Discouraged after double: Kyle Larson’s attempt leaves doubt for future ones

Kyle Larson often has a stoic face. But his disappointment was easy to see in Indianapolis and then in Charlotte after another attempt at 1,100 miles in one day went sour.

Of the 1,100 miles, Larson only completed 595. He wrecked in Indy after lasting 227.5 instead of 500. In Charlotte, he was out after 367.5 instead of 600. Larson likely knew he had no chance to run the full distance of both races Sunday when drizzle delayed the Indy 500 start.

“It’s just tough,” Larson said Monday night at the Indy 500 awards celebration. “Logistics, everything, has got to go right. The last few years, it didn’t go right — at least on the weather.

“And then I ended up crashing also. I wish I wouldn’t have crashed. I wish I’d have just not been able to make it [to the finish]. I would probably have felt better about everything.”

Larson would love to run the Indy 500 again, but he can’t seem to stomach the fact that so much work and effort can be put into something only to have rain and other factors outside their control ruin it. 

In 2024, he ran the entire rain-delayed Indy 500 and then arrived at Charlotte just past the halfway point of the race. Then rain arrived there and the 600 was called as official.

While Larson became the fifth driver to start both races on the same day, only once did the driver complete all the miles. That was Tony Stewart in 2001. So the odds aren’t great.

“I just wish I could go back and redo them all, but that’s not real life,” Larson said. “Hopefully again someday, I can get the chance to run the Indy 500. I don’t think the double is feasible.

“There’s just too much that goes into it for it to just play out [with] weather and stuff. …. I really don’t want it in my 500 on the hook, either. I’d love to race it out and finish.”

And the fans would love to see another driver try the double, but apparently they can’t imagine good things. And that’s because the shame of Larson’s experience the last two years could hamper other drivers’ efforts to try.

The notoriety of a driver trying to accomplish both creates an awesome storyline of determination and racing craft. The fact Larson wrecked three times in a month at Indy shows just how tough it was.

“It’s all things trying to learn on the fly,” Larson said. “If I had more experience, I probably wouldn’t have made those mistakes.” 

That, though, is the point. 

If a driver as talented as Larson is prone to mistakes, it shows just how big completing both races is as far as racing accomplishments. Trackhouse Racing owner Justin Marks said that a driver attempting a double increases the spotlight of both NASCAR and INDYCAR.

The hard part is there can’t be much more time between the two races. The Indianapolis 500 used to start about 15 to 30 minutes earlier. Years ago, when Indianapolis was on Central time, it had an 11 a.m. local start. The end of the Charlotte race already approaches 11 p.m. when it starts around 6:30 p.m.

To make things more difficult, NASCAR wants its stars in its house for its entire race and has now created a rule where, if a driver misses the start of a race for a non-medical reason, the driver forfeits all the playoff points earned during the regular season. So any driver who thinks the playoffs are a possibility isn’t going to risk that penalty.

The must-start-every-race rule was designed so drivers wouldn’t take weekends off to rest and so that fans who bought tickets to see their favorite driver could still see them in action. Any fan of a driver doing the double is going to know about it well ahead of time and would likely be willing to accept that risk.

“If I was running everything, I would do everything in my power to make sure things like that double can happen. I think it’s an amazing opportunity for NASCAR fans that want to watch their favorite NASCAR driver maybe watch the Indy 500 for the first time, learn about INDYCAR, learn new stories and all that and vice versa,” Marks said.

“I don’t know if you change the schedule of the day, but I think that people need to be working in a direction to try to make it happen versus trying to not make it happen.”

That isn’t happening. And until it does, it appears that the last NASCAR driver who is in contention for the full-season championship has run Indy.

“That’s not the day that I had dreamed of and you wanted to have for everybody involved,” Larson said. “So I’m bummed out on how it all went. I feel like I let myself down, let everybody else down. It’s not a very good feeling.”

This could have been the last double attempt for a while, and that’s not a very good feeling, either.

Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR and INDYCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including over 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass.