In their first year together as teammates at Hendrick Motorsports, Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott mostly played nice.
Two races into the 2022 season? Not so much.
With 21 laps to go during Sunday’s race at Auto Club Speedway, both drivers had a shot at victory.
Auto Club Speedway was the first intermediate track of the 2022 season and the first the NASCAR Cup Series has visited since Kansas Speedway last October. The result, though, wasn’t new at all.
Kyle Larson won the last intermediate track race of 2021 and he won the first of 2022 on Sunday (Feb. 27), taking the top spot in the WISE Power 400.
On Sunday (Feb. 27) at Auto Club Speedway, Kyle Larson’s No. 5 came to life late, and the defending champ held off all comers to win his first race of 2022 in the Wise Power 400 and open his title defense.
Or as it was once called, California Speedway.
California was the stuff of dreams in NASCAR’s early days, holding the magic of Hollywood and the solitude of the coastline and forests. And NASCAR was not immune to the lure.
Many drivers go a lifetime without winning NASCAR’s biggest race, but it took Austin Cindric just eight starts to put that notch on his belt. Cindric powered to the front on the final restart and blocked his way to the win as chaos erupted behind him.
After a flip, multiple multi-car crashes and late-race chaos, Austin Cindric emerged as the 2022 Daytona 500 champion on Sunday (Feb. 20) as he survived final-restart challenges from teammate Ryan Blaney, Brad Keselowski, Bubba Wallace and others as the field crashed through the Daytona International Speedway trioval behind him. Cindric’s most recent Cup start, at …
The 2022 Daytona 500 is here. It took three months and 13 days, but we made it through the offseason, folks. NASCAR Cup Series racing is back. Well, if you want to get technical, regular-season NASCAR racing is back, since the Clash at the L.A. Coliseum took place two weeks ago, but the season opener is upon …
With the field splintering into small packs during the Daytona 500 qualifying races and the only major Duels incident on the final lap of the night, how much will the main event reflect the twin 150-mile races from Thursday? Were hosts Bryan Nolen and Adam Cheek surprised by Kaz Grala and Greg Biffle securing the final transfer spots among unchartered teams? And who has the edge among the top drivers entering Sunday’s Great American Race?
The duo discuss these topics and more in a pre-Daytona 500 edition of Stock Car Scoop.
Entering a season with so many new and unknown variables, one thing stayed constant: Hendrick Motorsports qualified on the front row for the Daytona 500.
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