Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour presented by NASCAR on FOX - Chris Buescher Interview | VICTORY LAP

Episode Date: September 16, 2024

Join Kevin Harvick for a special episode of Victory Lap as he sits down with Chris Buescher! In this exclusive interview, Chris takes us behind the scenes of his thrilling OT victory at Watkins Glen! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to Kevin Harvick's Happy Hour, presented by NASCAR on Fox. We encourage you to follow us wherever you get your social media or on YouTube. And today on our Victory Lab, we have Chris Buster, who had an absolutely phenomenal race and especially the ending that he and SVG gave us a treat to. So I can't wait to catch up with him. Here's a motion from missing the playoffs to win in a race. I hope you enjoy the conversation as well. Chris, thanks for taking the time today to join us after your win.

man, what a last couple sequences of restarts, and then you had that last restart. SVG got by you there, and did you think you were going to have another chance and it would play out the way that it did? I sure hope so. I do it was going to be hard. Obviously, SBG's extremely talented road racer.

And we had a couple of good restarts there and kept getting those quick cautions and that last one. the excitement level turned up a little bit. Everybody drove down into turn one a little harder yet. A little push and shoving through there and lost the lead. And I was pretty deflated until we took the light. And I realized that we gained a little bit in turn one and up through the S's.

And made me realize we were within striking distance there. So I tried to run in hard, keep pressure on. And, you know, ultimately he had that really big slug. and the bus stop and I kind of opened a window of opportunity to get back to the lead there and it's quick to see it on that one. Yeah, well, it was a fantastic finish. And I think from a fan's perspective that I get now sitting in home to watch it. And just that last lap was pretty unbelievable.

And, you know, I think with the thing that people don't realize with this car is just how physical those restarts get now. and when you're actually the leader, you're almost vulnerable. And I think that probably dictates a lot of lane choice that you had going into turn one on the bottom because it seemed like a lot of times those guys would get shoved out wide that were up on the outside. Was that really the choice of picking the bottom every time? Yeah, it seemed to be pretty consistent through the race. And, you know, you just, you're guarding.

The top was able to roll a little better speed if all lanes would have been, but you surely can't count on that in overtime attempts. You know, we're just, you know you're going to get pushed wide from the outside and new we're going to have a hard charging laying down the inside.

So you go to cover that, which, you know, forces me to be way further out on exit that I want to be just by not getting that proper arc. And it's, yeah, it's pushing, shoving. There's no metal fender damage. There's no, really nothing that's going to hurt your race car in that moment, especially in corners on research like that that are fairly slow. You know, you're going to have a little beating and banging.

And you know what? Walkins Glen has produced some fantastic finishes through the years. And we've been a part of a close finish this year that is going to go through highlight reels forever. and at least this one will be more enjoyable to look back and see it on the TV and say that one, we ended up on the good side. Well, it's fun to watch from a fan perspective. Take me through your season.

You know, I think a lot of us saw the speed that RFK had last year. You guys kind of started the year with a new body, had to figure some things out. Middle of the year, I felt like, oh, man, they've really found it and kind of had a couple weeks there where kind of got away from you as far as the circumstances. and everything that happened. Talk me through the middle part of that year, everything leading up to the end of the regular season, and now winning a race.

How did, how has that, how has your team been? How have you been? I know it's been very up and down, but this has to put some icing on the cake to say, oh, you know, it's not a complete loss of the season finally getting back to Victory Lane. Yeah, you know, it's been over a year since we've been able to win a race. and I'm excited to be at a point in my career and with a team where that upsets us. But, you know, there was definitely different times throughout. So to be working this hard to get back to Victory Lane, to have the season we've had, yeah, we've had some very close calls.

We started off the season very good, and I didn't hit a little bit of a wall there in the, you know, five to 10 weeks stretch and after that seemed to learn enough and get our legs up underneath us and we're able to be pretty competitive. We certainly could have used a little bit of good luck along the way would have surely helped us in a lot of scenarios. But you know what? We missed that as a group on a handful of things too. You know, I made some poor decisions from behind the wheel. We've had a couple of just different struggles throughout the season that ended up just taking away our day. And put us in a spot where not able to get into the playoffs simply from wins like we had anticipated the year.

We hit that fantastic stretch last year. The biggest goal on this season was not to wait that long. And we waited longer. So definitely not the goals that we had set for ourselves. I am frustrated and certainly taking a hit on us over the last couple of weeks, knowing that with the year we've had, the speed we've had, the fact that we have been able to get a checker flag now, what we could have done in the playoffs will remain a mystery.

So that part is very, very frustrating. And at the end of the day, we know the system. and we just didn't capitalize on it at the right time. So we're going to go into these next handful and bring into a place to a more often. Well, you're a very well-mannered, you know, quiet person and kind of fly under the radar. And I think, you know, when people see what they saw this weekend out of you and your team and have seen that in the past, I don't want to make it sound like this just started because it hasn't. But when they see you succeed like that and you had a good car all weekend,

in the mix, beat one of the best road racers in the world. And now you go into the playoffs and you look to be, you know, a spoiler as you go forward, too. So, but my last question here is, I don't think a lot of people would have pinned high-level road racer on Chris Bisher, right? And because you are such a under-the-radar type of guy, I was fortunate to go to Road America and watch you, you know, in a Mustang and watch the, you know, the training and things that you in time that you would put into your road racing skills. Talk to me about just the road racing skills that you have,

because I think you're sneaky quiet from the road race standpoint, how you've worked through that with all the Ford people and yourself and what your background is in the road racing. Yeah, I'm not a road racer by trade, but I love them. I've always enjoyed road racing, whatever it's been. We used to, in Texas, we ran four races on a road course in the infield at the Texas Speedway there. It's a little rough around the edges, but it was just a good training round and picked up on it pretty quick. And then from Archer Racing to Exfay Racing, had some good teachers, Dick Danielson early on my career while I was Archer Racing, Billy Johnson, a handful of folks within the Ford Group that have really helped.

hone in on different skill sets that have come from different backgrounds, whether it's prototypes or Trans Am or Stock Car Racing. I've had really good teachers along the way that have helped just hone in on different skills. And I think with the appreciation for it and enjoying it, my mindset is good going into road races, and it certainly seemed to help them go a lot better. You know, you've seen it, right? There's a group of drivers that hate road racing, and as much as they hate it, you don't see them run well. Very, very rarely do they get it figured out.

And I think, you know, the first half of that just comes from the idea and the mindset that you don't want to be there. And I don't want to be that guy. So, you know, with that, we're able to take what we've learned through the years. We've had good runs and all kinds of races. My first Xfinity win, my first NASCAR win was at Mid Ohio on a road course. And I remember driving back to the airport, talking on the phone with Jack, he said, good job. But what was that? You were supposed to be our short track guy.

So, you know, it's got a lot of people off guard through the years. But our record's been great for the last several years road racing. I'm just stoked to finally get a win to finally say, yeah, we've, we've, been able to run second or fourth or sixth, it's finally got to win on these things. So that's a big personal accomplishment for myself. Well, it was fun to watch, and I appreciate you taking the time today

to share a little bit of your weekend with us and your background. And we wish you luck going forward. Go win some more, man. Have some fun these last few weeks, and we'll see you next year when we get to the Daytona 500. Sounds like you playing. We'll go there again.