JOLIET, Ill. – Kyle Larson understood the contact he and Kyle Busch exchanged at the finish of Sunday’s Overton’s 400 at Chicagoland Speedway.
Larson ran into race leader Busch before the favor was returned in their thrilling battle on the last lap of Sunday’s race. Larson had to hang on as he slid from that retaliation and was able to take the checkered flag second behind Busch.
Despite the heated on track confrontation, Larson accepted the circumstances and the consequences of what followed.
“Oh man, I’m not upset,” Larson said. “I had an opportunity there to slide in front of him and I figured I wouldn’t clear him or I would allow him to drive back underneath me. So, I tried to get to his door and you know I opened the door for him to retaliate into (Turn) 3. I thought it was free game.”
Larson did a masterful job of running the high line in the final laps to catch Busch and once he did, that’s when the battle for the lead and the win intensified.
“Yeah, I was fighting hard to catch them and had a really good car especially on the long runs,” Larson explained. “We were able to get the top going and finally run them down. Yeah, the lappers bottled him up pretty bad there and I was able to get a run on him. He changed his line up there for a couple of laps in a row and I got a big run and went to throw the slider on him and got really tight.
“My plan was pretty much to run into the side of him to try and slow his momentum down and was able to do that and get clear of him. I didn’t really want to be clear of him in (Turn) 3 though because I knew he would get to my back bumper and move me out of the way, which he did. So, I mean, I know the fans probably already don’t like Kyle Busch, but that was just kind of hard racing there I thought.”
Larson moves on still looking for his first win but chalking up Sunday’s second place finish to nothing more than hard racing.
“So, I think if roles were reversed I would have done the same thing if he got into me off (Turn) 2,” he said. “So, I probably would have ran into him into (Turn) 3, so, can’t fault him for that. That was just hard racing.”
