Kyle Busch goes two-for-two at Bristol with Nationwide win
Another race at Bristol (Ten.) Motor Speedway on Friday night translated into another win for Kyle Busch. Busch dominated the Food City 250 NASCAR Nationwide Series race on Friday, leading 228 laps of the 250 that made up the event en route to his second win of the week. He also won the UNOH 200 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race at the track on Wednesday.
“You’ve got to win two to go for three, and here’s two,” Busch said in victory lane.
Busch’s third Bristol race of the week comes Saturday night in the form of the Irwin Tools Night Race for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series. He is the all-time winner at Bristol across NASCAR’s three national divisions with the Nationwide race being his 15th win at the track, overall, and his sixth in Nationwide competition.
Another driver competing in all three Bristol events this week, Brad Keselowski, finished second in Friday’s Nationwide race after running second to Busch for much of the event.
“We just didn’t quite have enough,” Keselowski said. “We were close, just not quite good enough.”
Busch started on the pole and led until the second caution of the race came out just past lap 100. After being the only driver to stay out during the first caution on lap 63, Busch pitted, along with almost everyone else this time around. But Kyle Larson stayed out to restart with the lead. Trevor Bayne got off pit road second by taking only two tires. Busch came off pit road third, following Keselowski, and restarted the race from the fourth spot.
Both Busch and Keselowski got by Bayne when the race returned to green, and Busch moved back into the lead when he passed Larson on lap 129. Keselowski also got by Larson to take second and Busch and Keselowski ran first and second the rest of the way.
“It’s great to start up front and lead laps, but still battle other guys,” Busch said.”
Suffering fewer problems than the other championship contenders, Austin Dillon finished third and moved up to second in the points standings, six points behind Sam Hornish Jr. Dillon was the only driver among the top-five in points to finish on the lead lap, but his day wasn’t without its issues. A slow pit stop during a lap-63 caution cost Dillon positions, but he was able to make them up under green on the race track.
“We struggled on pit road, Dillon said, but he went on to compliment his team on his fast race car that allowed him to make up for the pit road trouble.
Elliott Sadler, formerly the driver second in points, finished 10th, but was the first driver a lap down. Hornish battled a faulty plug wire. Other drivers in the top-five points, Regan Smith and Brian Vickers, also had problems. Smith went laps down after an unscheduled green-flag pit stop for a broken wheel, and Vickers’ car sustained heavy damage in a wreck in the final 100 laps.
“I went down into turn three and the car just took off,” Vickers said. “We were just running so high, so fast.”
Justin Allgaier finished fourth and Larson was fifth. Finishing sixth through ninth and on the lead lap were Bayne, Ty Dillon, Kasey Kahne and Brian Scott
— Photo courtesy of Getty Images for NASCAR
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