NASCAR Cup Series: Kyle Larson finally records a great finish

Kyle Larson ended a long streak of misfortune by recording a third place finish in the 11th race of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season, the Gander RV 400, at Dover International Speedway.

Entering the 11th race on the 36-race 2019 NASCAR Cup Series schedule, the Gander RV 400, at Dover International Speedway, no driver had experienced even close to the amount of misfortune that Chip Ganassi Racing’s Kyle Larson had experienced through the season’s first 10 races, and no driver was more in need of a great finish.

Larson recorded just two top 11 finishes in the season’s first 10 races, and he did not finish a single race in the top five. He was involved in multiple crashes along the way, including a huge one that sent him into a seemingly never-ending barrel roll on the final lap of the race at Talladega Superspeedway, a race in which he had been strong and appeared to be on his way to ending his streak of awful misfortune.

Perhaps most notably, the 26-year-old Elk Grove, California native dominated the season’s second race at Atlanta Motor Speedway by leading 142 of its first 223 laps, but he was then issued a penalty for speeding in the pits. He dropped out of contention for the victory and only managed to recover to finish in 12th. This disappointing result pretty much set the tone for him for the next several races.

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Last season alone, Larson had five or six victories seemingly locked up that ended up slipping away from him for one reason or another, be it the circumstances of the races themselves or his own errors. He ended up failing to win a single race in 2018, and after this incident at Atlanta Motor Speedway, the 2019 season was starting to look like it would produce a similar result.

But while he is, in fact, still winless through the first 11 races of the 2019 season, Larson got back on the right track in the Gander RV 400, at least as far as recording a great finish is concerned.

He entered this race with an average finishing position of 27.60 in the last five races and an average finishing position of 29.75 in the last four races. His five best finishes of the season were his finishes in the first five races and his six best finishes of the season were his finishes in the first six races. He sat 17 points below the playoff cut line all the way down in 21st place in the championship standings.

Larson qualified for this 400-lap race around the four-turn, 1.0-mile (1.609-kilometer) high-banked Dover International Speedway oval in Dover, Delaware in a season-high third place in his #42 Chevrolet. He did not lead any laps of the race, but he brought his car home in one piece in third for his best finish since he finished in third in the 2018 season’s penultimate race at ISM Raceway.

Larson shot up to 15th place in the championship standings and six points ahead of the playoff cut line as a result of his first true strong performance from start to finish this season. His focus has now turned to ending the win drought that he has been on since before the 2017 playoffs began. This win drought is up to 57 races.

With his first great finish of the 2019 NASCAR Cup Series season behind him, Kyle Larson can now focus on trying to end the win drought that he has been on since earning the fifth victory of his career in the race at Richmond Raceway back in September of 2017. When will he end this win drought?