“It’s still 2020”
Kyle Busch finished in the runner-up position in Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway, a finish good enough to move him through to the round of 12, which would think would make most drivers happy about a solid run and optimistic about the weeks ahead.
However, as we all know, Kyle Busch isn’t most drivers.
Busch was upset with some of the drivers in Saturday Night’s event at Bristol – including fellow NASCAR Playoff contender Joey Logano — after slower cars altered the outcome of the race several times over the last 100 laps, including on the final lap of the event, when the leaders tried to put Joey Gase a 37th lap down.
In fact, in the last 15 laps of the race, the race leaders had to work by Gase – driving the Rick Ware Racing No. 51 — on two separate occasions, which inevitably slowed the progress of the leaders.
When asked about the slower cars in the final laps of the race, Busch said “If the lap car wasn’t there, I would have blown it in on the outside, or maybe the inside and maybe we would have banged each others doors or whatever, and had a greater finish at the checkered, but some of those dipshit kids don’t know what the hell they’re doing or where they’re at and can’t stay out of the way.”
“Nothing like a Gase and a Smithley.”
https://twitter.com/MatthewMayerCBS/status/1307515451619053573
After the event, Garrett Smithley reacted to the comments on Twitter, saying “Even when I don’t do anything Kyle Busch blames me…”:
Even when I don’t do anything @KyleBusch blames me. Went outta my way to give him room tonight. Think he might have thought I was in a different car. ?????
— Garrett Smithley (@GarrettSmithley) September 20, 2020
Of course, this isn’t the first time that Kyle Busch has been critical of the slower lap traffic, or even Garrett Smithley for that matter, as last September at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, Busch was involved in an incident with Smithley – who at the time was driving Rick Ware Racing’s No. 52 — after contact late in the event relegated Busch to a 19th-place finish.
Garrett Smithley Defends Driving After Kyle Busch Calls Him Into Question
TobyChristie.com has since reached out to Joey Gase for a response to Kyle Busch’s post-race comments, but has not gotten a response at the time of publishing this article.