Who needs teammates?
Kyle Larson shoved his teammate, Chase Elliott, out of the way in turn one on the final restart in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Watkins Glen International.
Elliott appeared to have the win well in hand on the final restart with five laps to go. But Larson, his Hendrick Motorsports teammate, drove hard to the inside as the duo raced into the first corner of the 7-turn, 2.450-mile road course.
Larson’s aggressive move saw him make contact with Elliott, shoving Elliott’s car out of the way and allowing Larson to take the lead. Elliott’s woes didn’t end there, as he plummeted well back in the top five.
Meanwhile, road course ace A.J. Allmendinger powered to second, and at one point closed to within a few car lengths of the leader’s back bumper.
But Larson’s car had more power on the faster parts of the course, and held on to record the victory.
“Yeah, I knew that was kind of my only opportunity,” said Larson of the move on Elliott. “I’m not proud of it. But being in the inside lane or the right lane…being the leader, choosing the left lane, it definitely wins out. But when it gets too late in the race, it’s definitely risky.
“Like I said, I knew that was my only opportunity to get by him. I felt like our cars were pretty equal today. Had a lot of fun after the green flag cycle trying to chase him down. Kind of burnt my stuff up a little bit. The restarts kept me in it and kept our team in it.”
It’s the second straight win at the historic New York road course for Larson, his second win of the season, and his 18th career Cup Series win.
It also gives Larson a sweep of the NASCAR race weekend at Watkins Glen after scoring the victory on Saturday in the NASCAR Xfinity Series race.
“Good to get another win here at Watkins Glen and get some more bonus points going into the Playoffs, which we haven’t had many of those this year,” said Larson. “Hopefully this will build on some momentum and we can keep racking up some more points.”
For Elliott, who came home in the fourth position, it was a near miss at a fifth win on the season, and his first of the year on a road course – the type of layout he’s expected to be dominant at.
“Just a huge congratulations to Kyle (Larson) and everybody on the No. 5 team,” said Elliott, who led 29 laps on the day. “Congratulations to everybody at Hendrick Motorsports for getting another win.”
Elliott’s day wasn’t a complete loss, as he locked up the regular season championship going into the final regular season race next weekend at Daytona International Speedway.
Allmendinger spent the final laps of Saturday’s Xfinity Series race chasing Larson to the checkered flag. He did it again on Sunday, with the same result – a second place finish.
“Obviously, Kyle (Larson) drove it in quite deep to get the lead there on Chase (Elliott) and I was getting shoved in the corner,” Allmendinger said. “Maybe if I could have gotten the car squared off a little bit earlier in the corner…but obviously I was getting run into so hard that I was happy just to keep it on the race track and not have anybody next to me off the corner.
“Just proud of everybody at Kaulig Racing. This is absolutely one of the most fun cars I have ever driven in my life. I was hustling it and it was fast.”
Joey Logano, who won the second segment of the race while playing out pit strategy, came home with a third place finish.
“It was crazy and I am ecstatic about what we did,” Logano said. “We got the stage win, and usually, if you get a stage win here you bury yourself, which we did. We were 27th at the start of the third stage. We passed a bunch of cars and got to 17th and then we got stuck around 15th or so. I have to give it to Paul (Wolfe, Crew Chief), he put two tires on it and gave us some track position and then we had a couple of more good restarts and it ended up as a top-three. Pretty good.”
Daniel Suarez, who scored his first career victory earlier this year on the road course at Sonoma Raceway, finished in fifth.
Michael McDowell, Tyler Reddick, Christopher Bell, Chris Buescher, and Erik Jones rounded out the top 10.
The battle for the last spot in the Playoff going into next weekend’s cutoff race stayed pretty much in the same spot as it was coming into Sunday, as both Ryan Blaney and Martin Truex, Jr. had lackluster outings. Blaney finished in 24th, and leads by 24 points over Truex, who finished one position ahead in 23rd.
Former Formula 1 champion Kimi Räikkönen made his first career NASCAR Cup Series start on Sunday, running well up in the top 10 at one point. But his day came to an early end as he tried to avoid a spin exiting the bus stop chicane by Austin Dillon on lap 45. Räikkönen’s Chevrolet was pushed side in the melee, making hard contact with the tire barrier, ending his day. He was credited with a 37th place finish.
“Yeah, it was good fun,” said Räikkönen. “I felt more confidence all of the time. We had some good laps. It’s a shame. The car felt like it had a lot of speed, but that’s how it goes sometimes.”
The start of the race was delayed by about two hours, first due to lightning in the area, and then to allow track officials to dry portions of the raceway that were ponding due to heavy rainfall.
When the race finally started, it was on rain tires, which saw road race ace McDowell surge to the lead over Elliott and Larson. As the track dried, several drivers moved to dry tires, allowing them to move through the field. By the end of the first segment, the track was dry enough that the entire field moved to the dry tires. Rain was not a factor the rest of the race.
NASCAR Cup Series
Watkins Glen International – Watkins Glen, NY
Go Bowling at The Glen – August 21, 2022
1. (2) Kyle Larson, Chevrolet, 90.
2. (6) A.J. Allmendinger(i), Chevrolet, 90.
3. (20) Joey Logano, Ford, 90.
4. (1) Chase Elliott, Chevrolet, 90.
5. (9) Daniel Suarez, Chevrolet, 90.
6. (3) Michael McDowell, Ford, 90.
7. (5) Tyler Reddick, Chevrolet, 90.
8. (38) Christopher Bell, Toyota, 90.
9. (7) Chris Buescher, Ford, 90.
10. (31) Erik Jones, Chevrolet, 90.
11. (29) Cole Custer, Ford, 90.
12. (24) Kevin Harvick, Ford, 90.
13. (8) Austin Cindric #, Ford, 90.
14. (11) Alex Bowman, Chevrolet, 90.
15. (21) Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., Chevrolet, 90.
16. (28) Ty Dillon, Chevrolet, 90.
17. (12) Austin Dillon, Chevrolet, 90.
18. (13) Justin Haley, Chevrolet, 90.
19. (15) Brad Keselowski, Ford, 90.
20. (22) Denny Hamlin, Toyota, 90.
21. (18) Ross Chastain, Chevrolet, 90.
22. (4) William Byron, Chevrolet, 90.
23. (25) Martin Truex, Jr., Toyota, 90.
24. (26) Ryan Blaney, Ford, 90.
25. (14) Chase Briscoe, Ford, 90.
26. (16) Ty Gibbs(i), Toyota, 90.
27. (32) Corey LaJoie, Chevrolet, 90.
28. (30) Harrison Burton #, Ford, 90.
29. (35) Aric Almirola, Ford, 90.
30. (33) Mike Rockenfeller, Chevrolet, 90.
31. (17) Joey Hand, Ford, 90.
32. (10) Kyle Busch, Toyota, 89.
33. (34) Loris Hezemans(i), Ford, 89.
34. (39) Cody Ware, Ford, 88.
35. (23) Bubba Wallace, Toyota, Suspension, 83.
36. (36) Daniil Kvyat, Toyota, 58.
37. (27) Kimi Raikkonen, Chevrolet, Accident, 44.
38. (19) Todd Gilliland #, Ford, Rear End, 28.
39. (37) Kyle Tilley, Ford, Steering, 15.
Average Speed of Race Winner: 95.962 mph.
Time of Race: 2 Hrs, 17 Mins, 52 Secs. Margin of Victory: .882 Seconds.
Caution Flags: 5 for 11 laps.
Lead Changes: 12 among 9 drivers.
Lap Leaders: C. Elliott 1-3;M. McDowell 4-11;T. Reddick 12-13;C. Elliott 14-15;C. Briscoe 16-22;T. Gilliland # 23-27;J. Logano 28-42;M. McDowell 43-48;C. Elliott 49-58;C. Custer 59-65;A. Dillon 66-71;C. Elliott 72-85;K. Larson 86-90.
Leaders Summary: (Driver, Times Lead, Laps Led) Chase Elliott 4 times for 29 laps; Joey Logano 1 time for 15 laps; Michael McDowell 2 times for 14 laps; Chase Briscoe 1 time for 7 laps; Cole Custer 1 time for 7 laps; Austin Dillon 1 time for 6 laps; Todd Gilliland # 1 time for 5 laps; Kyle Larson 1 time for 5 laps; Tyler Reddick 1 time for 2 laps.
Stage #1 Top Ten: 14,8,99,38,1,22,42,34,18,16
Stage #2 Top Ten: 22,18,34,9,42,15,17,5,41,20
Playoff Standings: 1. Chase Elliott – 922 (4 Wins); 2. Kyle Larson – 788 (2 Wins); 3. Joey Logano – 767 (2 Wins); 4. Ross Chastain – 761 (2 Wins); 5. Kevin Harvick – 690 (2 Wins); 6. William Byron – 664 (2 Wins); 7. Tyler Reddick – 602 (2 Wins); 8. Denny Hamlin – 591 (2 Wins); 9. Christopher Bell – 733 (1 Win); 10. Kyle Busch – 679 (1 Win); 11. Alex Bowman – 615 (1 Win); 12. Daniel Suarez – 614 (1 Win); 13. Austin Cindric – 580 (1 Win); 14. Chase Briscoe – 571 (1 Win); 15. Kurt Busch – 485 (1 Win); 16. Ryan Blaney – 779.
(i) Ineligible for driver points in this series
