March 23, 2009
By Ron Felix
People are starting to wonder, how much better can this guy be?
Twenty-three year-old Kyle Busch has done it again. Busch led five times for 378 of 503 laps en route to his second win in the last three races. He also won at Las Vegas three weeks ago. Busch dominated the Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway on Sunday to win his second Bristol race.
“It’s pretty awesome. We should’ve won here last fall and we should’ve won here yesterday. We’ve had so many great Nationwide cars here, too, we just keep messing up on pit road (yesterday)," said Busch. "“This thing really came to life today. Our car was fast. We knew we were in practice but we just weren’t sure exactly how fast."
Busch also has won 14 Sprint Cup races in 155 career attempts.
There were some concerns for Busch in the closing laps. He knows as well as anyone that something can go wrong.
“There definitely is (concerns) especially when we were gaining on all those lap cars with like 30 to go," Busch continued. "You never know if a lap car’s gonna turn another lap car and spin in front of you and you're going to T-bone the guy or whatever. You never know what’s gonna happen. That’s what so tricky about this race track. That's what makes it so fun when you do win here, you know all the things that can happen.
"We had a good racecar today. When we got behind on pit road there, we drove back up through, like Steve (Addington, crew chief) said, we passed Denny (Hamlin) after a few laps, then we passed Jimmie (Johnson) when he got in traffic a little bit. Traffic was just real tough. Everyone runs equal side by side, it's so hard to get by guys.”
John Harrelson/Getty Images for NASCAR
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Busch Passes Johnson For Lead
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Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Denny Hamlin, finished second.
"It’s great to get a one-two finish for Joe Gibbs Racing and just can’t thank this whole team enough," Hamlin said. "A good job on pit road today, very solid. We just had a solid car all day. We had a third place car on short runs and we had a winning car on long runs just never got it. It’s somewhat of a redemption, but we feel like we deserve to be in victory lane and hopefully we’ll get that done next week.”
Jimmie Johnson brought his Chevrolet home in third, one place ahead of his teammate Jeff Gordon.
"It was such a great team battle," Gordon said. "I just love the fight these guys on this DuPont Impala are putting up. I mean, I wish the chase was right now because we are in championship form right now. We are very consistent, we are fighting, we are making good adjustments, great pit stops. I was a little disappointed; I really thought we were going to be better than that."
Kasey Kahne finished in the fifth spot followed by pole sitter Mark Martin, Ryan Newman, Jeff Burton, Juan Pablo Montoya and Marcos Ambrose to round out the top ten.
Scott Speed posted a 28th-place finish and took Raybestos Rookie of the Race honors for the second time this season.
“I tried not to hit anything," said Speed. “I think it’s more random whether you hit it or miss it it’s a big space difference. It’s more random. I think mile-and-a-halfs are a little bit easier to get everything out of what you need.”
Unofficially Joey Logano leads Speed by one point (53-52) in the Raybestos Rookie standings.
The next event on the Sprint Cup schedule – the sixth event of 36-races for the 2009 Sprint Cup Championship. The Goody's Fast Pain Relief 500 will be on March 29th, at Martinsville Speedway in Martinsville, Virginia. The race begins at approximately 1:30 p.m. eastern time with live, high-definition coverage provided by FOX beginning with its pre-race show at 12:30 p.m. eastern time.
The race will also be broadcast live on SIRIUS Satellite Radio Channel 128 and MRN radio.
For full final race results...
(Insider Racing News)
For top-40 Sprint Cup drivers points...
(Insider Racing News)
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