Kyle Busch and new crew chief Ben Beshore are off to a promising start for the 2021 campaign, after bringing Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR) a season-opening win in the Busch Clash Tuesday evening.
News broke that crew chief Adam Stevens and Kyle Busch confirmed that they were splitting after the 2020 campaign in November, which may have caught some fans off guard as a sudden change after an off-season for the pair.
Busch went into specific details on Wednesday in an interview on why the duo parted ways following an abysmal season for the defending champion.
“Just something wasn’t working or clicking,” Busch said to Bensinger. “I asked Adam for a couple of changes to be made over the offseason, and he didn’t agree with my philosophy on those changes. So he said, ‘You know what, I’m going to do something different and let you do something different and we will see what happens.’ ”
“I was shocked because I was like, well, essentially you just told me you quit on me,” Busch explained. “OK. See you later. Now I have to go find somebody else who is going to be the next guy to step in and take over the reins.”
Kyle Busch stated that he requested “personnel changes” and that Adam Stevens declined to honor his request.However talks between the two ultimately led to the splitting of the championship-winning duo.
Chase Elliott: “If I’m sorry about trying to win the race, I’m in the wrong business.”
Busch continued: “When we’re at the racetrack, and we’re under normal circumstances, every time we’re in practice sessions and I ask for changes or I talk about how the car is reacting, and he makes changes, we always improve. I haven’t had that with a lot of crew chiefs. Sometimes you talk about the same thing over and over again, from the moment you unload to the moment you go home there’s never improvement, there’s never change.