One would imagine that for someone like Kyle Larson, who has already won the Chili Bowl twice, winning a third wouldn’t mean as much. But that’s not the case. Because if Larson ends up winning his third Chili Bowl title in the coming days, it would mean a whole lot more to him because of one special reason.
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In a recent interview with FloRacing, Larson explained how if he wins his 3rd Golden Driller trophy this time around, it would be because of the people he’s working with this time. “It would be great to inch your way up the winner’s list of the Chili Bowl. But I think what would make it extra special is just getting a win for Keith (Kunz) and Pete (Willoughby), would be, it would just mean a lot personally to me,” Larson said.
“I was super excited to win that first Chili Bowl, but at the same time, when Keith and Pete came to the victory lane to congratulate me, I was tearing up because I was sad that I didn’t get to win with them.”
Looking forward to the challenge, Larson hoped it would all go well for him in a “storybook, fairy tale” kind of way, that everything could work out just right and he could get that win. But if not, it’s not all that bad.
“If I don’t happen to lock in and all that, I wasn’t going to be doing anything on Thursday night anyways, and I love to race, so at least I got to go there and race and have a good time,” Larson claimed. “We’ll see how it goes.”
Kyle Larson pulled another big name from NASCAR into Chili Bowl this year
With Kyle Larson arguably being the biggest name from NASCAR amongst those fighting for the Golden Driller Trophy, he also managed to convince one of his Cup colleagues to do the same. The defending Daytona 500 champ, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. announced he would be competing in the Chili Bowl, following in the footsteps of the two-time Chili Bowl champ.
And the whole thing came together in a pretty dynamic way for Stenhouse too. “I was texting with [Kyle] Larson, telling him, the same time you were trying to get your deal together, I was trying to get a deal together, and he said to call Keith [Kunz], which I’ve run for him one other time at the Chili Bowl, and I didn’t really perform the way I wanted to, so I wasn’t sure if he would let me back in one of his cars,” Stenhouse said as per FloRacing.
However, Stenhouse did send a text which eventually led to him being another surprise entry from NASCAR in the Chili Bowl Nationals.
