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The Top Five: Breaking down the Chicagoland race

Five thoughts following Sunday’s thrilling race at Chicagoland Speedway…

1. THIS is why we watch

Yes! Wow, that was so fun. I would have never imagined Chicagoland would put on such an entertaining and exciting race, but NASCAR sure needed a day like that. What we witnessed Sunday was the kind of race you’d show your non-NASCAR friends and say, “See? It’s worth watching!”

Those stand-up-and-scream-at-the-TV finishes have been all too rare lately, especially in this predictable and oft-dry season. But Chicago was a reminder of why so many of us invest our time watching NASCAR. The payoff for those who tuned in for the race was very high, and viewers got rewarded with one of the best finishes in a long time.

When you get a race with lead changes and passing and contact and drama on the final lap, that’s thrilling enough. But when it happens on a 1.5-mile track, it’s oddly even more of an adrenaline rush than on a short track — because you don’t really expect it.

Are we going to see this every week? No, of course not. That’s why a bunch of important people wanted the All-Star package to be used in Cup. So let’s just be appreciative and thankful for seeing a good intermediate track race — and getting the reminder they do exist and can put on an outstanding show under the right circumstances.

2. Totally fair

Kyle Busch’s aggressive bump of Kyle Larson was 100% fair game. Larson said as much in his classy interview after the race, but that won’t keep some people from loathing Busch even more now (I’ve already seen this in my Twitter mentions).

Had it been a driver other than Busch, fans would have been cheering like crazy during his postrace interview. Can you imagine if Tony Stewart had done that? People would have said it was one of the coolest things ever.

Instead, fans showered Busch with boos and jeers. But at least that made him turn to the camera and do the crying face acting, which was hilarious and instantly meme-worthy.

Seriously though, Larson hit Busch in a last-lap battle for the win. You don’t think it’s fair game for Busch to nail him back? C’mon. That’s just silly. That’s pure NASCAR right there, and it’s what distinguishes stock cars from the other forms of racing.

3. Larson’s stock rises

This has been the season of Busch, Kevin Harvick and Martin Truex Jr. — a whopping 13 wins in 17 races between them! INSANE! So the fact Larson has even been a factor in some of these races is super impressive. He arguably doesn’t have as good of a car as the Big Three and yet can battle with them anyway. Imagine if he was driving a Stewart-Haas Racing car!

Additionally, his racer mentality is a really cool part of his personality and story. Did you expect him to get out of the car and rip Busch for being dirty, or perhaps whine or make a sarcastic personal comment? He didn’t do any of that.

In fact, he did the opposite. He essentially let Busch off the hook and took the high road, then even went to victory lane to congratulate the winning driver! That certainly raised Larson’s respect level in a lot of fans’ eyes.

Look, it’s fun when drivers get angry and punch each other after the race. You can get good videos of that and post them to YouTube, and lots of people will watch.

But it’s also neat to see competitors go all-out during the race and then treat each other respectfully afterward. It’s not like Larson was OK with losing, but he knew what happened was just part of racing — so he didn’t pout about it.

4. Dale’s Debut

Apparently there was a new broadcaster in the NBCSN booth. I’m having trouble coming up with the name. Let me watch the replay of the finish real quick.

(Watches replay)

Oh yeah — SLIDE JOB!

 

Dale Earnhardt Jr.’s debut for NBC was refreshing and interesting. He had some good lines (“It’s like driving off a set of stairs,” he said of the Chicago bumps) and shared solid insight (“It does feel good, but it’s early,” Earnhardt said of Aric Almirola, pumping the brakes early in Stage 2 when the rest of the booth was getting excited).

But the best part was Earnhardt’s genuine enthusiasm for what he was seeing. There was nothing forced or fake; he wasn’t trying to sell anything to the viewers or convince people it was a good race — he was simply passing along his passion (or hitting Steve Letarte in the shoulder). It felt more like you were watching the race with a buddy rather than being talked down to by a professional broadcaster.

That said, I’m worried people are setting Earnhardt up for failure. NBC promoted the crap out of his debut, and everything leading up to the race was all about the guy in the booth — not anything to do with the cars or current drivers. So the expectations for what Earnhardt can bring to the broadcasts is very, very high.

That’s unreasonable. No matter who the broadcaster is, people aren’t going to tune in on a large-scale basis just to hear someone talk. I mean, the ratings didn’t even go up for Earnhardt’s final race last season at Homestead (they actually went down 20% and had a decline of 1.4 million viewers over the previous year)! So how can Earnhardt be expected to stop NASCAR’s ratings slide just by his presence as a broadcaster?

Everyone should just let Dale be Dale. Appreciate his insight and voice in the booth, which will fit seamlessly into the NBC broadcasts. But don’t expect he’s going to save the sport at this point. No one individual can do that.

5. Points Picture

With nine weeks to go in the regular season, there are still a whopping 10 spots available to make the playoffs on points.

Brad Keselowski is the current leader among those who haven’t won yet, followed by Kurt Busch, Denny Hamlin, Kyle Larson and Ryan Blaney. Aric Almirola is also comfortably inside the playoffs at this time.

The cutoff right now is Alex Bowman. Those above him in points are Jimmie Johnson (+52), Chase Elliott (+45) and Erik Jones (+18).

Those on the outside are Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (-23) and Paul Menard (-28). Daniel Suarez is the next-closest, but he’s pretty far out of it (-74 points).

Next week is Daytona, which represents an opportunity for someone like a Jamie McMurray or Bubba Wallace to steal an unexpected playoff spot.

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Kyle Larson says expressing love for sprint cars is no slight at NASCAR

Kyle Larson found himself in hot water with some NASCAR fans this week when he responded to the World of Outlaws Twitter account during a Q&A session.

Larson, whose first love is all things dirt racing, tweeted he’d like to run full-time with the Outlaws by the time he’s 40. He’s only 25 now and has already been running in the NASCAR Cup Series for five seasons, so that could potentially mean running 20 years in Cup before he leaves.

Still, some fans seemed to be angered by Larson’s tweet, inferring he loves sprint cars more than stock cars. And this isn’t the first time recently Larson has drawn some sensitivity from those in the NACAR world; some were offended in January when Larson said he’d rather win the Chili Bowl than the Daytona 500.

So on Friday at Sonoma Raceway, Larson suggessted he hasn’t communicated well enough what he really means.

“Maybe I don’t do the best job in the world of talking about how much I love NASCAR as much as I do sprint cars — but I do,” Larson said. “I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t love NASCAR racing. I enjoy sprint cars and I feel like I talk about sprint cars a lot just to open people’s eyes to that style of racing because it’s a great form of racing — and so is NASCAR.”

Larson said his goal is to have fans support all forms of motorsports — not just NASCAR and not just sprint cars — because that’s what he does. He loves to race anything on four wheels.

“Most fans get it, but some fans aren’t quite open-minded enough,” he said.

And though Larson wants more NASCAR fans to support grassroots racing, he said it works the other way as well.

“I have multiple fans come up to me each and every night (at a dirt track) and they are like, ‘Man, guys like you and (Christopher) Bell you are the reason why I’m watching NASCAR again,'” he said. “That makes me feel really special. It makes me feel like I’m having an impact when I am going to race that stuff or racing here even.”

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The Top Five: Breaking down the Pocono race

Five thoughts following Sunday’s Pocono 400 at Pocono Raceway…

1. Three’s Company

Every NASCAR fan knows two drivers have been the best this season: Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch. They’ve combined for nine wins, 50 playoff points and approximately two gazillion laps led.

Quietly, though, Martin Truex Jr. has been close all season — just not quite with “winning speed,” as he put it last week.

But now, after winning Sunday at Pocono? It suddenly looks like Truex is right there with the top two.

“I would say we had winning speed today for sure,” Truex said. “… Today was the first weekend in awhile — even though we’ve been finishing good — that everything made sense. We had a game plan and everything went the way we thought it would, and it was just a smooth weekend. It felt like we were doing all the little things right.”

Yes, clean air and track position benefited the No. 78 car late in the Pocono 400. Busch couldn’t track him down despite having four fresher tires.

But as crew chief Cole Pearn noted, Truex was running third in Stage 1 and was able to pass both Busch and Harvick for the stage win. And in the final stage, the trio was running nose to tail — just unable to make any passes because they were all so close in speed.

So to Pearn and Truex, that showed the 78 car has made gains.

“It hasn’t come without hard work, I promise you that,” Pearn said.

With 14 races down, three drivers have hogged 11 of the wins. Only Joey Logano, Clint Bowyer and Austin Dillon have gone to victory lane aside from those three (and two of those were superspeedway wins).

It’s been the Busch and Harvick show until now, but it seems they might have to make some room on the marquee.

2. Truex 2017 vs. Truex 2018

Truex being a low-key guy can kind of fool you into thinking he’s more chill about the racing than he really is. Actually, he knows what’s up.

For example: Truex was able to rattle off a stat about the number of quality passes he made in the Coke 600 (91) and knew the precise number of races where he’s had crashes vs. races that resulted in top-fives (four vs. nine).

That’s a pretty solid point that has been lost in the wake of Harvick and Busch’s dominance. Truex already has nine top-fives (every race he didn’t crash) and didn’t get his ninth top-five last year until Watkins Glen.

So in Truex’s mind, the No. 78 team’s performance hasn’t been that far off what it was in his 2017 championship season. The difference is the amount of adversity it has had to overcome in some races — like on pit stops, for example.

“We’ve had more battles this year,” Truex said. “Last year, it was almost like we couldn’t do anything wrong. This year, we’ve had to really work a lot harder for it, but I feel like we’re still right there, and today was a perfect example.”

As the summer goes on, it may turn out Truex is able to firm up his playoff points and go on a similar run to what he did last year. If it’s circumstances that have been holding him back, then watch out.

“Sometimes you can have the best of everything, and if things don’t go your way it’s impossible,” he said. “Today we did all the little things right and had a little bit of luck on our side as well, and that’s what it takes at this level.”

3. Poconope

Cup and Xfinity used two completely different aero packages this weekend, with a speed difference of roughly 20 mph. Either way, the result was the same: Once the leader got into clean air, he was hard to pass.

Busch had four fresh tires and two late restarts to try and get the lead from a driver who was on older tires, but he couldn’t do it. Track position won out.

“It was a little disappointing the tires didn’t mean anything more than they did there at the end,” Busch said. “Guys that had 10, 11 laps on their tires were able to still outrun us and beat us (despite) us having fresher rubber. Clean air was king.”

Look, here’s the thing: As much as everyone talks about rules packages or tires or whatever it may be, it’s pretty difficult to put on an entertaining show when you’ve got a track with mind-numbing straightaways (long enough to land an airplane!) connected by turns that weren’t exactly designed to promote passing.

Maybe it’s just that Pocono, for its odd charms, isn’t conducive to great racing. Side-by-side action and passes for the lead can happen here — especially on restarts — but they’re often the exception rather than the rule.

4. More work to do

Chevrolet put three drivers in the top seven (and five in the top 11) at the Coca-Cola 600, which sparked conversation about whether the manufacturer was starting to make gains.

After Pocono? Well, hold that thought.

Kyle Larson finished second, but he was the only Chevy in the top seven. Jimmie Johnson seemed to be getting a bit closer to contention (and drove his butt off), but he still only finished eighth.

Once again, the Fords and Toyotas collectively seemed to be a step ahead of the Chevrolet teams — as has been the case all season.

However, there’s some good news for Chevy: With 12 races until the playoffs are set, four Chevy drivers are in the top 16. That’s not terrible. Kyle Larson is ninth in points, Jimmie Johnson is 12th and Chase Elliott is 13th — plus there’s Dillon’s victory that already gave him a playoff spot.

In addition to that, Alex Bowman is only nine points behind Ricky Stenhouse Jr. for the final position on points.

So even though a Chevy driver hasn’t won since the Daytona 500, the manufacturer might still end up in decent shape when it comes to potential playoff representation.

5. Up next

It’s been all about two drivers dominating the season, and now there might be three — as we mentioned above.

But wait! What if there was a FOURTH driver in the title hunt? Well, if there was someone else to challenge the frontrunners, it would be Larson (although he’s not out there saying that yet).

“I’m the only one that doesn’t have a win in the front four,” he said. “Three of those guys are definitely head over heels better than the rest of us, but I think from fourth- to sixth- or seventh-best car, it’s pretty close.”

But what if he did have a win? This seems like a good time to mention his name, because next week’s race is at Michigan — a 2-mile track. And guess what Larson’s record is in the last five races on 2-mile tracks (Michigan and Fontana)? The answer is first, first, first, first, second — including three straight wins at Michigan!

So at this time next week, the conversation might be all about how it’s four drivers who seem to be head and shoulders above the rest — not just two (last week) or three (this week).

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The Top Five: Breaking down the Kansas race

Five thoughts after Saturday night’s race at Kansas Speedway…

1. For the love of the game

There are few things in NASCAR more boring than when one driver dominates a bunch of races (or championships). It typically sucks all the oxygen out of the sport, because it suddenly feels predictable — and predictability often equals a lack of excitement.

But Kevin Harvick’s crazy start to the 2018 season feels different. It’s more of the holy-crap-that’s-amazing dominance than the oh-geez-not-this-again snoozefest.

Five wins in the first 12 races of the season. In-SANE! Harvick has already tied his career high for wins in a season and is on pace to become the first driver since Jimmie Johnson in 2007 to reach double digit wins.

Look, we’ve seen teams come out and kick butt for a season in recent years — Martin Truex Jr. last year and Harvick in 2014 come to mind.

But winning at this rate? It’s been a long time since we’ve seen anything like this, and Harvick knows he’s in the midst of something very special.

Like everyone else, he’s curious to see how far it can go.

“Now it feels like a game,” he said. “You want to see how many races you can win. You want to see how many laps you can lead. We know that we’re riding a momentum wave that is hard to come by, and you need to capitalize on it as many times as you can — because it may never come again.”

I wasn’t around for Jeff Gordon’s 13-win season in 1998, but I’m guessing what Harvick and Rodney Childers are doing is shaping up to be the closest thing. Harvick said the feeling is “addicting” and it feels like Homestead in terms of the level of focus each week.

“It’s something that you may never do again in your career,” Childers said. “… The reason we all are here is because of watching people like Jeff Gordon and Ray Evernham win 12 races a year, and that’s what your goal should be no matter what race team you are.”

Can they get there? It’s intriguing to consider the possibility, and it’s starting to make me actually look forward to watching this kind of dominance rather than dreading it.

2. Larson the beast

Kyle Larson has still never won a 1.5-mile track race, but he sure looked on his way to doing it at Kansas.

Even though he didn’t win, that performance might have been the best NASCAR race of Larson’s career. He ripped around the high line more effectively than anyone and executed it to perfection, clearly elevating his car to another level.

In a race dominated once again by Fords and Toyotas, Larson was the one Chevrolet driver who can run up front — and stay there. But Larson wasn’t taking credit for the performance; he said the cars have been pretty good.

“I was happy about the performance in our Chevy,” he said. “It looks like (Chevrolet) has been struggling, but I don’t think we really have been that much.”

Still, it has to have a lot to to with Larson. Remember earlier in his career when he used to ride the high lane but then hit the wall every time he was having a good race? He’s not doing that anymore. The guy is just extremely talented, and it’s a joy to watch when he’s on like he was at Kansas.

So did he agree it was one of his best races? He’s not really one for boasting, so he actually downplayed it.

“It’s not too hard to run the wall here,” he said. “It’s fairly smooth and has a lot of grip. But yeah, I was happy with it. I felt pretty calm out front.”

3. Truex team has lost a step

Martin Truex Jr. almost won at Kansas for the third straight time, but that was thanks to pit strategy rather than pure speed.

For the most part, Kansas reaffirmed Truex’s car isn’t where he needs it to be right now.

It’s not like the 78 is awful, but the flat splitter and the enhanced inspection have certainly cost it some speed. Meanwhile, the Fords have gained at the same time and it makes Truex look vulnerable.

“We’re going to have to find something,” Truex said. “We’ve had good speed throughout the season at points, we just haven’t been as consistent as last year in finding it.”

I wouldn’t discount Truex’s chances of making another final four, but it just seems like he’s going to be doing the chasing instead of being chased this summer.

“It’s pretty evident the Fords have an unfair advantage this year,” he joked, referencing the accusations lobbed Toyota’s way in 2017. “I’ll just throw that out there.”

4. YRB’s bummer

It’s not like Ryan Blaney meant to hit Larson, but he felt there was no choice but to aggressively side-draft in the situation that led to the No. 12 car wrecking out after leading 54 laps.

“You have to run inches from each other,” Blaney said. “Can’t pass nobody anyway, so you have to do that.”

Blaney took blame for the incident, but said he essentially had to race Larson that way or “he would have sucked me around into (Turn) 1.”

“The cars are really edgy and hard to handle,” Blaney said. “Harvick went by me a foot from me — probably 10 mph faster — and about spun me out.”

Was it fair game? After all, Larson had done a similar side-draft on Harvick earlier.

But Larson rejected the direct comparison when I brought it up.

“It wasn’t the same move, because when I was side-drafting Harvick to get by him, I had more of a run than Blaney had on me,” Larson said. “I was able to clear (Harvick) when I side-drafted. (Blaney) was just trying to side-draft and slow me down and get to my door.”

5. A penny for Trevor’s thoughts

Trevor Bayne showed up at Kansas to be a good team player, even though Matt Kenseth had basically taken his ride. The point of Kenseth returning to Roush Fenway Racing is to get the program headed back in the right direction, but this weekend was probably a rude awakening as to how far off Roush actually is.

Kenseth finished 36th after getting caught in a crash, but the night wasn’t great before that. He was running two laps down in the mid-20s when the wreck happened.

I’d love to know Bayne’s true thoughts after watching Kenseth struggle in the car — or at least run about where Bayne had been this season. There had to be some sense of, “See, guys? It’s not just me!”

Maybe it was never realistic for Kenseth to show up and immediately make the No. 6 into a top-10 car, but there were definitely people (um…me!) who thought a Cup champion who had just won a race last November could immediately elevate that ride beyond its typical finishes.

Perhaps that will be the case later this season, but now we know the car is definitely more to blame for poor results than the driver.

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12 Questions with Christopher Bell (2018)

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The series of 12 Questions interviews continues this week with Christopher Bell, the Chili Bowl champion, Camping World Truck Series champion and current Xfinity Series driver for Joe Gibbs Racing. This interview was recorded as a podcast but is also transcribed for those who would rather read.

1. How often do you have dreams about racing?

I haven’t dreamed about racing in a while. As a kid, I used to always have nightmares that I wouldn’t be ready in time. I don’t know why, but I would always have nightmares that I would miss my heat race at the Chili Bowl or something. Like I wasn’t dressed in time and the next thing you know, your heat race or the feature’s pushing off and you’re trying to get in your car. I would have those dreams quite frequently whenever I was a kid. Recently, I haven’t dreamed too much about racing.

2. If you get into someone during a race — intentional or not — does it matter if you apologize?

If you intentionally wreck someone, then there’s no need to apologize. If it’s an accident and you really didn’t mean to do it, I think you need to make that effort to connect with him. Generally, if I accidentally get into someone, I guess I don’t go immediately because everybody’s still wound up from the race. But within a couple hours, I’ll reach out and try to talk to him.

Like via text?

Yeah.

3. What is the biggest compliment someone could give you?

Honestly, this is gonna sound weird, but growing up and following (Kyle) Larson’s footsteps, the biggest compliment that people have given me is when they compare me to Larson, because he’s the greatest race car driver I’ve seen. And so for people to have me and him in the same conversation, it’s pretty cool.

4. NASCAR comes to you and says, “Hey, we are bringing a celebrity to the race and we’re wondering if you have time to say hi.” Who is a celebrity you’d be really excited to host?

I don’t know. I don’t really follow too much of the celebrity scene I guess, but recently, I just watched Ride Along and get a good laugh out of Kevin Hart, so that’d be kind of cool.

He’d be fun to hang out with at the track.

Yeah. He’d make you laugh, anyway.

5. In an effort to show they are health-conscious, NASCAR offers the No. 1 pit stall selection for an upcoming race to the first driver willing to go vegan for a month. Would you do it?

No. I live on meat, so there’s no way.

6. It’s time for the Random Race Challenge. I have picked a random race from your career and you have to guess where you finished.

I’ll be good at this.

You have good memory?

Yes.

Then I probably didn’t go hard enough because I was like, “There’s not enough NASCAR races to where you would probably remember most of the NASCAR races.”

If you picked a dirt race in 2013, I’d tell you where I finished.

Well let’s see. Where did you finish in the 2014 Belleville Nationals feature?

Second. No, third. No, sorry, fourth. I think it was, Rico (Abreu) won, I finished fourth.

You did finish fourth.

Sorry, it was ’15 when I finished second to (Bryan) Clauson.

How do you have such a good memory for a race? I can’t even remember races from this year.

I don’t know, man. That’s just something that I’ve always had. For the most part, you can tell me any race and I’ll be able to tell you where I finished and pretty much how the race went. I remember at Belleville in 2014, the dash is what lines you up in the feature, and I think me and Rico were running first and second in the dash and I thought I had a flat tire, so I pulled in. So I finished last in the dash which was sixth or eighth, and I didn’t have a flat, so I felt really dumb and my confidence was beat down. Keith (Kunz) the car owner was mad at me because I pulled in and didn’t have anything wrong with the car. And then I started in the back, and couldn’t make our way up through there.

Wow. But you got to fourth.

Yeah, I did get to fourth, so that was OK.

7. Who is the best rapper alive?

Eminem.

He’s got a long track record.

When I was a kid, I used to love listening to Eminem and I could actually pretty much rap or sing most of his songs word for word.

Even now if it’s on the radio?

I lose some parts of it, but yeah, if the right song comes on.

8. Who has the most punchable face in NASCAR?

Oh man. (Pauses) The driver in the number 60 car has wrecked me a couple of times.

They have rotating drivers.

Yeah, I think we know which one it is.

9. NASCAR enlists three famous Americans to be involved with your team for one race as part of a publicity push: Taylor Swift, LeBron James and Tom Hanks. Choose one to be your crew chief, one to be your spotter and one to be your motorhome driver.

Taylor Swift, motorhome driver.

Just to be fun to hang out with?

Yeah, she looks good, too. So we’ve got Tom Hanks and LeBron for spotter and crew chief? I guess I’d have to put LeBron on the spotter stand and that leaves Tom on the pit box.

You feel like Tom’s leadership is gonna help steer your team in the right direction there?

Yeah, I don’t see LeBron being a crew chief.

10. What is the key to finding the best pre-race bathroom?

That’s (public relations representative) Donald (Edwards’) job, man. He’s always scoping it out for me. Sometimes they’re tough to come by. There’s a lot of these racetracks that we go to and it sucks. Like, that’s a problem. It shouldn’t be a problem. Port-o-pissers on pit road is a must-have. You’ve gotta have them.

You gotta wait in line sometimes?

Yeah. I’m trying to think…where did we go that’s bad recently? Vegas. We had like five or six drivers lined up in Vegas waiting to go into the port-a-potty. It’s an issue. It’s a real issue.

11. NASCAR misses the highlight reel value brought by Carl Edwards’ backflips and decides a replacement is needed. How much money would they have to pay you to backflip off your car after your next win?

I think they just need to give Daniel Hemric a different tapered spacer and it’d come back. (Smiles) No, Daniel has been doing it ever since I can remember, he just hasn’t had the opportunity to win in NASCAR. So there’s a guy out there that will do it if he ever wins, and he will win at some point. That’s not for me.

He says he can do it standing flat-footed on the ground. Do you think that’s true?

I’ve seen him do it, so yeah.

12. Each week, I ask a question given to me from the last interview. Last week, I interviewed Kyle Larson. His question was, “What year will you win your first World of Outlaws championship?”

That’s a great question. So I’m in Xfinity now. The hard part is you don’t know how long your NASCAR career’s gonna last. And then after you’re done with your NASCAR career, do you have the opportunity to go Outlaw racing? But that’s a dream of mine.

I’m 23 now. I would say 50 is too old to win an Outlaw championship. So, maybe, hopefully by 20 years from now…that would be ’38, right? 2038? Hopefully by 2038 I’m an Outlaw champion.

So you have a long enough NASCAR career, but you don’t want to get too old to where you’re not competitive.

Exactly.

You have to find the right window there. I don’t know who the next interview is going to be with, so do you have a question I can ask another driver in general?

I guess just, “What drives you? Why do you go race?”

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12 Questions with Kyle Larson (2018)

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The 12 Questions series of interviews continues this week with Kyle Larson of Chip Ganassi Racing. These interviews are recorded in podcast form, but are also transcribed below for those who prefer to read them.

1. How often do you have dreams about racing?

I would say when I was a kid, I had them almost every night. I would dream of races and racing. Now I might have quick flashes of it, but not like deep dreams. They might happen every so often, maybe once a week or so. I guess probably leading up to the weekend or right after the race.

2. If you get into someone during a race — intentional or not — does it matter if you apologize?

Yeah, if I feel like I’ve done something wrong, I feel like I’m good about making sure I at least text them or come up to them right after and apologize. At times too when it’s not my fault, I seem to apologize for something that I may feel like I did to put both of us in that situation or whatever.

But yeah, for sure you need to apologize, because there’s some sensitive people in our sport.

3. What is the biggest compliment someone could give you?

Now our race cars are fast all the time, but when somebody would say like I’m carrying the race car on a certain weekend or something like that, I think that means a lot to me. When you’re doing more than maybe the potential of (a car), I think that’s always a positive.

And I feel like I’m versatile, but when somebody else can see it and thinks that I’m good in any type of race car, that means a lot to me.

4. NASCAR comes to you and says, “Hey, we are bringing a celebrity to the race and we’re wondering if you have time to say hi.” Who is a celebrity you’d be really excited to host?

I don’t know. I’m not that into celebrities that much.

You don’t get starstruck?

I don’t get too starstruck. NASCAR will come to me, or to Davis (Schaeffer, his public relations representative), and be like, “Do you want to meet this celebrity?” Davis will ask me, and I’m like, “No, I don’t really care.” I usually turn all those down unless he gives me the politics speech and then I have to do it. So yeah, I don’t really care to host any celebrity.

Is that because when they ask you about these people, you’ve never heard of them? Or have you heard of them and you just don’t care?

No, I’ve heard of them, I just don’t really care. I don’t know, I feel like they’re not gonna be that excited to meet me, so I don’t really care to meet them. Maybe that’s just jumping to conclusions or judging a book by its cover, but I don’t really get that excited meeting people, so I don’t think they would get that excited meeting me.

5. In an effort to show they are health-conscious, NASCAR offers the No. 1 pit stall selection for an upcoming race to the first driver willing to go vegan for a month. Would you do it?

So I really like salads. What foods are vegan?

You would not be able to have any cheese, nothing from an animal at all. Nothing with butter. You can do soy stuff or the fake meat stuff.

I mean, I feel like I could do it, but I don’t think the No. 1 pit stall is that important to suffer for a month. But I do like salads, I could survive off salads. Like chicken’s not even vegan, huh?

No. And no buttermilk ranch dressing.

Yeah, I like any type of salad. I could probably do it for sure, but I don’t think I need to do it.

6. It’s time for the Random Race Challenge. I have picked a random race from your career and you have to guess where you finished.

NASCAR career?

Yes, because that’s all that’s on Racing Reference.

There’s like Knoxville Nationals stuff on there.

But you would remember those too easily. I need to make this one harder. So this is the 2015 Pocono spring race for Cup. Do you have any recollection of that whatsoever?

2015 Pocono spring race. Oh…I feel like we struggled at a lot of places in 2015, but I’ve always been OK at Pocono. I want to say eighth.

Are you serious? Did you look at my sheet?

No. Eighth.

Yes!

Perfect. I was gonna say eighth or 12th.

You started 15th, you finished eighth. Jamie McMurray was seventh, so you guys were seven and eight, and Martin Truex won that race.

I was all over Jamie at the end, but I couldn’t get by him. I got tight. But yeah, I think most all my finishes at Pocono were like fifth to eighth or so.

Are you good a remembering races in general?

I used to be really good at it, and then I bumped my head a couple times racing sprint cars and my memory’s gotten a little bit worse. NASCAR races are so long, it’s hard to kind of remember everything about it. So sprint car races, I have a shorter memory, they’re shorter races, so I can recollect those ones a little easier.

7. Who is the best rapper alive?

I like all types of music. I like rap music. I don’t have a favorite artist out of any genre. But I would say for me, I like listening to Drake. I don’t know if he’s the best rapper alive, but currently I like him a lot. I can rap every word to Afroman’s “Crazy Rap,” but then again, I don’t think he’s the best rapper alive. So I’ll go with Drake for now.

I thought you might say Lil Wayne because of Young Money and you’re “Yung Money.”

I hate Lil Wayne.

Really?

His voice is so annoying. Like I said, I kind of like rap, but if Lil Wayne comes on, I have to change it. I don’t like him at all.

I don’t think he listens to my podcast, so it’s OK.

He might now, though.

8. Who has the most punchable face in NASCAR?

I saw that this popped up on my calendar that I’m doing 12 Questions. So I was telling Ricky Stenhouse, “Ah, there’s a question about who has the most punchable face, so I’m gonna say you.” Because last year at Knoxville Nationals, everybody hangs out all night and parties and all that and we’re all drinking and everything, and I end up getting really intoxicated and he was as well. We were like wrestling around and we’re just standing there and I quick-jabbed him in the face and he jabbed me back in the face. I jabbed him in the face again. He got me back, and then we like play wrestled. He beat me.

Anyway, I didn’t really remember all of this until the next day. I was like, “Man, my jaw hurts.” We’re golfing the next morning. I’m like, “We were punching each other last night, weren’t we?” And so yeah. So Ricky’s got the most punchable face in NASCAR.

You punched him and you didn’t even realize you were doing it.

I just don’t remember it. I was numb at the moment. So yeah, I guess I have the most punchable face as well.

9. NASCAR enlists three famous Americans to be involved with your team for one race as part of a publicity push: Taylor Swift, LeBron James and Tom Hanks. Choose one to be your crew chief, one to be your spotter and one to be your motorhome driver.

I’ll just go basically off kind of what everybody has been saying, is Taylor Swift motorhome driver. I’ll say Tom Hanks is spotter, and LeBron is crew chief. I don’t really know much about Taylor or Tom Hanks, but LeBron would be a good crew chief because he’s basically the coach for all his basketball teams he’s ever been on. So LeBron will be the crew chief.

Wait, how do you not know much about Taylor Swift? She’s everywhere, you can’t escape it. How have you been able to escape it?

She departed from country music a little bit there, so I stopped listening to Taylor Swift as much. We kind of lost touch with each other. And I was never a big Taylor Swift superfan like a lot of teenagers were growing up. She just didn’t do it for me.

So if Taylor Swift comes to a race and they ask you to meet her, you’d say no?

I wouldn’t meet her. She was actually (sponsored by) Target and I was (sponsored by) Target and I never even got the chance to meet her. If I would have, I’d still wouldn’t have really cared.

10. What is the key to finding the best pre-race bathroom?

Usually Davis has one spotted for as soon as I get off the truck (at driver intros) with Owen. I get off the intro truck, I kind of pass Owen off to him and head off for the bathroom. So most racetracks have port-a-potties close by. There’s a few — and they seem to be our biggest racetracks — that you would think would have tons of room for port-a-potties, but they don’t have any bathrooms. Indy’s probably the worst. At least the care center or Goodyear I think has some bathrooms in it, like Charlotte I usually go there. But usually there’s port-a-potties kind of everywhere else.

11. NASCAR misses the highlight reel value brought by Carl Edwards’ backflips and decides a replacement is needed. How much money would they have to pay you to backflip off your car after your next win?

Well, I think if I got some practice, I could do it, but I would still need to be paid a lot because I’d probably end up hurting myself. But as of right now, I have never ever done a backflip. I don’t think I’ve tried on a trampoline. Usually when I do it off the side of a boat or into the pool, I don’t quite get the full rotation. So right now, there’s no way I could do it.

12. Each week, I ask a question given to me from the last interview. Last week, I interviewed Daniel Hemric. He question was about how there’s a lot of underappreciated or unknown drivers in the lower ranks right now that nobody really talks about, who don’t have a lot of hype. Who’s somebody from the lower ranks of racing that you think deserves more attention than they’re getting?

There’s a lot in dirt track stuff and they’re still really young, so they might get that recognition in a couple of years. I would say Logan Seavey. We raced go-karts together, and he was probably 4 or 5 years old. I think he’s maybe 19 now. But he’s done a really good job. He’s probably the best go-kart racer of the last seven or eight years.

He got some midget rides and some sprint car rides here and there, and he made good work with them. But now he got picked up by Keith Kunz Motorsports and Toyota. I think he’s still relatively unknown to everybody here, but he’ll be the next Christopher Bell. So that will be really fun to see.

And then, man, there’s so many, it’s so hard. But I’m trying to think of somebody who I’ve noticed in NASCAR. I would say Matt DiBenedetto. I mean, to see what he does in that 32 car and even the rides that he was in before the 32 car. I remember 2016, he passed me the first three or four races every week. And I’m like, “You know our budget might not be as big as Hendrick or Penske, but it’s a lot bigger than what he’s got, and he’s outracing me.”

So I would say in NASCAR, Matt DiBenedetto is that guy who doesn’t get enough recognition from the media, but also team owners here. I feel like he deserves an opportunity in some really good equipment because if he can finish top-20 in that thing, he can easily win in a good car. So I think he’s put in enough time where he deserves an opportunity for sure.

And you guys grew up racing together. Is it true he used to regularly beat you a lot?

Yeah. So Matt and I, he’s a year older than I am and he was always like a year ahead of me. We grew up racing at Cycleland and Red Bluff in go-karts. He was the guy. He had a super pretty go-kart, you know, like baby blue, number 44, pinstripes. It was a slick-looking race car. He was always really fast.

When I started, he won like every week. He was the guy that kind of set the bar and we wanted to beat him and all that. I remember when I finally won my first race, I think he finished second to me by a nose or something. That was a big deal for us at the time.

So it was fun to follow Matt’s career, because he left California when he was probably 11 or 12 years old and moved to North Carolina. That was a big deal for us, like, “Oh, it’s gonna be interesting to see how his career progresses,” because we all want to make it to NASCAR when we’re young. He was getting opportunities, ended up signing with Gibbs for a little bit, and he was the guy that kind of gave us a little bit of hope even though he had a totally different background than what I’d ever planned on doing. But at least there was just some hope for an opportunity for me to maybe make it someday. For sure, he was the guy to beat when we were young.

I don’t know who the next interview is going to be with. Do you have a general question I can ask?

I don’t know. This is always tough. Like I prepared for all the other questions somewhat, but then we get to the last part of it and I feel like I do this every year for you and I always have you come back. So can you come back to me once you figure out who’s gonna do it?

OK, I will come back to you once I nail somebody down.

Note: The next interview is with Christopher Bell. Larson’s question for Bell is: “What year will he win his first World of Outlaws championship?”

Previous 12 Questions interviews with Kyle Larson:

— May 6, 2014

— March 18, 2015

— April 6, 2016

— April 26,2017

 

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The Top Five: Breaking down the Auto Club 400

Five thoughts after Sunday’s race in Fontana…

1. We were robbed

Nothing against Martin Truex Jr.’s dominating win, but Sunday sure could have been a lot more interesting had Kevin Harvick not wrecked with Kyle Larson during the first stage.

What would have happened? Would Harvick have won his fourth straight race? Would Truex have thumped the field anyway?

“We’ll never know,” Truex said.

ARGH! That stinks. Even Furniture Row Racing owner Barney Visser sounded a little disappointed about it.

“After the beginning of the season there, watching Harvick run away with everything, I wasn’t sure where we were at,” Visser said. “I wish he would have not had the problems he had today and we could have run him again. I think we had something for him today.”

Now everyone has to wait for three weeks — until Texas Motor Speedway — to find out who will win a head-to-head battle on an intermediate track (Martinsville is next week, followed by an off week).

Still, the lack of evidence didn’t stop drivers from guessing what would have happened.

“Just the little bit I was around Kevin, I felt like he still had the best car,” Larson said. “Who’s to say, though?”

Truex said he left pit road after the first stop and drove away from Harvick — which leads him to believe the No. 78 car might have won anyway. It was pretty damn fast, after all.

But there’s no way to know for sure.

Sigh. Oh well.

“I’m sure we’ll have plenty of chances to race each other throughout the rest of the season,” Truex said.

2. What was that?

So what exactly happened in the Larson/Harvick incident?

Though it initially seemed Harvick was somehow retaliating against Larson for hard racing (a theory floated by the FOX broadcast), that turned out not to be the case.

Harvick said he went down to side-draft Larson when they came off the corner, and he was “trying to get a little too much right there.”

“That’s my fault for coming down the racetrack and trying to side draft,” he said. “… That was just a dumb mistake on my part.”

Larson had a more detailed explanation when asked if he was surprised Harvick was racing him so hard. Harvick had pitted one lap earlier than Larson, so the Chip Ganassi Racing driver was coming with slightly fresher tires.

“I think he knew he was better than I was overall, so he was just trying to hold me off, race me hard to maybe burn my stuff up, and then he could stay in front of me and not have to worry about me 10, 15 laps later when he would be better than me,” Larson said.

Makes sense, right? At that point, Harvick just made a mistake rather than acting out of malice.

“I was actually having a lot of fun racing like that because this place is really cool and you can just kind of go wherever,” Larson said. “I respect Kevin a lot. I think he respects me a lot, too.  You never want to see anything like that happen.”

3. Harvick, and…

After five races, it’s not much of a mystery which team is the one to beat. And it’s not the one that ended up in victory lane.

“I don’t think anything changes with the 4 car being the fastest car in the field right now,” Brad Keselowski said.

“He’ll be good every weekend,” Larson said.

If that’s the case, Truex — now the points leader — is probably second-best, with Kyle Busch also right there.

But who else is good?

Larson, for one. Keselowski and Joey Logano, too. The thing is, they’re all a half-step away from being able to run up front regularly like Harvick, Truex or Busch.

“I’ve been happy to see how we’ve started so far,” Larson said. “But we still have a little ways to go to win.”

Keselowski said he’s been about a fifth-to-10th place car most weeks and noted the team hasn’t seriously contended for a win. And Logano, who missed the playoffs last year after his infamous encumbered penalty at Richmond, said his team is “getting closer” but isn’t there yet.

“Today we had some decent speed and it’s progress in the right direction,” Logano said. “We still have a ways to go, but we’re getting closer to where we can have solid runs, score stage points, score good finishes and keep ourselves up there for points.”

There are really no surprises in the top half of the playoff standings. Truex and Busch are 1-2, followed by the Team Penske trio of Logano-Keselowski-Ryan Blaney. Then it’s Denny Hamlin and Larson.

4. Standings surprises

Speaking of the point standings, there are still a few unexpected trends after five races.

— Despite winning three of the first five races, Harvick is only eighth in the standings. That’s because of Daytona and Fontana, where he got only two points.

— All four Stewart-Haas Racing drivers are in the top 11 of the standings. In fact, they are 8-9-10-11 (Harvick-Clint Bowyer-Aric Almirola-Kurt Busch).

— Chase Elliott is the lowest-running Hendrick driver (21st) after Jimmie Johnson moved up to 18th in the last couple weeks. The lead Hendrick driver is Alex Bowman, who is 16th.

— Jamie McMurray, who has pointed his way into the playoffs, is only 26th in the standings — behind Michael McDowell and both JTG Daugherty Racing drivers.

— Daniel Suarez is 23rd in the standings while all of his Joe Gibbs Racing teammates are 13th or higher.

5. The clock says Bubba Time

As Bubba Wallace walked off pit road following a 20th-place finish at Fontana, he was already looking toward next week — his first visit to Martinsville Speedway since winning the Truck Series race there four years ago.

“Man, I’m so pumped up and so excited to get there,” he said. “I want to win this fucker. … We’ll have to be ready there.”

Unlike recent weeks — such as Phoenix, where two loose wheels turned a possible top-15 day into a 28th-place finish — the No. 43 team might be rolling into the next race with some positive mojo.

There wasn’t anything particularly special about Fontana, except nothing went wrong.

“Smooth on pit road all day, didn’t make any dumb moves on the racetrack and came home 20th,” Wallace said. “We can improve from that.”

Wallace and his team are still figuring each other out, and the team is transitioning to Chevrolet and its alliance with Richard Childress Racing at the same time. But in only nine career Cup starts, Wallace now has top-20 finishes in five of them — all with a mid-level team — and has a three-point lead in the Rookie of the Year battle with William Byron.

“We came back here (after the Phoenix disappointment), regrouped, took a deep breath and can use this as a little bit of momentum going into Martinsville,” he said.