The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series’ “California Kid” is heading back home with the proverbial wind at his back.
After a series of strong runs that ended without representative results, Chip Ganassi Racing rookie Kyle Larson broke through last Sunday at Bristol with a 10th-place finish that marked his first Top-10 in Sprint Cup competition.
Now, the Elk Grove, California native is looking for more as the NASCAR circus heads for the Auto Club Speedway in Fontana for this weekend’s Auto Club 400 (Sprint Cup) and TreatMyClot.com 300 (Nationwide).
“We’ve had really fast cars all year long,” Larson said this morning in a teleconference. “Just haven’t really caught the right breaks to get those top 10s. I feel at Phoenix and Vegas both, we had top‑10 cars. I got stuck a lap down there from mistakes.
“I think with the good finish at Bristol, it’s really going to hopefully turn things around, hopefully bring a lot of consistency.”
Larson has continued his work in the Nationwide Series with Turner Scott Motorsports along with competing in his first full Cup season with the Ganassi camp.
One would assume that the extra work in Nationwide is helping Larson on the Cup side of the fence. However, the 21-year-old says that more so, the reverse has occurred.
“I think it helps a little bit just knowing how the track might change throughout a race,” he said. “I really think it helps for my Nationwide race running the Cup stuff. Now when I get in the Nationwide car, it feels slow. Things happen slower. I have more confidence in that.
“That’s why I’ve been running really well in that car so far, too. I think it helps [my Cup races] a little bit, but I think it helps [my Nationwide races] a whole bunch.”
It would appear that he’s correct – Larson has earned three Top-5s and four Top-10s so far in the four Nationwide events he’s ran with Turner Scott, and he’s been doing it while fighting at the front against battle-tested Cup veterans.
The issue of Cup drivers coming in and winning most of the Nationwide races has been a hot-button one for some time now, but Larson said he would be “disappointed” if NASCAR ever made rules to keep the Cup guys out of the Nationwide Series.
“I think the Nationwide regulars like Cup guys running with them – I know I do,” he said. “I consider myself still young, I guess, in racing stockcars. Whenever I’m out there with guys like Matt Kenseth, Kyle Busch, Brad Keselowski, I can see them in front of me, I’m learning a lot from them.
“I like it. I think it’s good for the development side of the young drivers ’cause it is a development series for those kids. I think it’s a good thing for NASCAR to have the Cup guys in there because it’s just going to make their series more competitive when those young guys move up.”
