Busch “would not have been able to race” without break due to injury

While on vacation, Busch appeared in photos with a brace around his left wrist. The 2x NASCAR Cup Series champion had sprained it in the closing laps of the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

While battling Denny Hamlin for position down into Turn 3, he spun out from under him and crashed into the outside wall. He blamed “these great Next Gen race cars” for the injury, curtly adding: “Snap the wheel and snap your wrist.” The two-week break was lucky timing for Busch in a year where nothing has seemed to go his way. Busch has yet to win a race this season and currently sits outside the Cup playoffs.

The wrist is still wrapped, but Busch admitted that “without two weeks off, I would not have been able to race. I’m good. I’m pretty good now.”

He explained that there is nothing broken and it’s just a sprained wrist, but he was also eager to move on to topics regarding the current race weekend. Busch qualified 12th at Richmond, a track where he leads all active drivers in race wins (six). Richard Childress Racing showed decent pace overall, and his team-mate Austin Dillon advanced into the final round of qualifying.

“Yeah, I mean, we unloaded good here,” said Busch. “We felt good balance and you know decent speed. So definitely a balance difference between the two sets of tires. That was probably our biggest thing that was our biggest struggle. So just if we can close that gap up, I felt pretty good on the controls and. Austin laid down a really good lap to make the top ten there, so I thought I could have run at least what Denny ran if I were to hit my line and everything perfect. But I messed up just a little bit, so I didn’t quite get that.”