Busch can’t stop winning
He edges Elliott, Hamlin for his third straight victory
RICHMOND, Va. — Kyle Busch pulled away on a restart in a two-lap overtime sprint to the finish Saturday night for his third consecutive NASCAR Cup Series victory.
Busch, who started 32nd but quickly worked his way into contention, outran Chase Elliott and teammate Denny Hamlin for his fifth career victory at Richmond Raceway, the most among active drivers. The victory is his 46th overall and came from the deepest starting spot in the field of his career. It also is the deepest starting position for a winner at Richmond, surpassing Clint Bowyer, who started 31st in 2008.
The points leader also matched Kevin Harvick’s three-race winning streak from earlier in the season.
“Pats on the back, everybody,” Busch said on his radio after taking the checkered flag.
The race went more than 350 laps with the only cautions coming after stages one and two, both won by defending race champion Joey Logano, and remained clean until Ryan Blaney and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. crashed on Lap 353, bringing out the first on-track yellow.
Busch took the lead after the next caution, brought out by the smoking car of Ryan Newman, when he was running second to Truex heading onto pit road and got out first. He also beat Hamlin and Harvick off the line on a restart with six to go, and then never let anyone contend when the race went back to green for the final time on lap 400.
‘The pit crew tonight, they won this race for us,” Busch said. “They got us off pit road first those last two times and got us where we needed to be.”
The three-race winning streak is the second of his career. The first came in 2015, when he won his only championship.
“I don’t know if you can shoot for four in a row,” he said. “It’s hard to go to Talladega with that much of a winning streak and think that you can get to Victory Lane.”
The end was a bitter pill for Truex, who ran up front all night. He and Busch were dueling after a restart with 23 laps to go, and after Busch pulled away, Truex seemed to be closing ground until a spin by David Ragan brought out the yellow.
INDYCAR: Josef Newgarden grinned when asked if a gloomy weather forecast made it more important to start up front.
“Yeah, for sure,” Newgarden said. For sure, Newgarden will be the favorite today in Birmingham, Ala., at Barber Motorsports Park, where he has won two of the past three years and will start from the pole. Newgarden edged fellow Team Penske driver Will Power in the final qualifying lap Saturday to earn the third pole position of his career.
He has never started the Indy Grand Prix of Alabama higher than third but has had plenty of success at the track a few hours from his Tennessee hometown.