This weekend, the 10-race Chase for the NASCAR Sprint Cup Championship kicks off at Chicagoland Speedway with the MyAFibStory.com 400.
In 13 Sprint Cup career starts at the 1.5-mile track track, Kurt Busch has added one top-five finish and seven top 10s to his record. His best finish at Chigacoland was last year, when he finished fourth in the Geico 400.
It’s a track Busch knows well, and heading into Sunday’s race, the No. 41 driver is taking stock of his past experiences there.
Q: Stewart-Haas Racing tested at Chicagoland Speedway in preparation for the Chase. Talk a little bit about that.
A: “I hope we are able to take advantage of the test and not fall behind on that first practice session (Friday). That has been some of the trouble this year and we have played a little bit of catch-up after the first Friday practice. Now, with a test session used at Chicago, a test session used at Loudon, we have to apply that knowledge the right way and make these finishes count because that is what the Chase is all about. I’m really proud of this team and congratulations to SHR (Stewart-Haas Racing) for putting two out of four cars in the Chase.”
Q: What have your previous races at Chicago been like for you?
A: “Chicago is a fast, mile-and-a-half track I have always enjoyed racing it since I started racing there in my rookie season. The track isn’t as smooth as it used to be – it has some bumps in it – but it’s a place I like. It is another one of those tracks, though, where I just haven’t had the best of luck. An example is the 2002 race. We had a really fast car for that race but, for some reason after the last pit stop, the car just wasn’t handling the same as it had been. We were just way too tight and really couldn’t figure out why. When we got back to the shop and started going over the car, we realized that the radiator pan had come off and that’s like 100 pounds of front downforce. We were going so fast that the car bottomed out and dragged the radiator pan out. It’s just weird stuff like that.”
The MyAFibStory.com 400 at Chicagoland Speedway will air this Sunday, September 14 at 2 p.m. on ESPN.
