Kyle Larson holds on to win Nationwide race at Charlotte - MotorSportsTalk

Kyle Larson held off late charges from Sprint Cup regulars Brad Keselowski, Kyle Busch and Kevin Harvick to win Saturday’s History 300 NASCAR Nationwide Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway.

It was the second NNS win of the season for Larson, who is also in his rookie season on the Sprint Cup Series.

“I love Charlotte and we’ll be trying to get a 600 win tomorrow,” Larson said of possibly doubling up Sunday in the Sprint Cup Coca-Cola 600 event.”

“It was nice looking in the rearview mirror seeing them get smaller and smaller on each lap.”

Larson led 82 laps in the 200-lap event, the most of any driver. His winning margin was nearly 1.5 seconds. It also was a great present for team owner Chip Ganassi, who celebrated his birthday Saturday.

Busch looked like he had the car to win, qualifying on the pole earlier in the day. However, he couldn’t get enough grip late in the race and couldn’t get to Larson as the final laps clicked off.

“We struggled real bad and came home with a third,” Busch said. “All things considered, we should be happy, but I’m here every time for a win.”

Matt Kenseth, who finished sixth, led the second-most number of laps (67), while Busch led 27 and Keselowski led 22.

Harvick finished fourth, followed by Brian Scott, Kenseth, Regan Smith, Trevor Bayne, Chris Buescher and Ty Dillon.

“We were just off a little bit today,” Harvick said. “They (his team) tried and we just came up a little bit short today.”

It was a down day, however, for rookie NNS driver Chase Elliott, who suffered mechanical failure in his JR Motorsports Chevy and ended with a disappointing 37^th-place finish out of the 40-driver field.

“It definitely was a bad day,” Elliott said.

Elliott also lost his lead in the NNS standings, dropping to third place, leaving him 28 points behind new series leader Regan Smith and 23 points behind second-ranked Elliott Sadler.

“We’ve dug ourselves a hole, so now we have to dig ourselves back out of it,” Elliott said.

Smith said of taking over the points lead, “I don’t want to discount it but also don’t want to put much stock into it still this early in the season.”

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An IndyCar executive said there is “absolutely” disappointment that its long-awaited video game recently was delayed beyond its target date, but the series remains optimistic about the new title.

“Well, I don’t know how quick it will be, but the whole situation is important to us,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said during a news conference Monday morning to announce IndyCar’s NTT title sponsorship. “Motorsport Games has spent a lot of money, a lot of effort to create an IndyCar title. What we’ve seen of that effort, which is not completely obvious, is very reassuring.

“I think it’s going to be outstanding. That’s our shared objective, that when it is released, it’s just widely accepted. A great credit both to IndyCar racing, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, something that our fans love.”

In June 2021, IndyCar announced a new partnership with Motorsport Games to create and distribute an IndyCar video game for the PC and Xbox and PlayStation consoles in 2023.

But during an earnings call last week, Motorsport Games said the IndyCar game had been delayed to 2024 to ensure high quality.

Somewhat compounding the delay is that IndyCar’s license for iRacing expired after the end of the 2022 season because of its exclusive agreement with Motorsport Games.

That’s resulted in significant changes for IndyCar on iRacing, which had provided a high-profile way for the series to stay visible during its 2020 shutdown from the pandemic. (Players still can race an unbranded car but don’t race on current IndyCar tracks, nor can they stream).

That’s helped ratchet up the attention on having a video game outlet for IndyCar.

“I wish we had an IndyCar title 10 years ago,” said Miles, who has been working with the organization since 2013. “We’ve been close, but we’ve had these I think speed bumps.”

IndyCar is hopeful the Motorsports Game edition will be ready at the start of 2024. Miles hinted that beta versions could be unveiled to reporters ahead of the time “to begin to show the progress in a narrow way to make sure we’ve got it right, to test the progress so that we’re ready when they’re ready.”

It’s been nearly 18 years since the release of the most recent IndyCar video game for console or PC.

“(We) better get it right,” Miles said. “It’s something we’re very close to and continue to think about what it is to make sure we get it over the line in due course.”