Larson holds off Logano for Fontana win
FONTANA >> Kyle Larson hopes his NASCAR Xfinity race victory will catapult him to a weekend sweep at Fontana.
The way this season is going for the overall Cup series points leader, it’s tough to argue against it.
Larson held off Joey Logano on the final lap to win another Xfinity race dominated by Cup drivers on Saturday.
Larson thrived out of a late restart with smart moves and a clever lane choice on Fontana’s five-wide asphalt. The native Californian won the Xfinity race at Fontana for the second time in his Chip Ganassi Racing Chevrolet.
“It was a lot of fun with Joey there late,” Larson said. “I hope it gives us some good momen-
tum. We’ll start from the pole and hopefully be here again (Sunday).”
Kyle Busch finished third. Erik Jones was fourth, and rookie William Byron came in fifth.
Larson earned his sixth career Xfinity victory when he kept Logano behind him off a late restart, winning by just over a car length.
Larson is also on the pole for Sunday’s race. He has finished second in three consecutive Cup races, propelling him into the overall lead without a victory.
Cup regulars Larson, Busch and Logano dominated on a cloudy day at Fontana. Busch led after each of the first two stages, but he brushed the wall in his Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota with 28 laps to go.
Larson overcame a speeding penalty on pit road that sent him to the back of the field midway through the race.
Logano twice rallied back from far behind and led five times for 70 laps.
He got an early speeding penalty on pit road. His car later fell off the jack during a long pit stop, but he passed 20 cars in less than two laps to get right back in it.
Despite the technical glitches, Logano had a blast.
“I vote for two races at Auto Club Speedway, I’ll be the first to say that,” Logano said. “What an awesome race track. It’s so much fun. You can run anywhere you want. The racing is great. There is tire falloff. There are bumps. There’s everything here. It’s the perfect race track. I wish we came here more often, because it’s the best race track we go to.”
Paul Menard’s car caught fire after hitting the wall with about 55 laps to go, slowing the race. About 12 laps later, Cole Custer ended up with a wrecked car for the second straight week when he hit the wall on Turn 1.
Custer blamed his wreck on “a clown move” by Ryan Sieg, who apparently got clipped by Custer on a side draft earlier. Custer and Austin Dillon got into a prolonged scrape last week at Phoenix, with Dillon running Custer into a wall under caution to retaliate.
“Last week it was all my fault, and I’ll take that all on me,” Custer said. “Today it was just a clown. I don’t understand what his reasoning was to pay us back that much, but that’s just a joke.”
Danica questions discipline after no fine for Dillon
FONTANA >> When NASCAR decided not to fine Austin Dillon for running Cole Custer into a wall last week in Phoenix, other drivers were left wondering how the sport decides who gets fined and who gets away with rambunctious behavior.
“Give me my money back,” Danica Patrick said Friday at Fontana.
Patrick is among several drivers who have been fined for on-track shenanigans seemingly less egregious than the scrape between Dillon and Custer.
Dillon deliberately ran into Custer’s Ford while under caution during the Xfinity race at Phoenix last weekend. Dillon was responding in anger after Custer made contact with him earlier, spinning him into contact with the wall.
Custer and Dillon met with NASCAR officials on Friday morning, and the matter is apparently closed with apologies and regrets on both sides.
Patrick was among the drivers who were surprised and confused by NASCAR’s decision, recalling her own fine for a disagreement with Kasey Kahne last year at Fontana. She also got fined in 2015 for retaliation against David Gilliland after trouble at Martinsville.
While concerned about NASCAR’s apparently nebulous justice, Patrick also has a bigger concern: Why is NASCAR getting mad about the stuff that draws fans and attention to the sport in the first place?
“I think NASCAR makes a really big mistake of fining for some stuff, especially something that happens in the car, because it makes for good TV,” Patrick said. “Just like fights and all that stuff. We can handle it. I think it’s a mistake. I might be speaking too much, but I’ve been fined a few times, and I think that it makes for good TV, and I think that we handle it out on the track ourselves.”
Patrick doesn’t disagree with the apparent new standards of discipline, but she also would like to know why fines are levied in the first place.
“I mean, what does that really do?” Patrick asked. “I’m not going to not go on vacation. I would actually rather know what it did. I would actually love to see the playground that got built for it, or homeless people that got food. I would like to see actually what the money does, because it’s supposed to go to charity, right?”
Hamilton takes pole in record pace
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA >> Something that surprised Lewis Hamilton after he posted the fastest lap ever at the Albert Park circuit and equaled Ayrton Senna’s record of six pole positions at the Australian Grand Prix was that his time wasn’t even quicker.
New technical and tire regulations for the 2017 season were designed to make the F1 cars faster and maybe reduce Mercedes’ dominance. Hamilton maintained Mercedes’ status quo at the front.
The times kept improving during the three practice sessions and the Mercedes driver’s last flying lap in qualifying Saturday was 1 minute, 22.188 seconds.