Busch, on the other hand, led 133 of the 150 laps and appeared destined to tie Sam Ard’s record of four victories in as many consecutive races.
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“But we still had some gas left and he didn’t so I just stepped on it and moved him out of the way”, said Dillon after adding his seventh Xfinity race win to his ever-growing resume.
It looked as if, for the fourth time in five races this season, that Kyle Busch was going to win. He took the victory on the last lap of the TreatMyClot.com 300 at Auto Club Raceway in Fontana, California. “When you steal one like this, it means a lot more for some reason”.
That finish came not only after the tire failure, but also following an issue earlier in the race when Busch pitted on Lap 19 for changes as he struggled with the handling on his vehicle.
“NASCAR made a great decision by not throwing a caution on that last lap”, said a grinning Dillon. “Today it was like a chess match”, said Dillon. “I probably would have done the same thing….” “It was a fun race, one of the best wins of my career”. Anybody in their right mind would have made the move.
Busch was upset with NASCAR’s decision not to throw a caution – which could have locked Busch in as the victor if the field was frozen – but he still managed to finish second.
Busch was chasing history – gunning for his fourth straight Xfinity victory.
First Daniel Suarez passed Busch – it looked like Suarez was on the road to his first Xfinity win. Meanwhile, Busch is still trying to get to the finish line on a flat tire.
“I was just thinking, ‘Get to the checkered flag”. “I knew that we were one to one-and-a-half laps short. It was exciting. A little bit of everything happened there”.
Busch (No. 18) has clearly fallen off the pace as lapped cars are now passing him easily as he tries to save gas.
“Who needs March Madness?” asked Cup driver Brad Keselowski, who was in the TV booth helping cover the race.
Formula One’s new qualifying system faces an immediate revision after a woeful debut at the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne that failed to deliver the promised shake-up of the established order and was panned by drivers and abandoned by fans who walked out on the anti-climactic event.
Busch started third behind pole-sitter Suarez and Jones, his JGR teammates.
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The 64th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring was stopped for 2 hours and 15 minutes due to track conditions and lightning. Third was Daniel Morad in the No. 24 BMW Riley from the upstart Alegra Motorsports team. In Prototype Challenge, Colin Braun led in the CORE autosport No. 54 ORECA-Chevrolet.
