Kyle Busch leads every lap en route to dominating Nationwide victory

Richmond, Va. – Kyle Busch made it look easy at Richmond International Raceway on Friday evening as he completely dominated the Virginia 529 College Savings 250, a NASCAR Nationwide Series event.

'Rowdy' led all 250 laps to win for the fifth time at Richmond.  In addition, he chalked up his 67th Nationwide Series career victory in 289 races.

Our Monster Energy Toyota was just awesome.

Race winner Kyle Busch

Busch was the also the most recent driver to lead every lap of a Nationwide race, doing so at Phoenix three years ago.

“You never think you will be that good, but I knew we had a good shot at being able to run good tonight,” Busch commented.  “We were better than we have been here in past, as we haven’t been able to hit on it like we did tonight.  Our Monster Energy Toyota was just awesome.

The new tire combination threw everyone for a loop.

No. 54 crew chief Adam Stevens

“The win was a true testament to the team and leadership that went on from our struggles here in the past.  To be as dominant as we were tonight and to beat the guys that ran so well in the Spring, it shows that we are not letting down.”

Added crew chief Adam Stevens, “It is tough to tell how well you will do.  The new tire combination threw everyone for a loop.  We had decent speed, but we didn’t know how we would do once we got 60 or 70 laps on our tires.  What guesswork we did worked out for us.”

At times, we had our car driving okay, but we just didn’t have the speed

Second place Chase Elliott

His margin of victory over rookie Chase Elliott was 1.323 seconds.  He drove the NAPA Auto Parts Chevrolet.

“We were fighting the same things since we got here,” Chase said.  “We were a little bit off from the time we unloaded.  At times, we had our car driving okay, but we just didn’t have the speed.  We needed a little bit of grip here and there.  We weren’t much better than we were (here) in the Spring race; we still have a lot of work to do.  The 54 guys (Busch’s team) did get better from the Spring race.”

I felt like we had a shot at the win if the race had stayed green.

Third place Kevin Harvick

Kevin Harvick advanced from 15th to third and he did run as high as second, including so on the final restart with 24 laps to go. He put on a stirring display of driving, rim-riding the track and making passes on the outside.

Discussing his shot at victory as the race wound down, Harvick said, “I felt like we had a shot at the win if the race had stayed green.  On the weekends when you don’t feel like don’t have anything going, you just have to keep at it.  There was plenty of grip on the top of the track and I went up there faster than I wanted to.”  

Ryan Blaney and Brian Scott were fourth and fifth, respectively. Sixth through 10th were Regan Smith, Dakoda Armstrong, Elliott Sadler, Ty Dillon and Chris Buescher. In the points race, Elliott leads Smith by 19 and Dillon by 42. Six caution flags slowed the race for 38 laps.