Chase Briscoe nearly pulled off the sort of afternoon that can turn a championship fight completely upside down.
Kyle Larson had spent most of Sunday at Kansas Speedway treating the field like his personal property. He swept both stages, led most of the laps and looked very much like a driver who had arrived intending to leave with another Chase victory.
Then Briscoe showed up.
The Joe Gibbs Racing driver started 23rd, which made his charge toward the front even more impressive. He finished fifth in Stage 2 and, by Lap 211, was hounding Larson for the lead. Sixteen laps later, Briscoe finally took it.
For a few glorious minutes, it looked like Larson’s afternoon had gone from dominant to doomed.
It didn’t last.
With six laps remaining, Larson went hunting for the lead. The two made contact, and Larson powered past. Briscoe tried to fight back, but his Toyota had become increasingly loose. He hit the wall again, then did it one more time with two laps remaining.
The spoiler had become the wounded party.
Briscoe held on for fourth behind Austin Cindric, Denny Hamlin and Larson, but the frustration was obvious. He didn’t simply believe he could win. He believed he needed to win.
“Yeah, just felt like I had a win there to stay in contention for a championship,” Briscoe said. “Obviously now losing, I don’t know, 123 points back, that’s probably not going to happen.”
The problem was the car. Briscoe said it became extremely loose late in the run, something he had already experienced during an earlier green-flag pit cycle. Once he got the lead, the problem became even worse.
Being second actually helped.
“Just being behind him, especially with how much he aero blocking, it would just tighten me up and allow me to actually be a little bit better,” Briscoe explained. “And then as soon as I would get the lead, I would just go really, really free again.”
That is a particularly cruel bit of racing mathematics. The car was better when Briscoe was chasing the guy he needed to beat, and worse when he actually got ahead of him.
Now Briscoe finds himself 123 points behind Larson with six races remaining. He knows what that means. The championship door isn’t technically locked, but someone has apparently misplaced the key.
Briscoe’s solution?
Channel his childhood hero and former boss, Tony Stewart.
“I don’t know, it’s still possible, but you’re going to have to win five or so of the next six races,” Briscoe said. “Yeah, a little Tony Stewart 2011 run or something.”
That is not exactly a modest assignment.
In 2011, Stewart won three of the final six races and used that late-season rampage to claim his third NASCAR Cup Series championship. Briscoe is now looking at the same number of races remaining, only with considerably more ground to make up.
So yes, the odds are ugly. But Sunday demonstrated something more useful than championship arithmetic: Briscoe has the speed to cause serious trouble.
He started 23rd, ran down Larson, took the lead and had the dominant car sweating in the closing laps. If he can find a little more grip—and perhaps stop introducing his right-side sheet metal to the SAFER barrier—there is still plenty of mischief left in this Chase.
The championship may be a long shot.
But after what Briscoe nearly pulled off at Kansas, nobody should be completely shocked if he decides to make the next six weeks considerably more interesting.
Greg was a writer for DriveTribe supporting Amazon's The Grand Tour and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, and a Masters degree in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek and a regular contributor to Forbes.
- Chase Briscoe was six laps from becoming Kyle Larson’s worst nightmare - September 27, 2026
- Kyle Larson puts the Chase field in the danger zone st Kansas - September 27, 2026
- A week after the punches, Ryan Blaney and Carson Hocevar are practically BFFs - September 25, 2026