TULSA, Oklahoma — Two accidents in Thursday night’s qualification race ended Kyle Larson’s quest to lock into his 12th Chili Bowl Nationals at SageNet Center. Failing to finish Thursday night because of an accident, he was credited with a 24th-place finish.
Larson was attempting to execute the “Dirt Double” by racing in a dirt late model race, the Wild West Shootout, at Vado (NM) Raceway Park on Saturday before flying to Tulsa for the 38th annual Chili Bowl.
He said before the race he would only return on Saturday if he locked into the Chili Bowl A-Main by finishing either first or second in Thursday’s qualification race.
Larson’s night got off to a rough start in the heat. Drawing a fifth-place starting position, he was in the middle of the pack and escaped a pair of incidents during the first lap of that race when Shayle Bade bicycled in front of him and Joe Perry flipped just as Larson was passing his car.
On the ensuing restart, Larson got a poor start and fell back through the pack where he was bumped from behind and crashed. Larson was able to continue and finished fifth but did not earn enough passing points to avoid being placed in one of the C-Mains.
Difficult though the task was, Larson has previously advanced from a C-Main in a qualification night and advanced into Saturday’s feature. In 2015 he won that race after starting sixth, then advanced from 13th to first in the B-Main and eventually won the qualification race.
Thursday, Larson won his C-Main after starting on the outside of the front row. After starting the B-Main 13th, he advanced to the feature by finishing second. Forced to line up deep in the A-Main in 20th, Larson was unable to get through heavy traffic in the opening laps and was only 15th at the halfway mark.
As traffic thinned, Larson worked his way to 11th with seven laps remaining. With time running out, he pushed off Turn 4, clipped the frontstretch wall and flipped twice.
Larson has won the Chili Bowl Nationals twice during his career, in 2020 and 2021.
