What Happened?
Kyle Larson pulled away from a restart with 15 laps to go to win his first race of the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season at Richmond Raceway on Sunday, April 2. His temporary teammate, Josh Berry, earned his best career result in only his sixth career Cup start by finishing second. Ross Chastain, Christopher Bell and Kevin Harvick rounded out the top five.
The victory is Larson’s second at Richmond and his 19th overall.
But What Really Happened?
A combined 55.25% of Sunday’s 400-miler was led by a driver from Hendrick Motorsports en route to the team’s third win and its second 1-2 finish of the year. At Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the team led for 88.9% of the event.
Last month at Phoenix Raceway, the championship track and one of the closest resembling circuits to Richmond, HMS alone led a combined 83.6% of the event.
Are you starting to get the point?
For 210 laps on Sunday, it was the familiar sight of Larson and William Byron alone sharing the lead as the two sat in positions first and second for a majority of the first two stages.
We’ve come to expect that nowadays from the dynamic Hendrick duo.
Toward the end of stage two, Joe Gibbs Racing had taken the reigns for a total 153 laps between Bell, Denny Hamlin and Martin Truex Jr. To its credit, the team really seemed like it was about to earn its first win of 2023.
Alas, with a late race caution, HMS retook the lead thanks to some fast pit stops and some restart craziness. Larson never looked back as Gibbs fumbled their opportunities to earn the victory.
With all that said and done, the Hendrick had three cars finishing in the top 10. If it weren’t for some contact from Bell, Byron very likely would have joined his bowtie counterparts.
Considering the resemblance Richmond has to the championship deciding circuit of Phoenix – another track where the team also dominated and won – is it that farfetched to think that maybe Hendrick already has a hand on that championship trophy?
It’s led a collective 798 of 1,735 laps so far in 2023 – more than three times the amount of the second most team in the Cup field of Joe Gibbs Racing, which only has 238 laps led and also has still yet to win this year.
There’s also the fact that the team leads the regular-season standings with Alex Bowman…
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