"THAT'S HARD TO COMPETE AGAINST"- KYLE LARSON CREDITS HMS TEAMMATE CHASE ELLIOTT'S TEAM'S CONSISTENCY THIS SEASON
Kyle Larson has praised his teammate Chase Elliott and the latter's #9 team for their dominance this season. The teammates are fighting for the top spot in the regular season standings and have scored equal points.
The 20th Cup Series debacle is around the corner and is scheduled to flag off tomorrow at 7 pm ET. Nashville Superspeedway will host the 300-lap Ally 400 and 38 high-octane cars will battle for the pinnacle spot.
Ahead of the 399-mile run, Kyle Larson was asked about his fight with Elliott for regular season standings and whether it would affect the former's racing approach. The #5 Chevy driver praised his teammate's consistency on the asphalt while outlining that there was no drastic change in his style.
"I don't think so. I mean, there's still a lot of races left before the playoffs start but we race really well together and it's been great to see (Elliott's) team being as strong as they are this year, they're super consistent. That's hard to compete against. Our team's doing a good job too and just gotta get back on those consistent runs like we've had," Larson said via Frontstretch on X.
Kyle Larson's teammate started his 2024 Cup Series season poorly. For the first four runs, Elliott failed to place his #9 Chevy among the top 10 runners and it took the Georgian six stints of zero top-5s before he bagged a fifth-place finish at the Richmond Raceway.
The three consecutive runs at Richmond, Martinsville Speedway, and Texas Motor Speedway saw Elliott bag a P5, a podium finish in third place, and his season's first win, respectively. Since then, the Hendrick Motorsports driver has mostly placed himself among the top 5s and 10s. Currently, Elliott has seven top-5s and nine top-10s.
Joey Logano's run-in with Kyle Larson's teammate in New Hampshire dethroned the latter as the regular season leader
During the previous race at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Chase Elliott and Joey Logano got wrecked shortly after the Lap 194 restart was given a green flag. The Team Penske #22 Ford's right front got locked up and Logano couldn't steer clear of Elliott on Turn 1. As a result, Logano rammed into the #9 Chevy while it ran in 11th place, destroying the chances of a comeback.
Thus, Chase Elliott came home with 29 points despite being the polesitter at the event. On the other hand, Kyle Larson kicked off his run from 19th place but progressed through the race. He couldn't score a point in Stage 1 but earned four from his seventh-place finish in the second stage.
During the final stage, the HMS driver caught up with the frontrunners to finish fourth, taking 37 points from his outing in Loudon.
Earlier, the 29-year-old led by eight points but after the New Hampshire run, both teammates have 620 points to their name. However, Kyle Larson has outperformed his teammate in several metrics, like 171 stage points over the latter's 104, three wins to Elliott's one, and one additional top-5 than the #9 driver.
With that, Kyle Larson resurrected as the regular season leader while Chase Elliott settled in second place.
2024-06-30T03:49:00Z dg43tfdfdgfd