CONCORD, N.C. - As the 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season builds up to the points-paying opening race of the DAYTONA 500, Kyle Larson and the No. 5 HendrickCars.com team are focused for what lies ahead.
Larson’s second season with Hendrick Motorsports had plenty of high marks. Although the Elk Grove, California, native's bid for a second consecutive championship fell short, he earned three victories on the season, led the No. 5 team to its second straight owner's Championship 4 and finished seventh in the driver's championship.
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There is a feeling within the 5 camp of some missed chances in 2022 that impacted the squad's ability to repeat as champions. Crew chief Cliff Daniels said the team has really honed in on that as a learning tool ahead of the new season.
"I think there is a lot to be learned and to grow and be better from," Daniels told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio last month. "The good news is it wasn’t all in one particular area. ... I could give you a handful of races off the top of my head where I know I did not do the right thing on pit calls for the strategy of our race that ultimately hurt the number of points that we gained whether it was in stages or in our final finishing position. Kyle has admitted there are a few races that he made mistakes in and we had a few races where we made mistakes on pit road and didn’t execute there.
"People always say control what you can control. The good news for us is there are things that we can control and can make a difference in and just be better in. A lot of those things are areas we got right in ’21, so we know that is within us. That’s within our team. We have the capability. We have the talent. Now we just got to get it put together and come out of the gate strong in ’23 and have ourselves built to go have a solid run at the season. I’m confident that we will."
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On the surface, you look at Larson's 2022 top-five finishes (13) and top-10 finishes (19) -- both the third-most for him in a single season and see nothing wrong. When the driver himself looks back at 2022, he feels he should have been in the mix more.
"I would love for this year to get that consistency back," Larson said. "I’m not saying go out and win 10 races. I would love to and I would love to win more than that, but I would just love to get our consistency back like we had in 2021. Yes, we won a lot, but even we when didn’t win, we were in the top five and contending. This last year, we had the speed to definitely have the consistency but we just made a lot of mistakes. A lot on my part especially. Just try to clean those areas up and get a longer stretch of smooth, consistent races."
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Larson’s 19 wins place him seventh among active full-time drivers. Last year, he entered into the top 50 on the all-time Cup Series wins list and two wins this season would place him into the top 40.
With all eyes now on the 2023 Cup Series season, Larson and the No. 5 HendrickCars.com team are setup well for the upcoming year. See the key story lines for the team as they seek to earn their second Cup Series title in three years - an accomplishment that see him join Joey Logano and Kyle Busch as the only active full-time multi-time champions.
PAIR OF ACES: Daniels and Larson are entering their third season together. The pair has 13 wins, which is the fourth-most of any active driver/crew chief combination and the most over the past two seasons. The duo has found plenty of success over their first two seasons together and based on the strong close to 2022 (two top-two finishes in the final three races) should continue to find more of that in 2023.
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SUPERSPEEDWAY GAINS: In addition to a pole position at last year’s season-opening DAYTONA 500, Larson earned a career-best finish of fourth at Talladega Superspeedway in April. He has yet to win on a superspeedway in any NASCAR national series. The ’23 season will feature six races with the superspeedway package for the second year in a row. It all starts with the 2023 DAYTONA 500 - a race Larson nearly captured when he drove the No. 42.
"It would mean a lot," Larson said on winning the DAYTONA 500. "That’s our biggest race of the year. The most prestigious race and the one that everybody wants to win. I’ve gotten close one other time (in 2017). I ran out of fuel leading on the last lap. Bummed that I didn’t win that because you never know if you are going to have another opportunity, which I haven’t since then. I would love to win that big race and add my name to that winner’s list."
300 STARTS: Larson will hit a milestone early in the 2023 season with his 300th Cup Series start set to take place in March at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Even with this experience under his belt, the same personality that shaped his racing career from a young age is still evident in his driving style.
"I feel like I am little bit more patient of a race car driver, but I am still really aggressive," Larson said of how he has grown as a driver. "Honestly, I don’t know that I have really changed a lot. I feel like I do still do a lot of the same things I used to but maybe just pick and choose my moves a little bit more wisely now."
ROAD COURSE REBOUND: Success on the Cup Series’ circuits that turn left and right was crucial for Larson in his 2021 run to the title. His three wins were the most in a single season by a driver on road courses his win in the Round of 12 cutoff race at the Charlotte Motor Speedway ROVAL advanced him on to the next round. However, the '22 season was a different story. While he did earn a road course victory at Watkins Glen, a late-race incident at the ROVAL resulted in his premature departure from the driver’s championship. Road courses remain a strength for the 30-year-old and he'll have six chances to do so in 2023 including the inaugural race at the Chicago Street Course.
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MARTINSVILLE MOJO: Martinsville has statistically been one of toughest tracks for Larson on the circuit. He sat on the pole and scored a career-best runner-up finish at the .526-mile track in October 2022. He has two top-five finishes in four starts with Hendrick Motorsports at its most successful track as an organization. With the Virginia short track occupying a key spot on the schedule as the race just before the Championship 4 finale at Phoenix Raceway, success there is crucial to make the title event (unless you have a win in a previous Round of 8 race).
"Martinsville has been a place that I struggle at pretty regularly. I feel like last year we had a good two races at Martinsville so I feel like its potentially in our future of winning a race. If I did, that would probably be the all-time biggest win of my life because anytime you can accomplish something that’s difficult to you or you don’t think that you can accomplish would mean a lot."
