Denny Hamlin and Kyle Larson were just a few feet short of scoring the win in Sunday’s Shriners Children’s 500 at Phoenix Raceway.
A thrilling overtime finish pinned Hamlin and his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Christopher Bell against each other in a two-lap shootout from the front row. Larson refired from second row in fourth place but charged into third on the final lap.
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Entering Turn 3 for the final time, Bell washed up the track and forced Hamlin to lift, allowing Larson to charge to the inside for a three-wide dash to the checkers. At the line, Hamlin had to settle for second behind Bell by just 0.049 seconds, while Larson finished third, 0.097 seconds behind Bell, who earned his third consecutive NASCAR Cup Series win.
Despite the sting of the loss, the results are a turn of fortunes for both Hamlin and Larson. Each of the rival drivers had one top 10 and two finishes of 20th or worse through the opening three races of the year entering Sunday’s contest. Hamlin’s runner-up effort is his best finish of 2025 while Larson’s third-place finish matches his season-best result from Atlanta Motor Speedway on Feb. 23.
The NASCAR Cup Series next heads to Las Vegas Motor Speedway for the Pennzoil 400 presented by Jiffy Lube on Sunday (3:30 p.m. ET, FS1, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
This story will be updated.
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