Two-time NASCAR Cup Series champion. NASCAR's most winningest driver ever across all three national series. Ninth on NASCAR's all-time Cup Series wins list. These are all incredible accolades Kyle Busch has achieved in his career so far.
Having achieved so much, the Richard Childress Racing driver has absolutely nothing to prove to anybody. Indeed, his place as a NASCAR legend is secure, as is his spot in the Hall of Fame when he decides to call it a day.
However, after going winless for the first time in 19 seasons in 2024, heading into 2025, Busch needed a rebound. Approaching and heading into his 40s, was he on the decline? Or was 2024 just a case of bad luck?
Kyle Busch 2025 season recap
Well, although he wasn't one of the hot favorites for the championship by any means, the odds you could get on Kyle Busch becoming the 2025 champion showed the level of respect he still had in the sport despite his winless 2024.
The Richard Childress Racing star entered the season as ninth favorite to lift the Cup Series title at Phoenix in November, coming in at +2200 at the conclusion of the previous campaign and in the end, he didn't even end up making the playoffs, meaning that it was another incredibly underwhelming season for Busch and his No. 8 team.
That failure to make the playoffs largely came because it was another winless season for 'Rowdy', who only managed to finish inside the top five on three occasions throughout the entire season. This marked his worst number of top-five finishes in the Cup Series since 2004, when he only competed in six of the 34 races.
Those finishes came at COTA, the Chicago Street Race and the season finale at Phoenix, with COTA having undoubtedly represented his best chance of a victory last season, only for tire degradation to hit late on after a very competitive battle with eventual winner Christopher Bell up to that point.
It wasn't just a lack of wins or top fives that were the issue, though. Even top 10s were hard to come by for Busch and his team, with his return in this regard (10) also marking his worst since becoming full-time in the Cup Series.
| Category | Statistic |
|---|---|
| Races | 36 |
| Wins | 0 |
| Top 5s | 3 |
| Top 10s | 10 |
| DNFs | 2 |
| Pole Positions | 0 |
| Laps Led | 88 |
| Average Starting Position | 17.5 |
| Average Finish | 17.9 |
| Points (Stage) | 737 (50) |
| Final Points Rank | 21 |
| Playoff Result | DNQ |
A real low point of Busch's campaign came in Mexico City, where he was classified as 37th and took out several cars, himself included, after igniting a multi-car wreck at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez.
Conditions were damp and tricky in Mexico City, but after a poor season up to that point, the lap seven incident just about summed up where Busch and his No. 8 Richard Childress Racing team were at.
Unfortunately, results didn't improve at any point for the remainder of the campaign; in fact, you could even argue that things got more excruciating. It became expected for Busch to be regularly running outside the top 10 - something that was unthinkable just a few seasons ago - and both he and team owner Richard Childress became increasingly frustrated with the machinery at their disposal.
Ultimately, this saw the two-time champion finish the season a lowly 21st in the standings - quite a way off being the ninth most likely to win the title and considerably short of the playoffs on either wins or points.
But, as always in these season recaps, we like to find the positives, and the big one for Busch is that a new season is just around the corner, and there is some cause for optimism.
Optimism heading into 2026
Despite his struggles, Busch and RCR agreed to a contract extension last year that will continue to see them work together into the new season, which would suggest that both driver and team are committed to fixing the mess they find themselves in, and the No. 8 team also has a new crew chief in Jim Pohlman sitting on top of their pit box.
Pohlman was one of the research and development directors at RCR during the initial next-gen era, and in that period, the team was winning races. His fresh set of eyes, in that regard, will be very much welcomed.
For all the optimism a new season brings, though, one thing is totally clear heading into 2026. The expectation from the oddsmakers for Kyle Busch to win races has diminished significantly, never mind championships. This is reflected by the fact that you can currently get odds of +5000 on him to win the championship next season.
The oddsmakers have clearly made up their mind on the 40-year-old, and if we're being brutally honest, some fans are starting to reach the conclusion that he can no longer win races, too.
However, at 40 years old, Busch has plenty of life left in his racing career yet, and plenty of time to prove his doubters wrong.
