ST. LOUIS – Kyle Larson added yet another crown jewel victory to his midget racing resume with a $10,000 score during Saturday’s Arizona Sport Shirts Gateway Dirt Nationals finale inside The Dome at America’s Center.
Larson slid past recent rival Cannon McIntosh on lap 15 of the 30-lap main and dominated from there on the temporary fifth-mile dirt oval, holding off Chris Windom in a single-lap dash to the checkered flag.
The Chip Ganassi Racing NASCAR Cup Series star reached the finish line .698 seconds ahead of Windom, who just edged out his Clauson/Marshall Racing teammate Tyler Courtney for runner-up honors.
“The car actually felt pretty good from the start, when the track was smoother,” Larson noted. “I felt like I could run a lot of throttle through the corners, but with Cannon getting to the lead early, I knew he was going to be the toughest guy to get around in the field there. He’s really good at tracks where you have to bend it and get grip that way, so I was surprised that I was able to get by him as early as I did.
“Later on, the track really started getting slicker … and it actually made it a little easier for me to get through the holes. I got a good rhythm going there that last run,” Larson added. “I didn’t want to see that last caution, because I knew we’d be green and white together and they’d probably throw something big at me going into (turn) one … and they did. Windom tried it there.
“I messed up through the holes the last lap, but still was able to have a big enough gap to get the win.”
In taking home his fifth-straight midget victory, Larson improved the record of his self-owned No. 1k Lucas Oil/iRacing.com King-Speedway Toyota to seven wins in eight appearances since debuting the car.
His worst finish during that span was a fourth-place run on the opening night of the Elk Grove Ford Hangtown 100 at Placerville (Calf.) Speedway in mid-November with the USAC National Midget Series.
“Paul Silva has just done an amazing job with this car and figuring out what we need on it to continue to be fast night-in and night-out,” Larson noted. “She’s been fast so far, and now we’ll look ahead to New Zealand coming up and then the Chili Bowl in a few weeks. That’s the one we really want to check off.”
Michael Pickens led the opening lap after starting on the pole, but gave way to Justin Grant on the second revolution as Grant came calling on the high lane off the exit of the fourth corner.
However, the early star was McIntosh, who came up the middle from third and split Grant and Pickens down the backstretch to take the top spot by the time the third lap went up on the scoreboard.
A lap-four caution for the stopped car of Andrew Felker did nothing to slow McIntosh’s roll, but Larson found his way to second in two revolutions following the restart and quickly was hounding the 17-year-old’s rear nerf bar in the battle for the race lead – a flashback to the recent Turkey Night Grand Prix.
McIntosh stayed calm through a second yellow with nine laps scored as Jonathan Beason slowed with a flat right-rear tire, but Larson methodically worked his way forward on the bottom groove to draw even with McIntosh at the head of the field by the 13th lap inside The Dome.
Larson finally tossed a turn-one slider at McIntosh coming to the crossed flags, officially leading for the first – and last – time as the 20-car field took the halfway signal. From there, it was lights out.
McIntosh’s race came unraveled with 14 to go, when he caught a rut in the wrong way working through turn four and went for a triple pirouette on the frontstretch.
The car eventually got upside down for a brief moment before coming to rest sitting straight up in the air, balanced on the tail tank nerf bar.
A dejected McIntosh could do little at that but climb from his family-owned No. 08 and shake his head.
“I don’t really know what happened there. It’s definitely frustrating because we had a good run going and I think we had a solid second place locked down,” he said. “I don’t know if it had anything for Kyle, but it sucks that we end it with a torn up race car. It’s a tough way to end the night.”
Four cautions in the final 14 laps shuffled the order mightily at the front and led to Windom coming through the chaos for his second-place result. Courtney charged from 13th to finish third.
A run from 17th for Tanner Thorson resulted in a fourth-place finish, with another NASCAR Cup Series star completing the top five in Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
Pickens rallied from a spin just past the midway point to cross sixth, followed by Logan Seavey, Christopher Bell, Grant and Chase Briscoe.
The finish:
Kyle Larson, Chris Windom, Tyler Courtney, Tanner Thorson, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Michael Pickens, Logan Seavey, Christopher Bell, Justin Grant, Chase Briscoe, Blake Hahn, Austin Brown, Thomas Meseraull, Cannon McIntosh, Andrew Felker, Anton Hernandez, Paul Nienhiser, Karter Sarff, Jonathan Beason, Sammy Swindell.