While not a guy to mince words, Kyle Busch let out his frustrations in his post-race press conference at Bristol Motor Speedway.
He let loose on the lapped car of Joey Logano, who held him up in the closing laps.
“He’s nobody’s friend for a reason,” he said.
He let loose on other lapped cars.
“Some of them dipshit kids don’t know what the hell they’re doing or where they’re at and can’t stay out of the way,” he said. “Nothing like a (Joey) Gase and a (Garrett) Smithley.”
And for his championship chances next week at Las Vegas Motor Speedway?
“We’ll be eliminated in the next round,” he said.
Then again, who wouldn’t be frustrated, in his position?
Even when Busch led a season-high number of laps, he came up on the short end of the stick in a duel to the finish with Kevin Harvick in Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race.
Lap traffic let Busch reel in Harvick to retake the lead with 62 laps to go. Likewise, it cost him the lead.
With roughly 50 laps to go, Busch was caught behind Logano on the high line. He couldn’t clear him for a few laps, and Harvick powered by on the bottom line.
He wasn’t done, yet. Until the checkered flag flew, he kept within a second of Harvick’s bumper. While Busch isn’t above using the bump ‘n run, he never considered dumping Harvick.
“You always try to win races clean,” he said. “You always try to race hard and race clean and get the job done right. Yeah, I mean, if that lap car wasn’t there, I would have blown it in on the outside or the inside and maybe we would have banged each other’s doors or whatever and had a greater finish to the checkered.”
Of course, lap traffic is an ever-present obstacle at Bristol. And it throws a wrench into which lane is advantageous.
“Some of those guys were running different lanes and then switching when you got there,” he said. “So that was kind of complicated for you to be able to pick and choose on which ones you wanted to take or where you wanted to go in order to pass them.”
Busch’s pessimism aside, he comfortably moved onto the Round of 12 and starts it 10th in points.
