The 2023 season has been an up-and-down ride for Kyle Kirkwood. Saturday in the Hy-Vee Homefront 250 at Iowa Speedway, Kirkwood saw one of the bright spots in a consistent day finishing seventh.
Kirkwood has finished as high as sixth this year and as low as 27th, but was able to put together a solid run Saturday. While he had nothing for the Team Penske cars, a seventh place run is respectable. It was his best run since a ninth at Road America earlier this year.
After a deep starting spot, Kirkwood would pick off a few spots each run. Eventually he found himself in the top 10. As he slowly got better during the day, it came with good adjustments from the team.
“Just trying to get the balance right and if you don’t have good balance then you won’t have good [tire degradation],” Kirkwood said. “It just overall isn’t going to be fun. So we just got the balance in a really good window there. Something that I was happy with, something that I could work with.”
Consistency hasn’t been the name of the game for Kirkwood this season. Finishing positions have been all over the place for this team this year. Needing a good run, Kirkwood and his team delivered.
He started in the 17th spot and as the day went on his Andretti Autosport team worked on the car to make it better. Looking for better balance in the car, they were able to achieve that and get Kirkwood comfortable. He worked his way through the field.
With a race that had long green flag runs, it played into the hands of Kirkwood and his car. After the race Kirkwood said his car got better as the run went on. He was able to make up spots late in runs because that is when he felt his car came in.
“We started off in 17th and moved our way forward from there,” Kirkwood said. “Our car was really good at end of stints unlike our teammates. So that’s why we were so good in the closing stages of the race. That’s why we made up so many positions there,” Kirkwood told Always Race Day after his seventh place run. “We constantly made the car better throughout the race. Looking forward to doing it again tomorrow.”
Saturday was his fourth top 10 finish of the year.
It was just what the doctor ordered for the Andretti Autosport No. 27 team as they needed a good run.
However, Kirkwood still feels they learned a lot and can get better as they head into Sunday’s event. He will be starting the middle of pack again for Sunday’s Hy-Vee One Step 250 once again.
“We’ve got to go and decipher what we learned just now and we’ll build off it for the next race,” Kirkwood said.
Sunday’s weekend finale race is set for 1:00pm CT (NBC) for the Hy-Vee One Step 250 at Iowa Speedway.
