"People are more cautious to not make mistakes": Kyle Larson predicts less excitement in Kansas this weekend compared to spring race

Kyle Larson recently shared his take on the upcoming race at the Kansas Speedway. The Hendrick Motorsports driver emerged victorious in a finish for the ages at the racetrack earlier this year, beating Chris Buescher by an inch and a seemingly unbelievable margin of 0.001 seconds.

With Kansas up next on the NASCAR playoffs schedule, the opening race of the Round of 12, Larson explained what makes the racetrack such a perfect fit for the Next Gen car. During a recent appearance on the DJD Reloaded podcast, he said:

"I’ve always enjoyed it for sure, even with the old style car, I think it raced really well. But I think for the Next Gen car, Kansas itself is definitely the best track. It’s got multiple grooves, it’s got tire wear, it’s hard for the leader to get away from the field. So you just always have tight finishes for one, but tight racing throughout the whole race." [8:15]

Larson remarked that the spring race at Kansas was "amazing" from the first second to the very end, which became the closest finish in NASCAR's history. However, sharing his prediction and tampering the expectations for the type of race Kansas would have this weekend, the HMS driver said:

"I’m sure it’ll be very exciting again. It’s hard to say if it’ll be as exciting as it was earlier in the year, I think playoff races sometimes people are more cautious to not make mistakes. Sometimes things act into play for less intense racing at least in the first half or initial three quarters, but when we were there in spring, we were going at it from lap 1."

Having said that, the 2021 Cup champion claimed the race would be a great one with cars on different lines leading to "all that fun stuff."

Kyle Larson has been in contention for the win at Kansas in almost every race since his move to HMS

Apart from his iconic win earlier this season at Kansas, in the last few years, Kyle Larson has registered several great finishes on the racetrack. Since his move to Hendrick Motorsports in 2021, Larson has two wins to his name at Kansas.

But more impressively, in the seven races at Kansas since the start of 2021, Kyle Larson has only finished outside of top 10 once. Moreover, 5 of his 7 finishes are top 5 finishes. And his last three results at Kansas are a 2nd place finish, a 4th place finish, and a win in spring this year.

However, the statistics favoring another Kyle Larson win at Kansas don't just end there.

In the Next Gen era, from 2022 onwards, no driver has led more laps than Larson at Kansas. The 2021 Cup champion has led 276 laps while the driver in second place, Denny Hamlin, is far behind with 168 laps led.

With that said, it'll be interesting to see if Kyle Larson ends up winning again at Kansas this weekend.

Not only would he win at the racetrack on both occassions this season, but by following up his Bristol win with another, he'd book his ticket to the Round of 8 of the NASCAR playoffs.