If you read the simple statistics, Kyle Busch won at Richmond from the pole his second-straight win at the Spring race at the ¾ mile oval. Jeff Gordon finished second and Kevin Harvick was third. But it really wasn't that simple.
Busch, the lap leader, who turned 25 on Sunday, led four times for 224 laps and took the lead from Jeff Gordon on the last restart, after fading earlier in the event, for his first NASCAR Sprint Cup win with crew chief Dave Rodgers.
“The car was phenomenal in the beginning. We were making minor changes to it to make it a little bit better. Then, for some reason, we missed the handle on the car in the middle of the race, around lap 170, 200. We started falling behind on the long runs, getting really loose. We kept plugging away. Dave never gave up,” Busch said after his 17th Cup win and first in 21 starts.
According to Busch, a late pit stop call put him in position to take the lead from Jeff Gordon on the final restart and race to victory lane.
“Especially at the end of the race when Dave made the call to come to pit road and put tires on with 25 or 30 to go, something like that, we just got going on restarts there.”
Gordon, who has been close to, but not in victory lane in 39 starts, said “Kyle was just the class of the field there early and I don’t know what happened to him, he started falling backwards. We had some issues at that same time. We were able to maintain and then get the lead from Burton and then pulled. I knew I didn’t want to see cautions. Our car was not really very good on restarts, but, we were able to get a couple of good ones.”
Harvick, who assumed the points lead, said, “We had a chance there at the end. The 18 (Busch) could run the outside where none of the rest of us could. He could carry that momentum.”
After the race Busch explained some of the dynamics of having a new crew chief come aboard during the 2009 season.
“When Dave came onboard, I don't know if I saw something or if I felt something, but I've worked with Dave in a couple of races in the Nationwide Series and really enjoyed my time working with him,” said Busch.
“He's a smart guy. He's a methodical thinker, utilizes the tools we have at JGR and makes more, pushes everybody harder. He's done it all throughout the off-season and all throughout this year. Some of our engineers were telling us. That's not the direction we need to go. Dave pushed it. It seems to be paying off for us.
“Dave and I, we have a lot of the same mentality, which maybe is scary to some, but to us it actually works pretty good.”
Busch, the lap leader, who turned 25 on Sunday, led four times for 224 laps and took the lead from Jeff Gordon on the last restart, after fading earlier in the event, for his first NASCAR Sprint Cup win with crew chief Dave Rodgers.
“The car was phenomenal in the beginning. We were making minor changes to it to make it a little bit better. Then, for some reason, we missed the handle on the car in the middle of the race, around lap 170, 200. We started falling behind on the long runs, getting really loose. We kept plugging away. Dave never gave up,” Busch said after his 17th Cup win and first in 21 starts.
According to Busch, a late pit stop call put him in position to take the lead from Jeff Gordon on the final restart and race to victory lane.
“Especially at the end of the race when Dave made the call to come to pit road and put tires on with 25 or 30 to go, something like that, we just got going on restarts there.”
Gordon, who has been close to, but not in victory lane in 39 starts, said “Kyle was just the class of the field there early and I don’t know what happened to him, he started falling backwards. We had some issues at that same time. We were able to maintain and then get the lead from Burton and then pulled. I knew I didn’t want to see cautions. Our car was not really very good on restarts, but, we were able to get a couple of good ones.”
Harvick, who assumed the points lead, said, “We had a chance there at the end. The 18 (Busch) could run the outside where none of the rest of us could. He could carry that momentum.”
After the race Busch explained some of the dynamics of having a new crew chief come aboard during the 2009 season.
“When Dave came onboard, I don't know if I saw something or if I felt something, but I've worked with Dave in a couple of races in the Nationwide Series and really enjoyed my time working with him,” said Busch.
“He's a smart guy. He's a methodical thinker, utilizes the tools we have at JGR and makes more, pushes everybody harder. He's done it all throughout the off-season and all throughout this year. Some of our engineers were telling us. That's not the direction we need to go. Dave pushed it. It seems to be paying off for us.
“Dave and I, we have a lot of the same mentality, which maybe is scary to some, but to us it actually works pretty good.”