MARTINSVILLE, Va: Ahead of Sunday’s Cook Out 400 at Martinsville (Va.) Speedway, Kyle Busch remains critical of the new NASCAR Cup Series short track package.
Just a few races into the new aerodynamic package for the Cup Series, this season has failed to produce better racing for the sport. Instead, drivers, teams, and industry members have remained baffled and frustrated about how to produce a better product for the sport.
With some drivers optimistic about 400 laps at the legendary Virginia paperclip track on Sunday, Busch did not think it was possible to go backward from last year’s package but believes, in his opinion, the sanctioning body did.
“I didn’t think we could make it worse, but by golly, we did,” Busch said Saturday afternoon at Martinsville.
“For me, anyways. Maybe it’s just because we don’t have it quite figured out like others do, but I cannot follow anybody in front of me whatsoever. It doesn’t matter if I’m in the bottom lane, the middle lane, the top lane – if there is a car in front of me, I am terrible.. really bad.”
However, the two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion did praise NASCAR for a minimal improvement in the rear of the vehicle.
“I will say the only positive to it is that you can slide the back of the car around a little bit more and not crash. But the front ends are just ungodly not working.”
Busch doesn’t plan to consult with NASCAR anymore on the package, however – as he feels his complaint won’t change anything.
“It doesn’t matter because they’re not going to do it, so it doesn’t matter,” Busch sounded. “I’m not going to paint myself in a bad spot to get in trouble.”
It’s no stranger that Busch and Richard Childress Racing have struggled on the smaller tracks. To be completely transparent, the entire RCR organization has not lived up to expectations on tracks such as Phoenix Raceway, Richmond Raceway, Bristol Motor Speedway, and Martinsville Speedway—to name a few.
The Welcome, North Carolina-based team has relied heavily on Chevrolet’s simulator program to help with the balance of their race cars. And while Busch has mounted plenty of laps at Martinsville’s 0.526-mile oval, the setup in the simulators has sometimes turned out differently than he had hoped.
Busch and the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet are good when the simulator setup works. When the information is skewed, the team has fallen further behind on race weekend.
“I feel like I know how to get around Martinsville. You know, I’ve won here before,” Busch explained. “I feel like my good stretch of races here certainly came from 2013-14 timeframe to about 2018-19, so we had some good runs. I think we won two or three races here in that time period. So yeah, the short track stuff, though, has, you know, been very miss.
“We’ve had like two hits, I think, so you know it’d be nice to get more on the on the hit side and to where we have good cars that we’re able to go out there and contend and compete.
“So, I think a lot of it is just the reliance on the simulation and what we’re being told in that, and making decisions based off of that – what makes you faster or better in the sim. And that is not transferring to the race track, so we’ve got to go about it a different way.”
Busch will start his No. 8 Lucas Oil Chevrolet Camaro 11th on Sunday afternoon. He is eyeing his third top-10 finish of the season and a leap from 13th in the championship standings.
“I think anytime you have good runs, you kind of know that the points will take care of themselves. Anytime you aren’t having good runs, you probably know that you are not in good point standing.
“So, definitely kind of on the back of the mind for sure. But more importantly, just trying to get our program right and up front, and in a position to where we can win a race or two and not worry about points.”
Follow Chris Knight on X (Twitter) @Knighter01 or email at [email protected].
