LOUDON, N.H. – With a fourth-place result Sunday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Kyle Larson moved into a tie with teammate Chase Elliott for the NASCAR Cup Series regular season points lead.
Larson’s series-leading eighth top-five finish of 2024 paced Hendrick Motorsports at the New England track with teammates Elliott in 18th, William Byron in 26th and Alex Bowman in 36th. Christopher Bell was the winner.
Inclement weather affected nearly every aspect of the New Hampshire weekend. Saturday’s time trials were rained out, putting Elliott in the top starting spot based on NASCAR’s qualifying formula. Saturday’s scheduled practice session was also shortened.
At the outset of Sunday’s race, Elliott led the field to green and commanded the first 41 laps. He gained valuable points with finishes of third in stage one and ninth in stage two, but a promising day for the No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts team took a turn at lap 194 when Elliott received contact from Joey Logano. His crew was able to make repairs and keep the 2020 NASCAR champion on the lead lap.
Bowman also picked up points in stage one, finishing 10th after starting fifth. His day ended early at lap 144 when the No. 48 Ally Chevrolet experienced an engine issue, relegating the Tucson, Arizona, native to a 36th-place result. Sunday marked Bowman’s second race of the weekend after he finished ninth in Saturday’s NASCAR Xfinity Series event at New Hampshire.
After starting 19th, Larson worked his way toward the front, earning points in stage two with a seventh-place finish. Then at lap 219 of the scheduled 301, the race was stopped for more than two hours as rain pelted the 1.058-mile track.
When the precipitation cleared, NASCAR made the decision to complete the race using wet-weather tires. In the closing laps, Larson’s No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet picked off three more spots before the checkered flag waved.
“Yeah, it was fun,” Larson said of racing on the damp track. “When it’s like that, I think that is why you see a lot of the dirt racers kind of migrate to the front. I just tried to feel it out under caution. It’s not my best bet on the restart to go extremely low, but it worked out and I was able to maintain track position the rest of the race, so I am proud of that.”
Next up on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Ally 400 at Nashville Superspeedway on Sunday, June 30. Elliott and Larson will go into the race tied for the regular season points lead with Byron seventh and Bowman 12th.
NBC, PRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will broadcast all the action from Nashville beginning at 3:30 p.m. ET on Sunday.