NASCAR CUP SERIES
DAYTONA INTERNATIONAL SPEEDWAY
DAYTONA 500
TEAM CHEVY MEDIA DAY PRESS CONF. TRANSCRIPT
FEBRUARY 12, 2020
KURT BUSCH, NO. 1 MONSTER ENERGY CAMARO ZL1 1LE Session Highlights:
ON THE 2020 CAMARO ZL1 1LE:
“it has shown well in the wind tunnel. That’s the real data we have to go off of. The balance last year at Daytona and Talladega isn’t all that different with the new Camaro. It’ll show up more so at the 1.5-miles and short tracks later on.”
TALK ABOUT THE UNIQUENESS OF SPEEDWEEKS. CAN YOU SEE IT CONDENSED BEGINNING NEXT SEASON TO EITHER ONE WEEK?
“It’s always great to have a week that leads into the Daytona 500. I think that’s the reasoning for the Clash and Qualifying to be on a separate weekend. I don’t mind it being spread out for a week. We have to kind of get the rust knocked off things. We’ve got to have a couple practice sessions and the Qualifier. It all makes sense the way it’s set up. But, could we do things with the Clash and do things different there? Sure. But, I really like the way Qualifying is a week out and leads us into the Great American race.”
WOULD YOU WANT TO GO UP AGAINST THE SUPER BOWL THOUGH?
“When they drop the green flag, I race. I don’t know when and where or how it will fall, but it makes sense to be after football.”
DO YOU AND YOUR BROTHER, KYLE BUSCH, STILL HAVE THE SIBLING RIVALRY YOU USED TO HAVE?
“Oh, absolutely. It’s as strong as it is in different reasons. But, I would say we’ve mellowed a little bit. But yet, to get left behind after I beat him at Kentucky, we were sharing a plane ride that weekend, and he was more frustrated that he lost. It wasn’t that he lost in general, it’s that he lost to me. And that’s what made it that much more better to win that and to have an outcome where two of us put it out on the line like that, racing against each other. There was that moment of brotherhood where he left me a small window on the outside of Turn 4 and that’s what helped me win with the Monster Energy Chevy.”
WHAT DO YOU THINK WHEN HE SAYS HE THINKS CAN WIN 7 OR 8 CHAMPIONSHIPS AND BE THE GREATEST OF ALL TIME?
“Ah, it sounds like Mohammad Ali speaking, and he should go for it (laughter). I wish him the best.”
IF YOU COULD MAKE ONE CHANGE TO THE SCHEDULE, WHAT WOULD YOU MAKE?
“Oh, these are a lot of cool questions right away. And I’m not even warmed up yet. I think we’re going to end up with a shorter schedule. There are some tracks that are part of the whole TV alliance and there are some tracks that we need to go to twice, and there are some tracks that we don’t. If a track isn’t selling out, could we go to Iowa Speedway and sell out? It would be a zoo. Why we’re not in Canada is beyond me. Xfinity was racing in Canada and Mexico years ago. Street races. Why haven’t we figured out how to do a street race yet? I think there are plenty of cool things that are on the horizon now that SMI, ISC, and NASCAR are all working out their track contracts.”
WHAT HAVE YOU LEARNED FROM CHIP GANASSI NOW THAT YOU’VE WORKED WITH HIM FOR A WHILE?
“Chip is pretty much a straight-forward guy like he is when you see him or what you know about him. He’s right up front. There’s no BS. When he wants an answer, you’ve got to give him an answer. He already knows the answer to the question that he’s asking. That’s a sign of a true leader in any which category. It’s fun to race with him and to do to dinner and to have team meetings and to represent his sponsors, the manufacturer with Chevrolet; it’s the perfect combination for where I am in my career. And to race for Chip, we’ve got to win more. We’ve got to win more races this year.”
INAUDIBLE
“It’s a tough line to draw. And it’s a tough line to talk about. With the tires and the rules package, it doesn’t lend to side-drafting and the stability that we need to be able to lean on each other that hard. There has to be an understanding that when you are going to perform a block at a certain level, and you wreck and you wipe out five other guys that had nothing to do with that block, that’s something that the driver needs to digest and understand and implement when it comes down to when they’re going to do that in the future. So, as long as people are learning from the mistakes and the carnage that happened in the Clash, that’s what I hope we can all take from it. But, at the same time, it’s the Clash. People are going to race different in the Qualifier. People are going to race different in the 500.”
ARE THE CHEVROLETS JUST NOT MARRYING UP AS WELL IN THE DRAFT AS THE FORDS AND TOYOTAS AT THIS POINT?
“I would say that we’re all pretty equal. It’s that when there’s a quantity, like we were the other day in the Clash, of seven or eight cars, and we’re all trying to tow our train through a smaller group of Toyotas and a smaller group of Fords, it looks larger and looks like they’re not as in sync. When there’s more, that’s what we’re trying to do is win by numbers. And that’s why you see us doing different patterns than what you might see the other smaller groups doing.”
IN LOOKING AT WHAT THE 2021 SCHEDULE MIGHT BE LIKE, ARE THERE CERTAIN TRACKS OR MARKETS YOU’D REALLY LIKE TO SEE NASCAR GO TO?
“For me, I don’t know why we’re not racing in Canada at that Montreal track. They have a street course where they’ve had IndyCar for years. Iowa Speedway is a track I thought NASCAR bought, but we’re not racing there in the Cup series yet. I love the Pacific northwest as far as the geography and why we’re not racing in Washington state yet is a question as well. So, there’s plenty of cool tracks that have good seating capacity that I think need to be explored. But, it’s all part of the politics and the structure that ISC and SMI and the TV partners have in place.”
ARE YOU OKAY WITH A STREET COURSE?
“Yeah, I think it would be great. I raced a street course in the Southwest Series in 1999 around the L.A. Coliseum. The atmosphere was incredible. The energy was buzzing, and it was fun. Mark Martin came back to race with us. Harvick was there. Ron Hornaday. It was a cool atmosphere to put on a street race.”
INAUDIBLE – ON THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TALLADEGA AND DAYTONA
“For Daytona, it’s tough to go three-wide. Talladega, we can go four-wide, no problem. So this track is narrower, more treacherous, and the penalty and the risk here are much higher at Daytona than at most tracks when you try to go three-wide. And the spot on this track that’s tougher than all other parts of the track is Turn 4. The sun always shines on Turn 4 and if you get the wind coming in off the beach, that’s where you have the least amount of downforce and that’s why you saw the most trouble in the Clash happen in Turn 4 the other day.”
DO YOU HAVE ANY ANXIETY ABOUT A POSSIBLE PRESIDENTIAL VISIT KINKING-UP YOUR PRE-RACE SUNDAY PLANS?
“This the Daytona 500. It’s already over the top, off the charts, fun, exciting, and you’re just rolling with whatever comes your way. They tell me it starts at a certain time, but you go when they tell you to put your helmet on. And I can’t wait for President Trump to show up and for all of the race fans to acknowledge him and just to have that fun atmosphere of a president at the Daytona 500.”