Kyle Larson can win his third NASCAR Cup Series championship this Sunday at Martinsville Speedway, with a race to spare. He has to stretch his lead from 73 points to 77.
He built that lead at Talladega Superspeedway on Oct. 25, on a last lap he said he tried to give away. Larson was leading when the white flag waved. Off Turn 2, his No. 5 Chevrolet got loose and went "straight up the racetrack," and he fell to 11th. "I choked it away off of turn two and was pissed," he said.
Then the cars ahead of him fanned out across the track. Ross Chastain, in the No. 1 Chevrolet, pushed him from behind, and Larson came off Turn 4 with a run on the bottom and beat his Hendrick Motorsports teammate William Byron to the line by 0.041 seconds. The race had gone to overtime after a 15-car crash stopped it under a red flag.
"Off of turn two, definitely did not think I would win," Larson said. "I mean, even off turn four, I didn't think I'd win."
The 77 comes from the finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Nov. 8. No driver can score more than 76 points in one race, so a 77-point lead cannot be caught. Larson leads Denny Hamlin and Christopher Bell, who drive the No. 11 and No. 20 Toyotas for Joe Gibbs Racing, by 73 and 74 points. To be 77 clear of both after Martinsville, he has to outscore Hamlin by four points and Bell by three.
He also has to lose no more than two points to Chase Briscoe, 79 back in the Gibbs team's No. 19 Toyota; 23 to Joey Logano, 100 back, and 30 to Ryan Blaney, 107 back, who drive Fords for Team Penske; and 49 to Tyler Reddick, 126 back in the No. 45 Toyota for 23XI Racing.
A week ago the title looked open. Larson came to Talladega five points ahead of Bell after crashing out at Phoenix. He scored 71 points at Talladega, finishing fourth and second in the race's two stages, the segments that pay bonus points before the finish, and then winning. Every other driver in the Chase, the 16-driver playoff that decides the title, lost ground to him.
Hamlin finished eighth and moved up to second. He said he was "all but wrecked" when Todd Gilliland's No. 34 Ford clipped him entering Turn 3 late in the race. Bell went out with a suspension problem after 177 laps and finished 35th. Briscoe, who started first, was collected in the 15-car crash, along with Logano. Blaney crashed out after 131 laps. Reddick finished 37th.
Where the Chase stands with two races left, from NASCAR's unofficial points sheet:
- Kyle Larson, 2,441 points
- Denny Hamlin, 73 behind
- Christopher Bell, 74 behind
- Chase Briscoe, 79 behind
- Joey Logano, 100 behind
- Ryan Blaney, 107 behind
- Tyler Reddick, 126 behind
Larson, 34, won Cup championships in 2021 and 2025. The Talladega win was his 35th in Cup, his third this season and his first in 24 starts at Talladega. It was also his first Cup win on a superspeedway, the big, fast tracks where cars race in tight drafting packs.
"It would be great to gain a handful of points next week and I guess we would have it locked up," he said. Later he added, "I'm not getting ahead of myself at all. I'm not going to let you guys get me ahead of myself either."
His crew chief, Cliff Daniels, was asked whether the plan was to put it away at Martinsville. "Try to do that every week, and then Phoenix showed up," he said.
Hamlin was blunter. "We've got a big old gap," he said. "I think as long as he can keep his four tires on it the next two weeks, he'll be champion again."
Martinsville suits Hamlin. Among active drivers he has the most top-five finishes there, 22, the most top-10 finishes, 28, and the most laps led, 3,014, in 41 starts, according to NASCAR.
The Xfinity 500, 500 laps on the 0.526-mile track, starts at 2 p.m. ET Sunday, Nov. 1, on NBC.
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