Chandler Smith lets his emotions fly after shutting down Kyle Larson’s historic bid

Chandler Smith bagged his first win of the 2025 season at Bristol Motor Speedway on Friday. By doing so, he took away Kyle Larson’s opportunity to pull off a historic feat at the 0.533-mile oval, short track.

Larson was tapped to run three races (Truck, Xfinity, and Cup) over the weekend. A weekend sweep is an achievement for any driver out there, but what Larson could have done was far greater.

Besides Kyle Busch, nobody has been able to pull off a weekend sweep at Bristol. What’s more impressive is that the two-time Cup Series champion did it twice in 2010 and 2017.

Unfortunately, Larson will not be equalling Busch in this aspect any time before September, when NASCAR returns to Bristol for the Bass Pro Shops Night Race.

However, winning at Bristol meant the world to Chandler Smith. While speaking with Josh Sims of FOX Sports after the race, the 22-year-old driver expressed his feelings.

“I'm more excited for this team than I am for myself,” Smith told Sims. “This group came together...I had my crew chief like three weeks before Daytona. Take that in for a second. This group just got assembled early in January.”

After a two-year stint in the Xfinity Series, Chandler Smith returned to the Truck Series as a full-time driver with Front Row Motorsports. Despite pulling off a championship-caliber season with Joe Gibbs Racing the year prior, the Georgia native fell short of making the playoffs.

“The good lord works in mysterious ways,” Smith continued. “My life's been really crazy here recently, and there are a lot of unknowns about my future going into the season.”

“We kind of had our backs against the wall about putting this group together at the last minute. But holy s**t, I wouldn't want any different group than I got behind me,” he added.

Besides the victory, Smith took home the $50,000 cash prize. Next up for him is the Black’s Tire 200 at Rockingham Speedway. The 200-lap race is scheduled for April 18 and will be televised on FS1 from 5 pm ET onwards.

NASCAR insider drops update on Chandler Smith’s fiery post-race interview

Chandler Smith was elated when he crossed the finish line ahead of Kyle Larson at Bristol Motor Speedway. Needless to say, beating a Cup Series regular (and a former Cup Series champion) like Larson calls for celebration.

After bagging the win, Smith performed an impressive burnout. However, he rubbed his tires a little too hard. As a result, his left front caught fire, thanks to his post-race show.

Performance Racing Network’s Doug Turnbull reflected on the incident in a recent post on X (formerly known as Twitter) and wrote:

“Chandler Smith wins Truck race at Bristol…and here is the burnout aftermath. There was also a fire under the left front while I was interviewing him.”

As of today, Chandler Smith sits second in the driver standings with 252 points to his name, 18 points behind points leader Corey Heim. The triumph at Bristol got him an automatic spot in the playoffs alongside Heim and Daniel Hemric of McAnally-Hilgemann Racing.