NASCAR

Sprint Cup

CUP: Kyle Drives For Five

Kyle Busch has won in his last four NASCAR starts...

Tom Jensen | Posted September 01, 2010 Charlotte, NC

Kyle Busch has been on a roll as of late. (Photo: LAT Photographic)

Kyle Busch has always been a streaky racer, for better or for worse. When he’s on his game, he’s as good or better than anyone else, and when he isn’t, he’s decidedly ordinary.

Right now, he’s on the right side of streaky.

Busch rolls into this weekend riding a four-race winning streak, the second time he’s done that this year. Two weeks ago in Bristol, he became the only driver in history to win races in all three of NASCAR’s top divisions at the same track in the same week.

The 25-year-old Las Vegas native has another tripleheader weekend lined up this week, racing in Friday night’s NASCAR Camping World Truck Series event at Kentucky Speedway, which will be televised live on SPEED at 7:30 p.m. ET, followed by the NASCAR Nationwide Series on Saturday and the Sprint Cup Series Sunday night. The latter two races are both at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

The NASCAR record for most consecutive race victories is 10, set by Richard Petty in 1967, with all 10 race victories coming in what is now the Sprint Cup Series.

According to statistics compiled by Joe Gibbs Racing, Busch’s four consecutive NASCAR event victories match him with Billy Wade (1964), David Pearson (1966 and 1968), Cale Yarborough (1976) and Darrell Waltrip (1981).

If he wins Friday night’s Truck Series race, he’ll tie Fred Lorenzen (1964), Richard Petty (1971), Bobby Allison (1971) and Pearson (1973) with five wins in a row.

If he then follows that up with a victory in Saturday’s Nationwide race, Busch would equal Harry Gant (1991) with a six-race winning streak. If he sweeps all three races this weekend, his streak would be seven victories in a row, tying him with Mark Martin (1993) for the second-longest streak in NASCAR history behind only Petty.

The irony of all this is that the weekend before Bristol, Busch blasted his Cup team on the radio, saying he didn’t think it was worthy of a spot in the Chase for the Sprint Cup. And until Bristol, he didn’t know whether or not his squad was good enough to compete for a Cup title.

“Before Bristol, I would have said I’m not sure,” Busch said. “We’re working really hard. The guys have been doing a great job. Dave (Rogers, crew chief) works harder than anybody out there.”

VIDEO: Last Lap Cup - Bristol Kyle Busch celebrates his Bristol sweep. (Image: SPEED)

Like many other teams, JGR has room for improvement on its intermediate-track performance, which means the Emory Healthcare 500 at Atlanta ought to be a good test on Sunday night.

“We’ve got to work on our mile-and-a-half program a bit, so this weekend in Atlanta will be good to try some things out,” said Busch. “It just seems like it’s a tenth-and-a-half off (per second, per lap) on some of the big tracks. We’re always a tenth-and-a-half, two-tenths off. We’re trying to find it, trying to figure out where it’s at.”

At least now, Busch has confidence on his side, something sorely lacking earlier this season.

“Bristol was a big confidence booster for this team, so were hoping it gives us some momentum that we need during the Chase,” he said.

Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Tom Jensen

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