By: Zach Catanzareti, Staff Writer
Just like Chicagoland Speedway, Kyle Busch didn’t have the winning car for most of the day. And similar to that race three weeks ago, it ended with what NASCAR calls a bump-and-run maneuver for the race win.
Unfortunately, Busch was on the “bumped” end this time around at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.
Leading Kevin Harvick with less than 10 laps to go in Sunday’s Foxwoods Resort Casino 301, Busch was struggling to stay ahead of the thundering No. 4 Ford and was stuck defending the 2014 Cup Series champion.
After a few small bumps from the No. 4 to the No. 18, Busch ended up out of the groove with eight laps to go courtesy of Harvick’s front bumper.
“I knew it was going to be hard to hold him off,” Busch said. “I was backing up three, four, five corners in a row and with a faster car, I’m not sure you had to do it. But he did, it’s fine. How you race is how you get raced.”
Despite the disappointing second-place finish, Busch was happy to have a shot following the struggle of a weekend his Joe Gibbs Racing bunch endured.
“We had a very, very poor performance,” he said of the weekend. “Our Camry just wasn’t there all weekend. We kept fighting the same things. Adam [Stevens, crew chief] made some really good calls, good adjustments to keep improving on it. Our pit crew was flawless, they gained us all those spots to get us in that position.”
Grabbing the lead off pit road with 42 to go, Busch didn’t have enough to earn his sixth victory of 2018.
“I drove away by a little bit but we weren’t the best car on the long run,” he said. “All them SHR cars were really good, all really fast.”
