DARLINGTON, SC – Kyle Larson has made one thing clear: He’s no Swiftie, even though he surprised his daughter with a birthday trip to Paris this week to see Taylor Swift in concert.
Yes, Larson wore a Swift-themed t-shirt and some friendship bracelets given to him by wife Katelyn and Audrey of 6 years.
“I don’t feel like a Swiftie,” Larson said Saturday at Darlington Raceway. “I appreciate her music and how hard she works, but I’m not a Swiftie.”
Larson, the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champion, is most comfortable as one of the hottest and busiest drivers on the circuit. He is coming off a historic victory last week at Kansas, where he edged Chris Buescher by 0.001 second – the closest finish in Cup Series history.
He will try to win for the second week in a row – and the second time in a row at the track nicknamed “Too Tough To Tame” – in Sunday’s Goodyear 400.
The photo finish with Buescher surpassed what had been a signature Darlington moment in 2003, when Ricky Craven edged Kurt Busch by 0.002 in what was previously the closest finish in the sport’s history.
Larson expected to hit the wall rather than win in the final moments.
“I thought I was going to run out of space,” he recalled. “But he left me enough space. Yes, we came out of the corner and then it was all about how the race was going to work out.
It worked with Larson getting the win, with a disappointed Buescher finishing second.
Buescher said he watched the ending several times and replayed it over and over in his mind. He learned more than he expected about NASCAR’s scoring system and transponder location. Buescher suggested many things he would have done differently to reach the top.
In the end, the Roush Fenway Racing driver made peace with second place. “It was uncomfortable for two days,” he said. “There’s really no way around it.”
The best way to overcome that, Buescher said, is with a more comfortable and successful showing at Darlington, where he has had four top-10 finishes in his last six starts, including a career-best third place behind winner Larson in the Southern 500 last. September.
Larson, whose two wins this season trail the three of Hendrick Motorsports teammate William Byron and Joe Gibbs Racing driver Denny Hamlin, said the trip to France was a break in what will be a busy rest of the month. .
Larson will fall between the All-Star race in North Wilkesboro and qualifying for the Indianapolis 500. He will attempt to complete all 1,100 miles of racing next week, first in Indianapolis and then in Charlotte for the Coca-Cola 600.
Erik Jones returns to racing after missing the last two weeks with a compression fracture of a lower vertebra following a crash at Talladega last month. Jones, a two-time winner at Darlington, said he feels 100%, although it is more likely he still has some healing to do in the coming weeks.
Jones said he can’t lift heavy weights, although he believes he can return to the gym next week. He expects to be fully recovered from the Coca-Cola 600 in Charlotte in two weeks.
Jones was cleared by NASCAR to race at Kansas, but after further conversations with his team he felt he needed more time to recover.
“If I really pushed, I could be in the car if I pushed, I could be in the car if I really wanted to,” Jones said. “At the same time, if I make that decision on my own and overturn the decision and go out and get hurt again, I look like an idiot.”
Larson’s race in Kansas makes him the betting favorite to take his second consecutive checkered flag at Darlington. He is listed at 4-1 odds by BetMGM.com for the Goodyear 400 on Sunday.
JGR teammates Denny Hamlin at 4.75-1 and Martin Truex at 5.5-1 are next. William Byron, who is tied with Hamlin with three wins this season and won the 2023 Darlington spring race, is at 7.25-1 and Tyler Reddick is at 8.5-1.
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