2021 NASCAR champion Kyle Larson is an avid dirt racer, and he often returns to dirt tracks even during the Cup Series season.
His most recent outing was at the Bristol Motor Speedway Dirt Track hosted the World of Outlaws in Tennessee during the same weekend he raced at Dover Motor Speedway in Delaware.
However, in the race at Bristol, Larson was penalized because of the staging rule in the World of Outlaws, where the drivers have 10 minutes to reach the staging area after a horn is blown. Larson failed to do so even after multiple warnings, for which he had to start at the tail of the field instead of the 2nd on the front row.
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Larson’s team owner Kevin Rumley was not happy with the decision and reminded the officials about Larson’s worth to the series and asked them to change the rules.
“From my point of view, we were misled by Casey Shuman,” Rumley added.
“And, not happy about it. I’m glad there are other series that are gaining momentum now. So, competitors have options to run other places when the management doesn’t hold up their end of the bargain.
“People are here to see Kyle Larson. So, if they want him to continue to show up, the officials need to be more reasonable in a situation like this.
“We’re going to re-evaluate who we race with in the future.”
Even with the penalty, Larson had a good race until 2 laps to go, when he was only behind Jonathan Davenport and kept pushing him for the win. However, he hit the wall while chasing the leader thereby destroying his machine.
Larson climbed from his ride to a roar from the grandstands. He looked back and gave them a peace sign.
“Yeah, it would have been a lot easier if I didn’t have to come from the tail,” Kyle Larson told DirtVision.
“I’m the only guy doing double-duty here. So, there’s a lot of shit I gotta get done to get my stuff ready!”
The crowd cheered once more.
“It’s no wonder that you got teams like Mark Richards and them pulling off the tour.”
Kyle Larson will return to Bristol for the finale of the World of Outlaws show.