Ahead of the playoff opener on Sunday, Kyle Larson took the wheel of the #17 for Hendrick Motorsports for the Xfinity Race at Darlington on Saturday. With his eyes more or less on the Cup playoffs, Larson sought to get some time on the track to gain some momentum, and for a large part, things were indeed going well for the 2021 Cup Series champion. However, due to an issue with the car, Larson finished all the way back in a race won by Cup playoff rival Denny Hamlin.
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After the race, while talking about running in the Xfinity Series in general, Larson did express a demand to his team to let the drivers run more races in the Xfinity Series, a decision not entirely in their own control.
Kyle Larson lets Rick Hendrick know HMS drivers want to run more Xfinity Races
The #5 driver, who won the Xfinity race at Darlington earlier in the year while running for Kaulig Racing, feels even the other Hendrick teammates would agree with his sentiment to run more Xfinity races in the year.
“I think all of us Hendrick drivers would love to you know race more often than we did maybe even this year, so we’ll see. It’s all up to Rick, but I know I can speak for all of us when we say we have a lot of fun racing this and it’s definitely a benefit to run.”
“We’ll see. I mean, I would love to run you know, three or four races, maybe a road course and a few ovals, but, uh, we’ll see.”
In 2023, Larson ran three times in the Xfinity Series, twice with Hendrick Motorsports and once with Kaulig Racing. Teammates Chase Elliott, William Byron, and Alex Bowman took the wheel of the #17 car for just one race each this season, a number Larson insists those drivers want to increase.
Kyle Larson thinks no driver should be taken lightly in the playoffs
At the media day ahead of the playoffs, the Hendrick driver was asked where he saw himself stacked against the field in a season that has been defined by surprises.
“It is tough. I mean when you really look at it, you know there’s 16 guys in the playoffs and you could honestly probably make a case for almost everybody on how or why they they could be the champion at the end of the year. So I don’t get my feelings hurt if I’m not No 1.”
Having said that, Larson did mention that the two drivers who could really be above everyone at this point could be JGR’s Martin Truex Jr. and HMS teammate William Byron because of their consistency.
While anything could happen at Phoenix, the tracks leading up to that point are well-suited for Larson, who desperately wants to return to the Championship 4 after missing it out last year.
