Kyle Larson leads most laps in Food City 500 but finishes third

Same song, same racetrack, different verse. 

Kyle Larson led the most laps (229 of 300) in Saturday's NASCAR O'Reilly Auto Parts Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway and the most (284 of 500) in Sunday's Food City 500 but won neither race. 

A runner-up on Saturday was coupled with a third-place effort in Sunday's Cup Series race. Polesitter Ryan Blaney passed Larson for the lead on lap 338, and the latter was unable to take it back. 

When the caution came out with 24 laps to go, Larson followed Blaney down pit road as five drivers, including eventual race winner Ty Gibbs, stayed out. But Larson took two tires, opposed to Blaney's four, and came out ahead of the No. 12. 

Larson quickly got into the top three before he was hunted down by Blaney, but even with an overtime restart to work with, he could only muster a third-place finish as Gibbs edged Blaney for the victory. 

Kyle Larson comment on podium effort at Bristol

"Blaney had by far the best car; his pit crew just kept putting him behind all day," Larson told Fox Sports. "Allowed us to lead a lot of laps and get those stage wins. Just knew it was going to be difficult to hold him off ever. Ty got strong there the last run, too. That was probably my worst run. The strategy got kinda crazy there at the end. We took a third-place car and finished third."

Larson swept the stages on Sunday and is sixth in the Cup Series standings. He enters the April 19 race at Kansas on a 32-race winless streak.