McReynolds, Petty, Despain and Wallace on Childress/Busch Incident
Below, SPEED on-air personalities weigh in on the incident, the motivation behind Childress’ frustration and in what manner NASCAR should intervene:
“I can relate to Richard Childress’ frustration and motivation behind punching Kyle Busch because of all my years spent as a crew chief and my 11 years in the broadcast booth. We all preach this but I’ve probably preached it the loudest – you don’t use your race cars or race trucks for retaliation. They’re so delicate and so expensive to repair. I think Richard just had enough of it. Between Kyle pushing and destroying the No. 29 car in post-race at Darlington, and then what he did to Joey Coulter’s truck post-race yesterday at Kansas when the truck didn’t have a scratch on it, I think Richard was fed up. I can understand his frustration and motivation. I don’t even see Kyle Busch or any particular driver when I make this statement. This is about an owner getting race cars and trucks torn up unnecessarily by one driver in particular.
“As far as what NASCAR should or shouldn’t do to penalize Richard, this probably is not what people want to hear, but Richard did it in the garage area. Despite the ‘Boys, have at it’ mentality, we still can’t have the Wild, Wild West. NASCAR still has to have lines in the sand. My personal opinion is NASCAR shouldn’t do anything to Richard. But they can’t have an owner just going up to a driver in the garage area, putting him in a headlock and punching him. But I hope the penalty is so minimal that we hardly realize he’s received it – kind of like the probation that Kyle and Harvick are finishing up."
–Larry McReynolds, SPEED/FOX Sports analyst and former crew chief for Richard Childress Racing
“I predict NASCAR will take strong action to further confuse the issue of just what ‘Boys have at it’ really means."
–Dave Despain, host of Wind Tunnel with Dave Despain on SPEED
“This is not the first incident between Kyle Busch and RCR. We can go back to Darlington where they got into it. Remember the 29 of Kevin Harvick and the 18 and how the 18 pushes the 29 into the wall. Childress was extremely upset. You see it (No. 29) hit the inside wall – not a scratch on it. Now it’s wiped out (after Busch pushed it). Now they have to put it back together. There’s a lot of things like that. It’s going to be interesting to see what NASCAR does. Those guys got $25,000 fines and six weeks of probation. NASCAR hands out probations like candy companies hand out free samples. It means absolutely nothing. So, this is going to be interesting … I’d hate to be – what is Kyle? 25 (26 years old)? And I got my butt kicked by an old man. Let’s be honest – The King used to kick my butt all the time."
“That wasn’t the incident that started it. Just putting a doughnut on someone’s truck is not a big deal. You see congratulatory donuts on the side of trucks but you also know when someone is mad at you. I think it goes back … I think Richard supposedly had spoken with Kyle and said, ‘Don’t touch my cars again. Ever.’ And the incidents we’re talking about are happening after they throw the checkered flag. So, you can see how Richard would be upset enough to at least go up and confront Kyle."
–SPEED analyst/former driver Kyle Petty on Sunday’s NASCAR RaceDay Built by The Home Depot
“Richard (Childress) had one bad nerve left in him. Kyle Busch jumped on that nerve and really made Richard mad. Let’s have fun and speculate. Speculation is this: When Richard Childress and those two got into it, Kyle Busch said, ‘You punch like an old man.’ Here’s what infuriates everybody. Kyle Busch never punches. He just stops this thing and walks away. It’s the Hatfield and McCoys.
–SPEED analyst/driver Kenny Wallace on Sunday’s NASCAR RaceDay Built by The Home Depot