NASCAR CUP SERIES
DAYTONA INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY
DAYTONA 500
TEAM CHEVY PRESS CONFERENCE TRANSCRIPT
FEBRUARY 15, 2023
KYLE BUSCH, NO. 8 RICHARD CHILDRESS RACING CAMARO ZL1, Daytona 500 Media Availability Transcript:
IS IT TOO EARLY TO COMPARE RICHARD’S (CHILDRESS) MANAGEMENT STYLE WITH COACH’S (JOE GIBBS)?
“Yeah, I mean its certainly early, but the way the companies are run are entirely different. Which is good, fine, different. Nothing wrong with that, its just a matter of trying to continue to figure out what the pluses and minuses all are. Certainly, there are some plusses with the new team at RCR and the management and the things that are going on there. I enjoy working with the whole group, whether it’s the office or the competition side. It’s been really fun. Obviously too, the JGR side had its plusses as well. Just trying to incorporate all the things that I have been accustomed to and been around for the last 15 years. Not all the processes and procedures that I am used to, but I am definitely trying to work my way into what RCR is and how they work first, and then just say ‘but, have you guys thought about doing something X,Y,Z like this?’ So, I think its been pretty good thus far and Richard has been great, Torrey (Galida), everybody and looking forward to a great relationship here.”
HOW HAS IT BEEN WITH ALL THE NEW SPONSORS LIKE CHEDDARS? I HEARD YOU WENT IN TO SEE WHAT THE MENU WAS ABOUT?
“Yeah, it’s been fun. Like I said, the management side of RCR has been great and that has been a part of all the sponsorship groups and things like that, that I have been getting around, meeting and spending some time with. Certainly been great to meet all those folks and I went from the candy man to the adult candy man. The nickname still works and still fits. So certainly, looking forward to the relationships with all these guys and girls and teams of people. You know, with 3CHI thankful for them for returning, Alsco and Cheddar’s and Lenovo. Just excited to have some people that have jumped on board to go race with Kyle and go out there and hopefully reward them by winning and going to Victory Lane.”
SPEAKING OF ODDS OF WINNING THIS RACE, MARK MARTIN, TERRY LABONTE AND RUSTY WALLACE NEVER WON THIS RACE. NOW YOU AND MARTIN (TRUEX) HAVE HAD LONG RUNS WITHOUT IT. DO YOU THINK ITS CIRCUMSTANTIAL OR IS THERE SOME DYNAMIC THAT IS GOING ON THERE?
“Definitely I think circumstantial. I think the whole thing kind of changed probably 2012-2013-ish where it just became a complete disaster and a total wreck fest at the end. Before that, I felt like there were times where there were some good races and some good racing. You had to be a fast car, you had to have a good handling car, and you had to put yourself in the right spot at times. It was a bit of a chess match, but I am sure that Denny (Hamlin) could come in here and say, ‘no, I have won three of them in that timeframe and its not luck’. So, he has just been fortunate to be in the right place at the right time, making the right moves, and I have been the one that just kind of waits and sees everything that is going to happen and I try to go with 10 to go. But sometimes that’s too late and I am not in the right spot at that point, so I kind of mess myself up. Overall, the last few years I have not watched 10 years in a row of footage, but I am going to guarantee you that there are not very many cars finishing and there are a lot of wrecks happening, especially last lap crashes..(even) from the lead guys are getting crashed. It happens.”
DO YOU STILL LOOK AT THIS RACE IN A NEGATIVE WAY, OR DO YOU STILL HAVE A POSITIVE ATTITUDE ABOUT IT?
“No, you just come in here and treat it as if its any other race. There is great opportunity to be able to win the race and if you put yourself in the right spot, you can. Its just not happened yet for me. So, its obviously a difficult race to win. There’s a lot of different winners. Some guys, this is the only race they ever win. Other guys, they win it two or three times over again. It’s the Super Bowl of our sport and its hard to accomplish this one. It’s a race where you rely on a lot of different factors than you do just yourself. You go to a race track like California, or the old Atlanta, and places like that…it’s a lot more driver that is involved in how you are and what your destiny will be. Where here, a lot of your result can be in the hands of the other driver around you and the circumstances around you. That’s just the nature of it, but you know, we all have the same race to go out there and run in. As far as being positive about it, yeah, I would be positive about it. Having a new fresh look and outlook with my new team, and being with the No. 8, its exciting for me anyways. So, I would love nothing more than to win the Daytona 500 with RCR, Chevrolet, 3CHI and everybody to really put an exclamation point on the offseason and what this year will hopefully bring.”
HOW MUCH HAS THIS BEEN A MENTAL RESET FOR YOU?
“Yeah, I mean a lot of it is. There has been a big reset in general obviously with joining forces with RCR and Austin (Dillon). Thankful for the opportunity and looking forward to the many sponsors that we have and working with them. Its just a fresh outlook and its nice to be in a place where you are wanted, and you are accepted. To having that chance to just go racing again is going to be fun. We have done a little bit of that already with the COTA race that we ran, the test that I had, and spending some time with Austin doing stuff off-track has been pretty cool. So, we will continue to evolve and get better and RCR will again become a powerhouse like it once was…and to win races and championships.”
REGARDING YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH KEVIN HARVICK AND HOW THAT HAS EVOLVED OVER THE YEARS
“He finally grew up and its nice to have a relationship with other veteran-type drivers. That is what we call each other, veterans. Or just the old crowd. He has got me by a few years but it still fun to mess with him a little bit. He actually gave me a ride over here this morning, from the short track. We rode together and that is kind of weird, right? Almost like ‘Days of Thunder’ where we should have gotten our own rental cars. It would have been a Ford versus a Chevy and that would have been funny. But yeah, him having Keelan and me having Brexton and us having things outside the race track, and different things in life like you mentioned to focus on and what it will teach you, has meant a lot to the both of us in how we can relate and work with one another.”
HOW IS YOUR BROTHER KURT DOING THIS OFFSEASON AND STILL DEALING WITH CONCUSSION ISSUES?
“He seems fine to me. Everything is day by day with him and he is very busy. I see him doing a lot of different things and looking at his schedule and talking with some of the folks around him, he is somewhere doing something every day. He is fine off the track, as much as it can be inside a Busch’s head anyway. So, he’s good.”
WHY DID YOU RESUME YOUR XFINITY SERIES CAREER? WAS IT SPONSOR DRIVEN OR MISSING THE SEAT TIME OR OTHER?
“Actually, it was just the relationship that I grew over the time in which I was talking to other teams and things like that through last year. Talking with Chris Rice and Matt Kaulig especially and the relationship that we developed and the communication and things that we had over that timeframe. When it came down to decision time and I had to let everybody know who wasn’t the choice for going Cup racing with, I told them that I would still love to drive for them and have a chance to go race his cars. It just wouldn’t be on Sunday. They were gracious enough to let me run in their Xfinity program and I would love to go over there and help those guys out. I feel like they are really, really, really close and right on the brink of a force to be reckoned with in the Xfinity Series and I would love to help carry that torch to the next level.”
A LOT OF TIMES THEY SAY A CHANGE OF SCENERY CAN BE GOOD. WHAT IS THE ONE THING THAT YOU HAVE EXPERIENCED BY HAVING THAT CHANGE OF SCENERY AT THIS POINT OF YOUR CAREER?
“It’s a lot. All the things that I have mentioned so far. The difference of the competition side at RCR and how they do things is entirely different than what they do at JGR. The management side is completely different. Differences are fine and its just a matter of exploiting the good things of all that and sometimes the not so good pieces of that and making it all good. I feel like there is room for me to help the group that we are with learn from the group that I came with and vice versa. I am not really going to be teaching the old group, but you get my point. Its just a matter of that I really enjoy working with Randall (Burnett) so far and the communication with him has been great. We are always back and forth, and we talk about every day. That has been really good, which has been different than my past couple of relationships. So far, so good.”
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