Kyle Larson picked up his first ever Brickyard win on Sunday but it wasn’t without controversy. Before the Hendrick Motorsports star took the white flag, Ryan Preece was stationary on the track. Instead of immediately calling the caution, NASCAR waited until the white flag fell before bringing out the yellow. This gave Larson an unchallenged drive to the win and not many people, including Denny Hamlin were happy about it. .
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The Joe Gibbs Racing driver had been taken out of the race earlier due to a wreck and was watching the event unfold from his motorhome. On an episode of his podcast, he slammed NASCAR for waiting it out until the white flag. The vice president of competition Elton Sawyer said that they were waiting to see if Preece could get his car rolling. By the time they made the decision, it was already too late. Hamlin was buying none of that.
“I was like there’s going to be a caution,” the 43-year-old said. “He (Preece) was not moving when they were coming off turn 4. He had resigned to sitting there. Through turn 4, he stops. He says, “Alright, I’m not gonna go anywhere.” So they had roughly eight seconds to make a call there and they didn’t.”
The 43-year-old was not the only driver who was unhappy with the outcome of the race. Ryan Blaney was not best pleased about it either but for a different reason. It had nothing to do with the Preece incident.
Blaney let loose on NASCAR after missing out on Indianapolis win
On the final restart, Blaney was on the front row with Brad Keselowski. The #6 car was out of fuel and the reigning Cup Series champion knew he could get a clean run to the finish. However, when the RFK Racing car pit, Larson took his spot on the inside and cleared the #12 for the lead. It left the Team Penske man fuming and he did not hold back on the profanities.
“There is no f***ing way he gets to jump up a row and I get f***ing screwed because someone ran out of gas. That’s f***ing bullshit NASCAR and you fucking know it and something better change. They just gave it to him,” he said.
There has been a lot of talk about NASCAR favoring the driver of the #5 car at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. Fans have been debating about it ever since the race ended. Larson responded to Blaney’s comments on X with a sarcastic tweet of appreciation for NASCAR. All in all, it was a tumultuous day for the sanctioning body and the debate over the ending of the Brickyard race is not going to die down anytime soon.
