Kyle Larson navigated his way around the 14-turn road course at Road America (Wisc.) to pole position for Saturday’s Henry 180.
Saturday’s race will be the first time Larson has competed in the NASCAR Xfinity Series since 2018.
“It was honestly surprising when I read that it’s been since 2018,” Larson said. “It doesn’t feel that long ago. But yeah, I don’t know. Just getting into the car, I guess. The driving stuff is whatever. It’s just like the visuals of the tag and the gauges, it’s different style dash than what I was even used to when I was racing Xfinity for (Chip) Ganassi. So, just the little things like that. It’s hard to adjust to at first, but once you’re out there, it kind of becomes natural and it’s just another stock car at that point.”
Larson vaulted to the top of the charts by nearly one second, with his closest competitor, Ty Gibbs, a distant .713 seconds back.
“I’m looking forward to competing with a lot of the young up-and-comers, as I’m sure they’re looking forward to compete with me also,” Larson said. “It should be a lot of fun this weekend and for the couple others I get to run the rest of the year.”
Last week’s pole winner Riley Herbst will lineup third, with Cup Series regular Cole Custer in fourth, and JR Motorsports rookie Sam Mayer rounding out the top-five.