Defending Richmond winner Kurt Busch "real confident" he can repeat

So it’s not surprising that one-third of his Sprint Cup victories have been earned on tracks under a mile in length. 

We feel real confident on the No. 41 team with winning the race here during the daytime

Kurt Busch

But last year’s win here at Richmond International Raceway was special for the No. 41 Stewart-Haas Racing team. It marked Busch’s first victory under the leadership of crew chief Tony Gibson. 

“It was amazing to jump in his car for a few races at the end of 2014 and for himself and all of those crew guys that have been with Gibson for so long,” Busch said. “They were excited to see their cars validated on where are we in the ranking, so to speak, on quality of car that we are providing. I think we hit top 10’s right off the bat. Just bang, bang, bang, just sliding around a little bit, but we didn’t quite finesse that maybe hit that exactly right, but we were cranking out top 10’s. So we knew we only had a short way to go to find those rhythms for a win.  

“It was great to win here at a short track. I think that is where him and I have really had most of our success is at the short tracks.”

With the exception of the Martinsville Speedway Chase race last fall, Busch has scored top-15 finishes on all short tracks since joining forces with Gibson. His best effort in 2016 was last week at Bristol Motor Speedway, where he led 41 laps before finishing third. 

The impact of having Tony Gibson atop the pit box

Busch has said repeatedly that Gibson has a calming effect on him. Gibson’s demeanor helps balance pressure-packed situations such short-track battles or qualifying, where Busch’s 11.1 qualifying average in 2015 was a career best. In the first eight races, Busch has lowered his qualifying average to 10.5. 

“The personal relationship is somebody that I look up to as a mentor, as a coach and he gives me the ball though when I’m out on the field, when I’m out on the track he Is giving me the ability to make the calls out there,” Busch said of Gibson. “That is what it takes. It takes that head couch, quarterback, it takes crew chief/driver combo to be able to see it all in this day and age and to know what to do on pit stops, two tires, four tires.  

“The restarts, he leaves those up to me, and yet we go back on watch tape together on what we can do better. It’s great to have the ability to have an old school guy like him continue to want to learn and to be the best in this garage.”

Looking for the repeat

Busch’s experience at Richmond should compensate for the lack of practice this weekend due to rain. In Happy Hour, Busch posted the 12th fastest single lap speed (119.564 mph) — 0.240-seconds behind Jimmie Johnson’s top pace. While Johnson also led the Best 10 Consecutive Lap Average chart, Busch was sixth quick. 

En route to last year’s Richmond victory,  Busch led 291 of 400 laps in the rain-delayed race which was moved to Sunday. He believes the data the team collected will help him this Sunday as well.

“We feel real confident on the No. 41 team with winning the race here during the daytime,” Busch said. “All the practices though were on normal sequences then and that was late afternoon headed into the evening where it’s cooler.  We’ve noticed we have run well on some of the warmer days and the hotter tracks and the slicker tracks. Evident last weekend at Bristol, I think that was the warmest Bristol race on record because of the way that is came in April and it was during the daytime.  

“Usually, we race there in March during the day and it’s a lot cooler out. Then we race there in August, yeah it’s warm, but then the track temp drops when we race into the evening. Tracks are very different, especially, with this downforce and rear-end camber package that all the teams are running now-a-days track temp is very sensitive. We are hopeful that our daytime set-up that we won the race with will be good again.”