Parity On Display In NASCAR Cup Series So Far In 2023

Kyle Busch (left) and Kevin Harvick (right) talk in the garage area during practice for last week’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Circuit of The Americas. Photo: Chris Graythen/Getty Images

Kyle Busch says the overall parity in the sport since the introduction of the Next Gen race car last year is not a bad thing.

Going into Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Richmond Raceway, there have been five different winners in the opening six races of 2023 with William Byron the only repeat winner.

“Parity is always good, right,’’ said Busch, who scored a victory at California’s Auto Club Speedway in February.

“Last year we had 19 different winners. Every manufacturer, obviously. I think the guy who won the most races, it was four or five that they won and it’s been a while since it’s been that few races won by the top winner of the series. Typically, you see seven, eight, nine 10 race wins.

“It just showed good parity and I feel like a lot of that has more to do with this Next Gen race car than it does the manufacturers, but they are all working hard and doing best we can with what we continue to build on our program with RCR and Chevrolet and hopefully keep heading in the right direction.”

When comparing the NASCAR Cup Series competitiveness to other series, such as Formula One, Busch grinned.

“If you look at F1 I don’t think there’s much parity,” he said. “So you could argue, that you turn on NASCAR races and you kind of don’t know whose going to win each week. You know who’s good at particular race tracks but sometimes those guys, like myself, only win one race a year so they’re not winning every single week.

“Where you turn on an F1 race and you’re just wondering if anybody’s going to beat Red Bull right now. It was Mercedes. So, there’s obviously a distinct difference between our two series.”

Mending Fences

The Circuit of the Americas road course race last weekend provided a typically thrilling finish with Tyler Reddick scoring his first victory of the year in triple overtime – his first win in his new tenure with 23XI Racing.

But there was also a lot of action on track well behind the race for the checkered flag. Bent fenders, hot tempers and hurt feelings characterized the COTA outcome and it will be interesting to see how that reconciles as the series moves to the .75-mile Richmond track, where tight racing is also the norm.

Daniel Suárez even received a $50,000 fine this week for purposely running into his teammate Ross Chastain on the cool down lap heading to pit road.

Ryan Blaney acknowledged this week that high emotion is nothing new. It’s just a matter of how you handle it.

“No matter, if you’re a teammate, worst enemies, best friends, you do this enough, you’re gonna get into it with everybody intentional or not and those things just happen,” said Blaney, who won the Richmond pole position in this race last year and has top-10 finishes in his last three Richmond starts.

“The teammate side, Joey (Logano) and I have had a couple run-ins over the years, me and Austin (Cindric), and you get over that stuff. You talk about it. You get over it and you move on from it. Those things you have do, I think fairly quickly.

“There is still probably something in the back of your head, but, at the same time, you’re a team and if you’ve got two teammates pissed off at each other, that doesn’t help the camaraderie of the whole organization. So, I’m sure those guys (Suárez and Chastain) got over it, but I don’t know their business. It’s important to try to set things straight when you and a teammate have a run-in because you can’t be walking around the race shop and crew members and have them being mad at each other too.”

NASCAR Cup Series
Richmond Raceway – Richmond, VA
Toyota Owners 400 – April 2, 2023

Sunday’s Starting Line Up

Pos Car Driver Team Time Speed
1. 48 Alex Bowman Ally Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
2. 8 Kyle Busch 3CHI Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
3. 24 William Byron RaptorTough.com Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
4. 1 Ross Chastain Jockey Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
5. 45 Tyler Reddick SiriusXM Radio Toyota 0.000 0.000
6. 2 Austin Cindric Discount Tire Ford 0.000 0.000
7. 17 Chris Buescher Castrol Edge Ford 0.000 0.000
8. 47 Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. Kroger/Kraft Mac & Cheese Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
9. 5 Kyle Larson HendrickCars.com Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
10. 4 Kevin Harvick GEARWRENCH Ford 0.000 0.000
11. 11 Denny Hamlin Shingrix Toyota 0.000 0.000
12. 19 Martin Truex, Jr. Auto-Owners Insurance Toyota 0.000 0.000
13. 38 Todd Gilliland Quincy Compressor Ford 0.000 0.000
14. 54 Ty Gibbs # Monster Energy Toyota 0.000 0.000
15. 34 Michael McDowell Love’s Travel Stops Ford 0.000 0.000
16. 7 Corey LaJoie BlueGreen Vacations Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
17. 12 Ryan Blaney Menards/Moen Ford 0.000 0.000
18. 22 Joey Logano Shell Pennzoil Ford 0.000 0.000
19. 14 Chase Briscoe Mahindra Tractors Ford 0.000 0.000
20. 99 Daniel Suarez Quaker State Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
21. 20 Christopher Bell Rheem Toyota 0.000 0.000
22. 43 Erik Jones U.S. Air Force Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
23. 42 Noah Gragson # Sunseeker Resort Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
24. 6 Brad Keselowski Solomon Plumbing Ford 0.000 0.000
25. 16 A.J. Allmendinger Action Industries Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
26. 21 Harrison Burton Menards/Dutch Boy Ford 0.000 0.000
27. 3 Austin Dillon BREZTRI Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
28. 23 Bubba Wallace Leidos Toyota 0.000 0.000
29. 31 Justin Haley LeafFilter Gutter Protection Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
30. 9 Josh Berry(i) NAPA Auto Parts Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
31. 51 Cody Ware Biohaven/Jacob Co. Ford 0.000 0.000
32. 10 Aric Almirola Smithfield Ford 0.000 0.000
33. 41 Ryan Preece United Rentals Ford 0.000 0.000
34. 15 J.J. Yeley(i) CW & Sons Infrastructure Ford 0.000 0.000
35. 78 Anthony Alfredo(i) DUDE WIPES Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
36. 77 Ty Dillon NationsGuard Chevrolet 0.000 0.000
37. 13 Chandler Smith(i) Quick Tie Products Inc. Chevrolet 0.000 0.000