“Metal fragment still had a 3 on it:” NASCAR insider unveils Richard Childress’ grandson’s involvement in Kyle Larson’s misery

NASCAR insider Jeff Gluck revealed that a metal fragment from Austin Dillon's Chevrolet ruined Kyle Larson's race after his major crash. The piece of metal stuck to the #5, which caused him to pit and lose positions.

Larson has been performing extremely well in the 2024 Cup Series season, leading his way throughout the playoffs. However, the South Point 400 at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway saw him drop two laps down to the leader after a slow pit stop. When he stopped first during the second stage, there was seemingly some issue in his right rear tire and it had to be tightened again.

While this stop itself cost him some positions, Kyle Larson was seen coming back to the pits to change his left rear again. Cliff Daniels, his crew chief, later revealed that there was a piece of metal fragment stuck to his car which had the #3 on it. The car, piloted by Richard Childress's grandson Austin Dillon, had gone through a violent shunt earlier during the race, which might have left a little piece of metal fragment on the wall. This ended up on Kyle Larson's Chevy, worsening his race.

NASCAR insider Jeff Gluck mentioned how the little piece of metal hindered Kyle Larson's chances of finishing better in the race.

"So the first thing that happened to them, I believe this was the first thing, you'll remember that he had to come down [to] pit roads suddenly when the field was, I think, about to take the green. And he had a piece of aluminum in his car, they said, they had taken it out."

"Cliff Daniels told a few of us afterwards that that was actually a piece of Austin Dillon's wheel. Austin Dillon hit the wall so hard that his wheel came apart. They know it was Austin Dillon's wheel because Cliff Daniels told us that it still had a 3 on it on the metal fragment that was in Larson's car. So that was a big piece that they had to get out of there. So they lost all their track position there."

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"It'll never happen again": Kyle Larson prepared to take on the challenge at Homestead after Las Vegas mishap

Despite the disastrous pit stop, the Hendrick Motorsports driver finished the race in 11th place but dropped two spots in the playoff standings. Reviewing his race and the incident that brought him down laps behind the leader, the #5 pilot said that the team, himself included, will assess more from this experience and a similar incident will "never happen again."

"I make a lot more mistakes than the rest of our team does. Yeah, that allows me to be calm and all that. So, yeah, it was a bit of a mess, but we'll assess it and learn from it. And it'll never happen again. I know that."

"It became a mess on that pit stop, but, you know, we just kept our heads in the game from then from there forward and, you know, almost got a top ten," Kyle Larson added (at 1:02).

The 2021 Cup Series Champion has been chasing his second title this season and has performed brilliantly. However, Joey Logano's drive saw him win the race and locked him in for the title fight at Phoenix.