‘Racing Kyle is always fun,’ Alex Bowman on wining the Pennzoil 400 edging reigning Cup Series champion Kyle Larson

‘Racing Kyle is always fun,’ Alex Bowman on wining the Pennzoil 400 edging reigning Cup Series champion Kyle Larson

Kyle Larson and Alex Bowman

Alex Bowman secured the second consecutive win for Hendrick Motorsports in the Cup Series edging defending Champion Kyle Larson in a wheel-to-wheel overtime battle to the chequered flag by 0.178 seconds. This earns him his 7th career win and first win in 2022 as he climbed up from P13 start at the begging to secure his win.

Team Hendrik’s top finish comes thanks to a risky strategy by crew chief Greg Ives as the team decided to change only two tires of their cars enabling them to come out of the pit the before the race leaders JGR duo Kyle Busch and Martin Truex Jr. Alex Bowman alongside his teammates Kyle Larson and William Byron started at the top and lead the following laps to secure the win among themselves.

Ross Chastain of TrackHouse racing was able to secure a P3 finish and Kyle Busch held on to his P4 restart position to secure the victory for himself. Team Hendrik driver William Byron missed out on the top 3 as he was only able to finish at P5 and another Hendriks man Chase Elliott finished the race at P9.

Find out what Alex Bowman had to say about the win

Alex Bowman
Alex Bowman

Alex Bowman was quick to acknowledge that the decision from their crew chief Greg Ives to go for a two-tire change instead of four paid off well as they weren’t in a great position to win the race before restart. He went on to add that it’s pretty special for him to win the race after disappointing finishes in the last three rounds.

“Can’t thank everybody enough…This thing was so fast all day. Never had the track position we needed to show it. What a call by Greg Ives to take two there. It paid off,” says Alex Bowman.

“It’s been a pretty awful start to the year so to come out here and get a win on the last restart like that is pretty special,” Alex Bowman added.

Alex Bowman went on to say it’s always fun to race Kyle Larson to the win as the duo went all out on the final lap. He added that he and Kyle Larson always fight clean and with respect indirectly mentioning the Fontana incident where Larson pitched Chase Elliott to the wall and subsequently won it.  

“Racing Kyle is always fun. Got to race him for a couple of wins. We’ve always raced each other super clean and super respectfully,” Alex Bowman said.

Also read: ‘It is the worst when you have teammate drama,’ Joey Logano on Kyle Larson and Chase Elliott saga