The NASCAR Xfinity Series travels to Martinsville Speedway, where the field looks to leave its mark in the Marine Corps 250 on Saturday (5 p.m. ET, The CW, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
MARTINSVILLE ENTRY LISTS: Cup Series | Xfinity Series | Craftsman Truck Series
Here’s a look at the full entry list for Saturday’s event:
HOMESTEAD, Fla. — Team Penske is battling its own Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde syndrome.
Through Sunday’s race at Homestead-Miami Speedway, the sixth race of the 2025 campaign, nobody has led more laps than its trio of drivers — Joey Logano (247 laps led), Austin Cindric (159) and Ryan Blaney (148). All three rank inside the top five in stage points this season and sit within the top 10 of the series’ best average running positions, according to NASCAR’s loop data.
And yet none of the three have the consistent results to back up their apparent dominance in the races’ early and middle portions. Cindric’s 17.5 average finish is best of the bunch ahead of Logano’s 18.8 and Blaney’s 21.5; Logano is still searching for his first top 10 just six races removed from his 2024 Cup Series championship; and Blaney has failed to finish each of the last three races — two due to engine failure, which bit him again at Homestead after leading a race-high 124 laps and winning Stage 1.
RELATED: Homestead results | Cup standings
As a result, Ryan Blaney is Team Penske’s highest-ranking driver in points at 10th, Logano 11th and Cindric 21st after a 50-point post-race penalty stemming from the March 2 event at Circuit of The Americas.
Travis Geisler, Team Penske’s vice president of competition, weighs the good with the bad. But his disappointment was evident in the NASCAR Cup Series garage following Sunday’s race. Logano was the team’s best finisher in 14th place, ahead of Cindric in 19th; Blaney’s blown engine relegated him to a 36th-place finish. Josh Berry’s No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford is built, assembled and supported by Team Penske, but one week after earning his first Cup win at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, a second-place qualifying effort at Homestead went for naught when he, Logano and Kyle Larson collided on pit road after the conclusion of Stage 1. Berry mustered a 17th-place finish.
“It’s obviously frustrating to be in a situation where we’ve had really good cars that are capable of winning every week and just haven’t really been able to execute and get it done,” Geisler told NASCAR.com. “But I think the key is the process is working as far as what we’re bringing to the race track. That’s the hardest part of this game, is finding speed. And right now, I think all the teams are doing that. We’ve just got to execute on all the other facets of the game.”
Logano’s day was equally unraveled by the early pit-road contact. While Logano’s lack of track position after the incident was a hinderance, the crew’s initial tape application to repair Logano’s right-front fender damage did them no favors, crew chief Paul Wolfe explained.
“When we had the damage, we covered over the hood flap,” Wolfe told NASCAR.com. “So that was why, when we were trying to recover from the issue on that green-flag stop, we had to cut it open. So that’s how we lost the lap and all that. Just kept snowballing for a minute. Fortunately, the car was good on the long haul, and we were able to get back into the (free pass) spot as the leaders were putting guys a lap down. We were coming along there pretty good, and then from there, just had a decent car that we could salvage something out of it. Just a rough day.”
Wolfe has guided the No. 22 team to championships in two of the last three seasons, the lone exception coming in 2023 when Blaney soared to his first title. The finishes aren’t landing for Logano and Co. yet, but Wolfe isn’t ready to hit the panic button.
“I think if you look back at this time last year, we didn’t have the speed or the results. So I guess the bright side of it is we have speed,” Wolfe said. “I think how we ended the season last year, we’ve been able to come out of the gates this year and still carry that speed that we were able to show at the end of last season, so I think that’s a positive. And now it’s just continuing to refine it.
“Speaking for the 22 group specifically, there’s a lot of experience here, and we’ve shown how we’re able to execute and do the things we need to do. So it’s unfortunate, but not really any reason to be concerned. Optimistic about being able to have the speed and (it’s a) much better spot than what we were starting season last year.”
MORE: Analysis: Power in positivity for Wallace
From the 30,000-foot perspective, however, Geisler is keen to smooth out the early-season bumps sooner than later.
“Stuff on pit road, you’ve just got to go back and review,” he said. “Was there anything we can do to avoid it? What are the things as our normal process can we adjust and try to get ourselves where we finish where we belong? That’s really the key right now. I think we’d be in really good shape if we just finished where we belong.”
Blaney had never failed to finish three consecutive Cup races until Homestead marked the unfortunate milestone. Before the March 9 race at Phoenix Raceway, Blaney’s last engine-related DNF was at Texas Motor Speedway in 2019 when he was sidelined for an overheating motor. Six years later, in two of the last three races, his engine has gone up in smoke. This time, his engine gave up on the frontstretch, leaving a cloud of smoke over the onlooking fans at Homestead-Miami.
Geisler said the team will pore over data to ensure nothing on its or Blaney’s end — like shifting, over-revving or overheating — contributed to the recent issues, and he indicated no signs of those have shown yet.
“From there, you’ve just got to lean on Roush Yates (Engines) and Ford to fix the problem,” Geisler said. “We have a lot of problems that we need to fix from this weekend, and we’ve got to outsource that one and let somebody else handle it and have the trust that, over the years, they’ve given us incredibly reliable engines and really have delivered for us. And they’ve just got to go the drawing board a little bit here and figure out what’s going on. I think it looks like a couple different modes of failure here, I would say. So maybe there’s not necessarily a clear direction, but that’s up to them.”
MORE: Cup Series schedule
In the meantime, finishing at the front is a top priority for Team Penske moving forward. Up next is Martinsville Speedway on Sunday (3 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), where Blaney has won each of the last two fall races.
Powered by the early-season frustration, perhaps there will be added emphasis here that will help the team’s results better reflect its performance.
“We’ve got to look internally at what we didn’t do well (Sunday),” Geisler said. “We had three other cars, if you include the 21, that should have been able to run top 10, and we didn’t get there with any of them. So that’s our job. That’s what we’ll go focus on (Monday). Martinsville is another solid place for us, so hopefully, we can go there and get things turned around.”
| Car No. | Driver | Team | Crew Chief | Chassis Mfg. | Sponsors |
| 1 | Patrick Emerling | KPL Racing LLC | Dale Hedquist | LFR | Fleetworks, Inc. |
| 3 | Tyler Rypkema | Boehler’s Racing Equipment | Greg Fournier | Boehler Racing | USNE; Northeast Drilling |
| 7 | Luke Baldwin | Tommy Baldwin Racing LLC | Tommy Baldwin | PSR Products | Baldwin Automotive |
| 16 | Ron Silk | Haydt Yannone Racing | Phil Moran | FURY Race Cars | Blue Mountain Machine; Future Homes |
| 18 | Ken Heagy | Christopher Fleming | Greg Gorman | FURY Race Cars | Avon Prime Meats |
| 21 | Stephen Kopcik | Wanick Motorsports LLC | Nick Kopcik | Troyer | Newtown Pools; Wanick Construction |
| 22 | Kyle Bonsignore | Kyle Bonsignore | Cam Mcdermott | FURY Race Cars | MTT; ChaLew Performance; Munns Auto |
| 24 | Andrew Krause | Supreme Racing | Bryan O’Shea | LFR | Supreme Mfg. Co. |
| 44 | Chase Dowling | Lawney Tinio | Danny Gamache | LFR | Harshaw Paving and S&S Paving |
| 46 | Craig Lutz | Goodie Racing | Douglas Ogiejko | FURY Race Cars | Riverhead Building Supply |
| 51 | Justin Bonsignore | Kenneth Massa Motorsports, LLC | Ryan Stone | FURY Race Cars | Phoenix Communications, Inc. |
| 54 | Tommy Catalano | Catalano Motorsports | Rick Kluth | Troyer | FX Caprara; USNE |
| 56 | Trevor Catalano | Catalano Motorsports | JJ Vece | Troyer | USNE Power & Construction |
| 58 | Eric Goodale | Goodie Motorsports | Rob Hyer | FURY Race Cars | GAF Roofing |
| 59 | Tyler Barry | Jody Lauzon | Billy Michael | Chevrolet | Pro Systems Integration; BNP Machine |
| 60 | Matt Hirschman | Pee Dee Motorsports Elite | Mike Stein | LFR | Elite Towing |
| 64 | Austin Beers | KLM Motorsports | Ron Yuhas | Troyer | G&G Electrical Supply, AP Marquadt & Sons, Dell Electric, Lumiere Electrical, Andrew James Interiors, Hughes Motors |
| 79 | Jonathan McKennedy | Jonathan McKennedy | Chris Ferreira | FURY Race Cars | Christophers Towing |
| 81 | Mark Stewart | Christopher Turbush | Christopher Turbush | FURY Race Cars | Cromers Market; Keith Grimes Excavating |
| 82 | Woody Pitkat | DWR Racing Corp. | Nick Walsh | LFR | Gunsmoke Stables Racing; Danny’s Cesspool Service |
| 88 | Roger Turbush | Roger Turbush | Jarrod Hayes | FURY Race Cars | Rheem |
| 107 | Jake Johnson | JMA Motorsports | Justin Albernaz | FURY Race Cars | Lin’s Propane; Propane Plus; Platinum Fire Protection; Island International; Axis Wealth Partners |
| 112 | Brian Sones | Dennis Wenner | Dennis Wenner | Troyer | Dennis Wenner |
| 120 | Max Zachem | Kenneth Zachem | Ken Zachem | LFR | USNE; Lu-Mac’s |
| 129 | Mike Marshall | Taylor Charbonnier | Taylor Charbonnier | Troyer | MLM Diagnostics; Jusczak Electric |
| 155 | Teddy Hodgdon | Hodgdon Racing | Ted Hodgdon | FURY Race Cars | Montanari Fuel; Business Time Motorsports |
| 163 | Dylan Slepian | Dylan Slepian | Jarod Zeltmann | Chevrolet | Eastport Feeds |
| 211 | Eric Berndt | Ferguson Racing | Rob Fuller | LFR | Alliant Insurance Services |
| 225 | Matt Swanson | Roscoe Racing | Gary Casella | FURY Race Cars | Ceravolo’s Auto; Mully’s Auto Repair; Casella Snowplows; Arco Welding Supply |
Richard Childress Racing announced Monday that Austin Hill will compete in a partial NASCAR Cup Series schedule this season, starting off a five-race slate with next month’s event at Darlington Raceway.
Hill, who has competed in at least one Cup Series event in the last three seasons and made his Cup debut at Michigan International Speedway in August 2022, is set to drive RCR’s No. 33 Chevrolet on the Cup Series side this season, with sponsorship provided by United Rentals. Andy Street will act as crew chief for the part-time entry, with Darlington acting as Street’s Cup Series debut in calling the shots atop the pit box.
RELATED: Cup Series schedule
“I’m excited to compete in the No. 33 United Rentals Chevrolet again this year,” Hill said in a press release. “United Rentals has been a longtime supporter of my career and to continue that relationship once again at the top level of our sport is special. I’ve enjoyed my starts in the Cup Series so far and the goal is to keep learning every time I climb into the car. We have been strategic with adding new tracks to the lineup each season, which allows me to gain valuable experience. Racing for Richard at any level is an honor, but especially in the Cup Series. The focus remains on winning the Xfinity Series championship in November, but any laps in the Cup car are important for the future.”
Hill’s five-race Cup Series schedule for 2025 includes:
Hill is in his fourth full season of Xfinity Series competition driving the No. 21 Chevrolet. During that time, the 30-year-old Georgia native has accumulated 11 Xfinity wins for the Richard Childress-owned organization, including his most recent triumph last month at Atlanta Motor Speedway.
Hill has made 10 Cup Series starts during the last three seasons, including four in the RCR No. 33 Chevy last year.
A lot of drivers showed how riding the high line can pay dividends in finding speed at Homestead-Miami Speedway, but no one could get as close as Kyle Larson as he rallied late to pass his teammate Alex Bowman and score his first Cup Series win of the season.
RELATED: Race results | At-track photos
Several drivers put together strong showings right behind the front-runners, while a few big names are already looking toward next week’s race at Martinsville Speedway (3 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) to turn their luck around.
THREE UP ⬆️
1. AJ Allmendinger, No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet
Started: 10th
Finished: 7th
What happened: Maybe it’s sunshine and palm trees, but Allmendinger seems to love racing around the 1.5-mile track at Homestead. He extended his top-10 streak at the track to four — which remains the longest active among Cup drivers — and he capitalizes off the momentum he gained last week with an eighth-place finish at Las Vegas. Allmendinger had a top-10 car all day, but probably needed a little bit more chaos or a late-race restart to truly challenge for the win.
What’s next: The Los Gatos, California, driver last made a start at Martinsville in a Cup car in the 2023 fall race. With a career average finish of 19.7 at the short track, it may be a climb for him to notch another top 10 next week. However, Allmendinger has still executed and brought a much-needed uptick in performance to the No. 16 team this year.
2. Chris Buescher, No. 17 RFK Racing Ford
Started: 11th
Finished: 6th
What happened: The Prosper, Texas, native had superb speed for most of the weekend, and it showed on race day as he spent most of the race with a top-15 car. He didn’t quite have as much as some drivers, though, given Buescher just barely missed out on stage points, finishing 13th and 11th in the first two frames. Still, Buescher remains ninth in driver’s points and continues a solid start in 2025 with a fourth top 10 through six weeks of racing.
What’s next: Buescher has netted a top-15 finish in the spring race at Martinsville Speedway the last five years and has two career top 10s at the track from the fall races in 2021 and ’23. Plus, RFK Racing has generally had a strong short-track package, so there’s a good chance he’s a contender next week.
3. Austin Dillon, No. 3 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet
Started: 30th
Finished: 13th
What happened: Dillon was one of the biggest benefactors from Blaney’s engine expiring on Lap 208. After spending much of the day in the back, the late caution was enough for the No. 3 driver to work his way up front at a track where he’s historically had good luck. He may still be looking for a top 10 in this season’s campaign, but a 13th-place effort gives him his second top-15 result of the season and a boost after finishing 32nd at Las Vegas.
What’s next: Perhaps the top 10 Dillon is looking for comes next weekend at Martinsville. He won a short track race last year (Richmond summer) and finished seventh at Martinsville in the fall race last year. It would go a long way for the No. 3 team to string solid performances together.
THREE DOWN ⬇️
1. Christopher Bell, No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota
Started: 16th
Finished: 29th
What happened: An early spin on Lap 70 from 15th place essentially sealed Bell’s fate on trying to bounce back from a 12th-place finish last week at Vegas. Bell had a fast Toyota over the long run, but couldn’t quite work through traffic like his teammates Denny Hamlin and Chase Briscoe could, as Hamlin climbed from 23rd to second in Stage 2 and Briscoe chipped away at spots in the top 20.
What’s next: While bad luck has hit the No. 20 team the last couple of weeks after three straight wins, Martinsville is a great track for Bell to turn this around. He won there before in October 2022 and has three career top 10s at the track; plus, given how last year ended for him at the track, there may be added fire to his competitive spirit to perform well.
2. Ross Chastain, No. 1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet
Started: 25th
Finished: 31st
What happened: The Florida native was never quite in contention this weekend, which is disappointing given how strong Chastain looked on an intermediate circuit just last week. What set Chastain back the most was a lack of long-run speed; he restarted 33rd on Lap 217, and while he did make up two spots on the final restart, he certainly struggled to move up more and drive his way to the top 20.
What’s next: Of course, there’s a special memory for Chastain at Martinsville, but more importantly, he’s yet to finish worse than 14th at the short track in the last six races there. With only two top 10s through six weeks, Chastain needs a boost if he wants to make it back into the playoffs this season.
3. Brad Keselowski, No. 6 RFK Racing Ford
Started: 32nd
Finished: 26th
What happened: Keselowski struggled to discover the same speed his RFK Racing teammates were able to find as they snagged top 10s. It’s the first time since 2011 that Keselowski, who dropped four positions after the final restart, has gone the first six races without a top-10 finish.
What’s next: Luckily for Keselowski he heads back to Martinsville, where last time the Cup Series was in town, he led a race-high 170 laps and finished ninth. He also has two wins and 12 career top fives at the Virginia track, so there should be some promise that he can turn his season around starting next week.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. — Chase Briscoe and Denny Hamlin walked away from Homestead-Miami Speedway with top-five efforts, but still searching for more from their Joe Gibbs Racing Toyotas.
Briscoe notched a fourth-place finish Sunday to match his Daytona 500 result in his first top five since the February race. Hamlin led 15 laps ahead of finishing fifth, but those were the only ones JGR led in the 267-lap race.
MORE: Official results | At-track photos: Homestead
Briscoe is the newest driver on JGR’s roster, joining Hamlin, Christopher Bell and Ty Gibbs at the four-car organization after four seasons at Stewart-Haas Racing. His Homestead finish was a much-needed step in the right direction after an opening five races in which he says it has been tough to find a rhythm.
“I just felt like we finished where we deserved to finish from a speed standpoint,” Briscoe said. “Today could have went, honestly, way worse. We have a lot to clean up still. I’d say we almost probably lost 20 spots on pit road today, so just had to keep battling from behind. But our car was really, really good — I say it was good, but it wasn’t as good as the 5. But it was still good.
“Just finally felt like we finished where we needed to to hopefully build some momentum. Hopefully, we can just continue to do this, continue to show that we’re one of those guys that can run up front week in and week out. It’s nice to finally do that. It’s been since the (Daytona) 500.”
JGR stands as a powerhouse within the NASCAR Cup Series garage, particularly evidenced by Bell’s three wins within the first four races of 2025. Briscoe, who drove the No. 14 car at SHR last year, believed he as a driver could perform in JGR equipment if given the opportunity. After a four-race stretch with finishes of 14th or worse, Briscoe and his No. 19 team delivered what he believes should be the standard of a JGR driver.
“We know that we’re capable, right?” Briscoe said. “But I think at least for me, from a confidence standpoint, I felt like I should be running in the top five all day long in Joe Gibbs Racing cars, but you never really know until you do it, right? So for me to be able to just be up front all day long … like in the past, there was only a couple weekends a year where I could do that and show that.
“So this year, hopefully we can do it a lot more often, and that’s definitely a lot of fun. It’s crazy, just the difference in car capability. So looking forward to the rest of the year and just continuing to click off races where we’re up front all day long and eventually it’ll go our way.”
Hamlin is the team’s veteran driver, a full-time Cup racer since the fall of 2005. A fifth-place finish might not do much to excite the 54-time winner these days, particularly as he believes his No. 11 team and the organization as a whole currently sits behind its top competition. Bell has led 114 laps thus far, fourth-most in the series; Hamlin has led 24, Briscoe nine and Ty Gibbs none.
“I still think we’ve got work to do,” Hamlin said. “I contend that we still don’t have the speed that it takes to lead a ton of laps, which is showing in laps led. We’re not leading laps like we have in the past. All of JGR. So I think we’ve just got to get our cars a little bit faster to really contend week in, week out, right now.”
HOMESTEAD, Fla. — In years past, even a couple of months ago during the 2024 season, a missed opportunity would’ve seen a dispirited Bubba Wallace with his head down climbing out of his No. 23 Toyota.
As the sun began to set at Homestead-Miami Speedway, there was a bright light on pit road.
Part of that brilliance was the exuberant scheme of Wallace’s vehicle, but the main source of light was the 31-year-old driver. Sharing a laugh and fist-bumping runner-up Alex Bowman and fourth-place Chase Briscoe as winner Kyle Larson celebrated in the background, there’s a newfound positivity in Wallace.
“I think I’ve got a tire going down,” Wallace jokingly said on the radio after taking the checkered flag in third place.
No. 23 spotter Freddie Kraft jabbed with the usual humor before crew chief Charles Denike rallied the gang.
“Great work today. We did what we said we wanted to do from Vegas and that’s see the race all the way through,” Denike said.
RELATED: Race results | At-track photos: Homestead
Despite a slew of stage points and race-contending pace to start the season, Wallace had yet been able to crack the top five on the results sheet after five races.
That changed Sunday at Homestead as Wallace turned 56 laps led and six stage points into his best finish since the Bristol Night Race last year. After getting passed by Bowman for the lead with 33 laps to go and Larson for second, Wallace was hoping he’d get one final shot at the Hendrick Motorsports teammates.
“My plan was hopefully they got to racing a little bit,” Wallace said. “But I messed up and Bowman messed up the same way I did, and gave it to [Larson]. So that’s what I told him. I walked up to Bowman after and I said we both suck.”
Making contact with the wall a handful of times and an unpleasant run-in with Noah Gragson mid-race on a restart likely would’ve snowballed into self-destruction for a younger Wallace. While frustrated in the moment, he turned toward the bigger picture quickly.
“When I got the fence, I was pissed off for a half-corner and then it was OK,” Wallace said. “There’s still a long way to go, regroup and focus, and I need to think about the winners that we have on this team. It motivates you to drive harder in a more methodical way, not just driving in the fence like I did. So this allows you to think and just gotta have the right people behind you pushing you to do it.”
While Wallace is making the mental shifts himself, a new voice on the radio has been a guide for this change.
Denike, who paired with Wallace this season after scoring eight wins in two years with Christian Eckes in the Craftsman Truck Series, has set a new standard for the No. 23 team early in his tenure and won’t have the team dwell on prior shortcomings.
“Before the race, we said we needed to execute like we did at Vegas last week where we control everything we could control,” Denike said. “We ran a really good 190 laps before we had an incident on a restart that was outside of our control. So we come here and we said we’re going to execute that way. We’re going to continue to control what we can control and the finishes will come if we keep doing that mentality. That’s really what we saw today.”
Wallace entered Homestead with the second-most stage points in the series at 55.
It’s a sign that the No. 23 team is among the top contenders early in the season as most of the mid-race points have come naturally.
“I can tell you that we only deliberately went for stage points at COTA, where we called the race to get the stage points and potentially sacrifice the outcome,” Denike said. “Obviously, we had some issues during the race anyway there, but we went for stage points. Everywhere else, we’re racing and it’s been very refreshing for the group to be able to earn those points by running up front outright on merit.”
As teammate Tyler Reddick has set the bar for the 23XI organization making the Championship 4 in 2024, the gap appears to have narrowed in the early portion of 2025 as Reddick leaves Homestead fourth in points, while Wallace is in seventh.
MORE: Cup standings after Homestead
“They’re certainly the benchmark on wins right now at 23XI,” Denike said about the No. 45 team. “I’m just proud that we’re in this conversation. The teams work so well together — all three of them. It’s an amazing group of people. Just super enjoyable to be able to work together and know that as we debrief this week, we were the benchmark today, fair and square. Super proud of everybody that contributes to that. Next week, something might be different, but the culture is we’re all in it together.”
Sunday was a position Wallace hasn’t been in consistently in his eight full-time Cup seasons.
According to Racing Insights, his 5.90 average running position at Homestead was second-best behind Bowman, which improves his average running position across six 2025 races to 12.55 — fifth-best among Cup drivers.
A complete race will serve as a huge boost for Wallace and the No. 23 team as they will be able to carry momentum into the next three race weekends at Martinsville, Darlington and Bristol, all of which fall on the 10-race playoff calendar.
As Wallace remained in a lighthearted fashion speaking to the media, he reflected on his two career wins and his past runs upfront compared to his position Sunday.
“Kansas [Fall 2022], I went up and took that win, right? That was my last one,” Wallace said. “I look at Talladega [spring 2023] when I was leading taking the white and blocked Blaney, and I wrecked. Other than that, I’ve never been in a spot to give away a race. So I can be pissed off about it, but hell, I’ve never been in that situation before, you know? So it’s different.”
A long season is still ahead and there’s no telling where the No. 23 team will end up or if they find Victory Lane, or make the postseason — which was not in the cards last year.
For now, at least, there’s a refreshed, motivated and joyous Wallace behind the wheel on Sundays this season.
HOMESTEAD, Fla. — Alex Bowman had the lead in the waning moments of Sunday’s race at Homestead-Miami Speedway. But one errant move allowed his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Kyle Larson to power past him for the win instead.
Though the disappointment of a missed opportunity to score his ninth NASCAR Cup Series victory was apparent, Bowman mustered a fair share of smiles on pit road after his first top-five finish of 2025.
MORE: Race results | At-track photos: Homestead
Larson’s No. 5 Chevrolet continued to gain on Bowman’s No. 48 car as the laps ticked away, but Bowman’s prolonged slide against the outside wall in Turns 3 and 4 negated his momentum and allowed Larson to pounce past him with seven laps to go.
“I just tried to get too much there and hit the fence a couple times,” Bowman said. “Bent the right-front (suspension) and lost feel of where I was at with the right-front being bent and then really hit the fence and let the 5 by.
“So yeah, that’s on me. Just needed to do a better job there. I don’t know that we were gonna hold him off regardless, as much faster as he was than us, but certainly made it easier on him than I wanted to.”
The sting of a loss doesn’t negate what was a strong weekend for the No. 48 team at a track where Bowman has historically struggled. Bowman powered to the pole position in Saturday’s qualifying session to start first, led 43 laps and notched a race-best 3.68 average running position Sunday in addition to his top-five finish. His 43 laps led at Homestead are his most since September 2022, when he led 107 laps at Kansas Speedway.
“I think this performance all weekend … does a lot for a race team,” said Jeff Gordon, Hendrick Motorsports’ vice chairman. “I think we saw the momentum building with that team at the end of last year, and you just hope that they can build on that and carry that into the season. And I think they have, but you’ve got to get the results.
“And so I think today is an important day for them, and I think you’ll see that create quite a spark to hopefully get them on a run.”
MORE: Jeff Gordon on Hendrick’s fast start | Newfound positivity sparks top five for Bubba Wallace
Bowman had never led a lap at Homestead previously but owns three top 10s there in his past four starts, including Sunday’s personal best. He attributed his progress to a 2024 test at the 1.5-mile oval. The intent of those extra laps were to help Goodyear develop wet-weather tires, but Bowman left with more confidence riding the high line nearest the wall than he ever had previously.
“Honestly, I don’t think we were nearly as good as we were at the test, especially at running the wall,” he said Sunday. “I just couldn’t run the wall well all weekend really, which was what I could do really well at the test. So we’ve got to go back and do our homework and figure out why that was. But yeah, felt like our short-run speed was obviously really good with being able to drive up there and get the lead. (I) pressured Bubba (Wallace) into a mistake and then let myself get pressured into a mistake.
“Annoying, but I mean, Kyle’s the greatest race-car driver of our generation. If that’s the one guy that beat us this week, it’s certainly not the end of the world, but we need to go get some trophies for sure.”
The runner-up effort marks Bowman’s best of what’s been an impressive start to the season, his fifth top 10 in six races and fourth in a row. The Tucson, Arizona, native joked: “The internet says we’re just lucky, I’m sure,” but echoed Gordon’s observation of the improved performance by the end of 2024.
What Gordon also reiterated Sunday was his and the team’s belief in Bowman moving forward.
“I think what we’ve worked on the most is just making sure he knows he’s got the support behind him,” Gordon said. “I think they’ve been searching for a little bit more depth in the team. I think that if you compare them to the other Hendrick teams, Blake (Harris, crew chief) was one of the steps (forward), and then he’s been working on car chief and pit crew and just putting all the pieces together. …
“Alex and he have always been on the same page and have a lot of confidence in one another. But when a team has the confidence that the organization is behind their moves and supporting them and the sponsors are there for them … just be in a position to go capitalize when the day goes well. And I think that’s really what I’m seeing this year in them, but also what you saw today.”
HOMESTEAD, Fla. — Kyle Larson proved himself the weekend’s most dominant driver at Homestead-Miami Speedway, winning two of the three national series races, capping off the extraordinary three-day performance with his 30th NASCAR Cup Series victory in Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400.
Larson seized upon a miscue by his Hendrick Motorsports teammate, Alex Bowman, who put his pole-winning No. 48 Chevrolet in the outside retaining wall with six laps remaining Sunday. That contact allowed Larson’s No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet to pass him for the race lead and jet off to a 1.205-second win — the 32-year-old Californian’s first Cup Series trophy of the year.
RELATED: Race results | At-track photos: Homestead
“I knew me coming towards those guys, they were going to start moving around and making mistakes, and I felt like if I could just keep pressure on Alex, he may make a mistake, and he caught the wall there, and I got around him easier than I expected to,” Larson, the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion, said. “Still had to work hard, though. My balance in clean air was really loose, just like those guys were. Hats off to the whole team.”
Bowman, who started first in the 37-car field, led 43 laps and was obviously disappointed even in a second-place outcome, coming so close to his first victory of the year.
“Guess I choked that one away, for sure,” Bowman said, revealing he actually hit the wall harder the lap before he was passed. “Just kind of burned myself up. Saw the 5 [Larson] coming, so I moved around a little bit.
“Man, I hate that for this Ally 48 group. They deserve better than that. Just a couple mistakes there. Felt like we were OK all day there.”
23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace finished third, leading a season-high 56 laps in the No. 23 Toyota. Joe Gibbs Racing’s Chase Briscoe finished fourth in the No. 19 Toyota — the afternoon delivering season-best finishes for Larson, Bowman, Wallace and Briscoe.
JGR’s Denny Hamlin rounded out the top-five finishing order and won Stage 2 — his 15 laps out front are the most on the year for him.
The day’s most dominant driver was Team Penske’s Ryan Blaney, whose No. 12 Ford led a race-best 124 laps, only to suffer an engine failure with 60 laps remaining. A huge blast of smoke burst out of the car as it slowed abruptly onto the frontstretch from a top-five position.
MORE: Blaney sidelined at Homestead
He ended up 36th of the 37 cars, the 2023 season champion suffering his third straight DNF this year.
“I didn’t have any warning,” said Blaney, a runner-up in the previous two Homestead races. “When I got back to wide open down the front, that was all she wrote. Just stinks. Really fast Ford Mustang, led a lot of laps, lost a little bit of track position with stuff on pit road, but got back to third, and it was a great race between me, Bubba and Larson. I’m sure Denny was going to get back into it. It was going to be quite a battle in the last 60 laps or so.
“Just didn’t really work out for us. We’ll continue to keep fighting. I appreciate the 12 guys for giving me just a hot rod today, an incredibly, incredibly fast race car today. We’ll keep our head up. Just one of those things where it isn’t really going our way right now. But the good news is we’re bringing fast cars, and that’s all you can ask for.”
RFK Racing’s Chris Buescher rallied to a sixth-place finish, followed by Kaulig Racing’s AJ Allmendinger, 23XI Racing’s Tyler Reddick, RFK’s Ryan Preece and Spire Motorsports’ Justin Haley.
WATCH: Larson describes “not typical Homestead” race | Gordon on Hendrick’s fast start
With the win, Larson moved into second place in the NASCAR Cup Series championship standings, 36 points behind Hendrick teammate and Daytona 500 winner William Byron. Bowman is now third in the championship, 39 points back. The fourth member of the team, Chase Elliott, finished 18th and is sixth in the standings — the promising start to the season a strong confidence-builder for all the drivers.
“Had to keep plugging away, proud of myself, proud of the team, just a lot of gritty hard work there today between damage on pit road, qualifying bad, bad restarts all that stuff,” said Larson. “Just super pumped. One of the coolest wins I think of my Cup career just because of all the heartbreak here, the heartbreak yesterday. Just kept my head down and kept digging.”
SHOP: Buy winner’s gear
The heartbreak Larson referred to was his 2-for-3 showing in his tripleheader sweep attempt. He won Friday’s Craftsman Truck Series race and suffered a gut-wrenching near-miss in Saturday’s Xfinity Series race — an afternoon where he led the most laps only to get tapped from behind in an overtime restart and finish fourth.
Larson will attempt the three-race sweep at Bristol Motor Speedway in April, hoping to equal the work of two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Busch, who is the only driver in history to win all three national series races on the same weekend — and he did it twice, accomplishing the feat at Bristol in 2010 and 2017.
Christopher Bell, who leads the series with three victories this season, placed 29th after a Lap 70 spin and slight contact in his No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Josh Berry — last week’s first-time winner at Las Vegas Motor Speedway — ended up 17th, continuing after contact with Larson and Joey Logano led to a pit-road spin during the Stage 1 break.
MORE: Cup Series standings | Cup Series schedule
The NASCAR Cup Series resumes next weekend at Martinsville Speedway with Sunday’s Cook Out 400 (3 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Byron is the defending race winner.
NOTE: Post-race inspection in the Cup Series garage at Homestead-Miami concluded without issue, confirming Larson as the race winner.
Contributing: Staff reports
Ryan Blaney found late-race trouble in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race, exiting with an engine issue at Homestead-Miami Speedway.
Blaney was running third when his No. 12 Team Penske Ford began showing heavy smoke in the 208th of a scheduled 267 laps in Sunday’s Straight Talk Wireless 400. He emerged from his car on pit road as track workers tended to clean-up.
RELATED: Race Results| At-track photos: Homestead
Blaney had led a race-high 124 laps before being sidelined. The result is his third consecutive DNF (did not finish), following a crash last week at Las Vegas and another engine failure the previous week at Phoenix. According to NASCAR Insights, it’s the first time in his Cup Series career that Blaney has recorded three straight DNFs.
“I didn’t have any warning,” Blaney said. “It just laid over when I got back to wide-open down the front and that was all she wrote. It just stinks. We had a really fast Dent Wizard Ford Mustang. We led a lot of laps. We lost a little bit of track position there with some stuff on pit road, but got back to third and it was a great race between me and Bubba (Wallace) and (Kyle) Larson. I’m sure Denny (Hamlin) was gonna get back into it. It was gonna be a heck of a battle the last 60 laps or so, but it just didn’t really work out for us. We’ll continue to keep fighting.
“I appreciate the 12 guys for just giving me a hot rod. It was an incredibly, incredibly fast race car today. We’ll keep our heads up. It’s just one of those things where it’s not really going our way right now, but the good news is we’re bringing fast cars and that’s all you can ask for. We’ll keep on moving.”
Blaney started sixth in the 37-car field, but will be credited with a 36th-place finish. He entered the 400-mile event ranked seventh in the Cup Series standings through five races.
