the ride.”
NASCAR heads to Atlanta. Christopher Bell won the first race at the track this season in March.
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Chase Briscoe celebrates with a burnout after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
Chase Briscoe celebrates in Victory Lane after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
Chase Briscoe celebrates with a burnout after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
Chase Briscoe celebrates in Victory Lane after winning a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at Pocono Raceway, Sunday, June 22, 2025, in Long Pond, Pa. (AP Photo/Derik Hamilton)
U.S. forces have boarded another oil tanker in the Caribbean Sea. The announcement was made Friday by the U.S. military. The Trump administration has been targeting sanctioned tankers traveling to and from Venezuela.
The pre-dawn action was carried out by U.S. Marines and Navy, taking part in the monthslong buildup of forces in the Caribbean, according to U.S. Southern Command, which declared “there is no safe haven for criminals” as it announced the seizure of the vessel called the Olina.
Navy officials couldn’t immediately provide details about whether the Coast Guard was part of the force that took control of the vessel as has been the case in the previous seizures. A spokesperson for the U.S. Coast Guard said there was no immediate comment on the seizure.
The Olina is the fifth tanker that has been seized by U.S. forces as part of a broader effort by Trump’s administration to control the distribution of Venezuela’s oil products globally following the U.S. ouster of President Nicolás Maduro in a surprise nighttime raid.
The latest:
Richard Grenell, president of the Kennedy Center, says a documentary film about first lady Melania Trump will make its premiere later this month, posting a trailer on X.
As the Trumps prepared to return to the White House last year, Amazon Prime Video announced a year ago that it had obtained exclusive licensing rights for a streaming and theatrical release directed by Brett Ratner.
Melania Trump also released a self-titled memoir in late 2024.
Some artists have canceled scheduled Kennedy Center performances after a newly installed board voted to add President Donald Trump’s to the facility, prompting Grenell to accuse the performers of making their decisions because of politics.
Mexico President Claudia Sheinbaum says that she has asked her foreign affairs secretary to reach out directly to U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio or Trump regarding comments by the American leader that the U.S. cold begin ground attacks against drug cartels.
In a wide-ranging interview with Fox News aired Thursday night, Trump said, “We’ve knocked out 97% of the drugs coming in by water and we are going to start now hitting land, with regard to the cartels. The cartels are running Mexico. It’s very sad to watch.”
As she has on previous occasions, Sheinbaum downplayed the remarks, saying “it is part of his way of communicating.” She said she asked her Foreign Affairs Secretary Juan Ramón de la Fuente to strengthen coordination with the U.S.
Sheinbaum has repeatedly rebuffed Trump’s offer to send U.S. troops after Mexican drug cartels. She emphasizes that there will be no violation of Mexico’s sovereignty, but the two governments will continue to collaborate closely.
Analysts do not see a U.S. incursion in Mexico as a real possibility, in part because Sheinbaum’s administration has been doing nearly everything Trump has asked and Mexico is a critical trade partner.
Trump says he wants to secure $100 billion to remake Venezuela’s oil infrastructure, a lofty goal going into a 2:30 meeting on Friday with executives from leading oil companies. His plan rides on oil producers being comfortable in making commitments in a country plagued by instability, inflation and uncertainty.
The president has said that the U.S. will control distribution worldwide of Venezuela’s oil and will share some of the proceeds with the country’s population from accounts that it controls.
“At least 100 Billion Dollars will be invested by BIG OIL, all of whom I will be meeting with today at The White House,” Trump said Friday in a pre-dawn social media post.
Trump is banking on the idea that he can tap more of Venezuela’s petroleum reserves to keep oil prices and gasoline costs low.
At a time when many Americans are concerned about affordability, the incursion in Venezuela melds Trump’s assertive use of presidential powers with an optical spectacle meant to convince Americans that he can bring down energy prices.
Trump is expected to meet with oil executives at the White House on Friday.
He hopes to secure $100 billion in investments to revive Venezuela’s oil industry. The goal rides on the executives’ comfort with investing in a country facing instability and inflation.
Since a U.S. military raid captured former Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro on Saturday, Trump has said there’s a new opportunity to use the country’s oil to keep gasoline prices low.
The full list of executives invited to the meeting has not been disclosed, but Chevron, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhillips are expected to attend.
Attorneys general in five Democratic-led states have filed a lawsuit against President Donald Trump’s administration after it said it would freeze money for several public benefit programs.
The Trump administration has cited concerns about fraud in the programs designed to help low-income families and their children. California, Colorado, Minnesota, Illinois and New York states filed the lawsuit Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.
The lawsuit asks the courts to order the administration to release the funds. The attorneys general have called the funding freeze an unconstitutional abuse of power.
Iran’s judiciary chief has vowed decisive punishment for protesters, signaling a coming crackdown against demonstrations.
Iranian state television reported the comments from Gholamhossein Mohseni-Ejei on Friday. They came after Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei criticized Trump’s support for the protesters, calling Trump’s hands “stained with the blood of Iranians.”
The government has shut down the internet and is blocking international calls. State media has labeled the demonstrators as “terrorists.”
The protests began over Iran’s struggling economy and have become a significant challenge to the government. Violence has killed at least 50 people, and more than 2,270 have been detained.
Trump questions why a president’s party often loses in midterm elections and suggests voters “want, maybe a check or something”
Trump suggested voters want to check a president’s power and that’s why they often deliver wins for an opposing party in midterm elections, which he’s facing this year.
“There’s something down, deep psychologically with the voters that they want, maybe a check or something. I don’t know what it is, exactly,” he said.
He said that one would expect that after winning an election and having “a great, successful presidency, it would be an automatic win, but it’s never been a win.”
Hiring likely remained subdued last month as many companies have sought to avoid expanding their workforces, though the job gains may be enough to bring down the unemployment rate.
December’s jobs report, to be released Friday, is likely to show that employers added a modest 55,000 jobs, economists forecast. That figure would be below November’s 64,000 but an improvement after the economy lost jobs in October. The unemployment rate is expected to slip to 4.5%, according to data provider FactSet, from a four-year high of 4.6% in November.
The figures will be closely watched on Wall Street and in Washington because they will be the first clean readings on the labor market in three months. The government didn’t issue a report in October because of the six-week government shutdown, and November’s data was distorted by the closure, which lasted until Nov. 12.
FILE - President Donald Trump dances as he walks off stage after speaking to House Republican lawmakers during their annual policy retreat, Tuesday, Jan. 6, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
