What a Finish. It wasn’t a photo finish at the line. But Damn that was good.
It was a classic shootout between the winningest driver in series history against one of the most promising bright stars in NASCAR today, ending up being the kind of race fans will be talking about for a long time.
While the first name on their lips will be Kyle, the next name and word will be Larson and not Busch.
The young gun, Kyle Larson, outworked, outdrove and outfinished the winningest driver in Nationwide Series history, Kyle Busch, to capture Saturday’s TreatMyClot.com 300 at Auto Club Speedway.
“It’s nice to get a win,” Larson said. “I was looking at the board over there in (turns) one and two and it said ‘five second-place finishes in the Nationwide Series,’ and I didn’t want to make it six,” said Larson, a native of Elk Grove, Calif., about 425 miles northwest of Fontana. “It means the world to finally get it here, in my home state of California.”
Larson led just 17 laps, including 15 of the final 17, to notch his first career win in the Nationwide series, edging Harvick at the finish line, with Busch falling back on the last lap to finish third.
“The 54 (Busch) and 5 (Kevin Harvick) were really good behind us,” Larson said. “I had a heck of a race with those guys, it was amazing. Those last 11 or 12 laps were the longest laps of my life. I could see the 54 and 5 racing hard behind me and they weren’t getting any further behind.”
No matter what Busch, who has won a record 65 NNS races in his career, tried to do, Larson displayed the savvy of a veteran driver in holding off his main challenger.
Larson had more than Busch to contend with as Harvick began a late surge with seven laps to go, but couldn’t quite get to the front.
Busch skimmed the wall with six laps to go, but damage appeared minimal and didn’t seem to affect his Toyota Camry.
Busch regained the lead briefly right after that, but on the next lap, Larson incredulously found a way to sneak by Busch on the right without hitting the wall.
If Larson had a couple of inches to clear, it was barely that, at best.
“(I’ve dreamed of this) for quite a while, ever since I finished second last year at Bristol,” Larson said. “It’s been over a year now since I’ve been close to winning, I finally got it done and it means a lot to have done it here in California.
“That was a blast racing out there and I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a heck of a race in the Cup car, too (on Sunday).”
Busch came into victory lane while Larson was giving a post-race interview to congratulate him, as did Sprint Cup team owner Rick Hendrick.
In the closing laps, and to his credit, Harvick continually worked the low line and gave Larson all he could handle.
Meanwhile, Larson and Busch stuck to the high groove, forcing Harvick to slide up several times before going back down to the bottom of the two-mile track.
That strategy wasn’t enough to win, but did earn Harvick the runner-up finish.
“It’s pretty cool to beat those guys,” Larson said. “The 54 and 22 (fourth-place finisher Joey Logano) have dominated this series for a while now and Harvick’s with a good team, so I’m sure we’ll be battling them for a while. It was a blast.”
Logano led the most laps (96) in the 150-lap race around the two-mile oval, but faded in the latter part of the race to finish fourth. Busch led 25 laps and Harvick eight.
