Kurt Busch says he 'wouldn't change
a thing' as he prepares to enter NASCAR's Hall of Fame
[January 23, 2026]
By STEVE REED
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — Success and fame came quickly for Kurt Busch.
In hindsight, maybe a little too fast for the driver known as “The
Outlaw.”
Busch won his first dwarf car race at age 15 in a small Nevada town,
setting him on a meteoric rise. He went on to win the Cup Series
championship just 11 years later in 2004 and finished his 23-year
professional career with 43 victories across NASCAR's three national
series before a concussion ended his time behind the wheel in 2023.
On Friday night, the 47-year-old Busch will be inducted into the
NASCAR Hall of Fame along with fellow drivers Harry Gant and Ray
Hendrick, culminating a drama-filled career that had more twists and
turns and momentum changes than your typical Sunday stock car race.
There were run-ins with NASCAR. Clashes with owners and crew members
of his own race teams. Altercations with other drivers and
reporters. Suspensions and firings became synonymous with the Busch
name.
There were highly-publicized relationship issues away from the
track, too.
“There is definitely the knowledge and wisdom thing that youth
doesn't have," Busch said with a laugh Thursday when asked if he
would do things differently during an interview with The Associated
Press. “And so if I could, I would have told my younger self to have
more patience and to not get so animated or so excited when things
went wrong.
“It was like I was on too high of highs and too low of lows,” Busch
went on to say. “If I could have just mellowed it out a little, I
think, that would have made for an easier path for me, so to speak.”
Getting to the Hall of Fame was not an easy journey for Busch, who
burned his share of bridges and made plenty of enemies along the
way, often bringing unnecessary negative attention upon himself
because of his short temper.
In 2005, his tumultuous six-year stint with Roush Racing, one that
included several on-track flare-ups, came to an end when he was
suspended for the final two races of the season by the team after he
was detained by police near the Phoenix track on suspicion of
drunken driving for being uncooperative and belligerent with
officers.
During a 2007 race at Dover for Team Penske, Busch recklessly
clipped a crew member for Tony Stewart’s team on pit road and was
parked by NASCAR for the remainder of the race.
His time with Penske ended in 2011 following a confrontation with a
member of the media. One year later, racing's governing body
suspended Busch for another incident in which he threatened another
reporter following a race at Dover.
Busch was suspended again prior to the 2015 season by NASCAR after a
judge said the former champion almost surely choked and beat a
former girlfriend and there was a “substantial likelihood” of more
domestic violence from him in the future.
Busch was never charged in the incident and later reinstated by
NASCAR.
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Former driver Kurt Busch is introduced to fans as an inductee to the
2026 Hall of Fame prior to a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at
Charlotte Motor Speedway, Oct. 5, 2025, in Concord, N.C. (AP
Photo/Matt Kelley, File)
As Busch aged, he began to mellow some.
He drove his Stewart-Haas Racing Ford to his only
Daytona 500 victory in 2017 and later helped lay the foundation for
23XI Racing run by Denny Hamlin and former NBA star Michael Jordan,
driving the No. 45 Toyota Camry and serving as a veteran leader for
the team’s expansion to a two-car operation.
Busch said Thursday that his fast ascent from winning the second
competitive race of his life in a dwarf car in Pahrump, Nevada as a
teenager to racing in the Cup Series at age 22 — he bypassed what
was then known as the Busch Series and went straight to the big
leagues because of his talent — never afforded him the time to
mature as a person.
He called his rise “uncharted territory” at the time.
“That journey, and how fast it went — that’s why I wasn’t ready to
be a professional," Busch said.
Busch, who followed his father Tom into auto racing and paved the
way for his highly successful younger brother Kyle, said he was
raised with a burning desire to win.
And that never went away.
“My dad, when he raced, he went to the track and he was not there to
make friends,” Busch said. “He wasn’t there for social hour. It was
‘We’re here for the trophy.’ So when you’re raised in that
mentality, that’s the tenacity and that’s what pushed me.”
Busch doesn't look back on his tumultuous career with regret,
though.
Despite the troubles, despite the ups and downs along his journey to
the Hall, Busch said he “wouldn't change a thing.”
“It was my ride, and I have to be happy with it,” Busch said. "I am
very complacent with how it all ended up.”
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