Kyle Busch Reveals RCR Was Caught “Cheating Without Cheating” in 2023

JGR veteran Kyle Busch shared his thoughts on how NASCAR shut down his team’s borderline legal designs to Next-Gen cars in 2026.

Kyle Busch Reveals RCR Was Caught “Cheating Without Cheating” in 2023

Kyle Busch (Via IMAGO)

The 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season witnessed Kyle Busch making one of the biggest decisions of his career, switching to RCR, ending his 15-year service with Joe Gibbs Racing. He started his maiden season for Richard Childress team strong, winning three races from first 15 events, before founding himself in a poor 100 race winless streak he is still trying to get over.

Talking about his last win on his appearance on the “Hang Out with Sean Hannity,” the two times Cup champion revealed that his team was caught by NASCAR exploring the grey area. They found a loophole with the Next-Gen car and took advantage of it. NASCAR didn’t like this exploitation of the rule book.

In 2023 when we won those three races, after the third race that we won at Gateway, we got our hands smacked for some of the stuff we were doing to the race car that NASCAR didn’t like and said, ‘Don’t bring that back. That’s happened over the course of NASCAR [for its existence]. It wasn’t anything, like, against the rules. It was just, you always exploit the gray area. So, we exploited a gray area and we found something and we had an advantage.

Kyle Busch told Sean Hannity.

In the words of Kyle Busch, it was ‘cheating without cheating’ something NASCAR teams have been doing since the start of the series. Taking advantage of the rule book and making risky move that are borderline illegal is what makes the sport special. The RCR crew hasn’t yet found another such loophole to explore and that might have been the key to their Poor 2024 and 2025 seasons.

It’s cheating without cheating. It makes it faster. You want more downforce, you wanna make it lighter, you wanna travel the car more because there’s rules and limitations around all that stuff. So, you go and you try to figure out ways of making more downforce than everybody else, getting your car lower to the ground, lower CG, getting around the corners faster. You do all of those things.

Kyle Busch added via Hang Out with Sean Hannity.

Kyle Busch shares his dislike for NASCAR Next-Gen cars

One key reason behind Kyle Busch’s struggle in the 2026 season has been his failure to understand the Next-Gen car as good as his rivals. He can’t no longer make a difference with the car, as unlike in the past overdriving is resulting in his getting spun.  

Kyle Busch
Kyle Busch (Via @KyleBusch/X)

I was always that guy that felt like I could make the difference. I could be the difference maker. I could go out there, and I could drive that car past its limit and make it go faster and pass the other guys I felt like I was better than. Now I feel like anytime I pass the limit of this new car… I just spin the damn thing out. You can’t overdrive this car because it’s so on edge.

Kyle Busch said.

Further talking about the point, the veteran pointed out that there no extra speed he could extract from the car and he feeling stuck driving the iconic No:8 Chevy. He also highlighted how the drivers and teams that has figured out that car are now consistently running upfront.

There’s just not a lot more for me to get out of the race car, so I feel stuck with the car that I have. Everybody goes to the racetrack with the car that they have, but now you’re starting to see the top-five guys are the same top-five guys every week. Sixth through 10th is the same sixth through 10th every week.

Kyle Busch added.

The comments suggests that both the veteran and his RCR crew is to blame for the three-year winless streak they are desperate to get out of. A premier team like them should not be a one trick pony and should have left NASCAR shutting down one of their unique car design changes to ruin their whole momentum in the new era.

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