Bobby Travis · NASCAR/IndyCar Correspondent
While Ryan Blaney won the season finale by 0.314 seconds on Sunday, the real decision of the season had been made long before the race even reached halfway.
The NASCAR Cup Series Championship Race took place at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Sunday, November 8, the season finale and the last of the ten Chase races. Kyle Larson finished 12th and secured his third Cup title after 2021 and 2025, mathematically as early as the end of Stage 1. The race win went to Ryan Blaney in the Team Penske Ford, who edged Tyler Reddick by the narrowest of margins in the closing laps.
Title decided before the race really got going
Polesitter Chase Briscoe led the first 30-plus laps and dropped back after a slow pit stop, then his engine let go from seventh on Lap 78. The caution ended Stage 1 early and froze the order: Tyler Reddick won the stage ahead of Ryan Blaney, Christopher Bell and Kyle Larson. That fourth place in the stage was enough for Larson to put his lead in the Chase standings mathematically out of reach before Stage 2 had even started.
On the team radio, Larson was remarkably matter-of-fact when crew chief Cliff Daniels gave him the news in the middle of the race: "That was a little anticlimactic, but that's cool. Good job, guys!" Team owner Rick Hendrick radioed: "Congratulations. Now you can run the wall." Larson did exactly that, and about 40 laps later he had to pit with a cut right rear tire. "I got word that we clinched it, and I started driving like an idiot," he said with a laugh. He eventually finished 12th, 5.621 seconds behind the winner.
Blaney comes from the back and strikes late
After Reddick's Stage 1 win, Denny Hamlin took the lead in Stage 2 and went on to win it, after Reddick and Bell had battled for the front in an all-Toyota fight. Blaney had to work hard for the win. At the first stage break he came back to pit road to fix a loose wheel and restarted at the back of the field, and by the end of Stage 2 he had worked his way up to fifth. In the final stage he pitted late, on Lap 220, and was about five seconds behind Byron and Reddick when Noah Gragson spun Daniel Suárez in Turn 1 to bring out the third and final caution. Blaney lined up fourth for the restart with eight laps to go.
Then he went on the attack: he got past Bell on Lap 263, passed William Byron a lap later and overtook Reddick on Lap 266 of 267. His winning margin at the line was 0.314 seconds, with Byron third, 0.239 seconds behind Reddick. Christopher Bell, Bubba Wallace and Denny Hamlin rounded out the top six, with Wallace 0.898 seconds behind Bell and Hamlin just 0.153 seconds behind Wallace. Team Penske's Austin Cindric finished seventh, 2.514 seconds behind teammate Blaney.
After the race, Blaney looked back at his narrow defeat at Homestead in 2024: "Every time I come here, that race haunts me. I kind of gave that one away. I didn't do a very good job at the end of that race. Learned from it. Was able to apply some stuff we learned a couple years ago in that situation to tonight."
Pit road chaos costs several drivers positions
During the break after Stage 2, a dicey chain reaction broke out on pit road. It started behind Austin Cindric, who said he was stuck between gears, and cars ran into each other nose to tail in the low sun. Those caught up and damaged included Chase Elliott, Brad Keselowski, Ryan Preece and Joey Logano.
Elliott was hit hardest. He was still up front in eighth at the end of Stage 2, but after repairs and a penalty for too many crew members over the wall he could only finish 22nd. Logano came home 17th and Preece 25th, 22.781 seconds back. Keselowski, who started 40th after a spin in qualifying, ended his last race for RFK Racing in 28th, one lap down. Elliott vented his frustration on the radio: "Did they stop or did I f*** something up? I need to understand here." He later said he was "scared as f*** to death to be on the left of somebody to see up the road, and plow into the back of the people stopped."
Larson's third title adds to Hendrick's history
According to NASCAR, Larson tops the final Chase standings with 2,501 points, ahead of Christopher Bell (2,452, 49 points back), Denny Hamlin (2,445, 56 back), Ryan Blaney (2,407, 94 back) and Tyler Reddick (2,397, 104 back). After 2021 and 2025, it is already Larson's third Cup title. He is only the 11th driver in the history of the series with at least three championships, and the first to successfully defend a title since Jimmie Johnson's run of titles ended in 2010. For Hendrick Motorsports, it is the 16th Cup title in team history.
The season finale at Homestead closes a chapter for Larson in which he spared himself any further worry about points early in the race, while Blaney at least takes the consolation of the race win home. For 2027, Bell and Hamlin remain the first challengers, having finished closest to him at 49 and 56 points back.
