CUP: Busch Happy With ‘09, Excited About ‘10

Sprint Cup

CUP: Busch Happy With ‘09, Excited About ‘10

Kyle Busch talks about 2009 and looks ahead to next season...

Jim Pedley | http://www.RacinToday.com | Posted December 10, 2009 Charlotte, NC

Kyle Busch celebrates winning the 2009 NASCAR Nationwide Series championship. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

The most misunderstood driver in NASCAR said Tuesday that nobody should misunderstand this: The 2009 racing season will not be filed away in his personal memory bank under the heading of “Disappointing”.

On the contrary, Kyle Busch said, he’s inserting 2009 into the brain file marked “Great”.

“A lot of successes,” Busch said during a telephone call from Ohio, where he was being honored for his biggest success of ’09, the Nationwide Series championship.

Busch expects to pile up more successes in 2010, probably with an expanded role as owner/driver in the Camping World Truck Series as he has scheduled an announcement on that for Friday.

“It could be as few as one (truck fielded by the team) and as many as three, so we’ll see,” Busch said of Kyle Busch Motorsports’ 2010 plans for the trucks.

As for 2009, many had expected more successes from Busch, the 24-year-old whom many believe is the best wheelman in North America. They expected a minimum result of a Chase berth. And the maximum? Many expected Busch and his Joe Gibbs Racing team to step between Jimmie Johnson and his bid for a fourth-straight Sprint Cup championship.

The basis for those expectations was, of course, Busch’s incredible 2008 season – the season in which he redefined excellence in NASCAR by winning 21 races (eight in Cup) across the sport’s three top series.

When the sun came up above the Atlantic on race day at Daytona last February, the grandstands and garages began filling with people who thought the year of the younger Busch brother was at hand.

When Busch failed to make the Chase and, hence, was shut out of championship contention with 10 weeks to go in the season, the belief among the masses was that 2009 was a bummer for Busch.

But the masses, once again, failed to understand Kyle Busch.

Taking a break from stuffing boxes for the disadvantaged at the Mid-Ohio Food Bank on Tuesday, Busch counted his own old-year blessings.

“I think it was a great year, overall,” he said. “I won five races in a row to tie (Ron) Hornaday in the Truck series. In the Nationwide Series, I won nine races and won the championship there, I had a lot of records set in the year.

“I won, I think, 24 or 25 races across the three NASCAR series and, of course, with my Late Model racing I'm doing some things there as well. I feel like it was a successful year.”

The latest of his victories came last weekend in the Snowball Derby for Super Late Models in Pensacola, Fla.

“The Snowball was really fun. I love going down there and this year was my opportunity to go down there with my own car and spend the whole week down there and set up my own car and equipment,” Busch said. “I got it to where I wanted it for Sunday and we made it through the room of doom and everything.”

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jim Pedley

RacinToday.com

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