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Uncut with Jay Cutler: Kyle Busch Talks Early Racing Days, Introducing the Sport to His Son, and NASCAR’s Next Gen Cars

Hot off his recent win at Bristol Motor Speedway on Sunday, NASCAR driver Kyle Busch is the special guest on this week’s new episode of Uncut with Jay Cutler. Busch drives the No. 18 Toyota Camry for Joe Gibbs Racing and is a two-time Cup Series champion (2015, 2019). He’s the younger brother of fellow racer Kurt Busch who is also a Cup Series champ. The siblings have racing in their blood and got it honestly from their family.

Kyle Busch joined the show to talk about his life and professional career in NASCAR, which began at a young age. The 36-year-old opened up about being one of the youngest drivers on the circuit ever during his early days. Now, he’s even passing on his passion for racing to his 6-year-old son. So it sounds like the Busch racing gene is in good hands.

Plus, Busch talks to host Jay Cutler about many other subjects involving his career and NASCAR in general. Busch shares why he doesn’t like racing simulators on his off days. He talks about certain rule changes within the sport. Busch also gives his opinion on NASCAR’s new Next Gen cars, which the sport rolled out for the 2022 Cup Series season. The two famous athletes talk about that and much more in this week’s new episode of Uncut with Jay Cutler.

Kyle Busch Opens Up to Jay Cutler About the Early Start to His Racing Career

Kyle Busch has lived in North Carolina for almost 20 years after moving to the Charlotte area to pursue his NASCAR career. But previous to that, he was born and raised in Sin City – Las Vegas, Nevada. That’s where his racing career began as he grew up around a family of men who were car-obsessed. The Busch brothers both grew up working on their dad and grandad’s cars and their family would often attend races.

Their dad took it one step further as he started his own local race team in Las Vegas as an amateur driver. Eventually the two brothers followed in their father’s footsteps. At only 13 years old, Kyle started out racing in Legends Cars. By the time he was 16, the teenager became a professional driver on the NASCAR Truck Series circuit. He would become the youngest driver to ever win a NASCAR race, but shortly after the sport changed the age limit because of his success.

“I started racing at 13 and then I was racing the Truck Series at 16. I mean, it was quick. And so I think what happened was …,” Kyle Busch said before Jay Cutler chimed in.

“I mean you just got your license at that point,” Cutler joked.

“Pretty much, yea,” Busch agreed. “You know, and I think that’s why NASCAR people, the top guys, the executives were like, wait a second, this kid just turned 16. He’s only been racing for three years. He’s already now up here at a professional level. I think this is too young, too early. We can’t have somebody here like this right now. So they changed the age rule to 18.”

The NASCAR Champ Talks About His 6-Year-Old Son Who’s Already Racing

As Jay Cutler and Kyle Busch continued their conversation, the pair started to talk about fatherhood. Each have sons who are into sports, and Busch’s 6-year-old, Brexton, is already taking after his dad. As mentioned, the Busch brothers took on their father and grandfather’s love of racing. Now, that pastime is being handed down to the youngest generation of the Busch family.

While talking about Kyle Busch’s beginnings in racing, Jay Cutler asked the driver if he started out racing go-karts. That’s where many racers get their start when they begin racing at an early age. Although Kyle didn’t start in go-karts, his almost 7-year-old son is already racing them competitively.

“It’s just like me, I’ve got my boy [racing] too, so it’s crazy,” Busch said about getting his son into the sport. “Brexton, he’s 6, he’ll be 7 on May 18th. So he’s still on the younger, but he’s winning, he’s fired up. He wants to win ’em all.”

During the pandemic, Kyle introduced go-kart racing to Brexton. Kyle joked that his son didn’t exactly set the track on fire at first, but he’s took it seriously and continued to improve to the point where he’s a constant contender.

“He’s learned so much and he’s come such a long ways. Now, he’s fightin’ for wins every single place we go to every single time we’re on the track. So it’s really fun to watch,” Brexton’s famous father added.

Kyle Busch Shares His Thoughts On NASCAR’s Next Gen Cars

Later, the guys went on to discuss the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season, which just began in late February. Kyle Busch and his team are coming off a huge win at Bristol from this past weekend. For the 2022 season though, NASCAR has introduced the sport’s newest futuristic Next Gen cars that drivers are still getting used to. Obviously, Busch and his team are adjusting well since they just took the checkered flag on Sunday. However, every new model of stock car will take some adjustments for the drivers.

Each NASCAR team now gets seven cars they can rotate. But with parts shortages still an ongoing issue, he says they really have 4 or 5 they can rely on. Previously, teams could have as many cars as they wanted. Now, the new rules help even out the playing field since all the Next Gen cars are the same and come from the same vendors. Busch has mixed feelings about the change. He thinks there’s positives and negatives when it comes to the older Gen 6 cars and the newer Next Gen rides.

“How I kinda see it is, if you had every single car the same – like the setups were all the same and all that sorta stuff – then, boom, now it’s to the driver. That’s kind of what NASCAR wanted,” Busch said of the Next Gen cars. “They wanted it to be down to the crew chiefs – how smart they are. The drivers – how good they are. All with the same stuff to see who the best of the best is and being able to work with what they got.”

Make sure to check out Jay Cutler and Kyle Busch’s full conversation in the video above, or tune in and listen to Uncut with Jay Cutler on Spotify, Apple, or wherever else you listen to your favorite podcasts.