In 2006, Kyle Busch was a name you didn’t want to see in your mirror. Not because of raw speed but because you never knew when the firecracker inside him might go off. One Sunday at Lowe’s Motor Speedway, Casey Mears found out the hard way. After a wreck that put Busch’s day to bed early, Kyle tossed a safety device at Mears’s car in frustration. NASCAR responded with a $50,000 fine, points penalties, and a stern warning: get it together or sit out.
“It’s tough to not hold that emotion back and try and keep that frustration under control. There is a point of no return, and we stepped over that,” Busch later admitted. But back then, folks in the garage didn’t see him as a leader. He was fast. He was reckless. And more often than not, he was a problem. “A weapon on the racetrack,” some said. But nearly two decades and two Cup championships later, Busch has grown into the veteran driver.
Rowdy is now more mature and one of the most successful drivers on the track. But it took a lot of learnings and sacrifice and now the Richard Childress Racing driver is teaching same to others. Amid the ongoing debate around last week’s wreck fest at Martinsville, Busch is delivering a much-needed lesson in respect to the younger generation.
Kyle Busch sets the record straight after Xfinity’s ugly week!
This past week, the conversation around NASCAR hasn’t been about tight finishes or bold strategy. It’s been about one thing: the Martinsville Xfinity race. More than 100 laps under caution. Wrecked race cars everywhere. The Xfinity Series race turned into chaos, capped by Sammy Smith dumping Taylor Gray for the lead in the final corners. The aftermath was uglier than the race itself. Heated arguments, unapologetic interviews, and what followed next was the wave of criticism.
Now, almost a week after the incident, Kyle Busch spoke about it. In a pre-race interview at Darlington, he slammed young drivers. “This is racing in a racetrack, and there’s another R word with respect that needs to be utilized out there on the racetrack, and we’re not a clown show — don’t screw it up,” he said. It was a line aimed squarely at the drivers, turning short tracks into wreck-fests. His words hit hard because they come from experience.
Notably, Smith’s blatant move on Gray and the cold way he justified it afterward lit up the garage. “He would’ve done the same to me,” Smith said. But it didn’t hold water. Busch saw the problem. “You don’t run over your competitors every week. Go back and watch when guys raced with steel bodies. They respected each other because one bad move ruined your day,” he said. Busch has made those mistakes.
.@KyleBusch criticizes aggression of current Xfinity drivers:
“They need to go back and remember the days watching the guys that used to race with steel bodies.”
: @PitLaneCPT pic.twitter.com/v30PPEZlmi
— Frontstretch (@Frontstretch) April 5, 2025
Rowdy had had his run-ins with drivers like Dale Jr, Mears and Tony Stewart. He has taken the hits from fines, suspensions, and backlash in the garage. But he has grown from them. And now he’s sounding the alarm for the next generation. Meanwhile, other cup drivers also didn’t mince their words. Hendrick Motorsports driver Chase Elliott also slammed Xfinity drivers. “It was terrible. The whole race was chaos,” he said in Darlington.
The 2020 Cup Series champion also admitted the performance was embarrassing and hoped the Cup drivers could set a better example on Sundays. He also acknowledged enough had probably already been said—but the point stuck. It wasn’t just the last-lap move. It was the full race unraveling early. But as the Xfinity Series prepares for more short-track battles, one thing’s clear: veterans like Busch are watching. And speaking of Busch, he had something else to say—this time, in response to Elliott’s take on a very different topic.
Busch shuts down Elliott’s gloomy take on throwback tradition!
Chase Elliott had another opinion this week. One with less heat but more indifference. Speaking ahead of Darlington’s Throwback Weekend, Elliott said the theme had “lost its luster” years ago. “We tend to ride the horse to death. At some point, I think we’ve got to chill,” he said. However, not everyone agreed with his views, especially Kyle Busch. Rowdy fired back with a perspective rooted in fan appreciation, not just different but direct.
“When I look at fan reception, I feel like the fans love it. Even if some of the drivers may think it’s overblown, it’s not for us. It’s for the fans… They get joy in seeing some of the older, cool schemes come back to life. If they’re all for it—trust me, I hear it all the time,” Busch said. For Busch, throwback weekend is about nostalgia, honoring the past, and giving fans something to connect with.
And he’s right. The energy in the stands, the paint schemes that spark memories, the buzz around the garage—it’s still there, and Busch sees it. He even joked about not having many throwbacks himself. “It took 10 years for someone to finally do a Kyle Busch throwback. That’s pretty cool to have one finally,” he said, referring to William Byron’s Xfinity paint scheme.
Many often accused Busch of being self-centered, especially early in his career. But his comments here show how much he’s changed. He’s not thinking just about the race. He’s thinking about what it means to the fans who show up every week to watch the racing spectacle. In a week where the younger crowd needed a reality check, Kyle Busch gave them two—one on respect and one on remembrance.
The post “We’re Not a Clown Show”: Kyle Busch Shows NASCAR ‘Kids’ What Respect Is, Ringing the Wake Up Call for Xfinity appeared first on EssentiallySports.