Dylan L Ellis
DirtRacingNews
As we have all been seeing the past few months from various media outlets, including from NASCAR themselves, they have all speculated that Kyle Busch would be leaving JGR and switching to another race team. He (Kyle) has announced this morning that he will be leaving Joe Gibbs Racing and will be racing the No. 8 car for Richard Childress Racing in 2023. This means his 15-season run with Joe Gibbs Racing will be coming to an end — Busch will be moving from driving a Toyota to Chevrolet for the organization. Kyle won 58 of his 60 career wins with JGR and won two championships in 2015 and 2019.
According to the NASCAR Wire Service: Kyle Busch wanted to drive for a racer’s racer and Richard Childress saw a gleam in Busch’s eye that reminded him of Dale Earnhardt.
Busch saw something In RCR, he sees a team on the upswing. This came to fruition at the exhibition Clash at the Coliseum in early February.
“I think it started earlier this year when we were racing at the (Los Angeles) Coliseum when the 8 car blew my doors off and was driving away.” - Kyle Busch
Recently, Busch said during Tuesday morning’s announcement at the NASCAR Hall of Fame in Charlotte, N.C. “I certainly knew right then and there at the beginning of the season that those guys definitely had some speed.”
Busch will be replacing fellow 2022 championship contender Tyler Reddick in the No. 8 Camaro. Reddick will be leaving RCR and driving for 23XI (23 11) Racing in 2024. Reddick still remains under contract with RCR for the 2023 season. Childress announced on Tuesday he plans to run three chartered Cup cars in 2023, but Reddick’s crew chief, Randall Burnett, will serve in that capacity on Busch’s team next year.
In Busch, Childress is hiring an elite driver who has a combined 224 victories across all three NASCAR national series. Busch has a total of 102 NASCAR Xfinity wins and 62 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series wins; both are series records.
What does this mean for Busch's Truck Series team?
The future of the Kyle Busch Motorsports NASCAR Camping World Truck Series team remains unsettled, though Busch has said he expects KBM to compete as a Chevrolet team next season, after serving as the flagship truck team for Toyota during his tenure at JGR.
Kyle Busch said that “Kyle Busch Motorsports intends to compete in the Truck Series as a Chevrolet-branded team next year. Whether that’s two, three, four entries, we’re not quite certain on that yet, but we’re working through those details as we can right now, and hopefully, again, we can have an announcement on that here shortly.”
Though this announcement does indeed confirms Busch’s status for next year, it left people wondering and asking questions. These questions were along the lines of; among them the source of a charter for Reddick’s 2023 ride and sponsorship for Busch’s team (though Childress said he already had commitments and would announce sponsors later).
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