Kyle Busch Wins Martinsville Truck Race; Earns 201st NASCAR National Series Victory

Kyle Busch Wins Martinsville Truck Race; Earns 201st NASCAR National Series Victory

by March 23, 2019 1 comment

RIDGEWAY, Va. – Kyle Busch captured his 201st victory on Saturday at Martinsville Speedway, becoming the all-time winningest driver in the NASCAR national series.

Busch tied Richard Petty’s 200 wins last weekend during the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series race at Auto Club Speedway. On Saturday in the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series TruNorth Global 250, Busch led a race high of 174 laps and survived a late-race restart to earn the record-breaking victory. Petty’s 200 victories were in NASCAR’s premier series, while Busch’s has been across the Cup Series (53), Xfinity Series (94) and Truck Series (148).

“These guys worked really really hard this weekend,” Busch said. “We unloaded and I didn’t like where we were at. We made wholesale changes to this thing all weekend long. I just tried to keep improving this Cessna Beechcraft Tundra and make it faster. Certainly want to give thanks to TRD and Rowdy Manufacturing – all these guys.”

The caution that set the field up for the late-race restart occurred on lap 244 when Tyler Dippel and Spencer Davis had issues in Turn 2. Busch and Ben Rhodes restarted on the front row for the final restart of the race. Once the green flag flew, it was Busch who got the advantage. On the final lap, Busch had a commanding lead, but the caution came out due to Reid Wilson spinning in Turn 4. The field was frozen, and Busch was declared the winner.

“We didn’t need to go up there and get any stage points or anything like that so the opportunity for us to just kind of ride was given to us,” Busch said. “We knew the 52 (Stewart Friesen) was going to pit, so I kind of let the 99 (Ben Rhodes) go and was riding in fourth and going to inherit third on a restart. All of the battling ended up ensuing there anyways. Awesome day. These guys gave me a great Cessna Beechcraft Tundra. It was awesome to drive. It wasn’t so awesome yesterday. We worked really really hard on trying to make this thing better and improve this truck and our program and all of the other trucks as well too.”

Rhodes finished second, and Brett Moffitt finished third. Rounding out the top-five was Stage 2 winner Ross Chastain and pole-sitter Stewart Friesen. Completing the top-10 was ThorSport Racing’s Myatt Snider, Grant Enfinger, Matt Crafton and Johnny Sauter, as well as Bubba Wallace.

Friesen now leads Enfinger by four points in the standings.

The NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series be back in action on Friday, March 29 for the Vankor 350 at Texas Motor Speedway. Live coverage of the race will broadcast on FOX Sports 1 (FS1) and the Motor Racing Network (MRN) at 9 p.m. ET.

Photo Credit: Hunter Thomas/TheFourthTurn.com

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