Kyle Larson suffered another setback, this time in the O'Reilly Series. Despite dominating the race, he was beaten by Connor Zilisch at the Bristol Speedway.

Larson led 230 out of the 300 laps, but a late gamble that came from a caution with 30 laps to go threw him off. It was Zilisch who benefited from this late caution as he stayed on track while the others pitted. As Larson crept back into second place, the JR Motorsports driver made a move to the high side of the track to prevent Kyle from overtaking him.

“He [Zilisch] did a good job, so did Brent [Crews],” Larson said. “I figured the pace is going to pick up a lot there, you go for the short run speed with the top being rubbered in. Everyone is going to run really hard, and to run that hard, I was just too free.”

A win at Bristol would have been great for Larson, as that would have given him all the momentum needed for the upcoming races.

He will now be focusing on the Cup Series race as his form there has been a little bit of a concern. Connor Zilisch has also had his struggles, but the win should help him bounce back in the Sunday race.

Zilisch bags a huge win in Bristol

Zilisch was in no form expected to win the race, as it was Larson completely outracing everyone on the grid.

However, things seemed to work for him after his crew chief pulled a rabbit out of the hat to secure the win.

"It's been a tough past few weeks for me in the Cup Series. Feels good to come back down here into the O'Reilly Series and remember that I could still do it," said Zilisch in a post-race interview. "It's tough. You finish in the back every week, and you forget who you are. This feels good.”

The race went into caution due to an incident, and while many went to the pit, Zilisch stayed out as per the instructions of his crew chief, Rodney Childers.

"We played strategy. Rodney made a great call to keep us out. The tires weren't wearing much all night, and we were able to get the track position we needed to go out and win the race," said Zilisch. "Really cool to be able to race against Kyle and learn from him. He's so talented and such a fast race car driver. It's good to be back with JRM and back in Victory Lane."

Up until now, Zilisch has had a tough rookie season in the Cup Series as he currently sits in 33rd in points. He showed a promising performance at COTA but failed to deliver after he was spun out by Daniel Suarez. 

He will be hoping to carry forward the momentum into future races this season, as that would help him massively in moving up the standings.

Read more at the RFK Racing Digest!

Written by

Chionia Libania Colaco

Edited by

Godwin Issac Mathew