SPEEDWAY, Ind. — A spot of rain fueled by a sweltering afternoon at Indianapolis Motor Speedway gave Kyle Larson a second wind to potentially capture back-to-back Brickyard 400 victories.
Before the precipitation caution on Lap 156, Larson trailed by a big chunk in second while Bubba Wallace set sail after storming to the lead following the final pit-stop cycle.
As the field bunched up for the first overtime restart, the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet driver lined up to the outside of Wallace and stayed even with the No. 23 Toyota through Turn 1. However, Wallace got the best of Larson off Turn 2 before a multicar wreck down the backstretch reset the field for a second overtime.
It was the same song, but second verse for Larson as Wallace set sail for the lead into Turn 1 to snap a 100-race winless drought while Larson crossed the line 0.222 seconds behind the No. 23 as the runner-up.
RELATED: Unofficial results | At-track photos: Indy
“The first one, he was first gear on both of them. He was just a little bit faster-paced for the restart zone,” Larson said after the race. “So I stayed second gear and he got a launch. I was able to just kind of barely hang on his right-rear quarter and then drag him back and kind of pull my momentum to halfway past him. I was just hoping that he could maybe have a moment underneath me and get loose. Then the second one, he brought the pace down so slow I had to be in first gear as well, and just kind of launched with him so I had no momentum. It was gonna be hard to beat him. I think that’s about as good of a job as you could do from the front row outside.”
The summer has had more valleys than peaks for Larson. Entering Sunday’s Brickyard 400, Larson finished outside the top 10 in four of the last six races. The No. 5 team finally put together its first top-five run since Michigan at Dover Motor Speedway last weekend.
At the drop of the green flag, the prospects of following up last Sunday with another top five didn’t look great as Larson slipped to midpack during the first leg of the race.
However, Larson was able to gain advantage on pit strategy by staying out for a dash to the Stage 2 checkered that put him in a spot to stay within striking distance of the lead and keep that track position to the checkered flag.
“It was a solid day,” Larson said. “The beginning of the race didn’t go well. I didn’t have a good start, and it’s like, damn, that’s maybe gonna kill our race strategy. But our team just did a good job with the strategy that we were on and we executed the green-flag cycles really good, and he [Wallace] was able to kind of maximize what we had going on. I wasn’t really expecting the guys on two tires to come out in front of me like that, but it is what it is. Maybe if I could have got by Reddick, I would’ve had a better opportunity.”
With just four races remaining until the playoffs, the regular-season title battle tightened even more as both Chase Elliott (13th) and William Byron (16th) finished outside the top 10. Byron ran inside the top five on the final restart before running out of fuel before getting to the checkered flag.
The three Hendrick drivers are separated by just 15 points for the coveted 15 playoff points that come with winning the Regular Season Championship as the Cup Series heads to Iowa Speedway next Sunday (3:30 p.m. ET, USA Network, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
“William does a great job every week and gaining a lot of stage points and finishing well,” Larson said. “Then, Chase is so solid. I mean, you’ve got to bank on him finishing in the top 12 every race. With that, you’ve just got to be on your game and be smart and try to execute every lap. That’s my goal. We were quick at Iowa last year, but I’m sure all the teams have gotten their stuff better going back.”
