Kurt Busch getting back into the groove ahead of Race of Champions

2004 NASCAR Cup Series Champion Kurt Busch will line up alongside Team USA teammate Travis Pastrana in the 2025 Race of Champions set for March 7-8 inside Sydney, Australia’s Accor Stadium. Busch’s full-time NASCAR Cup career came to a close in 2023 after he suffered a severe concussion during qualifying at Pocono during the summer of 2022. This past week, Busch was granted medical clearance to begin competing in motor racing again.

“It has been awesome these last couple of months, preparing for the Race of Champions,” said Busch. “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 driver’ suit and to get all of my safety gear updated. I’m looking at helmet, gloves, shoes and then hitting the track.

"I have been doing some track days in Arizona and some track days in North Carolina. Great friends have been 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.

“Now we here are at Charlotte Motor Speedway. I’m out here with Travis Pastrana and we were on their skid pad. I’ve also been working on the training process with the rally cars. We’ve been working on all the launches, the all-wheel drive and then pitching the cars into the corners.”

A former supercross champion, motocross champion, multi-time X Games gold medalist and, to many insiders, the most recognized and accomplished action sports athlete short of Evel Knievel, Busch is stoked to team with the high flying Travis Pastrana come the RoC.

“Travis Pastrana is a good friend of mine, and from all of the different paths that we’ve walked in motorsports, here’s another one we are crossing. And every time we have crossed paths with one another, it has been so much fun and there is such an education that both of us talk about with each other. We talk about what we’ve been through and what we’ve done and where we are going.

"The call came through Fredrik Johnsson and the Race of Champions and he was recruiting the best talent that he could that is available. I mean, it always tough for Fredrik. He's got one of the toughest jobs in motorsports. He’s got the pedigree of the Race of Champions. He’s been around the world to all different arenas and stadiums. But to find people who have the time in their schedule and who are the best of the best, that’s a bridge that is tough to cross. He’s got to use some of the racers and the racers that he has lined up to recruit others. That’s when the phone call came to me from Travis Pastrana and I said, ‘Bro! I remember we ran strong together at Miami a few years back when we were on Team USA.'

"Now with us being together for this race, we’ve really laser focused in on our years past together and what went right and what went wrong and what can we go down there and apply in 2025 to bring home that big trophy. The Race of Champions will be on tarmac. With my asphalt experience, different style cars, rear wheel, all wheel, front engine, rear engine, sequential gearboxes, whatever it may be, I feel like Travis and I have every box checked, and we’re going to go into this with our eyes ready and focused and not wide opened and intimidated by the situation.

"I’ve got a second place trophy from the Nations Cup, and I want to advance further and do my best to win it overall. Each year you go, you have to apply a better position for yourself and the team around you. I’m in that spot right now. It’s awesome to see this. And with all due respect, yes, these are the names you want to race against. This type of atmosphere around the race of Champions, you can’t get wrapped up in who you are going up against. You’re going up against yourself, that car and that track. You can’t get intimidated by who is around you or you think you can easily beat. I want to have a good bit of fun, a good bit of success and to be among the camaraderie of being in the paddock with other racers and the energy from the stadium and the crowd.

"There is going to be that old school feel of just being on call for practice sessions, race sessions and media sessions and just blending in and having fun with all the guys who have done this for so many years, and also the locals down there in Australia. It has been fantastic. This is not at that full Cup Series level. I’m not racing at Circuit of the Americas in Austin this weekend for NASCAR, but it’s cool to get my plane ticket and to head to Australia and to get in the seat down there and drive with the best of the best."