Kyle Busch, my favorite NASCAR driver, took a record-setting win today and I couldn’t even be bothered to watch the race. Such is my distaste for the Woke mess that is NASCAR.
It must really grate on NASCAR’s higher-ups that the outspoken Busch, clearly not one of their favorites, won in California Sunday and in so doing claimed the all-time title of at least one win in 19 consecutive seasons of Cup racing.
Maybe you’ve heard of the guy whose record of 18 consecutive seasons with a Cup win Busch surpassed. That would be Richard Petty, The King!
I’ve had the great fortune to meet and speak with Petty on several occasions while covering NASCAR’s preseason media events in Charlotte, or a handful of NASCAR races. Petty is the real deal, an all-time talent with a down-home approach, and he’s secure enough with his legacy that he isn’t drinking NASCAR’s Woke Kool-Aid.
Asked a few years back if Danica Patrick, then NASCAR’s diversity cover girl, could win a race, Petty told reporters “(only) if everybody else stayed home.” Petty doubled down saying that if Patrick was a male, no one would even take notice of her.
For the record, Patrick retired and despite all the hypes and hopes, never did win a Cup race, going 0-for-191 in seven Cup seasons.
Contrast that to Busch, who has won two season championships and 61 races. Yet he rarely shows up in NASCAR promos. Prominent these days is Bubba Wallace, he of the two career wins. But he’s black and that’s what NASCAR is pushing.
The NASCAR guys similarly did metaphorical backflips when Mexican driver Daniel Suarez won a road race last year. That’s one win in 221 starts and counting.
Wallace has two wins in 185 races started.
The whole presentation of NASCAR Cup races is long on Woke messaging and short on traditional racing, which isn’t playing well with the fan base.
TV ratings for the flagship Daytona 500 race earlier this month were down, making it the third least-watched Daytona 500 ever in terms of television. I passed on it, completing my trifecta of ignoring the Super Bowl, the State of The Union Address and the Daytona 500, all formerly must-see TV for me.
NASCAR rules changes have turned Daytona into a luckfest. The latest evidence is this year’s winner, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. It was just his third career Cup win and snapped a winless streak for him that had spanned 199 races over a period of 2,060 days.
It was like the Cleveland Browns lucking into winning the Super Bowl.
Although there is unclear reporting of general NASCAR attendance, I can tell you the two races at Bristol used to have waiting lists to buy tickets and now are run before acres of empty seats.
But back to Busch. He’s running for a new team this year, Richard Childress Racing (RCR). Kyle got a less-than-wholehearted effort to re-sign him by his former employer Joe Gibbs Racing. That would be the team headed by the former Hall of Fame NFL coach, that prays publicly in pit lane after events and has been caught cheating more than a time or two.
But Gibbs has a dominant team and RCR has been something less. RCR hasn’t won a Cup title since 1994 and during Busch’s career has won 20 fewer races than Busch has by himself.
To see Busch win so quickly at RCR is further testament to his talent and shoves it right back in the faces of the Gibbs gang.
Busch may not win another race this season – NASCAR would like that – but just for today he is enjoying a moment in the sun that all the social justice warrior pandering can’t take away.
Sam Ross Jr's site 