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Kyle Larson Comes Up Short in Southern 500, Quest for Regular Season Title

DARLINGTON, S.C. — For much of the night, it seemed as though Kyle Larson was well on his way to a second consecutive Southern 500 victory as he put in a dominant performance at Darlington Raceway.

In those same moments, an ill-feeling Tyler Reddick began to fade through the latter part of the top-10, and the regular season championship seemed to be in Larson’s lap after sweeping the stages on the night.

Unfortunately for the 2021 Cup Series champion, neither came to fruition.

See also
Chase Briscoe Beats Kyle Busch for Southern 500 Win, Playoff Berth

Larson started fourth and grabbed the lead on lap 46 through a cycle of green-flag pit stops. From there, the No. 5 set sail. From lap 46 to 338, Larson led a whopping 263 of 292 laps, never once losing the lead outright on the racetrack.

However, a frenzy of cautions late led to a plethora of differing strategies, mostly from drivers needing to win to make the playoffs.

Larson lost the lead on pit road and fell back on the lap 342 restart exchange that saw Chase Briscoe take Larson and Ross Chastain three wide. Larson was never able to recover from there.

Briscoe seemed to have the only car that could hang with Larson all night long, lurking in the background of Larson’s dominating run nearly from start to finish. In the end, Briscoe made the right moves and stole the Southern 500 out from under Larson and the No. 5 team.

In that same moment, the backslide for Larson and solid restarts for Reddick allowed the driver of the No. 45 Toyota to gain just enough points to barely sneak out the regular season title with the smallest margin possible: just a single point.

When digesting his night, Larson seemed content with the result, highlighting the speed the team brought and the restart at the end as just a racing deal.

“I don’t necessarily think we did anything wrong,” Larson said. “It’s just kind of racing. You know when Ross stayed out it kind of got us a little bit off our gameplan. I chose the bottom, the front row, and Ross just got a good launch and he got clear down in front of me and kind of pinched my air off through [turns] 1 and 2. The No. 54 was able to hang on my right side and I just was stalled out on the backstretch. Briscoe did a great job and cleared all of us.”

Larson went on to congratulate Briscoe and the No. 14 team, highlighting the speed Briscoe had all night and stating how cool it was to see that team go to victory lane.

“It was going to be hard to pass Briscoe,” Larson said. “He was much better than me on the short runs and he was stuck behind me. So I figured once he got clean air he would be tough to beat. Congrats to him, I mean that was awesome, he did such a good job. He was probably equal to me I felt like tonight; for him to stay in it all race long and withstand Kyle Busch‘s pressuring him the end, that was impressive.”

See also
Kyle Busch 1 Spot Short of Win, Playoff Berth For 2nd Straight Week

As for the regular season title, there were a lot of moments that Larson wished he could have back, but he was sure to mention that could be said for anyone. Ultimately, he came up one spot short.

“It’s easy to look back at that,” Larson said. “But as well as everybody, I mean I’m sure Reddick has a handful that he feels have gotten away. But I mean Iowa, Michigan, Chicago, that’s just a few. Charlotte, if I could have just gotten to race there. For us to come up a point short and spotting the field a race, I’m proud of that. But you know, would have liked to have won it.”

Despite missing out on the regular season title, Larson will still start the playoffs as the top seed after acquiring the most playoff points throughout the season. Those points will come in handy as the playoffs start at Atlanta Motor Speedway, where Larson has yet to complete a race since the re-configuration.

About the author

Chase_folsom_ROVAL_2022

Chase began working with Frontstretch in the spring of 2023 as a news writer, while also helping fill in for other columns as needed. Chase is now the main writer and reporter for Frontstretch.com's CARS Tour coverage, a role which began late in 2023.  Aside from racing, some of Chase's other hobbies include time in the outdoors hunting and fishing, and keeping up with all things Philadelphia sports related.

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Class act Kyle.