Kyle Busch won his third consecutive race on NASCAR’s Nationwide Series, holding off Marcos Ambrose by less than a second in the Corona Mexico 200.
Busch passed Scott Pruett on the 72nd of 80 laps to take the lead. Pruett finished third, followed by Carl Edwards.
“It’s just awesome coming down here - everybody loves doing it and wants to win it,” said Busch “Only one of us guys gets to leave with the trophy, and I’m glad it’s us.”
“The consideration is there, but still, it’s a race by race deal,” Busch said. “We’ll make a decision here shortly. I love winning. I’ll run as long as I can win. That doesn’t bother me a bit.”
A few laps before the pass for the win, Busch had been hammering hard on Pruett’s bumper.
“He was just blocking a little bit too much, I believe,” said Busch, who had never won a NASCAR race on a road course. “Now I understand why he got dumped last year. And if it came down to it, it was going to be again. He smoked the tires, and I was able to get by him.”
“[Busch] shoved me a few times, telling me he was getting anxious to go,” said Pruett, who led 36 of the 80 laps. “Instead of getting turned around and my car tore up like last year, I gave him [room] and thought I could hold on and Marcos came up, as well.
“It was a good run, not a great run.”
“The good thing is two weeks in a row we had a car that could win,” said Edwards. “Congratulations to Kyle and the 20 team - three in a row, they’re getting it done.”
Ambrose’s finish was also a career best and his first top-10 finish of the year. He had six as a rookie in 2007.
“In two laps we would have gotten Kyle for sure,” Ambrose said. “Just proud of the effort. But I do want to say sorry to Boris, I didn’t mean to get into him. I don’t know if we just hooked up or what.”
“Just cheap-shotted me and took me out,” Said said. “He hooked my left rear in turn one. He had me sideways for a while and then just turned me around. ... I’m not going to cry about it, but I’m going to go apologize to his crew chief because it’s going to cost him a car.”
Ambrose tried to smooth things over following the race.
“I’m going to ring him on Monday and hopefully sleep will help him just think through things a little bit more,” Ambrose said. “I value Boris’ friendship and he is a fantastic racer. I didn’t mean to do it.”
Ambrose didn’t shy away from responsibility, though.
“I got into him and spun him out and ended his day,” Ambrose said. “I feel bad for him but our day has been fantastic.”
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