DARLINGTON, SOUTH CAROLINA – MAY 20: Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Delivering Strength Toyota, crosses the finish line under caution to later win the rain-shortened NASCAR Cup Series Toyota 500 at Darlington Raceway on May 20, 2020, in Darlington, South Carolina. (Photo by Jared C. Tilton/Getty Images)
Post-Darlington 2, the power ranking for the NASCAR Cup Series reveals a few ups and downs with Denny Hamlin’s win and Chase Elliott’s spin.
The second Cup Series race at Darlington Raceway was an exciting finish. Denny Hamlin was leading the Toyota 500, with Chase Elliott in close pursuit. Suddenly, Kyle Busch nipped the No. 9 car in the rear quarter panel, spinning Elliott around and out of contention. Hamlin wins the rain-shortened race, Busch still finishes second, Kevin Harvick is third, with Brad Keselowski and Erik Jones rounding out the top-five.
DARLINGTON, SOUTH CAROLINA – MAY 21: Chase Briscoe, driver of the #98 HighPoint.com Ford, celebrates in Victory Lane after winning the NASCAR Xfinity Series Toyota 200 at Darlington Raceway on May 21, 2020, in Darlington, South Carolina. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)
Chase Briscoe Rides Emotions in NASCAR Xfinity Series Return to Racing
An emotional Chase Briscoe battled Kyle Busch to the line, beating and banging each other in the last ten laps, that probably had fans at home on their feet. Briscoe overcame Busch at the line to capture the win in the Toyota 200 at Darlington Raceway in the NASCAR Xfinity Series’ first race back since the COVID 19 pandemic brought sports to a halt.
AVONDALE, ARIZONA – MARCH 07: Brandon Jones, driver of the #19 Menards/Turtle Wax Toyota, celebrates in victory lane after winning the NASCAR Xfinity Series LS Tractor 200 at Phoenix Raceway on March 07, 2020, in Avondale, Arizona. Photo by Christian Petersen/Getty Images
AVONDALE, Ariz. – From race winner Brandon Jones’ standpoint, it’s too bad there wasn’t a bounty on Kyle Busch in Saturday’s LS Tractor 200 at Phoenix Raceway.
Buoyed by a strong run through turns three and four, Jones shot past Busch into the lead on the frontstretch on lap 181 and pulled away to win by 3.556 seconds over Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Harrison Burton, who passed Busch on lap 190 for the runner-up position.
Next weekend at Atlanta, there will be a $100,000 bounty on Busch in the Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series race, courtesy of NASCAR cup veteran Kevin Harvick and Marcus Lemonis, chairman and CEO of Camping World.
On Saturday, Jones had to be content with the satisfaction of beating the career leader in NASCAR Xfinity Series victories, who rolled home third without adding to his 96 wins in the series. Jones was happy to settle for the trip to Victory Lane—after beating Busch and fellow NASCAR Cup Series champion Brad Keselowski, who ran fourth.
“These are two of arguably the best in the business,” Jones said. “We just had a car to beat ‘em today. These guys just did an incredible job.”
Crucial to the win was a quick pit stop on lap 130 that got Jones second off pit road and fourth in the running order for a restart on lap 134.
“I told (crew chief) Jeff (Meendering) kind of early in the race… I’m like ‘Man, I’m just lacking track position—that’s the only thing I’m lacking. The pit crew did a heck of a job, and they said, ‘There you go. There’s your track position, and it paid off at the end.”
The one-two-three finish for JGR was the sixth in company history. More important, Jones’ second victory in the series and first at Phoenix was the 500th win for Toyota in NASCAR’s top three national series combined.
Burton’s No. 20 Toyota improved throughout the afternoon, as the 19-year-old driver—fresh from his maiden win at Auto Club Speedway last week—posted his fourth straight top-five finish to start the season.
“Early in the day, we weren’t good enough at all,” Burton said. “We were running ninth, tenth, somewhere back there. We fought really hard and got a lot better by the end. The 19 (Jones) kind of did the same thing.
“We got better and better and better as the race went on, so I’m really proud of that. That was Toyota’s 500th victory, so that’s really cool. Good to have a one-two-three when we do it. Proud of our guys. Proud of our effort. Not quite enough, but we’ll be back (at Phoenix in November), hopefully with a chance to win the championship.”
Keselowski recovered from an off-sequence pit stop and a brush with the outside wall to finish fourth, followed by Xfinity regulars Justin Haley, Chase Briscoe, Noah Gragson, Austin Cindric, Ross Chastain (who overcame a power-steering issue that put him a lap down) and Riley Herbst.
Star-crossed Justin Allgaier had perhaps the fastest car in the race, but the driver of the No. 7 JR Motorsports Chevrolet was trapped in a pit stop zugzwang after staying on the track under caution early in the third stage. Subsequently, Allgaier pitted for fuel only under the sixth yellow on lap 139, but he failed to get a timely caution late in the race that would have allowed him to use his final set of new tires.
Allgaier, who led 51 laps and won the first stage, stood by crew chief Jason Burdett’s pit call.
“I’m good with the decision,” Allgaier said. “Obviously, it didn’t work out, and to say that I’m not disappointed would be lying to you. We had a fast, fast Camaro today. I thought we made the right call. I told him (Burdett) multiple times that I thought we made the right call.”
Notes: Busch led a race-high 78 laps… Gragson won the second stage and led 27 laps… Jones was fourth in laps led with 24… All told there were 12 lead changes among seven drivers… There were seven cautions for 45 laps, the last coming on lap 143.
NASCAR Xfinity Series Race – 16th Annual LS Tractor 200
Phoenix Raceway
Avondale, Arizona
Saturday, March 7, 2020
1. (8) Brandon Jones, Toyota, 200.
2. (3) Harrison Burton #, Toyota, 200.
3. (1) Kyle Busch(i), Toyota, 200.
4. (4) Brad Keselowski(i), Ford, 200.
5. (14) Justin Haley, Chevrolet, 200.
6. (9) Chase Briscoe, Ford, 200.
7. (7) Noah Gragson, Chevrolet, 200.
8. (2) Austin Cindric, Ford, 200.
9. (5) Ross Chastain, Chevrolet, 200.
10. (11) Riley Herbst #, Toyota, 200.
11. (10) Ryan Sieg, Chevrolet, 200.
12. (13) Brandon Brown, Chevrolet, 200.
13. (6) Justin Allgaier, Chevrolet, 200.
14. (15) Myatt Snider, Chevrolet, 200.
15. (29) Jeff Green, Chevrolet, 200.
16. (24) Josh Williams, Chevrolet, 200.
17. (26) Michael Annett, Chevrolet, 200.
18. (20) Dillon Bassett, Chevrolet, 199.
19. (17) Brett Moffitt(i), Chevrolet, 199.
20. (21) BJ McLeod, Chevrolet, 199.
21. (33) Jesse Little #, Chevrolet, 199.
22. (22) Alex Labbe, Chevrolet, 199.
23. (30) Timmy Hill(i), Toyota, 198.
24. (31) Chad Finchum, Toyota, 196.
25. (23) Ray Black II, Chevrolet, 196.
26. (32) David Starr, Chevrolet, 196.
27. (35) Vinnie Miller, Chevrolet, 196.
28. (28) Tommy Joe Martins, Chevrolet, 194.
29. (36) Kody Vanderwal #, Chevrolet, 177.
30. (12) Daniel Hemric, Chevrolet, DVP, 142.
31. (19) Joe Graf Jr #, Chevrolet, Accident, 142.
32. (27) Joe Nemechek(i), Chevrolet, Accident, 127.
Time of Race: Two Hrs, Nine Mins, 47 Secs. The Margin of Victory: 3.556 Seconds.
Caution Flags: Seven for 45 laps.
Lead Changes: 12 among seven drivers.
Lap Leaders: A. Cindric 1-9;K. Busch(i) 10-39;J. Allgaier 40-48;B. Keselowski(i) 49-55;J. Allgaier 56-75;K. Busch(i) 76-85;R. Chastain 86-89;N. Gragson 90-116;J. Allgaier 117-138;B. Jones 139-142;K. Busch(i) 143-180;B. Jones 181-200.
Leaders Summary (Driver, Times Lead, Laps Led): Kyle Busch(i) three times for 78 laps; Justin Allgaier three times for 51 laps; Noah Gragson one time for 27 laps; Brandon Jones two times for 24 laps; Austin Cindric one time for nine laps; Brad Keselowski(i) one time for seven laps; Ross Chastain one time for four laps.
After a couple of long, tension-packed finishes at Daytona and Las Vegas, the Auto Club 400 was significantly more subdued for the NASCAR Cup Series. The third stage ran 80 laps without a caution, and Alex Bowman cruised to his second career win by nearly ten seconds over Kyle Busch. Kurt Busch, Chase Elliott, and Brad Keselowski. While race number three of the season wasn’t nearly as eventful or full of action as the first two, it still wasn’t too hard to differentiate the good weekends from the bad.
FONTANA, CALIFORNIA – FEBRUARY 28: Kyle Busch, driver of the #18 Interstate Batteries Toyota, speaks to media before practice for the NASCAR Cup Series Auto Club 400 at Auto Club Speedway on February 28, 2020, in Fontana, California. Photo by Katelyn Mulcahy/Getty Images
It has certainly not been the season start to a robust defense of his 2019 NASCAR Cup Series championship for Kyle Busch.
A pair of sub-par showings in the opening two races have placed the driver of the No. 18 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota in a rather unfamiliar position – not even among the top-20 in the NASCAR Cup Series points standings. But he arrives at California’s Auto Club Speedway for Sunday’s Auto Club 400 (3:30 p.m. ET, FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) with at least four good reasons to feel optimistic about turning the early season tide. Trophy, trophy, trophy, and trophy.
Appearing all-businesslike at his media press conference Friday morning at Auto Club, the defending racer winner minced no words about his desire to get back on track, in all senses of the expression.
A disheartening 34th-place finish in the season-opening Daytona 500 – due to an engine issue – followed by a 15th place showing in his hometown Las Vegas race last week has left the two-time series champion 27th-place in the rankings. It’s the lowest he’s been ranked after two races since 2013 when he was 33rd heading into the third event.
“If you look at last year, look at Vegas as a trend over the last few years, besides (JGR teammate) Martin (Truex Jr.) kind of being the anomaly, JGR cars haven’t really run very well at Vegas for a while,’’ Busch said. “When you come to California, here, we’re always one of the guys that are upfront – cars that are to beat.
“I don’t look at this week as being too worrisome for us. It’s going to be nice to hopefully come out here with a good run, be able to run upfront, maybe win like we did last year. That would certainly be really good for then getting into Phoenix with the different package.”
Certainly, the two-mile Auto Club Speedway presents a more than a reasonable expectation of celebrating in Victory Lane for Busch. Only the track’s all-time winningest driver, six-time victor Jimmie Johnson, has more checkered flags. Busch has earned seven top-ten finishes in the last eight California races, including three of his four wins (2013, ‘14, ‘19), a runner-up in 2012 and a pair of third-place showings (2011 and 2018).
His 807 career laps led is second only to Johnson’s 980. And perhaps most encouraging about this total for Busch, is that he’s led 564 of those in that last seven-year span – 69.8 percent. And then there’s that feel-good part of the equation in that Busch earned the first of his 56 career NASCAR Cup Series wins at Auto Club Speedway in 2005. He remains the youngest winner in track history – aged only 20 years, four months and two days when he won in September 2005.
In other words, there’s plenty of reason for Busch to feel optimistic about returning to form Sunday afternoon. Even if he wouldn’t exactly declare himself the favorite.
“I have no idea,’’ Busch said when asked what he expected of the race.
“I’d like it to be a cake-walk for the 18 (Busch) and nobody is within the vicinity, but that’s not always exciting,’’ he said. “The Interstate Batteries Camry here last year was really, really fast and (Martin) Truex was a little better in the final run, but we had much of the guys covered throughout the race.
“There in that final run we were just as good and we were able to hold everybody off. Can’t say what’s going to happen this time around, there’s been a year’s worth of development on everybody’s side to get to this point. Could be a completely different race, but I would like to hope not.’’
Busch is not a good loser. And he’s really not had to learn to be considering he’s much more accustomed to winning with a record 209 victories over the three major NASCAR Series – the NASCAR Cup Series, Xfinity Series, and Gander RV & Outdoor Truck Series.
While his Cup start has been a bit off, Busch has already hoisted a big shiny NASCAR trophy – winning the Las Vegas Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series race last Friday night. His dominance in the series – he’s won the last seven races he’s entered dating back to 2018 – has even incited a little social media revolution.
Fellow NASCAR Cup Series driver Kevin Harvick along with the CEO of the Gander RV & Outdoor retail chains, Marcus Lemonis, has offered a ‘bounty’ of sorts. Should another NASCAR Cup Series driver beat Busch in one of the remaining Truck Series races he’s slated to compete in, then big money – $100,000 – will be donated to that driver’s charity. Should Busch prevail, the money would go to his and his wife Samantha’s charity, The Bundle of Joy Fund, which helps couples who require fertility treatments to conceive.
It’s still a bit hard to read Busch’s gut reaction to the proposal, but he certainly embraced the additional publicity it would bring to one of NASCAR’s perpetually most exciting series shows. He was glad to see the chance for major money to help out a charitable fund.
“It’s all good,’’ Busch said, allowing a slight smile. “It’s going to be interesting, exciting, whatever you want to term it. I guess Cup drivers in the Truck Series do sell tickets so take that for what it’s worth.
“I think it’s a unique opportunity for more attention on the series, which is good. Maybe if more drivers had more teams that had rides then there would be someone else there than just myself. I don’t remember who I told, but once (Kevin) Harvick kind of put the idea out there, I thought the guy that really has a shot is (Kyle) Larson at Homestead. Bring it on.”
