NASCAR: With Kyle Larson, the future has officially arrived

By Asher Fair | Sep 7, 2017

BRISTOL, TN - AUGUST 18: Kyle Larson, driver of the #42 Huggies Little Movers Chevrolet, sits by his car during practice for the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway on August 18, 2017 in Bristol, Tennessee. (Photo by Jerry Markland/Getty Images) /

The year 2017 has seen the rise of a NASCAR Cup Series superstar in 25-year-old Kyle Larson. Just how good will he become over the course of his career?

Kyle Larson, 25, drives for Chip Ganassi Racing in the NASCAR Cup Series. He drives the #42 Chevrolet, and he has done so since the 2014 season when his full-time Cup Series career began. In the 2013 season, he drove four races for Phoenix Racing in the #51 Chevrolet, finishing as high as 15th place.

It took Larson until this season for him to really blossom into a superstar to truly illustrate the fact that the future of NASCAR has officially arrived. Let’s have a look at how he got here.

In his rookie season, Larson failed to qualify for the Chase, as he only finished in 17th in the final championship standings. The following season, he was once again unable to qualify for the Chase, and he actually finished lower than he did in 2014, finishing in 19th.

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Last season, we finally got a glimpse of Larson’s true potential. He won his first career race at Michigan and ended up qualifying for the Chase for the first time in his career. However, he failed to advance to the second round, although he did still end up finishing in 9th place in the final standings thanks to his final points total, which is pretty impressive for a driver who didn’t make it out of the first round of the Chase.

This season is the season that Larson has truly demonstrated that NASCAR’s future has officially arrived. He opened up 2017 by leading late at the Daytona 500, before unfortunately only finishing the race in 12th place. But after that heartbeat, he reeled off four straight top 2 finishes, including another victory at Fontana, the second of his career.

Larson was the leader of the standings for a while, but he now sits in 3rd place, which is still superb for a 25-year-old. Since his early four-race streak of top 2 finishes, he has added two more victories this season, with both coming at Michigan, including this come-from-behind victory, his most recent win.

To go along with those three wins, he has seven 2nd place finishes, meaning he has finished in the top 2 in 10 of this season’s 25 races thus far, another extremely impressive statistic for any driver, let alone a 25-year-old.

As one of three drivers with three or more victories so far this season, Larson, a 25-year-old who is the the only one of those three drivers who is under the age of 37, will enter the playoffs as one of the favorites to win this season’s championship.

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When do you think Kyle Larson will win his first NASCAR Cup Series championship? Let us know in the comments below, and be sure to follow along with Beyond the Flag for the latest news, opinions and analysis stemming from a number of different motorsports series. You don’t want to miss any of it. Also be sure to follow Beyond the Flag on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.