Busch gets revenge a race at a time

As Dale Earnhardt Jr. still seeks his first win in two years, the man he replaced, Kyle Busch, has racked up four Cup wins in '08. Jared C. Tilton/ASP Inc/Icon SMI

KOONTZ LAKE, Ind. -- It appears that Kyle Busch is getting the last laugh after he was dismissed from Hendrick Motorsports last June to make room for Dale Earnhardt Jr.

At the time, there were more than a few skeptics who wondered if team owner Rick Hendrick had let go of the wrong man. After all, the young driver from Las Vegas displayed tremendous talent and potential, even if he wasn't known for doing and saying all the right things.

So Hendrick's loss made Busch the big prize for other team owners in Sprint Cup, and when Joe Gibbs Racing signed the driver, it was expected to be a successful combination.

After winning four Cup races in the first 13 events, stunning would be a better way to describe Busch this season.

It's not just Sprint Cup but every car or truck that Busch climbs into. Sunday's win at Dover, Del. was the 10th victory for Busch this season, counting the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series and the Nationwide Series. He has four Nationwide wins and two NCTS victories.

In the meantime, Earnhardt continues to search for his first Cup win for Hendrick.

Even though "Shrub" is known for speaking his mind, and it isn't always what the team wants to hear, he is benefiting from marrying his great talent to JGR's well-prepared race cars.

"That was all I had," Busch said of a win at Dover that saw him use outstanding pit stops to get in front late in the race. "That was it. I was just riding, taking care of it and running 90 percent and not pushing too hard to try to do anything stupid. That was about all she had. There wasn't much that I could have done. If I would've tried driving any harder I probably would've just wrecked myself.

"The [crew] should enjoy this win. This is their win right here. I just drove a race car and drove a race that I just needed to pace myself and just run around the bottom every lap and not really move around much. Even though I could, I just didn't need to. The guys that pitted this thing on pit road definitely won it for us and they are deserving."

Most impressive about Busch's season has been his ability to adapt to almost any circumstance and find a way to win. That has made him the driver to beat in Sprint Cup racing as the summer season is here and teams jockey for position in "The Chase for the Championship."

"For me, I believe there's a way that you drive the trucks, there's a way you drive the Nationwide cars; that's full out, as fast as you can go," Busch said. "The harder you go, the faster you can go. These cars here (in Cup), you have to pace yourself a little bit. You have to slow them down. You can drive them hard for the first three or four laps, then you have to start backing off, start slowing down, slowing up your entry, slowing down the center, just kind of moseying around the corner, trying to make the thing stick in one particular groove.

"I've found something that's worked for me here recently in the past few weeks. I found it at Darlington. I won there. Then I finished third at Lowe's. Then we won here again today. You know, we're gaining on the car as well. But I think a lot of it is a little bit of the driver. You've got to stay calm when you can. You've got to get going when the time's right and when you can get riled up.

"I just want to win everything, man," Busch said. "That's all I'm here for."

While Busch continues to keep winning, he's had to overcome some adversity, including this weekend when someone broke into his team transporter and stole his race helmet.

"Friday night somebody snuck in the garage area with the cleanup crew and rattled the back doors of the trailer open, dumped their beer and ice and everything in the trailer, went up into the lounge, stole my helmet," Busch said. "Somebody saw it happen, I guess, they told security guards outside. They were checking everybody that was leaving the racecar.

"They found him, confiscated him, brought the helmet back. It didn't matter. It's not a lucky helmet. It's not any of that."

The incident offered an interesting twist on a driver more accustomed to playing the villain himself, a role team owner Joe Gibbs has long understood.

"From the very first time we talked to Kyle, he came over, we sat down and talked, J.D. Gibbs and everybody there," Gibbs said. "We never make a decision at Joe Gibbs Racing unless everybody agrees and is in on it. Denny Hamlin and Tony Stewart both said to us, 'Go get him.'