Busch kicks off five-race NASCAR Truck schedule at Atlanta

Busch, who sold his Kyle Busch Motorsports shop and assets in the offseason, will run five Truck races this year with Spire, including driving its No. 7 Chevrolet in Saturday’s race at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

The two-time Cup champion will also compete March 1 at Las Vegas, March 16 at Bristol, Tenn., April 12 at Texas and May 10 at Darlington, S.C.

Busch, who competes full-time in Cup with Richard Childress Racing, is fresh off a 12th-place finish in Monday’s rain-delayed Daytona 500.

“Even before I was an owner, I always enjoyed racing in the Truck Series, so I’m thankful to Jeff (Dickerson), T.J. (Puchyr) and everyone at Spire Motorsports for the opportunity to compete in the five races that I’m allowed to do each season,” said Busch.

“A lot of the employees from KBM transitioned over to Spire, and I’ll be working with (Brian) Pattie and the same group that I had last year, so while it’ll be a little bittersweet not having a KBM decal on the front of the truck and a No. 51 on the side, I know that I’ll be getting in the best equipment in the series.”

The Las Vegas native advanced to the Championship 4 in Cup in five consecutive seasons from 2015 to 2019 and owns 63 career wins.

In addition to his two Cup titles, he won the 2009 Xfinity Series championship and is the all-time wins leader in that series (102) as well as Trucks (64). Busch also ranks first all-time among Truck drivers with an average finish of 6.4 and second all-time with 7,787 laps led.

“Kyle Busch is a generational talent and I’ve been fortunate enough to witness so many of his accomplishments first-hand. It means a lot to everyone at Spire Motorsports, including everyone who stayed after the sale, to have Kyle in our truck this season,” Team-co-owner Dickerson said.

“And, it means a great deal to me personally, for us to make this happen.”