Kyle Larson, the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series Champion, made some headlines this week after throwing Ricky Bobby under the bus on a podcast. The acclaimed racer discussed his racing heroes, life on the road, and his attempt to ‘do the double’ by racing in the Indianapolis 500 and NASCAR’s Coca-Cola 600 on the same day.
But when the topic turned to lighter subjects, like racing movies, the gloves came off and Larson shared his thoughts on 2006’s ‘Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby’ noting that people who don’t follow NASCAR know the movie, and even quote it in public. Yet for Larson, seems that’s a negative.
“I mean, I like the movie. I think it did not do anything good for our sport. I think it turned our sport into a joke, unfortunately. But that is one of the most popular racing movies … I feel like the rest of the world — that’s what they think about our sport now.”
– Kyle Larson, on the Julian Edelman Podcast
Laughable Larson also shared that he has not seen the blockbuster movie of the summer ‘F1: The Movie‘ but was quick to say that Tom Cruise’s 1990 NASCAR movie ‘Days of Thunder‘ was his favourite.