Where have we seen this movie before?
You know the story: Kyle Busch wins one race, then another and then another and another and ... well, you get the idea.
The younger Busch brother won 21 races last season, 10 in the Nationwide Series, three in the Truck Series and, of course, eight in the Sprint Cup Series.
For the better part of the 26-race “regular season”—in other words, the run-up to the 10-race Chase for the Sprint Cup—Busch looked unbeatable, a cinch to run away with the championship.
Unfortunately for the Las Vegas native, it didn’t work out that way at all. His last Cup win was in mid-August on the road course at Watkins Glen, and by the time the Chase was over, he had finished a disappointing 10th in the final standings.
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Now it’s time for “Kyle Busch: The Sequel.”
Or, as the old Herman’s Hermits song, “Henry the VIII,” goes, “Second verse, same as the first.”
And what a start it has been already. Busch won the Sprint Cup event last week in his hometown. In the Nationwide Series, he has a win and a fourth-place finish in the first three races. And in the Trucks Series, he won Saturday for the second time this season and was runner-up in the other event.
“Winning races and finishing up front and placing well is what my job is to do,” Busch said. “It’s nice to have guys that respect what you do out there, and I respect what they do out there and to have them talk nice and stuff is cool. I’m not sure if they’re just trying to get into my head so then later on they can do something else or what.”
Busch has already conquered Atlanta Motor Speedway, which plays host to Sunday’s Kobalt Tools 500 Sprint Cup event, five times. At what is considered the fastest track in NASCAR, he has four truck wins and also won last spring’s Sprint Cup race on the 1.5-mile layout.
But the KyBusch of this season seems much different than the KyBusch of 2008. Early last year, Busch bragged that he could win all three championships—Cup, Nationwide and Trucks.
In the end, he won none.
That’s why it’s not surprising to see him with a much more reserved attitude in 2009. Even though he’s already won four races overall, he’s not tooting his own horn by any stretch of the imagination.
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