NASCAR team owner Richard Childress doesn’t mince words when asked if Kyle Busch could win RCR’s first Cup championship since 1994 when Dale Earnhardt captured the organization’s sixth Cup title.
“If we can execute, we can win a championship,” Childress told FOX Sports prior to the start of the exhibition Clash earlier this month.
That is what Busch is banking on as the two-time Cup champion embarks on his first year in the last 16 seasons not driving for Joe Gibbs Racing.
A bitter breakup after months-long negotiations that resulted in JGR opting to just elevate Ty Gibbs from the Xfinity Series rather than sign him, Busch found a new home at RCR, an unexpected landing spot considering a tense history between Childress and Busch that included Childress slugging Busch after a truck race in 2011.
[Kyle Busch talks working with Richard Childress, third-place finish in Clash]
Can two fiery personalities work well together? They both need each other as they search for the formula that they know they need for success.
“His credentials speak well for himself,” Childress said when introducing Busch as an RCR driver last September. “When I was with Kyle and we first started talking and we talked about championships and we talked about winning races, I looked at him in his eye and I’ve seen that look in Dale Earnhardt Sr.’s eye.
“He’s hungry. We’re going to win. I’ve seen that look before.”
Since Earnhardt’s last championship, RCR has won 57 races but has had only 12 drivers finish in the top five in the standings. Since 2015, RCR has won only eight races and has not had a driver finish in the top-10 in the standings.
Busch has won 60 Cup races in his career, with his first win coming as a rookie in 2005. His 2015 and 2019 Cup titles bookended a string of five consecutive finishes in the top five in the standings.
As Busch “struggled” with JGR with just four wins in the last three years, Childress grandson and driver Austin Dillon went on the recruiting trail to convince his father and Busch that RCR would make the best home for one of Cup’s most talented and polarizing superstars.
New team, no problem?
Kyle Busch explains some of the details a driver must pay attention to when changing teams.
Their first days on-track together didn’t go the most smoothly but it had nothing to do with driver chemistry. Dillon has an endurance race car that he entered in an event at Circuit of the Americas in December. The wheels, literally, fell off the car.
“Everything fell apart,” Busch said. “We had a lot of issues.”
They actually won the second day’s 8-hour race with no power steering.
“It was a blast getting to hang out with him,” Dillon said. “We were both cooked after the race. It was a fun first experience for Kyle to come and hang out with us at RCR. [He did] no complaining. He just toughed it out.
“If there was any kind of an eye-opener for him coming to RCR, that would have been it. It’s only going to be good from there. We are going to be able to make it work either way.”
Everyone had a drink afterward as part of the bonding weekend. And maybe it helped continue a dialogue between Busch and Childress. Beyond his crew chief Randall Burnett, Busch said his first couple of months in the offseason he spent more time talking to Childress than others at RCR.
“Coming home from that, there was a lot of discussions with Richard as well as with … all those [RCR] guys, just to kind of figure out why and what all went down on that race car and the problems that it had,” Busch said.
“But I definitely know they’re on top of it and they felt bad about it obviously just having the issues that we did. It was not something that you want to have to endure, but hey, that was a learning experience and I thought it was a good lesson.”
Dillon, Busch teaming up
Austin Dillon explains why he thinks he will work well with Kyle Busch as new teammates at RCR.
The 37-year-old Busch did have to get accustomed to some things at RCR and has spent part of the offseason just getting his seats mounted properly in the race car and making sure all the things he likes as far as the cockpit area are implemented. He has had to change uniform manufacturers, and he has spent time making sure his suit has what he wants.
“It’s been a little bit tiring at times, but it’s all been well worth it,” Busch said. “Everybody has been super receptive and super fun to work with.”
Busch said because of how welcoming RCR has been he doesn’t feel challenged as the new person coming in when he makes suggestions to tweak or change the way they do some things.
“Everybody has been like, ‘Let’s do it, let’s make him happy, let’s get everything the way we need to get it,'” Busch said. “That helps because I’ve been around for a long time and obviously the credentials speak for themselves and people respect that and I respect what they’ve been able to do.
“We’ve got some really cool stuff coming.”
That prediction was made in January, and the organization proved that at the Clash as Dillon finished second and Busch placed third.
“We both would like to be in the [No.] 1 position,” Dillon said. “That’s what I’ve learned from Kyle in a short period of time. We’ve got to win, so that’s the main goal.”
Childress said what?
Kyle Busch laughs about team owner Richard Childress coming on the radio after he was spun by Joey Logano at the Clash.
That can be a weird-sounding quote when reading it. Of course, drivers want to win. But it’s an attitude that can either be infectious or demoralizing depending on the performance. Busch and the crew chief of both his championships, Adam Stevens, split after the 2020 season when Busch wanted changes on the team that Stevens wouldn’t make. Busch’s last three years have been a struggle, and even Busch couldn’t figure out exactly why.
Now he has a fresh start, one that he compares to Tom Brady moving to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He has an attitude that Childress feels will motivate his organization.
“He has never forgotten why he is sitting in a race car,” Childress said. “Some drivers look at it as a job. He looks at it as fun. That’s the neatest thing I’ve seen. He loves it.”
Prior to the start of the Clash, Childress boasted that Busch will excel in his new home.
“We’re getting to know each other a lot better and understanding each other,” Childress said. “He is a racer’s racer.
“I’m a racer and to have a real racer like him — I’ve had them in the past but to have him in here with us is incredible.”
Bob Pockrass covers NASCAR for FOX Sports. He has spent decades covering motorsports, including the past 30 Daytona 500s, with stints at ESPN, Sporting News, NASCAR Scene magazine and The (Daytona Beach) News-Journal. Follow him on Twitter @bobpockrass, and sign up for the FOX Sports NASCAR Newsletter with Bob Pockrass.
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