Kyle Busch: Driver, No. 51 Safelite® Toyota
NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Overview:
Event: DoorDash 250, Race 12 of 23, 75 Laps – 20/25/30; 149.25 Miles
Location: Sonoma (Calif.) Raceway (1.99-mile, 12-turn road course)
Date/Broadcast: June 11, 2022, at 7:30 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR 90
The Report on ‘Rowdy’:
Owner-driver Kyle Busch gets behind the wheel of the No. 51 Yahoo Tundra TRD Pro Saturday at Sonoma Raceway for his fifth and final NASCAR Camping World Truck Series start in 2022. Yahoo’s sponsorship of Busch is part of a multi-year agreement with Toyota Racing Development (TRD) which will see the global media and tech company with primary sponsorship of teams at KBM, Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR), Venturini Motorsports and Keith Kunz Motorsports. In addition to this weekend’s primary race with Busch, Yahoo will adorn the hood of John Hunter Nemechek’s No. 4 Tundra TRD Pro July 23 at Pocono Raceway in Long Pond Pa., and July 29 at Indianapolis (Ind.) Raceway Park.
Busch, the winningest driver in series history, enters Sonoma having won 37.4% (61/164) of the Truck Series races he has entered and finished first or second in 56.4% (92/164). In addition to his Truck Series leading 61 wins, ‘Rowdy’ also ranks first all-time among Truck Series drivers in driver rating (123.6), average finish (6.6) and is second in laps led (7,591).
Saturday’s race at Sonoma marks only the second time that Busch has competed in the Truck Series on a road course. He made his first-ever Truck Series start earlier this season at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Tex. where he led a race-high 31 laps and was in control of the race until two late-race cautions. On the second overtime restart the Las Vegas native was leading heading to Turn 11 when Alex Bowman and Stewart Friesen both overdrove the corner sending Busch off course. He was able to battle his way back to a disappointing third-place finish.
Over his last 25 Truck Series starts, Busch has an average finish of 3.2 while recording 13 wins and seven runner-up finishes. This year in the Truck Series, he has an average finish of 3.8 with 63 laps led across his four starts. His runner-up finish at Las Vegas (Nev.) Motor Speedway being his best result to date.
While he as never raced at Sonoma in the Truck Series, the 37-year-old driver has accumulated two wins (2008 and 2015), six top-five and eight top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 14.6 across 16 starts at the California road course in Cup Series action. He has finished seventh or better in his last six starts there, including four straight top-five finishes.
Mardy Lindley returns to KBM for his second season atop the pit box of the No. 51 team. Lindley has led his team to five wins since coming to KBM at the start of the 2021 season, including two with Corey Heim this year. In 2021, his drivers produced three victories, two with Busch and one with Martin Truex Jr. Before arriving at KBM, Lindley guided his drivers to 32 wins and four ARCA Menards Series East championships since 2013, including back-to-back titles with Sam Mayer the last two seasons. Additionally, he earned the ARCA Menards Series Sioux Chief Showdown championship with Mayer in 2020. Behind the wheel, the second-generation driver won 11 races on the Pro Cup Series from 2000 to 2006 and was crowned the series champion in 2001. Lindley has crew chiefed four races on road courses at KBM with Busch’s seventh-place result earlier this year being the best finish. He has been atop the pit box for two races at Sonoma in the K&N Pro Series West with a best result of 11th coming with Daniel Suarez in 2017.
Kyle Busch, Driver Q&A:
What are your thoughts on possibly being the first active cup series driver to win both the Truck Series and Cup Series races in the same weekend at Sonoma Raceway?
“I think everyone knows how much I like to win an inaugural race in any series, so would certainly hope we can go out to Sonoma and have a shot to win the first Camping World Truck Series there since 1998. We’ve got a new sponsor to KBM onboard this weekend, so getting Yahoo to victory lane in their first race on one of our Tundra TRD Pros would be pretty cool. I’ve always enjoyed racing at Sonoma. We’ve had top-five finishes five out of the last six Cup races there but haven’t been able to get back to victory lane there since 2015. It would be great to have a shot to get to win on Saturday in the Truck Series and the follow it up by getting back to victory lane there in the Cup race on Sunday.”
Do you believe your experience and two cup series wins at this track will help you beat the competition since the truck series hasn’t run on this track since 1998?
“Sonoma has been a really fun place to race over the years. I used to look at road course racing as a weekend off. You only had two races that you turned left and right, and you would go out there and try to have fun and you either had a really good day or a bad day you moved on. Now that we have six road courses on the schedule, there’s definitely more focus on road course racing and time spent on it than it was in the past. So, to get that experience on the same track with the Truck Series and to see how the tire reacts will be a good thing for us at Sonoma and hopefully it will help us out on Sunday as well.”
Kyle Busch Camping World Truck Series Career Highlights:
- Busch has a total of 164 Camping World Trucks starts and is ranked first all-time in wins (61), driver rating (123.6) and average finish (6.6).
- The 37-year-old driver has won 37.2% (61/164) of the NCWTS races he has entered and finished first or second in 56.1% (92/164).
- Busch stands alone as the leader in all-time career wins in NASCAR’s national touring series with 223 total victories. He has earned 60 NASCAR Cup Series wins, 102 NASCAR Xfinity Series wins, and 61 NCWTS wins.
- In August of 2010, Busch made history when he won the NCWTS, NXS and NCS races at Bristol Motor Speedway, becoming the only driver to sweep all three of NASCAR’s top three series at one track on the same weekend. He then repeated the feat in August of 2017.
Kyle Busch’s No. 51 Safelite Tundra:
KBM-71: The No. 51 Yahoo! team will race KBM-71 for Saturday’s race at Sonoma. This is the same Tundra that Busch led a race-high 31 laps with earlier this year at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Tex., but was relegated to a third-place finish after getting run over the course on the first lap of the second NASCAR overtime. John Hunter Nemechek finished second with KBM-71 in its maiden start last year at Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International.
KBM Notes of Interest:
- Across 35 starts on road courses, KBM drivers have earned one win, 13 top-five and 15 top-10 finishes, with an average starting position of 9.4 and an average finish of 12.3.
- Erik Jones picked up KBM’s lone road course victory in 2015 at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in Bowmanville, Ont.
- KBM holds the Camping World Truck Series records for most career wins (94) and most wins in a single season (14 in 2014). With his victory at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway, Corey Heim became the 18th different driver to win a Truck Series event for KBM. In addition to collecting a series-record seven Owner’s Championships, the organization has produced two championship-winning drivers: Erik Jones (2015) and Christopher Bell (2017).
- With 39 victories, the No. 51 is the winningest number in KBM’s Truck Series fleet.
