At 9, Brexton Busch lined up against his father, Kyle Busch, a two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion, for their first battle together at Millbridge Speedway. The father-son pair closely trailed each other throughout the 20-lap event in the 600cc Winged Micros class, with Kyle bagging a podium finish in third from his third-place start, while Brexton landed in sixth, advancing from seventh.
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The event started without a hitch until lap 13 when front-runner Tyler Lupton lost control, stirring the field and positioning Brexton right in his father’s draft. Amidst the caution, the Busch duo ascended to P4 and P5 places. However, at the race’s climax, Busch swung to the outside, momentarily seizing the P2 place before Nathan Meendering snatched it back.
Emulating his father, Brexton took to the high side, but couldn’t maintain the momentum, allowing Kolson Nelson to dive inside between turns 3 and 4, pushing Brexton just outside the top 5.
Despite noting his son’s valiant effort in the race, given Brexton had playfully tweeted before the race, “Can’t wait to kick my dad’s butt..,” Busch couldn’t resist evaluating his son’s performance on their drive home.
In a media session before the Martinsville race, Busch discussed his approach to debriefing with his son, noting, “I know Aaron, his crew guy that works with him a lot, his mentor is certainly key in all the things that he does… So, I know they were doing that, but my debrief hasn’t necessarily happened.”
However, Busch did seize a light-hearted moment to challenge his son, sharing that on the way home, he nudged Brexton a bit, asking “Just on the way home I was like “Hey how’s that third place in the heat race feel?” and he was like “Yeah I know Dad if I would have won I would have started on the pole.””
Christopher Bell is all praises for Busch
Following a year without wins, Busch is going all out to hone his skills, even if it means burning rubber on dirt tracks. Sprint cars, known for their lightweight frames and nimble handling, are a big contrast to the stock cars Busch usually races in. However, lately, he is often seen on the dirt tracks.
That’s why, after winning the pole position at Martinsville, Christopher Bell, a former Kyle Busch Motorsports alumnus, remarked on Busch’s evolving perspective towards dirt racing. Bell said:
“I’m going to dog on him a little bit, but whenever I went to KBM (Kyle Busch Motorsports) back in 2014, 2015 – we were talking about dirt racing, and he was kind of scoffing at me, like come on, dirt racing is nothing, its nothing, so now it makes my heart happy to see how invested he is in it.”
It appears that Busch is now recognizing the value of dirt track racing. Although the immediate impact on his NASCAR Cup Series performance is pending, having only managed a P17 finish in his latest outing at Martinsville and just a single top-5 and two top-10 finishes this season, there’s hope he’ll regain his form soon.
