2004 NASCAR Cup Series Champion Kurt Busch Retires

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Kurt Busch, the 2004 NASCAR Cup Series champion and a 34-time winner in the series, has officially announced his retirement from the top level of stock car racing. Busch's decision comes 13 months after a crash at Pocono left him with lingering effects from a concussion that has kept him out of the car.

While Busch announced that he was stepping away from full-time racing after last season, he had left the door open to a return once he was medically cleared to race again. In a brief video shared to Twitter today, he announced that discussions with his medical team led him to the understanding that this would not be possible any time soon and made his retirement official. It ends a long and unique career, one that saw Busch fired on at least one occasion before becoming one of the most respected voices in all of stock car racing.

Early in his career, Busch was known for a short temper and an uneasy relationship with the teams that employed him. Busch left Roush Racing, the team he drove for during his 2004 championship season, two races early after acitation for reckless driving during a race weekend. A six-year stint at Penske ended when Busch was dropped, or maybe fired, in December of 2011 after a series of public confrontations with reporters in and around NASCAR. Busch spent two years at the smaller Phoenix and Furniture Row Racing before landing at Stewart-Haas Racing, where he served a brief suspension following domestic violence allegations.

That reputation took a sharp turn in the opposite direction in the second half of his career. As his time with SHR continued, he became known as a steadying presence at a team with an inconsistent history. He was seen as a major veteran asset for a struggling program by the time he joined Chip Ganassi Racing, securing the IndyCar legend's final two wins as a team owner before that program was sold to Trackhouse Racing. In his brief final stint at the young 23XI Racing, he became the only driver to secure victories for all of Ford, Chevrolet, Dodge, and Toyota.

While he was never officially a teammate of his championship-winning brother Kyle Busch in the Cup Series, 23XI's alignment with Toyota meant that the two brothers finally worked together closely last season. The younger Busch left the Toyota-backed Joe Gibbs Racing for Chevrolet and Richard Childress Racing before this season, meaning that the relationship would not have continued into 2023 whether or not the elder Busch was able to race this year.

Thanks to both that rocky public persona during the first half of his career and a stellar reputation as a team player later on, Busch has won races with five different teams. Those wins span from four victories during his second full-time season in 2002 toa big day for 23XI racing at Kansas last year, just 13 races into his time with the young team. That feat alone should make him a NASCAR Hall of Famer very soon. He also has a championship and a Daytona 500 for good measure.

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