MONSTER ENERGY NASCAR CUP SERIES
BOJANGLES SOUTHERN 500
DARLINGTON RACEWAY
TEAM CHEVY DRIVER PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
AUGUST 31, 2018
KYLE LARSON, NO. 42 DC SOLAR CAMARO ZL1, met with members of the media and discussed his Darlington appearance talking to local reading champions, not running the Indy USAC race, his thoughts on heading into the Playoffs and many other topics. Full Transcript:
WHAT IS IT MEAN GETTING TO MEET THESE KIDS AND TALK TO THEM A LITTLE BIT ABOUT WHAT YOU DO?
“Yeah, ever since I had and I always enjoyed doing stuff with kids anyways, but ever since I had children of my own, I enjoy these types of things even more. It’s cool anytime you get to spend some time with kids who might not know who you are, but you might be able to become one of their heroes or something down the road. Neat to do some stuff here. I think it was last year or the year before I actually went to a school nearby and went by some classrooms as well. Always enjoy doing stuff like this.”
WE WERE ALL EXCITED WHEN WE SAW YOUR ENTRY FOR THE BC39 AND THEN TALKED TO USAC AND IT LOOKED LIKE YOU HAD WITHDRAWN. WHAT IS THE STORY THERE?
“I am doing my go-kart race in California and with it being on the West Coast flights are just… Sunday night I will probably get home at 2 or 3 in the morning and I have like a 7 a.m. flight to California, so I probably will get an hour of sleep that night and then the go-kart race always runs late and then I have to be on a 6 a.m. flight Wednesday to get to Indy by 4 p.m., so it would just be a rush. I told Keith (Kunz) I will just skip this year and we will see how it goes for next year. I’m still going to get some racing in while I’m out West. I am just going to stay out there and I’m going to race the sprint car race in Oregon on Wednesday night and then race Chico (California) on Thursday. I’m still getting race in it just won’t be at Indy. But, the event is going to be just as cool without me there. (Christopher) Bell might just win by a half a lap rather than a straightaway now.”
WHAT DO YOU ANTICIPATE THE RACE IN INDY WILL BE LIKE?
“The prestige around the event has already been really cool, but once everybody starts rolling into the pit area and you get the first night in it’s going to be really cool. Somebody is going to put their name in the history books of winning the first USAC midget race in the speedway. Definitely a cool deal and with it being on TV now the next night is special as well. I’m looking forward to watching it. Like I said, I wish I could be there, just the schedule is just not going to work out for me this year.”
WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON ROSS CHASTAIN RACING THE NO. 42 XFINITY CAR?
“Ross has overachieved in kind of everything he’s been in that I have paid attention to since I’ve made it to NASCAR. For the Carpoff’s to give him an opportunity in a great piece of equipment is really cool. I think he’s going to do an amazing job. Like I said, he overachieves in the stuff that he’s in now in both Xfinity and Cup. He’s got some good race tracks that he gets to run as well. I think he will run up front and could even win.”
WHAT DO YOU EXPECT INDY IS GOING TO BE LIKE NEXT WEEK CONSIDERING IT’S THE LAST CHANCE FOR GUYS TO GET INTO THE PLAYOFFS?
“You never really know what any race is going to be like before you get there. I don’t know. I think as you get to this point in the season, even months before you kind of have… the field is getting close to being set for the Playoffs already. So, you already have those guys that are in a little bit of a desperation mode, but with Indy being the last shot they might try and get lucky with pit strategy and stuff, but that track you are still going to have your fastest cars up front. So, I wouldn’t expect anything too crazy.”
HOW DO YOU HANDLE THAT NOW THAT YOU KNOW YOU ARE IN THE PLAYOFFS? DO YOU WORRY ABOUT GETTING INVOLVED IN SOMEONE’S MESS THAT IS IN DESPERATION MODE?
“No, I mean, I have felt like for the last, I feel like three or four months I felt like our team has been solidly in the Playoffs even though mathematically you are not set until whatever we were last race. But for how our team has been performing and outperforming some other guys that are already outside the top 16 I knew we would make the Playoffs. So, our mind set I wouldn’t think is any different the last couple of races and especially these next two. We try and go out and win every race, every stage, every week, we just haven’t been able to do that.”
WHAT DO YOU THINK DOUG DUCHART HAS BROUGHT TO CHIP GANASSI RACING?
“Well, I think he has brought a level of experience that is a little bit different than what we maybe had at Chip Ganassi Racing. With Doug, he brings it across all forms of motorsports within our organization. I think that is really cool. I don’t really know exactly what his job entails, I just know that he is a part of everything, the Indy stuff, the NASCAR stuff, the IMSA stuff, he is a part of it all. Which is good to have eyes on everything and his hands on everything as well. So, I’ve enjoyed Doug a lot so far having him around. You know a fresh face, fresh ideas, it’s all good.”
DID THE OFF WEEK COME AT A GOOD TIME FOR YOU TEAM?
“I don’t know. We will find out I guess this weekend. It didn’t feel like an off weekend for me. I didn’t even pay attention really. I think being able to have a test in the middle of the off week was good. I felt like our Richmond test went really well. I felt like we learned quite a bit, hopefully, you never really know until you get into a racing situation, but I felt like we were one of the faster cars there at the Richmond test. Like I said, we learned some things, so hopefully those things that we learned, we can … I know we have already put some into the Darlington car, so we will see if it works or not.”
DID YOU FIGURE OUT WHAT IT WAS AT BRISTOL WHY YOU GUYS DIDN’T RUN AS WELL AS YOU TYPICALLY HAVE THERE?
“No, I haven’t asked. I don’t know, an off race. I think my expectations are just really high whenever I go to Bristol. I was in a bad mood for a lot of that race I think just because my expectations are high when I go to Bristol. I was kind of a negative person throughout the first half of the race, but once I gave myself some realistic expectations for the rest of the race I was in a better mood, but still wanted to… like I told Chad (Johnston, crew chief), I’m sorry I was an a-hole on the radio, I just expect to go there and lap the field. We didn’t have that there, but we work hard to get better at every race track because we want to dominate every race. We’ve just got to keep digging, keep working hard.”
WHAT WAS CHAD’S RESPONSE?
“Chad was like, ‘no I get it I want to dominate every race.’ So, we both do. Like I said, I feel like I’ve got a great team and we continue to make our stuff better and innovate and try to get faster we’ve just got to keep hitting on some things.”
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Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.
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