Kyle Larson feeling stressed over one track in Round of 12 of NASCAR playoffs

Following his dominant win at Bristol, Kyle Larson was asked for his thoughts on the structure of the next round of the playoffs. In the Round of 16, a superspeedway-esque Atlanta was followed by a road course in Watkins Glen, followed by the short track at Bristol.

The story is a little different for the upcoming Round of 12 as Kansas would be followed by Talladega, before the round ends at the ROVAL.

Larson and his crew chief, Cliff Daniels, were asked during a post-race press conference if they structure of the next round with its narrower margin of error, 'nerve-wracking.'

Larson said he liked that Kansas, a more traditional track, is first up in the round rather than last. He added that if he can go to Kansas and do a good job and get enough stage points, he'd be a little more comfortable heading into Talladega compared to how he was in the Round of 16, as he finished last [following a wreck] at Atlanta, and being "stressed the whole time."

"It's constructed similarly, but different. The ROVAL to me, I've had a lot of moments of stress throughout my playoff career. Hopefully we're in a better position once when we get there. You can always have less stress because it is more stressful than Talladega for sure," Larson added. [13:05]

For Daniels, however, the perspective of looking at a playoff round was different.

He said that the #5 team is process-oriented, regardless of the race. All the team wants to do is make their process better.

He said,

"We're going to approach all those races the same way, with the same work ethic, the same process, the same, 'If we execute our day we're going to be fine.' Certainly a lot of variables, all these races have a lot of variables with which you can get into trouble really quick, which I guess is almost a good reality check because it makes you dig that much deeper in finding the ways to execute. No matter what that's going to be our focus."

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Kyle Larson happy with closing out a dominant race at Bristol, registers major achievements with stats

At Bristol, Kyle Larson registered his name to the top of several noteworthy lists. For starters, his win margin of over 7+ seconds was the highest in the Next Gen era.

Leading 462 laps in a single race was the most for any Hendrick Motorsports driver in history. Moreover, this was the most laps led at Bristol for a NASCAR driver since Cale Yarborough led 495 of 500 in 1977.

Speaking about his win in a post-race interview, Larson said,

"I've had a lot of good cars since I've come to Hendrick Motorsports, so it's tough to say [if it's the best]. But man, that was just great execution all weekend by the team. Practiced good. You've got to qualify good; we did that. Yeah, just had a great car. Thanks to the whole 5 team. They're the best in the business."

Larson claimed that while the #5 team tends to dominate a lot of races, it's not always the case that they close them out as race wins.

And because he was able to do that at Bristol, Kyle Larson added he felt "really good."