AVONDALE, Ariz. — Kyle Larson finished third at Phoenix Raceway for the third straight time Sunday. The last time he did, the result clinched his second NASCAR Cup Series championship in last season’s finale. This time around, the rally was admirable, but the struggle was real.
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Larson scored his best finish of the young Cup Series season in Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 500, but the eventual top-five outcome belied the early-on challenges that the reigning champ and his No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet faced. While it was an overall positive in the results column, Larson said he was hoping for more at the 1-mile Arizona oval.
“Was not expecting that with how bad we were,” Larson said on pit road post-race, “but again, proud of the team, and yeah, just got to get a lot better here. It’s rewarding to run like (expletive) all day and finish third, but I would love to come here and control our own destiny and lead laps, get stage points, all that sort of stuff, and then get a good finish.”
Larson’s day started with promise from the front row alongside polesitter Joey Logano, but by the end of the first stage — on the 60th of 312 laps — he faded from second to 13th place. During the stage-break yellow flag, he relayed feedback about his car’s handling, adding with exasperation: “I mean, you guys see it. Good luck.”
No. 5 crew chief Cliff Daniels promised major adjustments, saying, “We’re going to really throw a lot at it right now.” After a longer stop to make those changes, Larson left the pits in 26th place.
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Larson worked his way back to ninth by the end of Stage 2, but his report was matter-of-fact: “I think we’ve just got what we’ve got.” A mix of solid restarts, pit strategy and attrition brought him back into the top five by the end.
The result helped Larson rise five spots to 10th in the Cup Series standings, but the 33-year-old driver still had lingering worries, suggesting that the updated Chevrolet body for 2026 and a new 750-horsepower rules package may also take extra adjustment time.
“Yeah, it’s concerning, but I mean, like, we’re always really bad here at Phoenix, at least me,” Larson said. “William (Byron, his teammate) has had his moments of being pretty strong, but I feel like the rest of us three have always been really bad. We just were worse today. I don’t know, just maybe a combination of us needing to learn the body a little bit more and then the horsepower or whatever, but I had the same sort of feel that I always have here, just worse. So yeah, but again, I mean, because we are so bad here, I feel like we know how to fight through it and get a third-place finish like we typically do here, but performance-wise, that’s not where we should be running. So with that, yeah, I’m proud of the team, but for Phoenix, we’ve got to get way, way, way, way better.”