September 29, 2024

BRISTOL, Tenn. — It was a story of absolute domination on the part of Kyle Larson, who led 462 of 500 laps at Bristol Motor Speedway and won Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race by 7.088 seconds over Hendrick Motorsports teammate Chase Elliott.

Larson’s advance to the Round of 12 in the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs was hardly in doubt. Still, the vicissitudes of the elimination race were unkind to Ty Gibbs, Martin Truex Jr., Brad Keselowski and Harrison Burton, who are no longer eligible to compete for the series championship.

Sweeping both stages in front of a massive crowd on a near-perfect night, Larson set a record for laps led in a single race by a Hendrick Motorsports driver. He has now led 1,351 laps at Bristol, his most at a single track.

No driver has led as many laps in a victory at Bristol since Cale Yarborough led 495 in 1977.

The victory was Larson’s second at the 0.533-mile track, his series-best fifth of the 2024 season and the 28th of the career. He enters the Round of 12 as the top seed as the series moves on to Kansas Speedway.

“Man, that was just great execution all weekend by the team,” Larson said. “Practiced good. You’ve got to qualify good; we did that. Yeah, just had a great car. Thanks to the whole 5 team. They’re the best in the business.

“We dominate a lot of races, but we might not close them all out, so it feels really good to close one out here in this HendrickCars.com Chevy. We’ve got (team owner) Rick Hendrick here today, too. He hasn’t been to many races this year …

“Just a phenomenal car, could kind of manage my stuff and then really pass some cars there at the end.”

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