Kyle Larson’s Brickyard win extends HMS’ dominance in Next Gen era

Hendrick Motorsports has recently bagged its 30th win in the NASCAR Cup Series with the NextGen car. Thanks to Kyle Larson's victory at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Hendrick Motorsports is now at the top of the list of teams with the most number of wins in the NextGen era.

Hendrick Motorsports was founded in 1984 by automotive tycoon Rick Hendrick. The team, originally known as "All-Star Racing", made its first Cup Series start 40 years ago with Geoff Bodine behind the wheel of the No. 5 Chevrolet, which Kyle Larson drives today.

Here is a recent X (formerly Twitter) post by NASCAR statistician Trey Ryan, that shows Hendrick Motorsports as the team with the most number of wins with the NextGen stock car:

According to NASCAR, the Chevy team has 310 Cup Series wins so far. The team earned its 300th win this year when William Byron drove the No. 24 Camaro to the victory lane at Texas Motor Speedway.

For Kyle Larson, recording a win at Indianapolis was like redemption. A couple of months ago, Larson had attempted to do "The Double", i.e., running the Indianapolis 500 and the Coca-Cola 600 on the same day.

Unfortunately, rain delayed the Indy 500 by several hours and thus, Kyle Larson failed to make it to Charlotte in time for his Cup Series start. According to the NASCAR rulebook, every driver is required to start in all point-paying races in the regular season to be playoff-eligible. Therefore, Larson was also on the verge of missing this year's playoffs. Thankfully, he was given a playoff waiver a few weeks later.

HMS boss Rick Hendrick on how the failed "Double Duty" attempt motivated Kyle Larson

According to Rick Hendrick, Larson's Indy misery from earlier had only fueled the latter's hunger to kiss the bricks at the iconic 2.5-mile racetrack. There was nothing that the No. 5 team could have done back then as the weather jeopardized the day.

"We were disappointed because of the weather," Hendrick said after Sunday's 400-miler. "We really wanted to get back and finish the 600. We brought that car back with the paint scheme that was on the 600 in the INDYCAR. It was special."

"I think that gave Kyle a lot of, I guess, momentum, motivation. I think we all felt like we were disappointed, disappointed a lot of fans. We couldn't help it. The weather did it," he added.

Larson's car on Sunday flaunted the same orange-blue paint scheme that his car from this year's Coca-Cola 600 had. The current Vice Chairman of Hendrick Motorsports Jeff Gordon, who is also a five-time Brickyard 400 winner, reflected on the same saying,

"I don't know. I just feel like today, especially with that car, that paint scheme, the one that was going to run that day, just seemed to bring it all full circle, made it very special."

Jeff Gordon won the inaugural Brickyard 400 for Hendrick Motorsports 30 years ago. Gordon is also the only driver to this day to have won five times at the crown jewel event.