NASCAR CUP SERIES: CHAMPIONSHIP

November 5, 2023

Kyle Larson

Pit Lane Interview

Q. Perfect pit stop there at the end action Kyle, both driver and crew. Walk me through the restart and final laps. What was missing there?

KYLE LARSON: Yeah, his car was really fast. Really the last few months. Yeah, especially here today. Our pit crew and pit road really kept us in the game. We weren't the greatest on the track, but I was just hoping for pit stops 'cause I knew the way our team executed our lights, the way our pit crew can execute a fast pit stop, I knew that was going to be our only shot really to win.

They did everything in their power to give us the winning job done there. Huge thank you to them. I needed to come out the leader on that restart. Ross got a really good start from the second row. Was hoping I could get clear of Denny and get the lead, have Ross kind of protect for me behind me.

I'm not sure if it would have made a difference. I was just not as good as a few guys, especially Blaney and Ross probably. It would have been difficult. But my team did a really good job all season, so I'm extremely proud of them. We had an up-and-down year and we finally put together two solid weeks in a row. I don't know if we've done that all year.

Yeah, just huge thank you to Hendrickcars.com, Team Chevy, Valvoline, Jinya Ramen Bar, everybody back at Hendrick Motorsports, the shop. Everyone.

We'll come back next year and try to be stronger.

Q. Blaney pointed out how respectfully everybody raced. How important was it not to do anything egregious in this race?

KYLE LARSON: I tried to take as much as I could in one and two just to see if I could to anything because he was a lot faster.

He was behind me a number of times throughout the race, never touched me. I would say for me, my respect level, it started with him. He raced with a lot of respect early on in the race. He always has, too.

It was fun watching Ryan and William and Bell kind of when he was still out there us all racing hard. Yeah, just a lot of fun there. Congrats to Ryan. He's a deserving champion. Him and his team have done an amazing job. It's been fun to kind of come up through the ranks with him, now you see him be a champion.

Congrats to Team Penske and their whole team. We'll try and beat 'em next year.