By: Zach Catanzareti, Staff Writer
Kyle Busch is ready to win Sunday at Homestead-Miami Speedway. And if you know anything of Busch’s postrace stature following anything less, there is no other option.
Making the Championship 4 for the fifth consecutive year, Busch enters the title weekend with four wins on the season, lining up against two teammates of Martin Truex Jr. and Denny Hamlin as well as Kevin Harvick.
If his presence in the Xfinity and Gander Outdoors Truck Series is any evidence, Busch is someone who dives face-first into any opportunity that could end in Victory Lane.
With 55 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series and a championship crown from 2015, Busch was hesitant to even breathe a word of contentment Thursday during NASCAR’s Championship 4 Media Day in Miami, Florida. Even with some of the highest winning percentages in the sport, Busch is far below his career aspirations.
You can say it’s another case of an extreme winner in American sports.
“I’m behind. I’m behind for sure,” he said of his career numbers. “I’m behind in wins and in championships. Why? The list goes on. It’s a pretty long one.”
Never shying away from an emotional, honest postrace interview, Busch is undeniably obsessive when it comes to leaving the racetrack as the only winner. And in many ways, it’s a positive. It’s brought in fans, sponsors and has surely given Busch that extra percent to push on the final lap every weekend.
However, it also brings in a negative. Unlike football or baseball, an individual racecar driver loses far more than he or she wins. Nobody talks about the 984 races Richard Petty lost, however, the 200 he won. For Busch, it’s a whopping 478 times he had to bite his tongue and leave the track in second place or worse.
And in terms of championships, Busch is 1/15. Sunday will be his fifth appearance in the Championship 4, hoping to earn his second title in that timespan.
“With 2015 and being able to come out a champion, that was the greatest achievement,” he said. “You set your goal at the start of the year to go out and do that. For us to be eligible five years in a row is a pretty cool thing. But to come out with one of four is not so cool.
“How many you can get now is about where it’s at. If I end at one, it’s going to suck. If I can only get two, eh, whatever. But three, four five… I think five is still achievable.
“You just deal with [the losses]. Trust me, there isn’t going to be anybody happier than me if we cross the finish line first on Sunday… for a least the first 10 minutes.”
Part of the reason Busch is a single-time champ is the same reason nobody on in the Cup ranks have more than one title: Jimmie Johnson. The seven-time champion won five straight titles from 2006 to 2010, scoring an additional two since.
“Johnson scooping up five in a row was certainly hard for the rest of us to beat,” he said. “They were on top of it, in different cars for that matter. That means we didn’t do our job.
“I look at 2016, that was a missed opportunity. When the No. 19 crashed, that was our opportunity to win that race. I, for some reason, could not go on the restarts. I had no fire-off. And we lost that one. Johnson won again.”
Can Kyle catch up to his career aspirations? A victory on Sunday would be a big step in the right direction, but he doesn’t think so.
“There’s been too many missed opportunities,” he said. “A lot of stuff out there — woulda’, coulda’, shoulda’. They just didn’t happen. We just have to figure out how to leave that all behind this weekend and go out and succeed.
“When you get to this final race — and in this championships format — five years in a row and you only come away with one, that gets pretty defeating.
“Is this Kyle’s time being here five years in a row? I’d certainly like to think so, but it kind of sucks when you’re not able to bring home the trophy on Sunday.”