Being in the Championship 4 isn’t enough for Kyle Busch. ‘I want to win this one’
Kyle Busch has had his opportunities. Too many of them to be where he is right now.
The 34-year-old has been in NASCAR’s Championship 4 each of the last five seasons. He has one Cup Series title to show for it.
He wants more. He believes he can win more. He won’t be satisfied otherwise.
“If I end with one,” Busch said, “that’s going to suck. If I can only get two, well, whatever. But three, four, five, I think five’s still achievable. But when you get to this final race in this moment, this championship format the way that it is, and five years in a row and you only come away with one, that gets pretty defeating.”
Will 2019 be the difference? Will Sunday’s final championship race at Homestead-Miami Speedway for the immediate future be the one where he gets over the hump and starts racking up multiple series titles — an accomplishment matched only Jimmie Johnson, Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart has done over the past two decades?
Busch certainly hopes so.
“I don’t come in here thinking, ‘I only won one and I haven’t won any more,’” Busch said. “I come in here thinking ‘This weekend, I want to win this one.’”
Busch enters Sunday’s Ford EcoBoost 400 facing off against Kevin Harvick, Martin Truex Jr and Denny Hamlin for the coveted championship.
He’ll also enter the race with feelings similar to his 2015 title run. That year, he claimed the final spot in the Championship 4 by edging out Carl Phillips in the Quicken Loans Race for Heroes 500 before beating Kevin Harvick in a seven-lap shootout at Homestead for the title. The win at Homestead was his only victory in the playoffs.
This year? Busch finished second in Phoenix, trailing just Denny Hamlin at the Bluegreen Vacations 500 and squeaking past defending NASCAR Cup Series champion Joey Logano for the final spot in the championship field. He has yet to win a race in the playoffs.
“It’s all about what can you do for me now,” Busch said. “It used to be, what have you done for me lately, now it’s, what can you do for me now.”
And right now, Busch wants to win.
He was this year’s regular-season champion with four victories and 13 top-five finishes in 26 races. He had just three races before the playoffs where he finished worse than 14th. He paces the field with 1,462 laps led heading into Sunday.
“You set your goal out for the beginning of the year to be able to go out there and do that,” Busch said. “Everybody’s goal there after is to always just get to Homestead and if we’re eligible, then we can go after that championship. So I always look at it though as we want to be able to go out and win the championship.”
He has been in contention every year since winning that first — and so far, only — championship of his career but has fallen short each time. He was third in 2016, second in 2017 and fourth last season.
No more, he says.
This is the year things change.
“For us to be eligible five years in a row I think is a pretty cool thing,” Busch said, “but to come out with one of four [so far] is not so cool.”
And if Busch does make it to Victory Lane on Sunday?
“Trust me,” Busch said with a smile, “there ain’t going to be anybody happier than me if we cross the finish line first, for at least the first 10 minutes.”
This story was originally published November 15, 2019 at 12:25 PM.
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