Toyota Racing, #18-Kyle Busch, spoke to the media at Pocono, some notes and quotes:
Do you feel you have a respect issue in the garage and do you need respect in the garage to be successful?
ÂCanÂt answer the first part for you — you would have to ask everybody else. As far as needing respect in the garage area — certainly. It makes your day a little bit easier. Makes your job a little bit easier. IÂve been able to have good conversations and talk to people outside the race car or at driver intros or stuff like that. Whether itÂs the case that theyÂre not being true to my face — I donÂt know, I canÂt read that. IÂm not in peopleÂs minds. If youÂre mad at me, youÂll have to tell me.Â
Do you understand why Richard Childress was mad last week?
ÂMe giving a congratulatory bump to Joey Coulter is what tipped him (Richard Childress) over the edge there. I donÂt recall anytime — face-to-face conversation where Richard did tell me that, ÂIf you touch another one of my cars IÂm going to come find you. I donÂt know if it was ever said in the media, but it was never relayed to me.Â
Have you received any secret fines in the last seven days?
ÂNo.Â
How should NASCAR handle penalties if someone is threatening a lawsuit?
ÂI donÂt know. ThatÂs not to my discretion to be honest with you. ItÂs further to NASCAR to depose. ThatÂs a great question for the, but for myself, I need an instance of what youÂre explaining. Besides all the information youÂve just given me and the question youÂve asked, I canÂt really comment further.Â
Did you know how much damage there was on Joey CoulterÂs truck at Kansas?
ÂNo, I didnÂt feel like I hit him all that hard. I just thought I rubbed him a little bit. Typically when you rub a guy, you donÂt see much damage from it. The trucks are so different too. I forgot about how the left-front fender on a truck — the nose is so much wider than the tire is so it kind of sticks out a little further so maybe there was more damage than I thought I would have caused. ThatÂs entirely my fault — IÂm the one that instigated it there or initiated it. As far as him having to fly out body hangers and all that stuff — if itÂs something they didnÂt feel that they could hammer and dolly out, sorry it came to that.Â
Did the media interpret malicious intent toward Joey Coulter?
ÂThere can be an easy way to interpret things sometimes and it seems like maybe I might be on the wrong end of interpretation a lot of those times. There was no malicious intent to be involved in hurting or damaging a RCR (Richard Childress Racing) vehicle.Â
Was anything said to you by Richard Childress prior to last weekÂs incident?
ÂNo. We were in that NASCAR hauler from Darlington after the race and he (Richard Childress) never said a word in there.Â
How are M&MÂs handling the recent situations?
ÂM&MÂs is handling things the best that they can handle it and going through things day by day. ThereÂs a lot of support there. We just had a NASCAR day at Hackettstown, New Jersey yesterday and people were awesome. They had a lot of great questions about racing, about the sponsorship, about the partnership that we have and how things have really been working well for them over the past few seasons and how we can continue to grow the brand. TheyÂre doing everything they can in their power to make sure that we continue to carry on the presence of M&MÂs in NASCAR and with Kyle Busch.Â
(Toyota Racing)(6-10-2011)
