{"id":61570,"date":"2026-10-10T16:38:57","date_gmt":"2026-10-10T21:38:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/?p=61570"},"modified":"2026-10-10T16:38:57","modified_gmt":"2026-10-10T21:38:57","slug":"nascar-saturday-charlotte-notebook-7","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/2026\/10\/10\/nascar-saturday-charlotte-notebook-7\/","title":{"rendered":"NASCAR: Saturday Charlotte Notebook"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

By Reid Spencer | NASCAR Wire Service<\/p>\n

 <\/b>Kyle Larson honored to be part of Kyle Busch Memorial<\/b><\/p>\n

CONCORD, N.C.\u2014Kyle Busch and Kyle Larson shared more than a first name.<\/p>\n

\"\"
KANSAS CITY, KANSAS – SEPTEMBER 27: Kyle Larson, driver of the #5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet, waves to fans as he walks onstage during driver intros prior to the NASCAR Cup Series Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway on September 27, 2026 in Kansas City, Kansas. (Photo by Sean Gardner\/Getty Images)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

There was mutual respect and admiration between the drivers, both two-time NASCAR Cup Series champions.<\/p>\n

They also shared the responsibility to nurture the next generation of racers within their own families. Hence, it wasn\u2019t surprising that Larson said he felt honored to be part of the celebration of Busch\u2019s life on Friday evening at Charlotte Motor Speedway.<\/p>\n

Busch died suddenly and unexpectedly in May, less than a week after winning his last NASCAR CRAFTSMAN Truck Series race at Dover Motor Speedway.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just an honor to be invited to be a part of it,\u201d said Larson, who appeared on stage during Busch\u2019s memorial. \u201cI thought it went well\u2014super good\u2014listening to everybody\u2019s stories. I thought everybody did a great job honoring Kyle and really just talking about who he was as a person, as a family man, a racer, a competitor.\u201d<\/p>\n

After a moving speech by Busch\u2019s widow Samantha, son Brexton, 11, delighted the crowd with a burnout, followed by a deep bow, which had been Busch\u2019s signature victory celebration.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo cap it off with Brexton doing burnouts was something I don\u2019t think any of us will ever forget,\u201d Larson said. \u201cThat was awesome … He just looked like such a mini-Kyle in the car. The onboard was just special\u2014like \u2018Here is the next Kyle Busch.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Front-row starting spot is a mixed blessing to Chase Briscoe<\/b><\/p>\n

Winning last Sunday\u2019s NASCAR Cup Series Chase race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway put Chase Briscoe on the front row for Sunday\u2019s Bank of America 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway (3 p.m. ET on USA, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).<\/p>\n

There\u2019s only one problem with that scenario: Kyle Larson, the driver Briscoe is chasing for the championship, is starting from the pole beside him.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s definitely a great start, just because we haven\u2019t gotten to start up front in any of these Chase races because of the metrics, for the most part,\u201d said Briscoe, who is sixth in the Chase standings, 84 points behind first-place Larson. \u201cWe\u2019ve been 20th on back. From that standpoint, it\u2019s really good.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe hard part is, the guy we\u2019re trying to catch for the championship will be beside me, and I need to gain all the points I can on him. If we qualify, maybe he doesn\u2019t qualify up there, but maybe I don\u2019t either. So I\u2019m just taking my second place and going on.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s good\u2014outside of Kyle, everybody else is behind us that I\u2019m racing. But the goal is to be champion, not second or third in points.\u201d<\/p>\n

Denny Hamlin has recent history on his side at midpoint of Chase<\/b><\/p>\n

If Denny Hamlin needs encouragement after a lackluster start to the NASCAR Cup Series Chase presented by Mobil 1, he needs to look no further than his own performance in the regular season.<\/p>\n

After falling 129 points behind fellow Toyota driver Tyler Reddick, who drives for the 23XI Racing team he co-owns with Michael Jordan, Hamlin won three straight races in June, overtook Reddick and earned top seeding in the Chase.<\/p>\n

Over the first five Chase races, Hamlin has lost the 25-point edge he had to start the postseason\u2014and then some. Currently second in the standings, Hamlin trails Chase leader Kyle Larson by 40 points entering Sunday\u2019s Bank of America 400 at Charlotte Motor Speedway (3 p.m. ET on USA, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).<\/p>\n

Hamlin\u2019s bid for a first series title, however, is far from a lost cause.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know it can be done,\u201d Hamlin said. \u201cIt\u2019s a 10-race season. We got a little head start to that, but it\u2019s a 10-race season. What happened in the first (26 races) doesn\u2019t matter when we come down to these playoffs.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnything is possible, and if we go win, we\u2019ll take care of the rest.\u201d<\/p>\n

A late-Chase surge wouldn\u2019t be unprecedented. In 2007, Jimmie Johnson won four of the last five Chase races to snatch the title from Hendrick Motorsports teammate Jeff Gordon. Four years later, Tony Stewart won three of the last four events to catch Carl Edwards and win the series championship in a tiebreaker.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

—<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Reid Spencer | NASCAR Wire Service  Kyle Larson honored to be part of Kyle Busch Memorial CONCORD, N.C.\u2014Kyle Busch and Kyle Larson shared more than a first name. There was mutual respect and admiration between the drivers, both two-time NASCAR Cup Series champions. They also shared the responsibility to nurture the next generation of racers<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":676,"featured_media":61136,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11],"tags":[233,16],"class_list":["post-61570","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nascar","tag-charlotte-motor-speedway","tag-nascar"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7hzTZ-g14","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/racedaysa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/GettyImages-2297434584-scaled.jpg?fit=2560%2C1707&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61570","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/676"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61570"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61570\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":61573,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/61570\/revisions\/61573"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/61136"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61570"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=61570"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/racedaysa.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=61570"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}