There is a narrative out there in the NASCAR community that Parker Retzlaff owes Kyle Busch, Richard Childress Racing and Chevrolet an apology but the two-time Cup Series champion doesn’t feel that way.
“Not me, but I don’t really know him that well,” Busch said. “I don’t know what kind of business relationships there are behind the scenes. Once upon a time, when I owned a Truck Series team, we had other teams that we supported and helped, gave parts and pieces and resources to. I don’t know how all that works with Beard behind the scenes.
“Yeah, not to me, he doesn’t owe me anything.”
The behind-the-scenes machinations Busch referenced is that the Beard Motorsports No. 62 team Retzlaff drove for last weekend at Daytona leased its ECR engine to the deal while also serving as a technical partner of sorts.
Busch was leading the race at Daytona on the final restart, sharing the front row with Harrison Burton, both drivers needing nothing short of a win to advance into the Cup Series playoffs. Christopher Bell was third at the choose and lined up behind Busch with Retzlaff taking the top behind Burton.
Retzlaff pushed Burton in a Wood Brothers Ford past Busch to the win, generating some tension within the Childress and Chevrolet camps as a result. Of course, there has been little attention garnered towards Bell lagging back to not push Busch to the win, which would have also knocked Bubba Wallace out of a playoff spot.
There was also communication over the radio that said ‘do not push the 21’ but Retzlaff also claims to have not heard it, pondering that it was said on channel 2 and not on the radio that goes directly to his ear.
Ultimately, Retzlaff said he was simply trying to win the race for Beard Motorsports and his sponsors.
“I didn’t want to push a Ford to the win necessarily but FunkAway has supported me for the last two years in NASCAR and it was their first Cup race and I wanted to do whatever in my power to give them a good result and put my name on the map. The end of the race is not how I wanted it to work, pushing a Ford, but I also didn’t want to give away a result for FunkAway and how they’ve supported me.”
Busch said he didn’t expect Retzalff to help him because the Beard team wasn’t even included in the Chevrolet pre-race teams meeting in the first place.
“We have our Chevrolet team meetings and key partner meetings and he’s not in those, so if you’re not in one of those, you should not be relied upon as a key partner to need to push and know the game that needs to be played,” Busch said. “That’s how I look at it.”