Underconfident Kyle Busch Exposes Richard Childress Racing’s “Achilles Heel”

Moving to a different team, drivers would generally require time to settle in and dial in the suitable settings, but this is not the case with Kyle Busch. Shrugging off his 15-year-long Joe Gibbs Racing hangover, Busch quickly adapted to the Richard Childress Racing camp for the 2023 season. A true workaholic, Rowdy’s committed attitude helped him collect the Pala Casino 400 title win in just his second race with RCR.

Collecting two more wins in Talladega and Gateway, the #8 Richard Childress Racing driver now ranks 3rd on NASCAR’s Cup Series championship standings. But Rowdy’s maiden season at RCR hasn’t been a cakewalk. In the pre-race presser at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Rowdy lent a deeper insight into his struggles this season.

Kyle Busch reveals RCR’s Achilles Heel

NASCAR’s short tracks have been a highly debated topic ever since the Next Gen car’s introduction in 2022. Unable to extract the desired performance from their machines on the short tracks, drivers have often voiced their concerns. Listening to driver inputs, NASCAR tweaked the design of its Next Gen car, shortening the rear spoiler from four inches to two. Furthermore, multiple changes were done underneath the car which saw the downforce drop down by a significant 30%. The overall changes did see a few drivers benefit from the tweaks, but things only got tougher for Kyle Busch.

During the course of the press conference,Busch was asked about his struggles on short tracks and what he expects to achieve at the Crayon 301 race. He replied, “Yeah, this is a weekend where we come here, not planning on, but knowing that this has been our struggle. And so, it’s just the shorter spoiler, the less strakes on the diffuser.”

Revealing the Achilles Heel of Richard Childress Racing, Rowdy added, “The less downforce has kind of just been our Achilles heal this year so far, so we’d love to come out of here and just have a solid run – learn and get better. The previous events – Martinsville (Speedway), we ran 25th all day. At Richmond (Raceway), we ran 16th all day. Phoenix (Raceway), we ran 10th or 11th all day. So we just need to make some gains on that and get ourselves closer to the front with some of our other Chevrolet key partner guys – they’re doing it, so no reason why we shouldn’t do it.”

Plagued by the shorter spoiler, Kyle Busch’s prayers may have finally been answered as NASCAR has prepped a new short-track package for its Next Gen cars.

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Will NASCAR introduce another short-track package?

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With its improved 2023 short-track package not receiving much success on the tracks, NASCAR returned to its R&D facility to improve the Next Gen car’s short-track performance. After thorough research and rigorous wind tunnel testing, a new aerodynamics package was developed.

Fabricating a new front splitter as a part of its new package, NASCAR felt it would drastically improve the Next Gen car’s performance on short tracks. To test out the new front splitters’ performance, NASCAR has scheduled a test run later this month, after postponing it due to bad weather conditions at the New Hampshire Motor Speedway. 

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While this new development may help ease Kyle Busch’s ongoing struggles, Rowdy will have to wait longer for the new aerodynamics package to take effect.