Kyle Larson and Ross Chastain have become a major storyline in recent weeks, with the Trackhouse Racing driver causing crashes that have ruined the No. 5 team’s day three times in the past four races. Sunday at Darlington Raceway, it happened again.
Interestingly, the day before and after the 2021 Cup Series champion won the Xfinity Series race, his Victory Lane celebration received little attendance. According to a report, the reason for the small audience is his pit crew Kaulig Racing, which also serves as Chastain’s pit crew in the Cup Series, opted out of the celebration in protest at what the Hendrick Motorsports driver had done a few weeks earlier. .
Kyle Larson and Ross Chastain involved in multiple crashes in 2023
After Talladega, everyone was talking about the violent crash between Kyle Larson and Ryan Preece. The focus was naturally on the damage done to the HMS car and the chilling images of the Stewart-Haas race car. This all resulted from a crash that Chastain started with a move to the front of the pack on a late restart.
Fast forward to a week later in Dover. In the first stage, the watermelon farmer rode on the back of Brennan Poole, who ran up the track into the wall and collected the #5 car. Two weeks. Two incidents.
After avoiding No. 1 Kansas, Larson and Chastain reconnected at Darlington on Sunday, in a late restart when the Trackhouse car tried to squeeze the HMS car but miscalculated and turned into the outside fence instead, harvesting the 2021 champion in the process.
Larson wins the race and the pit crew does not show up
Larson did not express his irritation at the situation after Sunday’s latest incident as he avoided speaking to reporters after the race. According to the Couch Racer Twitter account, which is operated by several spotters who also work on the Clear door bumper podcast, the HMS rider made no attempt to hide his frustration a few weeks earlier at Dover when he reportedly offered the No.1 team a wave following that Stage 1 incident.
It made things interesting on Saturday at Darlington because the Chastain’s Cup pit crew doubled as the Xfinity pit crew for Kaulig Racing’s #10 car, which Larson drove to his very last first victory on the track Too Tough to Tame.
According to the tweet, members of Larson’s pit crew failed to show up at Victory Lane to protest what happened several weeks earlier.
“Why is the path to victory so empty? asked the tweet. “The 10 Xfinity Pit Crew is also the 1 Cup Pit Crew. Apparently, Larson waved at them after the Dover incident. So they boycotted victory lane at Darlington. Disrespectful or loyal? »
Wants to run more Xfinity in the future
On Monday, Larson appeared as a guest on NASCAR Race Center and talked about the two races at Darlington, first addressing the wild finish on Saturday with John Hunter Nemechek.
“It’s nice to be on the safe side of a late finish like that after losing to Kansas the week before,” Larson said. “Thanks to Kaulig Racing. It was a fun weekend of racing with them. Hopefully we can do more in the future.”
In other words, Larson wasn’t bothered that the pit crew didn’t show up for the post-race celebration and would work with them again. Because in the end, the end result on the track is all that matters, not who turns up at Victory Lane.
To stay up to date on the latest happenings in NASCAR, including the latest stories you won’t find anywhere else, follow Kyle on YouTube And Twitter.