NASCAR – Kyle Bush Wins the Sprint Cup at the Richmond International Speedway
By Stephen Lars
In a very exciting race, the young driver Kyle Busch skillfully imposed himself to the other drivers to become the champion once again, adding one more win to his record of 15 victories at the Sprint Cup Series, after not visiting the podium for a month. Before the race started, the rain was threatening to cancel the event, but fortunately, minutes before giving the start signal the rain stopped and allowed a good start.
With this new victory, the youngest of the Busch brothers has a record of three wins during the current season, which makes him the driver with most wins so far in the Sprint Cup 2009, adding a total of 50 titles throughout his participation in the Sprint Series along with the Nationwide Series and the Camping World Truck Series.
The competition began with a yellow flag to avoid accidents because the track was wet, but after the sixth round the track conditions bettered, giving way to the green flag to start the real competition that from that moment on captured the attention of all fans that were there. In the middle of the tough fight to occupy a privileged position, accidents were inevitable; for about 79 laps the event had to stop because during that period 15 different accidents occurred and affected the pace of competition.
These constants accidents had a negative impact on many drivers who had already taken an advantageous position. Among the drivers affected with this was the defending champion Jimmie Johnson, who had serious problems with the brakes of his car so he had to go to the pits area to resolve the damage and when he going back to the track, he exceeded the speed limit and was penalized for it, which caused him to lose positions, being relegated until he finished the challenge in the 36th position. Another driver that was terribly affected was Busch’s teammate, Denny Hamlin, who was the driver who led the greatest number of laps, 148 in total, but in the end he had some problems with the tires of his Toyota and also lost several positions to finish fourteenth.
The wise decision of Joe Gibbs Racing team of staying on the track with the same tires for a good period of time was one of the factors that contributed Kyle Busch to obtain the checkered flag. Furthermore, he did not go off the track to refuel often either and that way he managed to remain in a constant pace until he got at the head of the race. From that moment on, he forced the other drivers to chase him since he was not going to the pits area.
After a final and strategic refueling, Busch returned to the leading position and managed to remain there despite the fact that Tony Stewart and Jeff Burton, who finished in the second and third place respectively, were following him closely, but they could not prevent Kyle from rising to the top of the podium. With this result, Kyle Busch is now on the fifth place of the general standings with 1314 points, right under his teammate Hamlin who is in the fourth, while his brother Kurt went down to the second position and Jeff Gordon raised the first position with 1441 points.
About the Author
Stephen Lars has been a prominent writer on daily NASCAR races; sports news and the sports book industry for many exceptional sport web sites. You may reprint this article in its full content, please note no modifications to it are accepted.