NASCAR Cup Series
Talladega Superspeedway
YellaWood 500
Team Chevy Post-Race Report
October 25, 2026
Larson Earns First-Career Superspeedway Win at Talladega
Chevrolet Drives to Season-Best Eight Top-10 Finishes
Kyle Larson and the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet team earned their first superspeedway victory in NASCAR’s premier series, surviving an overtime finish to take the checkered flag in the YellaWood 500 at Talladega Superspeedway. The victory – Larson’s third of the season and his 35th all-time in the division – came paired with a strong points-earning performance at the Alabama venue, with the reigning champions earning a pair of top-four stage finishes to end the eighth race of The Chase with a 71-point day. Larson will head into the penultimate race of his title-defending campaign at the top of the standings with a 73-point lead over Denny Hamlin.
Chevrolet earned their season-best showing at the Alabama-based superspeedway, sweeping the top-six and eight of the overall top-10 finishing positions. It was effort accomplished by five different Chevrolet organizations with Larson leading Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron in second, Hyak Motorsports’ Ricky Stenhouse Jr. in third, Trackhouse Racing’s Ross Chastain in fourth, Haas Factory Team’s Cole Custer in fifth and Spire Motorsports’ Carson Hocevar in sixth, with Alex Bowman (ninth) and Michael McDowell rounding out the top-10.
RACE RECAP:
Stage One:
A trio of ECR-powered Chevrolet’s earned top-five qualifying efforts in yesterday’s qualifying session at Talladega Superspeedway, led by Richard Childress Racing’s Austin Hill, who helped paced the field to the green flag of the YellaWood 500 from a spot on the front row. Lining up on the inside lane with fellow Chevrolet driver, Connor Zilisch, in his rearview mirror, a side-by-side battle with the polesitter, Chase Briscoe, saw the No. 33 take over the command position as the field exited Turn Four on the opening lap. It took just two laps around the 2.66-mile oval for his Richard Childress Racing teammate, Austin Dillon, to jump to the outside and form a third lane, ultimately muscling his Chevrolet from outside the top-10 to the bumper of the No. 33 Chevrolet to put the organization in the top-two positions to open the stage. With fuel mileage becoming a topic early in the run, a shakeup on the leaderboard took place when the three RFK Racing cars opted for an alternate strategy not to save. The pair of RCR teammates found themselves at the front of the second pack, hovering around the top-five as they led the first group of Chevrolet’s to pit road for a green flag pit cycle on Lap 51. Just one lap later saw the points leader, Kyle Larson, lead the second group of Chevrolet’s to their first trip to pit road of the afternoon. As the green flag pit cycle was deemed complete, a progressive climb through the field found Larson in the fourth position and leading the second pack as the stage hit 20 laps to go. While their strategy saw the RFK trio sit at an 18-second lead in the closing laps of the stage, Larson remained steady in the fourth position, and with a push from his Hendrick Motorsports teammate, William Byron, towards the line, Larson went on to lead the Chevrolet camp to the stage end – collecting seven crucial stage points at the first green-white checkered flag.
Stage Two:
After a pair of trips to pit road under the stage break, including one to just top off on fuel, the No. 5 Chevrolet restarted Stage Two in the 20th position. With the longest stage of the race in the rearview mirror, crew chief, Cliff Daniels, radioed to his driver that they were good on fuel to make it to the end of the stage. Nearing the midway point of the 45-lap stage, Larson had already made his way up into the top-10 and quickly started making moves to put them in position for a shot at the stage win. A sense of urgency formed just a few laps later that resulted in the attempt at forming a fourth lane, with Larson among those making the move to the top lane. Dicey moves paid dividends for the reigning champion as he edged his Chevrolet to the top position just before the caution came out with 11 laps to go in the stage for a multi-car accident. Leading the field to the green flag for a five-lap dash to the second green-white checkered flag, Larson remained on the door of Joey Logano coming out of the final corner – ultimately settling for a second-place finish and nine points at the end of the stage.
Final Stage:
Under the final stage break, Daniels called his driver to pit road for four tires and fuel, with the No. 5 Chevrolet lining up in the 15th position for the restart and 40 laps to go in the race. Larson’s power moves quickly resumed with the driver surging back up into the lead within the early laps of the stage. Sitting in the top position, Larson was surrounded by a strong contingency of Chevrolet-powered machines through much of the first-half of the run. But the bottom lane began to lose momentum just as the race was on the horizon of hitting 10 laps to go, resulting in Larson falling back to the 15th position. In typical speedway-style racing, it took just three laps around the Alabama venue for Larson to work his way back up to the front – being scored in the second position when a massive multi-car accident in the lead pack with five laps to go ultimately brought the race to red flag conditions. With an overtime finish on deck, Larson lined up in the outside lane with a pair Chevrolet drivers, Hill and Ricky Stenhouse Jr., in his rearview mirror. With a push by Hill, Larson was able to clear the pack to lead the field to the white flag. When chaos ensued on the final lap, Larson found himself outside of the top-five, but a monstrous move saw Larson shoot to the bottom lane and edge his Chevrolet to the line first to claim his first superspeedway victory of his NASCAR Cup Series career.
Team Chevy Unofficial Top-10 Results
Pos. Driver
1st – Kyle Larson
2nd – William Byron
3rd – Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
4th – Ross Chastain
5th – Cole Custer
6th – Carson Hocevar
9th – Alex Bowman
10th – Michael McDowell
Chevrolet’s season statistics with 34 NASCAR Cup Series races complete:
Wins: 8
Poles: 6
Top-Fives: 58
Top 10s: 120
Stage Wins: 22
The 2026 NASCAR Cup Series Chase will continue at Martinsville Speedway with the Xfinity 500 on Sunday, November 1, at 2 p.m. ET. Live coverage can be found on NBC, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.
Post-Race Driver Quotes:
Ross Chastain, No. 1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet
Finished: 4th
What more could you have done today?
“Not sped on that first stop. We had a massive issue with our speed prediction and I just completely forgot to go to the new lights on that first stop. We were stuck a lap down for most of the day, and I thought we were going to sweep a bucket of Busch Light camo into the trailer, but glad we made it and got our lap back. I thought we were going to get it back the old fashion and that would have been really cool. On the last lap, Brandon McReynolds (spotter) just called to push the No. 5 (Kyle Larson, race winner). I’m thankful he did it because he could see a lot better than I can, and I’m glad that a Chevrolet won.”
Kyle Larson, No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet
Finished: 1st
I talked to you when Corey Day won here in the spring, you didn’t even know where victory lane was. Now you’re standing here a few months later, just your big picture emotions of conquering this racetrack.
“Yeah, thanks to Corey (Day), we knew how to at least drive to Victory Lane. What a day. Just can’t really say enough about it. We had so much help from our Chevy teammates throughout the whole field, all day long, and it really allowed us to just feel like I was on offense. Our No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet was really good and handled well. That last lap got crazy. Austin Hill was doing an amazing job pushing me, and he was just on me really tight in (turns) one and two. I just didn’t feel confident to turn my hands, and it just kind of wandered me up the track. He was able to get underneath me, and I thought it was over for me right there, but I don’t know what happened. Just momentum and energy got broke up and here we came. Just wild how it ended up there.”
16 stage points as well, so this wasn’t just a run at the end. You had some pretty good help and some pretty good stages there early in the day, as well.
“Yeah, really all day long, I had help from the Chevy cars out there. It helped because they were all fast, as well, and had good days going. That’s what it takes on speedways, I feel like, is to have some allies. So just was proud of everybody at Chevrolet for the effort that they put in. Huge thank you to my team, as well. This wouldn’t be possible without them. It’s been 22 years since that terrible plane crash that took so many loved ones from Hendrick Motorsports. I really felt like they were riding with us there on that last lap to get this win.”
Absolutely, a 71-point day, a 73-point lead going into Martinsville. I don’t know if you had that on your bingo card coming out of Talladega. Just what’s your thoughts about the points and the chase as far as where we’re at right now?
“Well, I mean, as we all probably did in the field, we felt like there was an opportunity to have a good day if things went right, and man, did everything go just how I needed it to. I did not expect to have the point lead that I had when I got out of the car. I thought I’d be in the 40s, maybe 50s, which is still amazing. But a 73-point lead is incredible. Hopefully, we can go to Martinsville and have a good day and then just close it out would be amazing.”
William Byron, No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet
Finished: 2nd
“I feel like the energy got broken up off of (turn) two and I was like, man, I have a shot to get clear here and see what would happen. Once I got clear kind of into turn three, I had the No. 41 (Cole Custer) pushing me and Cole did a great job of just kind of keeping the momentum going. They all kind of split in front of me and I thought if I could get to the top that maybe I would have a shot. Second sucks, but it’s good that Kyle (Larson) won. We worked really well together all day. If I couldn’t win, I wanted him to win. At the end there, we weren’t really connected together. I was pushing the No. 34 and it looked like it got broken up in the front and have a shot at the win. Just proud of the fight by this No. 24 All-Pro Reconditioning Chevrolet team. Our Chevy was good today. It’s fun to come to these places and have chances to make decisions at the end. I thought I made the right one, and then out of nowhere, here came someone on the bottom and it was the No. 5, so I’m happy for those guys. It sucks to finish second, but it was a good day.”
Cole Custer, No. 41 Haas Factory Team Chevrolet
Finished: 5th
“There were some really big runs there at the end. (Kyle) Larson, I think he went back to seventh and then back to first. He just came out of nowhere on that trioval, I’m guessing with the No. 1 car (Ross Chastain) pushing him. It was a great run for our No. 41 Sysco/Eggs Up Grill Chevrolet team. This team has worked so hard all year long with the manufacturer swap. For them to get a top-five this year is awesome. We just executed a solid race and put ourselves in a great position at the end.”
Ricky Stenhouse Jr., No. 47 Hyak Motorsports Chevrolet
Finished: 3rd
“I did everything that I felt like I needed to do. I just never saw the No. 5 (Kyle Larson, race winner) coming. I was focused on the No. 24 (William Byron), and by the time realized the No. 5 was coming from five or six positions back, I just wasn’t able to get down and block him. It was an awesome day for our No. 47 NOS Energy Chevrolet team. They worked really hard. The strategy got us in a really good position to lead the race and control the race a lot during that final stage, so I was really happy about that. Just one wrong move there at the end, trying to block the No. 24, we gave the race to the No. 5.”
Carson Hocevar, No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet
Finished: 6th
“I only really got flats and a hole on the right-side door. Other than that, we were fine. I have to really thank the tow truck guy for getting us back to pit road quickly. We’re not allowed to throw it in reverse and drive out of the garage, they have to push me out of the garage, so we had everyone back there helping. My team put four tires on, pushed me out of the garage and I got going. I thought we had to beat the pace car to the line, but I think we could have waited another lap, so we actually beat the field and got almost a lap ahead. That just shows how fast my team works, so all the credit to them.”
About General Motors
General Motors (NYSE:GM) is driving the future of transportation, leveraging advanced technology to build safer, smarter, and lower emission cars, trucks, and SUVs. GM’s Buick, Cadillac, Chevrolet, and GMC brands offer a broad portfolio of innovative gasoline-powered vehicles and the industry’s widest range of EVs, as we move to an all-electric future.
GM Motorsports, including the Cadillac Formula 1® Team develops and proves advanced technologies in the most demanding environments, accelerating innovation in performance, safety, efficiency, and electrification for its production vehicles. Cadillac Racing is one of the leading manufacturers in the IMSA and FIA World Endurance Championships (WEC). Chevrolet competes in single seaters in the US IndyCar series, and in NASCAR with multiple team partners and drivers. Corvette customer teams compete in GT series across the globe including IMSA and WEC. Learn more at GM.com.
