Kurt Busch returns to racing next week at Race of Champions
02/28/2025 12:45 AM
Kurt Busch is hoping that his upcoming participation at the Race of Champions is a springboard to a broader return to racing.
The 2004 NASCAR Cup Series champion was forced to call time on his full-time NASCAR career in 2023 due to the effects of a concussion sustained in a crash during qualifying at Pocono in 2022. He gained medical clearance to get back into the cockpit this week ahead of the Race of Champions in Sydney on March 7-8, and told RACER that he hopes that more driving is on the horizon.
"It has been awesome these last couple of months, preparing for the Race of Champions," Busch said.
"Fredrik Johnsson, the main guy of the Race of Champions, called me and I told him that I had a few things that I had to get sorted out to be able to participate. And once I was able to do that, it was like a cloud was lifted and blue skies opened up, and it has been awesome to just get back in the groove of making phone calls again to places like Alpinestars to get a new drivers suit, and to get all of my safety gear updated.
"I have been doing some track days in Arizona and some track days in North Carolina. Great friends have been (there) all the way around. Friends like Paul Tracy, the old IndyCar racer, helped me out. I went back and spent time at the old Radford Racing School. It‘s in Chandler, Arizona and I went there in the 1990s to work on my road racing skills. So it has been fun to go back and say hi to some of the guys and meet the new people.
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Busch said that the enforced time off from the commitments that come with racing in the Cup Series gave him an opportunity to open his eyes to other categories that he hasn‘t previously had time to consider.
— Racer —
