Kurt Busch said he wanted racing to become fun again when he split with Penske Racing.
Now with an underfunded team that seems unlikely to compete for many victories, Busch believes his passion is back.
"The pressure is not there," Busch said Friday. "It's not going to take winning to make me happy. Right now, it's just going to the track and having fun."
Busch will enter the season with Phoenix Racing, a sometimes start-and-park team that leans on Hendrick Motorsports for support. Team owner James Finch fielded his Chevrolet in all 36 races last season and did not start-and-park. But the team had only two top-15 finishes — 12th-place finishes by Landon Cassill and Bill Elliott.
Still, Busch thought it was a perfect fit for him after a tumultuous 2011 that ended with both sides parting ways in December after yet another public meltdown.
Busch has said he realized his behavior stemmed from being too tightly wound, too sponsor-conscious and unable to relax and be himself. He believes a step back from the pressure-cooker will help him, and he said in December he has started seeing a sports psychologist.
"If I'm going to sit there and tell stories to my grandchildren, this is not what I wanted to tell them," he said. "So in looking at the big picture, I've got to understand what it takes to be a competitive driver and to harness that fire in my belly the right way and to put it together in a 2004-style effort.
"When things are going smooth, this is a tough freight train to stop. When things are going rough, that's what I have to polish up on and knock the rough edges off."
Busch said he had discussions with Richard Petty, Richard Childress and Michael Waltrip. Petty, who needed a driver for his iconic No. 43, said this week that sponsors wouldn't touch Busch.
"Nobody at the time wanted to pay the bill for him. That's how simple it was," Petty said. "About everybody we talked to said, 'Man, maybe in six months to a year ... maybe we'll talk about it. Right now, he's on the front burner. If we put him on the back burner, yeah, we may sit down and talk to you.' "
Busch said that was news to him.
"It was weird to hear his comments yesterday because he was ready to throw me in the car, and we would have been down the road," Busch said. "But the contracts just didn't align on where they were and where I wanted to be, and so I talked with Finch, made the deal happen."
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