Sunday, July 24, 2016

Kyle Busch Dominates at the Brickyard

Originally written for CLNS Radio.

Kyle Busch dominated the Combat Wounded Coalition 400 to win at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Sunday afternoon.
Photo courtesy Adam Niemeyer

Busch led a record 149 laps on Sunday, and showed his dominance throughout the weekend.

“This Toyota was awesome today, it was just so fast,” Busch said.  “We just had it hooked up, this thing was on rails.”

Busch swept the NASCAR weekend for the second-straight year following a win in Saturday’s Xfinity Series race.  He also became the first driver to sweep the weekend by winning both races from the pole.

“I’ve been successful at a lot of things people haven’t been able to do before,” Busch said.  “When it’s helping you win on Sundays, it’s what makes it all worthwhile running those Saturday races.”

Tony Stewart finished 11th in his final race at Indianapolis, and said this was the most relaxing race weekend at Indy he’s ever had.

“For some reason, this weekend…everybody made my schedule as open as they could so I could enjoy it, and we did,” Stewart said.  “We had a lot of fun this weekend from start to finish.”

One of the biggest stories of the weekend centered around Jeff Gordon coming out of retirement to drive for Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the 88 car.  Gordon said the car was good all day, but that he was a little rusty on restarts.

Photo courtesy Brian Lawdermilk/Getty Images
“I got my butt kicked on restarts today,” Gordon said.  “I needed a fill-in on restarts.  Other than that, it went pretty well.”

After the race, Stewart and Gordon ran a final lap together and saluted the fans after what is most likely their final race at their home track.

“I knew when we got the checkered, I didn’t want to come in just yet, and I wanted to run one more lap,” Stewart said.  “Before that last green run, I told my spotter to go tell his spotter that after this thing’s over, we need to go a lap around here together.”

 “What a class act he is,” Gordon said.  “It meant a lot to me that he asked me to make that last lap with him.”

“It is most likely the last time we’ll get to do that, and I couldn’t think of a better guy to spend a moment like that with,” Stewart said.

Unofficial results:
1. Kyle Busch
2. Matt Kenseth
3. Jimmie Johnson
4. Denny Hamlin
5. Kyle Larson
6. Kevin Harvick
7. Joey Logano
8. Martin Truex Jr.
9. Austin Dillon
10. Paul Menard
11. Tony Stewart
12. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
13. Jeff Gordon
14. Chris Buescher
15. Chase Elliott
16. Kurt Busch
17. Brad Keselowski
18. Kasey Kahne
19. Jamie McMurray
20. Landon Cassill
21. Clint Bowyer
22. Danica Patrick
23. Michael McDowell
24. Casey Mears
25. Aric Almirola
26. Regan Smith
27. Brian Scott
28. Michael Annett
29. Cole Whitt
30. Trevor Bayne
31. Ryan Newman
32. Ryan Ellis
33. Reed Sorenson
34. Patrick Carpentier
35. Carl Edwards
36. Ryan Blaney
37. David Ragan
38. AJ Allmendinger
39. Greg Biffle
40. Matt DiBenedetto

Photo courtesy Robert Laberge/Getty Images
 Special thanks to Adam Niemeyer for a photo of Kyle Busch.  For more from Adam, check out his blog here.

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