LAS VEGAS — Alex Bowman beat NASCAR champion Kyle Larson in a door-to-door overtime battle at Las Vegas Motor Speedway that sent Hendrick Motorsports to Victory Lane for the second consecutive week.
The win Sunday was the first of the year for Bowman and seventh of his career. It was the second through three NASCAR races this season for team owner Rick Hendrick. Bowman got his shot at the win when a caution with three laps remaining shifted the race from a pair of Joe Gibbs Racing cars to the Hendrick teammates. Las Vegas native Kyle Busch and teammate Martin Truex Jr. were in a lap-by-lap chess match for the win until the 12th caution ended the stirring duel.
Erik Jones lost control of his car with three laps remaining and crashed when he overcorrected. Bubba Wallace had to swerve hard to avoid drilling Jones’ disabled car and it caused Wallace to slam hard into an interior wall. NASCAR threw the caution to send the race into overtime and the leaders all headed to pit road for a tire change.
The Hendrick trio of Bowman, Larson and William Byron all changed just two tires to get off pit road first through third. Busch, who had gone to the pits as the leader, took four tires and came off pit road in fourth.
Larson, the defending Las Vegas winner and winner last week in California, chose the outside line for the restart with Bowman on his inside. The two were in a drag race over the final two laps, and Bowman got significant separation only as he closed in on the checkered flag.
Bowman, who led three times for 16 laps, beat Larson to the finish line by 0.178 seconds.