NASCAR: Kyle Larson not the big winner of the Brickyard 400

Hendrick Motorsports' Kyle Larson added to the list of his crown jewel NASCAR Cup Series victories, winning Sunday's Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway to take the series lead in victories this season with four.

The former Coca-Cola 600 and Southern 500 winner now needs only a Daytona 500 win to achieve victories in all four crown jewel races.

Larson was already locked into the 2024 playoffs. He entered Sunday's race around the four-turn, 2.5-mile (4.023-kilometer) Speedway, Indiana oval with victories at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Kansas Speedway, and Sonoma Raceway to his name this year.

Though he missed this year's Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, he was granted a playoff waiver due to the circumstances surrounding his absence.

Kyle Larson not the big winner at Indianapolis

Because of how the rule is written, drivers are not locked into the playoffs unless they win multiple races. There are 26 regular season races and 16 playoff spots. The 16 playoff spots go to the regular season champion, whether he is a winner or not, and the 15 drivers who rank next highest in wins.

Just 13 drivers can win more than one regular season race, meaning that winning twice locks a driver into the postseason. If there are more than 16 total winners, the tiebreaker to determine which single-race winners get in and which don't is points.

There are 12 drivers who have found victory lane so far this season, meaning that leading into Sunday's race, there still could have been as many as 17.

The lowest two of those winners in the point standings are Trackhouse Racing Team's Daniel Suarez and Team Penske's Austin Cindric. They won at Atlanta Motor Speedway and World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway and sit in 17th and 19th place in the standings, respectively.

In the event that there ended up being 17 winners, those two drivers would have been at risk of not getting into the playoffs, despite having won this year.

But thanks to Larson's Brickyard 400 victory, there can be no more than 16 regular season winners.

Suarez and Cindric technically aren't locked in yet, since there could still be 16 winners and a winless regular season champion. However, that is highly, highly unlikely. New winners would need to emerge in each of the regular season's final four races at Richmond Raceway, Michigan International Speedway, Daytona Internatinal Speedway, and Darlington Raceway.

Additionally, the highest non-winner in the point standings is currently Joe Gibbs Racing's Martin Truex Jr., and he is all the way down in seventh place, 96 points out of the lead.

Plus, those new winners would each have to outrank Cindric and/or Suarez in the standings to get in. So thanks to Larson's win, Cindric and Suarez can finally be considered safely in the postseason field.

The NASCAR Cup Series is now set for a three-week break due to NBC's commitment to the Summer Olympics in Paris, France. The next race on the 2024 schedule is the Cook Out 400, which is set to be broadcast live on USA Network from Richmond Raceway beginning at 6:00 p.m. ET on Sunday, August 11. Start a free trial of FuboTV and don't miss it!