Kyle Busch led 190 of 200 laps in the Auto Lotto 200 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway. The all-time Xfinity race winner held off Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Erik Jones in the closing laps to capture his 82nd career victory.
As a result, Busch raised his total of Xfinity Series laps led to an astounding 17,064. He claimed victory for the fifth time in 11 races at the one mile oval. Furthermore, this was the Sprint Cup mainstay’s sixth win in his 10 Xfinity starts in 2016. Busch commented on his amazing numbers he has posted in the lower tiered series.
“I guess they’re big numbers,” said Busch, who ran the Auto lotto 200 on one set of left-side tires and arrived at the finish line 1.499 seconds ahead of Jones. “I really don’t know what big numbers are, and records are made to be broken. There may be somebody like me that also comes along down the road that does the same thing. I’ve just been fortunate enough to do it in this era. Running in this series is something fun for me to do, and it also helps me out and gets me a little more experience.”
The race was not set in stone with 20 laps remaining. Even though Kyle Busch was the leader of the race, Busch was on only two fresh tires. His Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, Erik Jones, had four fresh rubbers and was re-starting next him on the front row.
Erik Jones got a great jump and placed himself in position for a pass. It was not to be as another caution came out almost immediately when the #1 car of Ryan Preece spun out. As a result, the drivers were realigned to do it all again. On the final restart for The Auto Lotto 200, Kyle Busch was able to get out front and pull away. From there, teammate Erik Jones could not catch up and settled for another second place result. Jones did manage to lead three laps during The Auto Lotto 200 and commented on the ending of the race.
“I thought we were just as good as him, if not even a little bit better when we got up close to him,” said Jones. “We had a lapped car right up in the groove coming off Turn 2 after the second restart, it took all the pressure off him where he wasn’t worried about making a mistake. I think if we could have stayed a little closer, we could have maybe forced him to make a mistake. That’s how we got around him earlier in the day. It feels good to be up there with him, but we definitely want to beat him straight up one of these days.”
Brad Keselowski, another NASCAR Sprint Cup Series full-timer, finished the race in third. Keselowski didn’t manage to guide his #22 Fitzgerald ford to the lead but had a strong car all afternoon long. The speedster just couldn’t find enough get up and go to overpower the Joe Gibbs Racing machines.
“We had a decent day in the Auto Lotto 200,” Keselowski said. “A little better than where we have been, which was also something to be proud of, but of course we want to get to Victory Lane with the No. 22 Team Penske Ford. We aren’t quite there, but we’ll keep pushing. That was also a step in the right direction overall for sure.”
Daniel Suarez raced his way to a fourth place finish. As a result, Joe Gibbs Racing placed three cars in the top five. The finish was good enough to keep Suarez atop the Xfinity Series point standings. He is 15 points better than JR Motorsport’s Elliott Sadler.
Austin Dillon rounded out the top five in fifth place. Furthermore, his placement put three NASCAR Sprint Cup drivers in the top five finishing spots. Austin Dillon’s performance was over shadowed by an on track incident that involved his little brother Ty Dillon.
Ty Dillon was racing Alex Bowman, who was filling in for Dale Earnhardt Jr. in Sunday’s main event. It appeared that Bowman got into the rear of Dillon’s #3 WESCO Chevrolet. The contact sent him careening into the outside wall and into a lowly 33rd place finish in the Auto Lotto 200.
The wreck helped the fourth through sixth drivers in the standings gain valuable ground on the young driver. Points are at a premium for Dillon as he has yet to capture a win in 2016. He also voiced his displeasure with Bowman in his post race interview, accusing his competitor of wrecking him on purpose. Bowman also retorted with his version of the events.
“He tried to wreck me about four times after the accident,” Bowman said after the race. “I don’t blame him for being upset. He has every right to be upset. He drove me way up the race track right before the contact. He obviously got tight underneath me. I had a ton of wheel in it, and it finally caught. I barely came off the wall. You come off the wall six inches and you tag somebody in the right rear. I hate that for the 3 car, but I definitely didn’t do it intentionally. He can think what he wants.”
Final Results for The Auto Lotto 200 at New Hampshire Speedway:
1 18 Kyle Busch(i) NOS Energy Drink Toyota 200 0 150.0 Running 2 190
2 2 20 Erik Jones # GameStop/NASCAR Heat Evolution Toyota 200 40 1 125.2 Running 1 3
3 3 22 Brad Keselowski(i) Fitzgerald Ford 200 0 119.9 Running
4 4 19 Daniel Suarez Juniper Networks Toyota 200 37 111.7 Running
5 7 2 Austin Dillon(i) Rheem/WATTS Chevrolet 200 0 110.6 Running
6 9 48 Brennan Poole # DC Solar Chevrolet 200 35 96.3 Running
7 8 7 Justin Allgaier BRANDT Chevrolet 200 34 103.7 Running
8 5 88 Alex Bowman Genesis Brake Light Services Chevrolet 200 34 1 101.5 Running 1 7
9 17 62 Brendan Gaughan South Point Chevrolet 200 32 81.5 Running
10 6 1 Elliott Sadler OneMain Chevrolet 200 31 97.5 Running
11 13 33 Brandon Jones # Cometic Gasket Chevrolet 200 30 83.7 Running
12 15 6 Darrell Wallace Jr AutoLotto Ford 200 29 88.8 Running
13 18 51 Jeremy Clements RepairableVehicles.com Chevrolet 200 28 82.7 Running
14 22 16 Ryan Reed Lilly Diabetes/American Diabetes Association Ford 199 27 74.5 Running
15 16 39 Ryan Sieg RSS Racing Chevrolet 199 26 72.4 Running
16 26 44 JJ Yeley Zachry Toyota 199 25 68.7 Running
17 19 28 Dakoda Armstrong WinField Toyota 199 24 67.0 Running
18 14 42 Justin Marks Katerra Chevrolet 199 23 73.7 Running
19 12 01 Ryan Preece # Mizzy Construction Inc Chevrolet 198 22 76.6 Running
20 27 78 BJ McLeod # Safecraft Safety Equipment Ford 197 21 57.8 Running
21 30 07 Ray Black Jr # Scuba Life Chevrolet 197 20 55.3 Running
22 34 13 Timmy Hill(i) Taiga Coolers/TLC Vacation Club Dodge 197 0 53.8 Running
23 29 0 Garrett Smithley # Flex Seal Chevrolet 196 18 46.7 Running
24 33 90 Mario Gosselin BuckedUp Apparel Chevrolet 196 17 48.0 Running
25 36 52 Joey Gase The Lisa Colagrossi Foundation Chevrolet 195 16 46.7 Running
26 35 15 Scott Heckert Carport Empire/Lilly Trucking Ford 195 15 42.3 Running
27 31 77 TJ Bell VroomBrands Chevrolet 194 14 45.6 Running
28 39 97 Matt Waltz VroomBrands Chevrolet 191 13 39.0 Running
29 40 25 Chris Cockrum Advanced Communications Group Chevrolet 191 12 36.0 Running
30 38 74 Mike Harmon Dodge 188 11 35.7 Running
31 21 4 Ross Chastain Dream Water Chevrolet 170 10 54.7 Accident
32 11 11 Blake Koch LeafFilter Gutter Protection Chevrolet 159 9 72.0 Transmission
33 10 3 Ty Dillon WESCO Chevrolet 144 8 71.0 Running
34 24 14 Jeff Green Toyota 109 7 53.2 Brakes
35 32 70 Derrike Cope E-hydrate/Ice-Frost.com Chevrolet 99 6 39.8 Suspension
36 25 93 David Starr Massimo Motors Chevrolet 82 5 46.0 Overheating
37 20 24 Corey LaJoie Youtheory Toyota 64 4 56.2 Accident
38 28 40 Carl Long OCR Gaz Bar/CrashClaimsR.Us Toyota 38 3 26.0 Brakes
39 37 89 Morgan Shepherd Chevrolet 25 2 27.3 Handling
