Kyle Busch was almost watching the start of the 2026 NASCAR Cup Series season from the sidelines. The driver of the No. 8 suffered a freak injury at his home that required 24 stitches.
The two-time Cup Series champion appeared as a guest on his wife, Samantha’s, podcast. Fans of “Certified Oversharer” got to hear a chaotic story as Kyle Busch recounted the details of what happened.
Kyle Busch suffered leg laceration from an accident at his home
Just days before the Cook Out Clash exhibition at Bowman Gray Stadium, it was a regular day at the Busch household.
But it turned into anything but an ideal day when Kyle went to fix a faulty smoke detector on the upstairs level of his house. With it being a “shorter” ceiling, all Busch needed was an 18-inch step stool to reach the smoke detector.
Busch assembled the stool and climbed up, but when he reached up, something went wrong.
“I get up on the stool and as I’m reaching up with my second arm, the stool explodes,” Busch said.
Initially, Busch felt as if he was OK as he landed on his feet and had his hands on the wall. That was until his son, Brexton, comes out and immediately tells his father he’s bleeding.
“As soon as he said, ‘You’re bleeding,’ I look down, and it’s not like you’re bleeding like a nosebleed. It is like pouring. Like, you’re gushing. … I’m like, ‘This is hospital grade,’” Busch said.
As shown in an image on the podcast, Busch had suffered a deep laceration on his right leg. Samantha immediately drove Kyle to the hospital with his leg propped up on the dashboard of the car covered in towels.
At first, Busch’s wife recalled a physician assistant (PA) was going to stitch his leg up, but was reluctant because he was a NASCAR driver and didn’t “want to mess up his leg.”
When Samantha saw the injury, it was as gruesome as her husband described.
“When they lifted up his leg, he’s not kidding. This flap was down and it was just gushing,” Samantha said.
Kyle Busch needed 24 stitches after home accident
Eventually, the doctor came in and ensured there wasn’t any porcelain inside the wound. Luckily, the laceration just missed a muscle in Busch’s leg.
“Just sliced the fat, folks. Didn’t even get a muscle,” Kyle Busch said.
The injury required 24 stitches. Fortunately, as Samantha noted, the injury wasn’t worse, as the freak incident happened just days prior to the Cook Out Clash at Bowman Gray.
“Thank God, though, because this was less than a week out before Bowman Gray. Like, you would not have been racing,” Samantha told Kyle.
Busch ended up being ready to race as he proceeded to qualify on the pole for this year’s Daytona 500, the first time he’s done so in his career. Aside from that, however, results have been difficult to come by.
The Richard Childress Racing driver has failed to post a top-10 finish in 2026. His best finish after four races was 12th at Circuit of The Americas. Busch currently sits 20th in the points standings.