Kyle Busch hangs on to win again at Indianapolis
Kyle Busch kept his perfect weekend intact at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Race winner Kyle Busch, Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota
Action Sports Photography
The defending winner of the Brickyard 400, won the pole for Sunday’s Sprint Cup race, won the pole for the Xfinity Series race, then led 62 of 63 laps in the Lilly Diabetes 250 for his 83rd NXS win.
“All right, great job, thanks,” said Busch, who picked up his seventh win of the season.
Busch beat Kevin Harvick to the line by 0.415-seconds.
“We overachieved and that was what our goal was,” Harvick said.
Paul Menard finished second followed by Kyle Larson and Justin Allgaier — who picked up an extra $100,000 for winning the Dash 4 Cash.
“Throughout the middle of the race we had a good car,” Allgaier said. “We knew at the end of that race it was going to come down to luck. At the end, it came down to racing my teammate (Elliott Sadler). Being able to pass him, to get a run. It was a great day to have all JR Motorsports cars in the top 6.”
Sadler finished sixth, followed by points leader Daniel Suarez, Joey Logano, Ty Dillon and Brandon Jones.
“Just too tight,” Sadler said about his final run. “I couldn’t hold my teammate off. Just stinks not to win the $100,000.”
Busch led the field to the green. With a push from Logano, Larson moved from third to second on the start. Sixteen laps later, Erik Jones passed Larson for second.
The leaders started pitting on Lap 23 with Logano. Kyle Busch pitted from the lead on Lap 26 — and relinquished the point for just one lap to Brendan Gaughan. When cars cycled out, Busch had the lead followed by Erik Jones, Larson, Logano, Suarez and Harvick.
The first (restart) didn’t go exactly how I wanted it to,” Harvick said. “Elliott (Sadler) was really pushing me and I probably should have gone three-wide. I didn’t want to be all the way on the bottom and have a bad angle going into the corner. I really thought I could beat (Busch) down the backstretch if I got off of 2 well and clear the 42. Right as I got to the inside, I decided to hold the line up a little bit and try to get a run and then 42 got stuck on the outside and that ruined my plan.”
Erik Jones experienced the only issue among drivers in the lead pack when he hit the wall coming off of Turn 2 on Lap 40.
“I couldn’t hold on,” Jones told his crew after exiting the pits. The No. 20 JGR team told the driver he had significant damage to his right quarter panel.
Jones cycled out to 11th — the last car on the lead lap but eight laps later, the No. 20 blew a right rear tire in Turn 1 to bring out the first caution.
Nine of the cars on the lead lap pitted with Busch opting to stay out. Suarez came out first from the pits followed by Larson, Brennan Poole, Harvick and Justin Allgaier.
With six laps remaining in the race, Ray Black Jr. bounced off the wall in Turn 2 and collected Harrison Rhodes in the process to ignite the second caution.
Kyle Busch held the lead followed by Larson, Harvick, Menard and Sadler coming to an overtime finish with 12 cars on the lead lap. Harvick passed Larson for second-place but neither Chevy was able to catch Busch who extended his lead by 0.488-second lead over Harvick and held it to the finish.
THE HEATS
Kyle Busch held the point from green flag to green flag in the first heat race. Kyle Larson, who started on the front row with Busch finished second followed by Joey Logano, Daniel Suarez, Elliott Sadler and Jeb Burton. Suarez and Sadler qualified for the Dash 4 Cash as the top-finishing Xfinity Series drivers.
Rounding out the top 10 were Brandon Jones, Ryan Reed, Blake Koch and Jeremy Clements.
Erik Jones led all 20 laps in the second heat. Kevin Harvick was second followed by NXS regular Justin Allgaier, Paul Menard, Brennan Poole, Ty Dillon, Darrell Wallace Jr., Brendan Gaughan Ryan Sieg and Dakoda Armstrong.
Jones and Allgaier transferred to the Dash 4 Cash.
QUALIFYING
Joe Gibbs Racing topped both qualifying sessions. Erik Jones posted the top speed in Round 1 (182.271 mph). Kyle Busch won the pole (181.939 mph) from the 12 drivers that transferred to the second round. Jones was second (181.932 mph) followed by Sprint Cup regulars Kyle Larson (181.105 mph) and Kevin Harvick (179.892 mph). The third JGR Toyota, piloted by Daniel Suarez (179.888 mph), was fifth followed by Justin Allgaier, Joey Logano, Paul Menard, Ryan Reed and Brennan Poole.
Busch and Jones started first in Heat 1 and Heat 2, respectively, with the odd-numbered qualifiers lining up in the first heat races the even-numbered qualifiers in the second heat race.
“I had to get real good restarts,” added Busch, who had the oldest tires among the cars on the lead lap. “The second to the last one, I got a really good one, the last one was an ok one. I saw Harvick pull out and he obviously must have been blocking the guys behind him who got a run because he never got beside me. I never felt him close enough that he was going to get alongside. But this Camry was awesome today. It was really, really fast.
"It’s really awesome feeling to go back to Victory Lane again here this year.”
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