BRISTOL, Tenn.: Kyle Busch was once the king of the Last Great Coliseum—and no other current NASCAR Cup driver came close.
In 34 starts at the concrete bullring, the 38-year-old champion has posted eight wins, fourteen top fives and 19 top 10s. Busch even won when the half-mile was packed with dirt in 2022.
But since the introduction of the Gen 7 car, his ongoing love affair with Bristol Motor Speedway isn’t what it used to be.
“The car really changes a lot for it, for me,” said Busch, who qualified 14th for the Food City 500. “We won here with this car on the dirt surface, but I would say that since we’ve been bringing the new Next Gen car to the concrete surface, I have not found my way with it yet.
“I definitely had a way with understanding this place; having a sense of setup, how to drive it and whatnot with the old stuff, but not with the new stuff. We’ll see what happens here this weekend with our No. 8 FICO Chevrolet.”
Still, given Busch’s success at Bristol, whether he’s racing in the Cup, Xfinity (nine wins) or Craftsman Truck Series, where he’s won five times and will return this Saturday behind the wheel of the No. 7 Spire Motorsports Silverado, the two-time Cup champion enters Thunder Valley with a little more swagger.
“Looking forward to the truck race,” said Busch, who starts fourth. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been in a truck here. I think the last time was 2017 when I won, so certainly would be nice to come out here and go back to victory lane with one of those.” In fact, 2017 was the year Busch swept all three national series races at Bristol–for the second time. No opther Cup driver has ever completed a three-race weekend sweep at any track.
Busch won early and in 2023—his first year behind the wheel of the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet. But this season has been the pits—literally. If his pit crew isn’t struggling to execute fast and reliable service, then the driver is contributing to the problem like at Las Vegas where he slid through the pits on Lap 210 and had to serve a pass-through penalty.
Busch finished 26th.
To appease the driver and improve performance, wholesale changes have been made to the No. 8 pit crew over the past two weeks. Prior to the race at Phoenix, Doug Warrick took over as the jackman—Busch’s third of the season. Richard Johnson was recruited to change the rear tires with Shiloh Windsor assuming the role of front tire changer.
After lackluster results, Busch’s average time of service at Phoenix was 12.292 seconds, and RCR shuffled the squad again. Josh Sobecki, Busch’s jackman at Daytona, returned to that position for Bristol. Michael Russell returns as the front tire changer while Windsor goes to the rear spot.
As for what might happen next week at Circuit of the Americas, Busch said the lineup is “still unsettled.”
“The proof is in your results, right? You’re only as good as your last race, as us drivers tend to say,” Busch added. “So you’re only as good as your last stop, I guess, is what a pit crew guy should say.
“But I know that everybody at the shop and all of RCR is working hard on trying to figure something out and get through it with the resources that we have. Each week, we’ll keep trying to fine-tune the personnel and make the best that we can out of the situation we’ve got to have at least decent stops.”
For a driver as competitive as Busch, nothing short of perfection will do. And if his comfort level is down at Bristol, the pressure of the pit crew to perform will only be magnified.
“My thing is – they’re either the defense or the special teams unit, however you want to look at that,” Busch said. “When you come down pit road, I’ve been saying it the last couple of years since we’ve been racing this car – the easiest time to pass people is when they’re sitting still.. it’s when they’re in their pit box. And so, we can’t be the ones that are always getting passed.
“We need to hold our own.”
Admittedly, there’s room for improvement at Bristol when it comes to the driver as well. Every tool he’s used over the previous 15 seasons is now obsolete.
“Bristol is a lot of rhythm, but it takes a feel of what you’re looking for here, too,” Busch said. “This car just drives a lot different, and it drives a lot different because of the limitations in which it’s built. It just has a different way of you needing to go about it. I’ve learned some of that, but I guess I’m not the best of figuring out how to be better than some of the other drivers. Or maybe their cars are better than my car.. I don’t know. It’s not like we can swap seats.
“I’d always run this place more round…like I would always try to make it as much of a circle as I possibly could, and now you kind of run this place in a diamond. You go up to the wall. You try to come off the wall. Do you up to the wall. You come up the wall, you know what I mean? So it’s more diamond-shaped. It’s definitely a different way of running it.
“That seems to be a little bit more of the faster way this day and age. It’s a different technique to get used to, but that’s not to say that I can’t do it. It’s just a matter of sometimes you can’t out-race your own equipment, and you’ve got to go and get what you can get out of it, but nothing more.”
Follow Lee Spencer on Twitter @CandiceSpencer or email her at: [email protected].
