By Luis Torres, Staff Writer
An All-Star sized drama escalated very early in the 40th NASCAR All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro Speedway, leaving one driver heated on a full moon Sunday night.
On the opening lap of the 200-lap main feature, Kyle Busch was already racing hard to get by both Michael McDowell and Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. for 10th position.
However, Busch saw himself being squeezed by Stenhouse and brushed the backstretch wall as a result. Busch was irate over the contact from Stenhouse and made it clear he wasn’t going to accept the ordeal.
It led to Busch targeting the 10th place car of Stenhouse and coming into the exit of Turn 1, he annihilated the No. 47 Kroger Healthy/Icy Hot Chevrolet into the wall, bringing out the first caution of the night.
A cold end didn’t meant things got hot as Stenhouse brought the wounded Chevrolet onto pit road and parked it in Busch’s pit stall. Knowing his chance at a million dollars was over as he made sure nobody was going to forget the 20th place finisher.
Stenhouse exited his car and climbed on top of the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing’s pit box to confront Busch’s crew chief Randall Burnett about the incident. Choice words were told before Stenhouse walked away to make a mandatory visit to the infield care center.
Neither Burnett nor RCR’s Vice President of Competition Andy Petree were fazed about Stenhouse’s issue to Busch wrecking him and went on with their night.
Stenhouse explained that he saw an opening in the middle and went for the gap Busch left when the green flag dropped. Initially, Stenhouse thought it would end up being just a fender bender between Busch and McDowell, but felt Busch didn’t understood the memo.
“We had a really good start. (Kyle) left the door wide open. I went through the middle and I almost had him cleared,” said Stenhouse. “The No. 34 (McDowell) kind of ran up the track, and we all just kind of touched there. Nothing major.
“And then Kyle tried to wreck me in (turns) three and four, and finally did wreck me there in one and two. Our No. 47 Kroger Healthy/Icy Hot Chevy was really fast. I felt really good. We were good in practice. We had already passed two or three cars there, so bummed we couldn’t see it through to the end.”
Without mincing words, Stenhouse will wait to have a conversation with Busch where it can lead to Richard Childress taking action.
“I guess he was mad,” said…
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