Ricky Carmichael is arguably the greatest of all time when it comes to Motocross. When he decided to come to NASCAR, he ran his debut race in the ARCA Menards series for Kevin Harvick Inc. Then it was in 2009 when the Florida native ran his debut Truck Season with KHI and went on for 3 full seasons before ending it in 2011.

A legend in one motorsport could not produce the same magic in another. Yes, majorly because they are miles apart from each other, but also because of various other factors. Recently Carmichael was in conversation with his old boss Kevin Harvick, where he dwelled on why NASCAR did not work out for him.

Ricky Carmichael explains the reasons behind his stint at NASCAR

In his career, he won 15 AMA Championships, 10 in Motocross, and 5 in Supercross. His record of 150 wins (102 in Motocross, 48 in Supercross) is close to impossible to beat. The legendary driver 2006 had his last full season in Motocross racing, post which in 2017 he rode part-time in a few select rounds, before taking complete retirement. Carmichael in the three seasons made 68 race starts in the NASCAR Truck Series. In which he bagged four top 5s and eighteen top 10 finishes. His best finish in the series was P4, which came in Dover and also in Talladega. Carmichael’s average finish in the Truck Series in the three years combined was 16.9 which is not terrible, and the Motocross veteran also led a total of 40 laps in his seasons. Not just the Truck, Carmichael also made eight starts in the Xfinity Series, four in 2010 for Braun Racing, and four starts for Turner Motorsports in 2011. His best finish in the Series came in 2011 when he finished 9th in the Road America race. After the 2011 Phoenix race, Carmichael did not return to NASCAR.

It’s no secret that in NASCAR sponsors dictate pretty much everything. The bigger the sponsor is the more money they will bring in, hence making the driver more attractive for teams. If you have small sponsors, it’s most likely that a driver will end up in a backmarker team. The problem with backmarker teams is that they don’t have the equipment required to compete with the top dogs in the game like Stewart-Haas, Hendrick Motorsports, or Joe Gibbs. Recently in Kevin Harvick‘s ‘Happy Hour’ podcast, Ricky Carmichael spoke about the challenges he faced in NASCAR, cutting his run short!

Carmichael is a legend, but in a bike sport that has nothing similar to NASCAR or a car-related sport. Yet his longtime sponsor Monster Energy from his Motocross time continued to back him in NASCAR as well. However, the bringing your own sponsor and money part and how much it drives the sport is something Carmichael did not enjoy. On the podcast, he said,  “From the business side, number 1, a lot of times you had to bring the money, where in motocross, it’s not like that, you represent your own talent and if you are good, you get opportunity. So it was going more towards pay to drive when I came into NASCAR. You got that right? And then you are at the mercy of whoever your sponsor is and how much money they are willing to spend and then you have to perform.”

And according to Carmichael, when he got a hang of the racecraft, at times, his truck wasn’t as optimal as it should have been. “I always wanted to take the personal responsibility of like hey I need to be better when in all reality it was probably just the car or the Truck wasn’t where it needed to be those are tough pills to swallow.” 

All these factors just probably were too much to handle for Carmichael and hence he quit NASCAR. In 2013, Carmichael went back to his roots, starting a team called RCH in Motocross, which also won the 2016 championship. And he credited his time in NASCAR to starting his own team. He had said, “I’m thankful I learned so much in NASCAR, and I’m trying to bring that mentality over to the two-wheel side.” However, the short stint pattern continued as the team was shut down at the end of the 2017 season due to a lack of funding and sponsorships.

While in NASCAR, another problem that Carmichael faced was dealing with the technicalities and the uncertainties that the sport brings.

Ricky Carmichael was irritated by NASCAR’s nuances

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Further in the conversation, he said, “And I don’t think the race craft part was as tough to learn. Number one for Trucks is just aero. What aero dynamics is like and you know I could go out there and qualify good especially when I was at KHI. Qualifying was good, especially on the mile-and-a-half stuff. But then you get in there in a race situation and it took me a while to figure out aero. And by the time I figured out the aero and where you needed to be and most importantly where not to be. By that time it was too late. So those were the two frustrating things.”

Aerodynamics plays a huge role in NASCAR’s ovals which dominate a majority of the track lineup and the drivers who can master that go on to win races and championships. This is perhaps the reason why his Xfinity’s best finish was on a road course! Apart from the technicalities like aero, there were several uncertainties, and for Carmichael, navigating those uncertainties became a bit of a challenge.

“For example I loved Texas, I loved Atlanta, always did good at those two tracks and I loved Martinsville, ran really well there. Because that was really super similar to Supercross. On the gas, off the gas, breaking points, things of that nature. Loved it there. And it was as less aero-dependent. But, when you go to that track and you’d unload and you’d easily be top 5 and you’d go back in the fall and you are driving as hard as you can and you can barely bust a top 10. That was so weird to me and it was hard for me to accept that,” He added.

Despite having year-on-year progress, Carmichael found the challenges in NASCAR too daunting. Do you think Carmichael quit NASCAR a little too soon? Share your thoughts with us in the comments down below.