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MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES: O'REILLY AUTO PARTS 500

April 9, 2017

Kyle Larson

Fort Worth, Texas

THE MODERATOR: We're now joined by today's second‑place finisher, driver of the No.42 CreditOne Bank Chevrolet. This is a career‑best finish for him at Texas Motor Speedway. You were closing in on Jimmie there in the last couple laps. Just talk about your run there. Did you feel like you could get up to him?
KYLE LARSON: Yeah, I think if I could have got by Joey with maybe five to go, I think I could have‑‑ I definitely would have caught Jimmie. Passing him is obviously another story. But I would have at least had a couple opportunities to get behind him and work there behind him and try and get by.
Wish I would have got him by a little sooner, but all in all a great day for our CreditOne Bank Chevy team. I made a mistake there on the first pit stop and clipped too many boxes. I turned in way early. I probably clipped a couple before the 11 box.
But yeah, I was disappointed in myself then because I feel like our car was really, really good the beginning part of the race and probably could have drove up to the lead and maybe controlled the race from then on. So you never know.
But I just got to focus a little bit harder and not make mistakes, and we can control some races, lead some laps. All in all, still a really good finish for us and we extend the point lead a little bit, so a solid day.

Q. Kyle, two‑part question for you. First off, how did the new configuration, new track handle in your mind, and Jimmie only had one top 10, but I'm sure you guys never counted him out. Did he remind everyone he's Jimmie Johnson today?
KYLE LARSON: Yeah, Jimmie was really good. I felt like we were definitely better than the first three‑‑ two‑thirds of the race, and there throughout those long runs there in the third stage, yeah, he was really fast, and passed a lot of cars. And actually almost drove up to the lead, and then he had a really good restart there at the end.
Yeah, it was‑‑ you can't ever count Jimmie Johnson out. He's the best out there. I know all the media was wondering why he wasn't running up front, but they're a great team, and he's a great driver. Yeah, he's going to win a lot more.
We'll have to keep fighting hard and hopefully run up front of him.
Yeah, track was a little bit better than I think I expected it to be. I thought it would be a little bit harder pass. Maybe it was, but our car was really good, so it could operate on the bottom of 1 and 2 really good, and that was about the only place you could pass was the exit of 2, so our car was thankfully working good over there.

Q. Kyle, you're really piling up the second place finishes. Now that you got the win, is this one easier to swallow?
KYLE LARSON: They're all kind of easy to swallow, just because we have a lot of speed in our cars right now. You know, seconds don't suck that bad. Yeah, you know, I'd like to have five wins right now, but four seconds and a win isn't terrible.

Q. Of course it took you a while to get by Joey Logano. Did you think of trying to get by him on the outside sooner or was your car not suitable for the top today?
KYLE LARSON: I don't think anybody's car was suitable for the top. I knew‑‑ so I got by Harvick by getting really close to his back bumper on entry and getting him a little bit loose. I knew if I could stay close enough to Joey off of 4 I could charge into 1 a little bit harder than he was and do the same thing. Finally I was able to stay close enough and get close to his back bumper on entry, and he got loose, and I was able to stick the bottom and get underneath him.
You know, the top just wasn't‑‑ yeah, it just wasn't as fast as the bottom today.

Q. Kyle, as we go into the break here, can you just talk about the improvements your team might need? I know we ask you this every week, but to do what you guys have done the first part of the season, can you give us an overview on where you want to go from here?
KYLE LARSON: Yeah, it's awesome. I know I keep giving the same answer every time you ask that question, but it's awesome. We knew, or we thought we'd start the year off good. I don't think we thought we'd start the year off this good. I'm extremely thankful to be part of Chip Ganassi Racing and a part of everybody's hard work at the shop and on the road crew. It's been a lot of fun to show up to the racetrack and be fast each and every time we hit the track. Even times when I feel like we don't end practice very good, they make great adjustments overnight and we're a lot better in the race, which was kind of what we were fighting yesterday was I didn't end Happy Hour being very happy. But today when I asked Chad all the changes that he need, sounded like he had a long list of stuff. He was able to make the right calls, and our car was definitely the best the first half, I thought. We just didn't have the track position.
Yeah, it's fun. It's fun right now, and hopefully keep it going. I don't know what it takes to improve because I just drive the cars, but yeah, we're going to Bristol, which is a track that I run really, really good at, so I'm excited about that, and hopefully can find some good luck there finally.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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