“I was able to hold him off”: Kyle Larson makes feeling known on outpacing Denny Hamlin to cement his place among HMS greats

Kyle Larson has broken down the turning point of his Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series win at Homestead-Miami Speedway that allowed him to become the third-winningest driver for Hendrick Motorsports. He believes that the winning moment in his victory was holding off Denny Hamlin in the 267-lap event.

The #5 HMS driver clinched his first win of the season after passing the struggling drivers ahead of him, including his teammate Alex Bowman, in the closing laps. After Bowman made contact with the wall on Lap 261, Larson capitalized on this and grabbed the lead to cross the finish line in P1.

In the post-race interview with SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, Kyle Larson reflected on his race strategy, execution, and a key moment in his second career win at Homestead-Miami.

Speaking about the win and turning point of the race, here’s what Larson said:

“Yeah, it was going to be the longest run of the day, so I knew I was going to have to run the wall and try to take care of my tires and unfortunately got into the wall a handful of times there last run and lost the spot to the #19, almost lost one to the #11, but thankfully I was able to hold him off and I really think that was kind of the winning moment for my race, was staying in front of Denny.”

“I was able to stretch out on him after that and just kind of start catching those guys. I could see they were struggling in front of me and yeah, I just was able to pick them off, so I had enough grip in the tires to do that,” he added.

Kyle Larson’s Miami victory marked his 24th career win that came in the #5 HMS, the third highest for the Rick Hendrick-owned organization. It also marked his 30th overall career victory in the series. The two most winning drivers in HMS are Jeff Gordon and Jimmie Johnson, with 93 and 83 wins, respectively.

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“So just proud of the team” - Kyle Larson praises his #5 team

Kyle Larson celebrates with teammates after winning the Straight Talk Wireless 400 at Homestead-Miami Speedway - Source: Imagn

In the aforementioned interview, the 32-year-old Elk Grove, California, native expressed pride in both his #5 HMS team and himself for staying composed and securing an early-season win, locking his playoff spot. He led 19 laps and crossed the finish line 1.205 seconds ahead of Bowman.

Praising his team, Larson said:

‘So just proud of the team and really proud of myself too for staying patient and not getting upset at myself when I was giving up those spots or having bad restarts or whatever was going wrong. So yeah, cool to get a win and yeah, good to get one early in the year too.”

Kyle Larson took fewer races than legends Mark Martin, Denny Hamlin, Dale Jarrett, Matt Kenseth, Joey Logano, Kevin Harvick, Martin Truex Jr., and Kurt Busch to secure 30 career wins in the series.