Richard Childress’ Frustration Boils Over, Sends Dire Warning: ‘We Are in Trouble’

 ”Gotta get some race cars,” the NASCAR Hall of Famer said over the No. 8 team radio. "We are in trouble. Period.”

While Childress has been known to share his feelings over the team radio, there wasn’t anything notable during the race that might have precipitated such a dire warning. And even more interestingly, the two-car team’s 2025 statistics are on pace to be better than the 2024 numbers.

For the entire 36-race schedule last year, Busch had 16 top 20s (five more than current 21-race season), 10 top 10s (three more) and five top fives (three more). Both his average starting and finishing positions are better this year. 

Dillon, Childress’ grandson, has performed similarly. He scored 13 top 20s (two more than current season), five top 10s (two more), a single top five (one more), which was also his controversial win at Richmond where he took out Joey Logano and Denny Hamlin on the final lap. He’s also improved his average starting and finishing position numbers in the 2025 campaign. 

Another interesting layer to the story is while Childress was clearly unhappy with his two-car organization, his other grandson Ty was in a celebratory mood and being congratulated by the garage for pulling off the improbable once again, beating John Hunter Nemechek and advancing to the finals of the in-season tournament challenge, where he will face off next week at Indianapolis with, ironically enough, another well-known grandson of a team owner in Ty Gibbs.