{"id":82243,"date":"2021-11-09T12:17:57","date_gmt":"2021-11-09T20:17:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/?p=82243"},"modified":"2021-11-09T12:17:57","modified_gmt":"2021-11-09T20:17:57","slug":"kyle-larsons-360-degree-turnaround","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/kyle-larsons-360-degree-turnaround\/","title":{"rendered":"Kyle Larson’s 360 Degree Turnaround"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Kyle
Photo Credit: Chevrolet Performance<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Less than two years ago Kyle Larson was in NASCAR\u2019s version of hell. He\u2019d made racist comments no Japanese-American should make during a non-NASCAR online racing competition and was relieved of his ride with Chip Ganassi Racing in the Cup Series and suspended by NASCAR.<\/p>\n

Larson, though, is a racer and he was able to continue to race, albeit not in the NASCAR Cup Series. The Californian returned to his roots and was soon winning his fair share (and a bit more) of open-wheel dirt contests around the country, keeping his hand in as a racer should do. He won 46 races during his NASCAR absence<\/p>\n

Before the 2021 NASCAR season began, he was hired to drive the iconic No. 5 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 for Hendrick Motorsports, with primary sponsorship from www.Hendrickcars.com. Many questioned Rick Hendrick\u2019s sanity in hiring a driver whose career looked like it was over before the 29-year-old had a chance to really show his ability behind the wheel of a Cup car. Four-time champ Jeff Gordon, who has taken an operational position with Hendrick\u2019s team, stood up for Larson as he became a member of the Hendrick family of Cup competitors: 2020 champ Chase Elliot, William Byron and Alex Bowman.<\/p>\n

\"Kyle
Photo Credit: Chevrolet Performance<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Now, of course, after 10 victories this season, Larson brought home Mr Hendrick\u2019s 14th NASCAR Cup Series title and 280th Cup Series race win by being first to the checkered flags in the Series Finale 500 at Phoenix Raceway in Avondale, AZ. This was a championship battle between Larson\u2019s teammate and defending series titleholder Elliott, Joe Gibbs Racing\u2019s Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr.\u2019s Toyotas to take all the marbles and, as seems to be a recent NASCAR tradition, winning the race to take the title.<\/p>\n

That Larson had never won in Phoenix didn\u2019t matter too much; his team helped the driver keep Truex behind with a virtuoso final pit stop, allowing Larson to nab a .398-second margin of victory on the one-mile oval. Up to the final 30 laps, it looked like Larson didn\u2019t have much of a chance as he was fourth of the four eligible drivers for the championship.<\/p>\n

Truex had a near four-second lead before the final caution for burning brakes and a dropped rotor on David Starr\u2019s No. 13 Toyota. During this ninth caution, Larson\u2019s crew put their driver in the lead with a lightning-fast and perfectly-executed pit stop, their second-best of the year. It didn\u2019t hurt that Larson had the first pit stall, earned with pole position for this season finale. He elected to re-start outside with Hamlin next to him, Truex behind Larson and Elliott behind Hamlin.<\/p>\n

While Truex tried to challenge the leader for this win and championship, he didn\u2019t have the best pit stop, losing two spots. \u201cWith 20 to go, it\u2019s going to be hard to pass anybody out front in clean air,\u201d Truex allowed. Teammate Hamlin, who has seemingly been a bridesmaid in these championship runs his entire career, saluted the winners. \u201cThose guys, any time you can win 10 races in a year, you\u2019re absolutely a deserving champion.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for Elliott, who finished fifth behind Team Penske\u2019s Ryan Blaney, he acknowledged the race \u201cjust didn\u2019t work out, and the sequence of the way all that went certainly was unfortunate for us.\u201d The 25-year-old was looking to become the youngest NASCAR driver to earn two championships.<\/p>\n

Larson led more laps in this 500km contest, 107 of the scheduled 312, than any driver. He\u2019s the first driver since Hendrick Motorsports\u2019 seven-time champion Jimmie Johnson (2007) to win 10 Cup races in a season and became Chevrolet\u2019s 33rd driver\u2019s champion.<\/p>\n

As he tearfully celebrated, both on the track and in Victory Lane, Larson was incredulous about his change of fortune. \u201cI cannot believe it,\u201d he said. \u201cI didn\u2019t even think I\u2019d be racing a Cup car a year and a half ago, so to win a championship is crazy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got to say, first off, thank you so much to Rick Hendrick, Hendrickcars.com, Jeff Gordon, NASCAR, every single one of my supporters in the stands, watching at home, my family. I\u2019ve got so many of my friends and family here. My parents, my sister, my wife [Katelyn] and [two] kids.<\/p>\n

\u201cWithout my pit crew on that last stop, we would not be standing right here. They are the true winners of this race. They are true champions. I\u2019m just blessed to be a part of this group. Every single man or person, man and woman at Hendrick Motorsports, this win is for all of us, and every one of you,\u201d Larson concluded.<\/p>\n

Team owner Rick Hendrick acknowledged, \u201cWe\u2019ve always known he\u2019s a wheelman. He worked so hard off the track. He deserves this. What a year!\u201d<\/p>\n

Kyle Larson and the No. 5 Chevy will begin their title defense on the banks of Daytona International Speedway with NASCAR\u2019s traditional season-opening Daytona 500, scheduled for February 20, 2022.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Less than two years ago Kyle Larson was in NASCAR\u2019s version of hell.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":82245,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[17,3424,3470,5029,22],"tags":[5614,683,127,41,1632],"class_list":["post-82243","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guest-column","category-nascar","category-news","category-racing","category-event-coverage","tag-anne-proffit","tag-kyle-larson","tag-nascar","tag-news","tag-racing"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/11\/5LarsonWinsChampionship06-min-e1636489042255.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p42YSK-lov","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82243","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82243"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82243\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":82246,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82243\/revisions\/82246"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82245"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82243"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82243"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.racingjunk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82243"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}