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The 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season marked an incredible time for Kyle Larson and the #5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet team but couldn’t outrun Ryan Blaney in the season-finale race at Phoenix Raceway.
During an appearance on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio’s “The Morning Drive”, Cliff Daniels, the crew chief of Larson’s #5 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 spoke about the team’s failure to meet expectations and reflected on their Championship 4 run.
Daniels admitted that they failed to get the predetermined goals but it was not due to lack of effort. He was disappointed to get beaten by Ryan Blaney’s #12 Ford, which did a better job to win their first NASCAR title.
“We did not meet our expectations for what our goals were. It certainly wasn’t for a lack of effort from the team and everybody at Hendrick Motorsports. A lot of prep went into the weekend. A lot of prep went into the race car and we just got beat. As disappointing as that is, we got beat by a car that turned a little bit better than ours and did a few things just a little bit better than ours,” Kyle Larson’s crew chief said as reported by HendrickMotorsports.com.
He also said:
“I think our team executed the day really well with adjustments that we made to our car throughout the race, our pit crew on pit road did just a phenomenal job of really keeping us in the hunt – getting us off of pit road with the lead of the Championship 4 cars (on lap 278). Our car just wasn’t good enough to give Kyle (Larson) what he needed to keep the spot that we had.”
Kyle Larson’s crew chief points out the things to focus in the offseason
Despite missing the title, Cliff Daniels is going with a positive approach in the offseason and is confident that they will have a lot more success in future.
Daniels said:
“We’re taking the opportunity to reflect on the race, our season and make the notes that we need to make to learn all the things that we need to do just to get better. That will be our focus this offseason. A lot of strength in our team. A lot of good years and a lot of good races ahead of us. We’ll take this in stride and keep moving.”
Kyle Larson registered four wins, 15 top-5s, 18 top-10s this year, with an average finish of 14.6 in 2023 season.
