NASCAR CUP SERIES: BUSCH LIGHT POLE QUALIFYING

February 15, 2023

Kyle Larson

Press Conference

An Interview with:

THE MODERATOR: We are now joined by Kyle Larson, driver of the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet.

We'll take questions for Kyle.

Q. Are you going to need to steal some setup secrets from Bowman? Even when all you Hendrick cars are so good in qualifying, seems they have something a little bit extra.

KYLE LARSON: I don't know. I think it's just because he's taller, he can push the gas further (laughter).

No, I don't know, just hats off to their team. We were able to edge them out last year. I don't remember what lap times were last year, but they clobbered us all this year.

Hats off to the 48 team and everybody at Hendrick Motorsports because everybody has a hand in all of our cars going as fast as they do in qualifying here.

Q. You've been good in qualifying here, particularly since you came over to Hendrick. You said yourself that racing at superspeedways has never treated you well. You said you're going to spend some time with Tyler studying tape. Is that what it's going to take? Are you trying to figure anything out to change your fortune going into Sunday?

KYLE LARSON: I don't know, I mean, you always study before every race. I don't know. We do it every week. We go over every race. Same as for Daytona and Talladega both, we go and try to probably dive deeper than normal. More of the same tomorrow.

But I would like to kind of see how the good guys set themselves up throughout a run to be up towards the front or wherever they need to be to miss wrecks and stuff.

It's just a difficult style of racing that, I don't know, I just haven't had the best of time in my career. I used to always say it's bad luck, but I don't necessarily feel that way any more.

Yeah, just try to, as you do with every racetrack, just get better.

Q. The fact that Hendrick Motorsports has been so dominant so often for so long for this race, how do you even begin to describe that?

KYLE LARSON: Yeah, I don't know. I'm new, pretty new, to Hendrick still. I don't obviously get involved in car stuff.

Yeah, they've got something figured out for sure. I mean, there's other teams outside of Hendrick Motorsports that use Hendrick engines. The cars are more similar these days, where they're not kind of hand-built in the shop.

There's obviously tricks and stuff that they've learned along the way that still apply to I'm assuming these cars. It's pretty neat. It's pretty cool to see the success that they've had on qualifying day.

Rick gets really excited about that. I know he'd be even more excited if one of the four of us could end up in Victory Lane on Sunday.

Q. Is it also more impressive when you think there's so little you can change on these cars, and they still are just as dominant as they were with the previous car?

KYLE LARSON: Yeah, yeah, I mean, I guess I kind of touched on that a little bit.

Again, I don't know. You'll have to ask Blake about car stuff. He's worked on the old ones and the new ones. I don't know what makes them go fast. He comes from a different team. He might spill all the beans to you here soon.

Q. You were on the phone with Rick. What did he have to say to you? This has to be a big feather in your cap to be on the front row again.

KYLE LARSON: Yeah, no, he was just really happy, as he has been for whatever, 16 times or so, for qualifying (smiling).

No, just quick congratulations. Happy to see him tomorrow, get to hang out with him some this week. Haven't got to see him much this off-season. Excited to see Rick tomorrow.