Between Bowman's seventh and eighth career Cup wins, he was sidelined by a concussion and later a back injury.
It's been a difficult road for the driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, but an impressive victory in wet conditions on the streets of Chicago locked him into the playoffs.
Bowman, 31, nearly parlayed that into back-to-back victory seven days later at Pocono. He has won before at Pocono, earning a Cup win there in 2021. On Sunday, he started sixth and remained near the front for most of the day.
Late in the race, he moved inside the top-five after two of his Hendrick Motorsports team-mates [Chase Elliott and Kyle Larson] were penalized for speeding on pitroad.
On the final restart, he was able to line up on the front row with a real shot at the race. Unfortunately, he was unable to get ahead of eventual race winner Ryan Blaney. He then fell back into the clutches of Denny Hamlin, finishing third.
"Hard to be satisfied when you restart on the front row, last restart, and can't get the job done," said Bowman in a post-race interview.
"Proud of everyone on our No. 48. We struggled with traffic quite a bit. Probably made most of our adjustments based on traffic, then just got too free there at the end when we had some clean air ... Congrats to the 12 car. A good, solid day for us."
Although he came up short of victory, Bowman "hopes" this is the beginning of a potential title run for the No. 48 team.
"I think there's certainly still things we need to do to be better, things I need to do to be better, our team, kind of across the board. You can always improve. At least we're pointed in the right direction.
It's been a good two weeks for us. Going to a really historic racetrack that means a lot to me next week. Hopefully we can get the job done there."
