Kyle Larson didn’t need to win Sunday’s Bank of America ROVAL 400 to secure himself a spot in the next round of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs — he accomplished that before the race’s final stage began.
By doing so, though, the Hendrick Motorsports driver collected himself an additional five Playoff Points and further padded his safety net as the eight drivers remaining in the post-season battle it out over the next three races.
His performance was not as dominant as his ass-whooping at Bristol, but the Elk Grove, California-native did lead a race-high 62 of 109 laps, making the final pass for the lead on AJ Allmendinger with 43 laps remaining.
From that point on, it was all about managing the gap for Larson, while also hoping for no late-race restarts, and when none manifested themselves, the Hendrick Motorsports driver cruised to victory.
It’s the sixth win of the season for Larson, and the 29th of his NASCAR Cup Series career — six of which have come on road courses.
“It’s really the first time in my playoff career that I’ve not been close to the cutline, so it was good to have a little bit stress-free of a weekend, I think the first time I’ve been here without crashing — besides the other time I won,” Larson said post-race.
“It’s known that I don’t really use the sim much, and I was in the sim this week. So, huge thank you to the guys there, it really helped me get into a rhythm early on and it helped us fine-tune our car, too, so hats off to everybody there.”
Christopher Bell continued a strong run in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs and finished runner-up, 1.511 seconds behind race-winner Kyle Larson. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver has only one finish worse than seventh in the post-season.
William Byron brought home a third-place finish, stringing together a sequence of three consecutive top-three results in this round of the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs.
Austin Cindric entered the weekend in a must-win situation after a heartbreaking loss at Talladega. The Team Penske driver was unable to capture the win, finishing a solid fourth place.
Chase Elliott rounded out the top five, a performance good enough to advance him into the semi-final round of the Playoffs.
Kaulig Racing teammates AJ Allmendinger and Shane Van Gisbergen finished sixth and seventh-place, after both elected to come down pit road during the race’s final caution. The pair drove through the pack and earned top-10 results.
Joey Logano came home in the eighth, narrowly missing out on advancing into the next round, while Bubba Wallace and Ryan Blaney completed the top-10.
Tyler Reddick finished 11th on the afternoon at the Charlotte ROVAL, coming back from a slew of misfortune early in the event, where he wheel-hopped into Turn 7 and nearly catapulted end-over-end after hitting Denny Hamlin.
The 23XI Racing crew made repairs to the racecar throughout the afternoon and finally got the No. 45 back into a competitive state, where he climbed through the pack on newer tires and secured an 11th-place result, making the next round by four points.
Denny Hamlin (14th) and Alex Bowman (18th) each had so-so afternoons at the Charlotte ROVAL, but managed to hold onto enough points to advance through the next round.
Daniel Suarez and Chase Briscoe struggled, finishing 31st and 37th, which led to them both being eliminated from post-season contention.
The NASCAR Cup Series will begin the ‘Round of 8’ with a critical race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway next weekend, where Larson will look to capitalize on an early-season win and lock himself into the Championship 4.
The South Point 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway will take place on Sunday, October 20 at 2:30 PM ET on NBC, PRN, and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (Channel 90).
