By Aaron Bearden, Motorsports Editor
SPARTA, Ky. — Kyle Larson is still searching his first victory of 2018 in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series. But with the regular season drawing to a close, the Californian is also starting to keep an eye on the points standings.
“You can’t risk a good finish and be too ballsy trying to go win because you still want to be as high up in points as you can to gain those extra bonus points for the regular season standings,” Larson said after Saturday’s Quaker State 400. “But we’re at a place where we’re definitely going to make the playoffs, so it would be nice to win some stages or a race.”
While he’s come close to victory several times, Larson has been part of a talented group of drivers in the garage that have gone winless this year due to the domination of NASCAR’s ‘Big Three’ – Martin Truex Jr., Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch. The Chip Ganassi Racing star has earned six top fives, including four second-place finishes, but has fallen short of one of Cup’s dominant trio in each near miss.
He didn’t finish second at Kentucky Speedway, but Larson felt like he’d given away a potential win all the same.
The 25-year-old qualified 18th, but was forced to start at the rear for the second-straight year after missing driver intros due to “a little miscommunication.” Larson quickly drove through the field, finishing eighth in Stage 1 and fifth in Stage 2. He passed the dominant Truex during the final stage and appeared to be a threat for the race win, but shortly afterward Larson’s No. 42 Chevrolet suffered a broken trackbar.
The fifth-year driver quickly began to fall back, and his CGR team were forced to improvise on his ensuing pitstop.
“I’m not exactly sure what happened to (the trackbar),” Larson said. “It was down five and a half inches on my dash and I could move it. They couldn’t move it under the pit stops and like I said they had to crutch it with the wedge so I’m not sure what causes that, but it happened.”
With his issues partially corrected, Larson marched forward again on the race’s final run. The dirt-track ace was running as fast as anyone on the track, but ran out of time to return to contention. He took the checkered flag as the top Chevrolet driver in ninth, and could only watch from pit road as Truex celebrated his third win in the past six races.
“It’s frustrating because I feel like I had a car capable of competing with them,” Larson said of Truex, Busch and Harvick. “I felt like I was better than the No. 4. I passed the No. 18 a couple of times, passed the No. 78 there before that second to last run. I passed him and kind of drove away from him for a few laps until right when our trackbar broke.
“It’s hard to say if I would have had a shot to win. You never know how these races will play out, but I would have loved to have had a shot.”
Larson didn’t have a chance to win in the closing laps, but he emerged with another strong points day. He left Kentucky sitting eighth in the championship standings, as the lone driver inside of the top 11 that’s yet to secure at least one playoff point.
He’ll gain three bonus playoff points if he can maintain his current position in the standings through the end of the regular season.