Kurt Busch Tag

By Seth Eggert, NASCAR Writer For the 2018 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series season, Stewart-Haas Racing will have two returning crew chiefs and two new crew chiefs for their four drivers. Clint Bowyer and 2014 Premier Series Champion Kevin Harvick will have the same crew chief, meanwhile 2004 Premier Series Champion Kurt Busch and newcomer Aric Almirola will have new faces atop the pit box. Almirola, who will replace the out-going Danica Patrick, will have John Klausmeier leading his No. 10 Smithfield Ford Fusion. Klausmeier has been a race engineerRead More

By Seth Eggert, NASCAR Writer The contract negotiations between Kurt Busch and Stewart Haas Racing show that there can be a lot of variables. Most drivers talk about the amount of money, sponsorship, and other obligations. One of the variables for Busch is unlike the others, the 2017 Daytona 500 winning car. Busch piloted the No. 41 Haas Automation / Monster Energy Ford Fusion to victory in the Daytona 500, his first win in ‘The Great American Race.’ It was also the first victory for SHR in the historic raceRead More

By Seth Eggert, NASCAR Writer Although it is the offseason for most of the NASCAR and motorsports community, the community came together to raise awareness for victims of child abuse. NASCAR drivers, Hall of Famers, and personalities alike visited with race fans at the NASCAR Technical Institute in Mooresville, N.C. on December 5, 2017 for the 29th Annual Stocks for Tots event. The event is hosted by the North Carolina Auto Racing Hall of Fame. Stocks for Tots is the brainchild of former Team Penske President Don Miller and driverRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor Ahead of this weekend’s race at Homestead-Miami Speedway that will see one of four drivers walk away with the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series championship trophy, we’ll take a step back to 2004 and the first year of the Chase format, along with the drama that played out in the season finale to deliver Kurt Busch with his first Cup championship. With Sprint/Nextel taking over the series title sponsorship from Winston at the end of the 2003 season, a new championship format was introduced, calledRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor The Round of Eight all comes down to this. After last week’s race at Texas, the stage is set for the final race of the round in Phoenix to determine which drivers will move onto Homestead and which drivers will see their championship hopes vanish in the Arizona desert. Phoenix has resided on the Cup Series schedule since 1988, but the track looks completely different than it did 29 years ago, having undergone a reconfiguration back in 2011. The reconfiguration added progressive banking to theRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service FORT WORTH, Tex. – A driver without a signed contract for 2018 won the pole position for Sunday’s AAA Texas 500 at Texas Motor Speedway (2 p.m. ET on NBCSN) with a record lap — giving a timely birthday present to his crew chief. In the final round of Friday’s knockout qualifying session, Kurt Busch covered the 1.5-mile distance in 26.877 seconds (200.915 mph) to top the previous record lap of 200.111 mph posted by Tony Stewart in 2014. In a third round thatRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor After a barn burner of a finish at Martinsville last weekend, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads to the Lone Star State and Texas Motor Speedway for Sunday’s running of the AAA Texas 500 and the second race of the playoff semi-finals. First joining the circuit in 1997, the 1.5 mile Texas track has provided some great racing over the years as the surface wore down as each season passed. For the second time the season, drivers will get a crack at the trackRead More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor After a trip out to America’s Heartland, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads back east this weekend and straight to the final short track race of the season, with Sunday’s running of the First Data 500 at Martinsville Speedway. A mainstay on the schedule since 1949, the historic half-mile, which is also the smallest on the circuit, will test both man and machine over 500 grueling laps. Sunday’s race will mark the start of the three-race playoff semi-finals that will trim the eight driverRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service KANSAS CITY, Kan. – Martin Truex Jr. survived a restart penalty and an unscheduled pit stop to return to what has become a thoroughly familiar locale—Victory Lane—in Sunday’s Hollywood Casino 400 at Kansas Speedway. In a dramatic race that brought Truex his seventh Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series win of the season, calamity eliminated four drivers from the series Playoff. Jamie McMurray, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Matt Kenseth and Kyle Larson all saw their postseason hopes end with the final event in the Round of 12.Read More

By David Morgan, NASCAR Editor The Round of 12 all comes down to this. After a wild weekend on the high banks of Talladega Superspeedway that saw the majority of the field suffer some kind of damage on the 2.66 mile behemoth in Alabama, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series heads west to America’s Heartland to take on the fast 1.5-mile Kansas Speedway for Sunday’s running of the Hollywood Casino 400. First joining the circuit as a relatively tame 1.5 mile track with 15 degree banking in the turns, KansasRead More