YellaWood 500: Larson gets first superspeedway win at Talladega, in control of Chase

TALLADEGA, Ala. — Hendrick Motorsports driver Kyle Larson scored his first career superspeedway win in the YellaWood 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, after he went from first to 11th and back to the lead on the final lap.

The two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion had 34 career Cup Series victories with none on drafting-style tracks heading into this race, and left with 35 career wins, his first Talladega trophy and a 73-point lead in The Chase with just two races to go in the 2026 season.

“Yeah, thanks to Corey (Day), we knew how to at least drive to Victory Lane,” Larson said. “What a day. Just can’t really say enough about it. We had so much help from our Chevy teammates throughout the whole field, all day long, and it really allowed us to just feel like I was on offense. Our No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet was really good and handled well. That last lap got crazy. Austin Hill was doing an amazing job pushing me, and he was just on me really tight in (Turns) 1 and 2. I just didn’t feel confident to turn my hands, and it just kind of wandered me up the track. He was able to get underneath me, and I thought it was over for me right there, but I don’t know what happened. Just momentum and energy got broke up and here we came. Just wild how it ended up there.”

Larson was also asked about his feelings on having a 73-point lead heading into the penultimate race at Martinsville Speedway next weekend.

“Well, I mean, as we all probably did in the field, we felt like there was an opportunity to have a good day if things went right, and man, did everything go just how I needed it to,” Larson said. “I did not expect to have the point lead that I had when I got out of the car. I thought I’d be in the 40s, maybe 50s, which is still amazing. But a 73-point lead is incredible. Hopefully, we can go to Martinsville and have a good day and then just close it out would be amazing.”

William Byron, Larson’s Hendrick teammate, was his biggest ally throughout the YellaWood 500. Byron, who has had a rough Chase, helped complete a Hendrick 1-2 finish as he crossed the line just 0.041 seconds behind his teammate.

“I feel like the energy got broken up off of (Turn) 2 and I was like, man, I have a shot to get clear here and see what would happen,” Byron said. “Once I got clear kind of into Turn 3, I had the No. 41 (Cole Custer) pushing me and Cole did a great job of just kind of keeping the momentum going. They all kind of split in front of me and I thought if I could get to the top that maybe I would have a shot. Second sucks, but it’s good that Kyle (Larson) won. We worked really well together all day. If I couldn’t win, I wanted him to win. At the end there, we weren’t really connected together. I was pushing the No. 34 (Todd Gilliland) and it looked like it got broken up in the front and have a shot at the win. Just proud of the fight by this No. 24 All-Pro Reconditioning Chevrolet team. Our Chevy was good today. It’s fun to come to these places and have chances to make decisions at the end. I thought I made the right one, and then out of nowhere, here came someone on the bottom and it was the No. 5, so I’m happy for those guys. It sucks to finish second, but it was a good day.”

Hyak Motorsports driver Ricky Stenhouse Jr. completed the all-Chevrolet podium after finishing third, his fourth top-five finish of the year.

“I did everything that I felt like I needed to do,” Stenhouse Jr. said. “I just never saw the No. 5 (Kyle Larson, race winner) coming. I was focused on the No. 24 (William Byron), and by the time realized the No. 5 was coming from five or six positions back, I just wasn’t able to get down and block him. It was an awesome day for our No. 47 NOS Energy Chevrolet team. They worked really hard. The strategy got us in a really good position to lead the race and control the race a lot during that final stage, so I was really happy about that. Just one wrong move there at the end, trying to block the No. 24, we gave the race to the No. 5.”

Results from the 2026 YellaWood 500 at Talladega Superspeedway are listed below:

Hard Hits & Crazy Wrecks

There were only two natural cautions during the YellaWood 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, but both were multi-car wrecks that took out multiple contenders.

The first “Big One” featured driver Nos. 1, 4, 7, 9, 11, 12, 23, 42, 45, 54, 60 and 66.

The second “Big One” saw even harder hits, including Joey Logano flipping upside down and Riley Herbst slamming both the outside and inside walls at full speed. The drivers involved in the second accident were Nos. 2, 6, 7, 16, 17, 19, 21, 22, 35, 43, 47, 48, 77, 88 and 97.

Both Logano and Herbst were checked and released from the infield care center.

RFK Racing’s Stage 1 Strategy

While 37 of the cars in the field were running 50-75% throttle to save fuel, the RFK Racing trio of Ryan Preece, Chris Buescher and Brad Keselowski decided not to do that and quickly separated themselves from the rest of the pack. In fact, the trio was over 40 seconds ahead of fourth place before the green-flag pit cycles began.

RFK also earned its first 1-2-3 in a stage with Buescher winning Stage 1, followed by Preece and Keselowski.

Other Race Facts

Chevrolet finished in the first six positions, marking the first time a manufacturer has swept the top six finishing positions in a NASCAR Cup Series race since Phoenix Raceway in November 2013, according to NASCAR Insights.

Haas Factory Team driver Cole Custer earned his first top-five finish of the 2026 season.

“There were some really big runs there at the end,” Custer said. “(Kyle) Larson, I think he went back to seventh and then back to first. He just came out of nowhere on that tri-oval, I’m guessing with the No. 1 car (Ross Chastain) pushing him. It was a great run for our No. 41 Sysco/Eggs Up Grill Chevrolet team. This team has worked so hard all year long with the manufacturer swap. For them to get a top-five this year is awesome. We just executed a solid race and put ourselves in a great position at the end.”

Chase Elliott set a NASCAR Next Gen record by recording a 47.546-second lap time (201.405 mph). It marked the first time in the Next Gen Era (2022-present) that a driver had recorded a lap averaging speeds over 200 mph.

Chase Driver Talladega Results

• Kyle Larson (1st)
• William Byron (2nd)
• Carson Hocevar (6th)
• Denny Hamlin (8th)
• Ryan Preece (13th)
• Ty Gibbs (17th)
• Daniel Suárez (18th)
• Bubba Wallace (22nd)
• Austin Cindric (27th)
• Chris Buescher (32nd)
• Chase Briscoe (33rd)
• Joey Logano (34th)
• Christopher Bell (35th)
• Chase Elliott (36th)
• Tyler Reddick (37th)
• Ryan Blaney (38th)

Chase Standings Post-Talladega

Everyone from Gibbs to Buescher is out of contention.

GRID Ranking

The 2026 GRID Ranking is the 10th year of the world’s premier motorsports ranking system, which was initially released on Sunday, April 5.
The official ranking includes drivers participating in seven racing series (NASCAR, IndyCar, Formula 1, Formula E, WRC, Supercars, MotoGP). Each driver earns GRID Ratings, which help determine their seeding in the GRID Ranking.

DRIVER	OLD RATING	PREVIOUS RANKING	MOST RECENT FINISH	NEW RATING	NEW RANKING
Denny Hamlin	N/A	N/A	8th	N/A	N/A
Tyler Reddick	N/A	N/A	37th	N/A	N/A
Kyle Larson	N/A	N/A	1st	N/A	N/A
Christopher Bell	N/A	N/A	35th	N/A	N/A
Chase Briscoe	N/A	N/A	33rd	N/A	N/A

Week 30 of the GRID Ranking:

*Week 30 of the GRID Ranking will be updated sometime in the next few days.*

The next race on the NASCAR Cup Series schedule is the Xfinity 500 at Martinsville Speedway on Sunday, Nov. 1. Coverage begins at 2 p.m. ET on NBC.

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