Kyle Busch wins NASCAR Cup Series race at Richmond

Kyle Busch celebrates after winning Saturday night's NASCAR Cup Series playoff race at Richmond Raceway in Virginia.
Kyle Busch celebrates after winning Saturday night's NASCAR Cup Series playoff race at Richmond Raceway in Virginia.

RICHMOND, Va. - Kyle Busch is starting to wonder why he even spends time trying to qualify well at Richmond Raceway.

Five months after winning the spring race on the 0.75-mile oval from the 32nd starting spot, Busch did even better Saturday night, starting 39th before finding his way to victory lane to complete a season sweep of the track's NASCAR Cup Series races.

"Yeah, I'm not going to qualify here anymore," he said after securing the 50th victory of his Cup Series career with his sixth win at Richmond, though his first in the track's fall race. "It's a waste of time for us."

Besides, once the green flag flies, his fortunes change, just as it did Saturday in the second of 10 playoff races.

"I don't know why," he said. "I just cannot qualify here, but we've got a really good race car when it comes down time to have a race, and especially the later it gets."

Busch, sent to the rear of the field at the start because of unauthorized adjustments to his Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, passed Brad Keselowski with 38 laps to go and held off hard-charging Kevin Harvick.

"To start dead last, come up through the field and win this thing? That's right, Rowdy Nation. All for you, baby," Busch said after climbing from his car. "I finally won a fall race here at Richmond."

Harvick closed a gap of more than 1.5 seconds over the final few laps, but he was not able to deprive Busch of tying him with a season-best seven wins this season.

Martin Truex Jr., who swept the first two stages before a penalty forced him to play catch-up, rallied for third, followed by Chase Elliott and Aric Almirola.

"The problem is when you get back there, to pass those guys, you've got to really use up your tires," Truex said. "We did really good for only having one caution thrown in there. It went well. We needed more cautions so we could pit for tires. What a hot rod we had tonight. They rebounded well from the pit-road mishap."

It was the first time all season Busch, Harvick and Truex - NASCAR's Big Three who have dominated this year - occupied the top three places in the same race.

Busch and Keselowski, whose winning streak ended after three races, have already clinched spots in the next round of the playoffs via victories, and Truex joined them on points by winning the first two stages of Saturday's race.

Busch and Keselowski battled for the lead for much of the last 100-plus laps. Keselowski grabbed the top spot on lap 343, but Busch took it back 20 laps later before Keselowski faded, eventually finishing ninth, and Harvick picked up the chase.

"I thought he used a little more when he was racing with Keselowski there," Harvick said of Busch, "and he drove off a little bit, and I started driving him back down at the end."

The race unfolded much like the spring race in April, when Joey Logano swept the first two stages, each run without an on-track caution.

This time, it was Truex who won the stages, but then his team burned him on pit road. During the caution between the second and third stages, Truex's team was penalized for an uncontrolled tire, dropping him to 19th place. After leading 159 laps, he had work to do to get back to the front. Like Logano, who wound up fourth in the spring race, Truex never quite caught up, finishing 5.8 seconds off the lead.

The 2017 series champion remains the points leader by 16 over Busch, 28 over Harvick and 30 over Keselowski. Each is on a quest for his second Cup Series championship.

The night was not as eventful as local favorite Denny Hamlin had hoped.

Hamlin, who grew up about 20 miles from the track, started the night 16th in the playoff standings and with hopes of winning stage points and a top finish. He got spun by Ricky Stenhouse Jr. about halfway through the opening stage, had to pit under a green flag, then scrambled all the way back to ninth before the stage was completed.

He didn't make it in the top 10 on the second stage, then tried to reprise his fresh tires surge by pitting under green with about 75 laps to go. But while he was on pit road under a green flag, Matt Kenseth made contact with Jeffrey Earnhardt, who spun into the wall and brought out a caution, putting Hamlin a lap down. The Chesterfield native finished 16th.

The caution was the only one because of an on-track incident all night.

Hamlin (29 points), Erik Jones (21), seven-time champion Jimmie Johnson (six) and Clint Bowyer (four) enter next weekend's race at Charlotte Motor Speedway as the bottom four in the playoff field, which will be cut to 12 drivers after the race.

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