"That was frustrating": Kyle Larson rues lack of consistency in bittersweet start to the 2025 season

Kyle Larson recently opened up on the current state of the #5 team so far this season. In the first four races of the season, Larson has had a couple of finishes inside the top 5, Atlanta and Phoenix. However, in the other two races in Daytona and COTA, he finished in 20th and 32nd place respectively.

During a media availability session ahead of this Sunday's race at Las Vegas, the Hendrick Motorsports driver was asked for his opinion on where he feels his team stands with the four results so far. He said:

"Daytona just was rough. Like we just were buried in the back the whole time. So that was frustrating to start your season off like that. I would have rather been up front and got crashed, but never got to see the front." [4:10]

As for Atlanta, where he finished in third position, Larson said that race was 'good' and made him happy because he expected to crash out of the race but ended up with a good finish. But when it came to COTA a week later, he believed he didn't do 'a great job'. And even when they had a chance to recover from the several mishaps in the race, he got spun. Speaking about Phoenix where he scored another top 5 finish, Kyle Larson didn't think he was either fast or good. But he credited his team for doing 'an amazing job' in execution which ultimately contributed to his result.

But from a bigger lens, Kyle Larson claimed the #5 hasn't had consistency to start to the season.

"I just feel like we haven’t had consistency really to start, whether that be kind of everything coming together. So I’m hoping that this week, a track that we have success at in the past, you know, we can kind of put it all together and have a solid weekend. And then go to another track next week where I’m really confident at and try and just put a few good races in a row together," he added.

Kyle Larson shares his take on Christopher Bell's ongoing winning streak

During his interaction with media ahead of Las Vegas, a reporter asked Kyle Larson about Christopher Bell's ongoing streak. Bell, who is Larson's rival in NASCAR as well as an old rival from their dirt racing days, has won the last three Cup races in a row.

Because of this, Larson was asked about the level of respect he has for Bell's streak or whether he feels he needs to end his rival's streak.

"I don’t know. I mean, I think we had a great season in 2021 and was able to win three points-paying races in a row, twice, that year. And four in a row once, you know, with the All-Star race in there. So, I think having lived through it on my own, I can respect it a lot more and it doesn’t bother me," Larson replied.

Having said that, Kyle Larson claimed that if Bell were to win another race on Sunday, he'd find it annoying.

However, as a acompetitor and as a fan, he finds Bell's recent success 'really neat' because of the nature of racing in the Next Gen era.