Kyle Busch on disqualification: “Guess NASCAR wants me here longer”

By Asher Fair | Jul 19, 2020

Kyle Busch, Joe Gibbs Racing, Texas, NASCAR, Xfinity Series (Photo by Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images) /

Kyle Busch thinks NASCAR just him in the Xfinity Series longer following the disqualification that stripped him of his 98th career win.

Kyle Busch has been very clear that once he notches his 100th career NASCAR Xfinity Series victory, he will step away from competing in the series, aside of when Joe Gibbs Racing may call on him to fill in as a replacement from time to time.

A win on Saturday afternoon at Texas Motor Speedway moved him to within two victories of that mark, or so he thought. After finishing 0.949 seconds ahead of Team Penske’s Austin Cindric around the four-turn, 1.5-mile (2.414-kilometer) oval in Fort Worth, Texas, his #54 Toyota was disqualified for failing post-race inspection.

As a result, he still sits three wins behind the century mark at 97.

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Busch ended up winning at Texas Motor Speedway on Saturday anyway, as he secured his third Truck Series victory of the season in his fifth and final start, giving him 59 career victories at NASCAR’s third highest level of competition. But the fact that he took two checkered flags while getting credit for only one victory at the track doesn’t sit well with him.

“Yeah, it’s bothersome. It pisses me off,” Busch said. “We come out here and race and run hard and score a win and then it gets taken away from you. It sucks because it’s nothing we did. We even put a round in the right-rear during the race in order to help the handling characteristic and then the left-rear was low. I don’t know. There’s nothing I can do about it, so you just kind of move on.”

His theory? NASCAR just wants him in the Xfinity Series longer.

“I don’t know; I guess NASCAR wants me here longer.”

This is the same sentiment Busch shared last season after it was announced that full-time Cup Series drivers with more than five seasons of experience at the sport’s highest level would be allowed to compete in no more than five Xfinity Series races per season.

“I would be there by now and I would have been out of it by now but apparently NASCAR and the fans love me there so much they keep make limitations on keeping me there,” he said at the time.

The limit had been seven races in 2018 and 2019 after it was reduced from 10 in 2017. Busch entered the 2020 season with 96 wins, meaning he could only afford to not win one of his five starts this year. He is now just one for four, so he won’t be retiring this year.

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Busch, who has one start remaining on his schedule for 2020, will need to go at least two for five in 2021 to retire next year. Should he enter next season needing to go three for five, his stay may very well be extended into at least 2022 as well.

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