Photo – Jerry Markland/Getty Images
It seems hard to believe, but just three races remain in the 2015 NASCAR XFINITY Series campaign.
The series just completed a 16-week stretch with no off-weekends that began at Daytona International Speedway in July and culminated at Kansas Speedway. Back at Chicagoland in June, the last race prior to the off-weekend, I wrote that when this stretch was completed, a driver would emerge as the championship favorite.
That driver pilots the No. 60 Ford for Roush Fenway Racing. While many expected Chase Elliott to defend his series championship before his promotion to the Sprint Cup Series next season, it’s been Chris Buescher that has maintained the lead since his trip to victory lane at Iowa Speedway back in May.
Buescher finished fifth at Chicagoland and left the track with a 29-point advantage over Ty Dillon and a 43-point cushion over Elliott.
Over the course of the 16-week stretch, Buescher never yielded the lead in the championship and finished no worse than 16th, which came at Indianapolis. The Propser, Texas native finished third, fourth and ninth on the three road courses during the summer stretch. With three races remaining, Buescher holds a 27-point lead over Elliott and is 33 points ahead of Regan Smith, Elliott’s teammate at JR Motorsports.
“We knew this summer stretch would be a tough part of our season, but we made it through pretty well,” Buescher said.
In 30 starts this season, Buescher has two wins, 11 top-five and 20 top-ten finishes. The 22-year-old is one of only two XFINITY Series regulars that has visited victory lane more than once.
“When you look through the XFINITY regulars it’s been a tough season on the regulars. We haven’t been able to get a whole lot of wins between all of us, and that’s been a tough part of this season is trying to run with Cup guys.”
Buescher carries a streak of seven straight races with a top-ten finish into the break before the final three races on the schedule at Texas, Phoenix and Homestead.
“Everybody keeps using the word comfortable for the points battle. There’s no comfort in it right now. It’s nice to have some gap, but it’s not very much when you look at the grand scheme of things and how many points can be gained or lost in a race weekend. We’re gonna keep doing what we’ve been doing.”
Even if Buescher wins the championship this season, it isn’t a guarantee that he will be racing at the Sprint Cup Series level when the field takes the green flag at Daytona International Speedway to being the 2016 season.
“I don’t know that I’m fully prepared right now,” Buescher said when asked if he was ready to go Cup racing next year. “This is a sport where you see way too many people get rushed up into the next level and aren’t ready to perform at that level.
“I’ve done all kinds of testing back when it was still allowed and all over this country from California back to Charlotte (in Cup cars with Roush Fenway Racing), so I feel pretty good about running in a Cup car. I had a lot of fun in the Front Row car earlier this year. I feel like our six races went really well all things considered, and my experience level I feel I was able to get in it and have it come to me rather quickly. If that’s what 2016 brings, then I think I’ll be ready for it.”
As for Buescher’s strategy to finish out the 2015 campaign?
“We’re out here to try and win races, knowing that if you win there’s nobody out here that’s gonna get any more points than you.”