How Larson pulled off his frantic final lap at Talladega

Kyle Larson, in his words, tried to give the win away Sunday at Talladega Superspeedway.

But as it turns out, Larson went from being shuffled out of the lead off Turn 2 to making one of NASCAR's most impressive charges. Larson was in 11th place going down the backstretch and then fifth coming off the final corner. Fortunately for the Hendrick Motorsports driver, Talladega's start/finish line isn't in the trioval, and Larson continued his run past the last few competitors.

It was Larson’s third win in eight Chase races. Here is how he said he made it happen:

“Austin Hill was doing a good job of helping me whenever he was around me all day. There in 1 and 2, as you can imagine, the pushes are going to get more aggressive where all race I wasn't getting pushed in the corners and stuff. Yeah, he was giving me shoves in the corner, which I was happy about. But as I got close to the transition from banking to flat, I got really loose, and I couldn't turn the wheel. Because my wheels were straight, I was going straight up the racetrack, and it just forced him underneath me.

“Then I was just stalled out and mad at myself because I was like, ‘Man, under that red and lining up for the restart, I've got a great shot to win here, and this is going to be the easiest speedway win of the history of speedway wins because I have so many Chevys around me.’ Then, yeah, I choked it away off of Turn 2 and was pissed.”

Hill getting underneath Larson put him in the middle with no help. It was when Larson fell from first to 11th.

“Then I'm like, ‘Man, let's just not crash.’ I was [having] negative thoughts - like there's going to be a crash, I'm going to get swallowed in it, the good day is going to be terrible. There it was, almost a crash into Turn 3, but I was just kind of stuck in the middle, then the middle kind of took off. I guess Ross [Chastain] got behind me and picked my momentum back up.

Larson stayed in the middle lane into Turn 3, which helped him get into Cole Custer’s draft. The two made short work of Denny Hamlin, as Chastain began to catch Larson’s draft to make it a three-car run. Through the corners, they also dispatched Carson Hocevar and Ryan Preece.

Off the corner, in the short chute before the trioval, Larson was still drafting Custer and split between Michael McDowell and Austin Dillon. It put him sixth as the run was still getting faster. Hill then pulled to the left and was left behind when his car quit.

Larson was fifth by the time the pack hit the trioval. Custer stayed high and got caught behind William Byron, but Larson began his turn to the bottom and quickly moved around Custer and then three-wide with Byron and Todd Gilliland. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. blocked Byron’s run, which kept the door open for Larson to stay clear on the bottom.

“Yeah, it looked like those guys in the front were all slicing and dicing to give themselves the best opportunity they had, but it was like washing them up the track with the moves they were making, and I got clear to go left. I had such a run, and the shorter distance, it worked out. Yeah, off of Turn 2, definitely did not think I would win. I mean, even off Turn 4, I didn't think I'd win. But that's just speedway racing; it's crazy.”

The fact that it all worked out so well, and that Larson sealed the deal, did not surprise crew chief Cliff Daniels. It surprised many others, however, including Larson.

“I never once in that last lap, after I got stuck in the middle off of Turn 2, did I think I was going to win. Not even until I entered the trioval and I had a clear track in front of me did I think I could win. I was so far behind that I was like, ‘We made it through all the craziness; I'm going to finish.’ I was happy I was going to finish. And then I’m like, ‘Oh, my gosh, I'm flying right now. I'm going to win.’

“It was just full of surprise. Like, there wasn't anything special that I did. I didn't really think on the last lap. It was honestly, like, more mistakes than anything that got me in that scenario. I don't know. Maybe it was just meant to be and the mistake opened up the opportunity for me to win. Who knows how the race would have played out had I been leading my lane, not having got put in the middle. Who knows, I might not have won, I might have crashed.

“It worked out how it was supposed to work out.”