NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series Overview
Event: N.C. Education Lottery 200 (Race 8 of 23), 134 Laps – 30/30/74; 201 Miles
Location: Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway (1.5-mile quad-oval)
Date/Broadcast: May 17, 2019 at 8:30 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR 90
What You Need to Know
- Owner-driver Kyle Busch returns to the No. 51 Cessna Toyota Tundra for his final NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series start of 2019. Busch has earned wins in each of his four previous starts this season and hopes to go five-for-five with a win at Charlotte Motor Speedway in the N.C. Education Lottery 200. In his 12 Gander Trucks career starts at Charlotte, Busch has posted seven wins, 10 top-five and 11 top-10 finishes, three poles and 662 laps led, including his very first Gander Trucks win in 2005. In seven starts at Charlotte in a KBM Tundra, Busch has not finished worse than second. In the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series, Busch earned a win in the prestigious Coca-Cola 600 last year, thus earning himself a win at every active NASCAR Cup Series track. Busch also has one NASCAR All-Star Race win in 2017 and eight NASCAR Xfinity Series wins at the famed 1.5-mile oval.
- The 34-year-old driver has 149 NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series races under his belt, with 55 wins, 97 top-five and 118 top-10 finishes. His average starting position is 7.2 and his average finish is 6.9. He has led 6,879 laps. Busch also has 95 career NASCAR Xfinity Series wins and 54 career MENCS wins, bringing his total NASCAR National Series wins to 204.
- Veteran crew chief Rudy Fugle leads the 51 team this season. Fugle has guided his team to four Owner’s Championships (2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017) as a crew chief at KBM, including combined Owner’s/Driver’s Championships with Erik Jones in 2015 and Christopher Bell in 2017. The New York native’s drivers have combined for 26 wins, 22 poles, 61 top-five and 95 top-10 finishes across his 119 races calling the shots for the organization. Fugle has one win at Charlotte, with Busch in 2013, as well as three top-five and five top-10 finishes.
- After seven races, the No. 51 team leads the owner’s points standings by 25 markers over second place. The team has earned four wins with owner-driver Kyle Busch behind the wheel, and has two poles, five top-five and five top-10 finishes.
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Kyle Busch, Driver Q&A
Do you like your chances of being able to go five for five in the Gander Trucks this season?
“Charlotte is always one of my best tracks, favorite tracks. I enjoy running there with the trucks especially. I feel like there’s a good opportunity to be able to go five for five. Hopefully we can put the Cessna Tundra in victory lane one more time this year and stay undefeated. It’s always special to win a truck race at Charlotte because you are able to celebrate in victory lane with a lot of the people that work in the shop at KBM that don’t travel and this is their once chance each year to experience it in person, and then for the guys that do travel, they get to have their families be a part of it.”
What are the challenges to continue improving your truck program once you’re done racing this season?
“For us, we aren’t a Cup team and so we move a lot slower than the Cup teams do. It just takes a bit longer to kind of get all that instilled into our stuff. If you look at me running the front side of the season and running as much as I do right now, we’ve been building some notes, and we’ve been building some things that we can work on and get better and do a little bit differently, so when we get to say July, August – that’s when you’ll start seeing some stuff coming out. That will be the brunt of the season kind of closing in for the Playoffs and then the Playoff push. I’d like to run more or maybe I’d like to run a little bit later, but I just don’t know that the races fall, especially with me – like going to Iowa, I’ve never been to Iowa. Gateway, those places, I don’t need to go to those places, so it doesn’t make any sense for me to go to those places. We have to rely on Rudy (Fugle, crew chief) and the other crew chiefs and drivers to make our stuff better when they go to those places.”
No. 51 Tundra – Charlotte Motor Speedway Advance Page Two
Kyle Busch Career Highlights
- Busch has a total of 149 NGOTS starts and is ranked first in Gander Trucks wins (55), second in laps led (6,879) and fourth in poles (22). Busch has a total of 97 top-five and 118 top-10 finishes with an average start of 7.2 and an average finish of 6.9.
- The 34-year-old driver has now won 36.91% (55/149) of the NGOTS races he has entered and finished first or second in 54.36% (81/149).
- Busch stands alone as the leader in all-time career wins in NASCAR’s national touring series with 204 total victories. He has earned 54 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS) wins, 95 NASCAR XFINITY Series (NXS) wins, and 55 Gander Trucks wins.
- In August of 2010, Busch made history when he won the NGOTS, NXS and MENCS races at Bristol Motor Speedway, becoming the only driver to sweep all three of NASCAR’s top three series at one track on the same weekend. He then repeated the feat in August of 2017.
Kyle Busch’s No. 51 Cessna Tundra:
KBM-058: Crew chief Rudy Fugle and the No. 51 Cessna team will unload chassis KBM-058 at Charlotte Motor Speedway for the N.C. Education Lottery 200 this Friday. This chassis is brand new and will make its first start.
KBM Notes of Interest
- KBM drivers have recorded five wins, three poles, 537 laps led, 11 top-five and 18 top-10 finishes resulting in an average finish of 9.1 across 24 starts at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
- Owner-driver Kyle Busch has earned all five KBM victories at Charlotte Motor Speedway, winning in 2010, 2011, 2013, 2014 and 2017.
- KBM holds the Gander Truck Series records for most career wins (72) and most wins in a single season (14 in 2014). In addition to collecting a series-record six Owner’s Championships, the organization has produced two championship-winning drivers; Erik Jones (2015) and Christopher Bell (2017).
Kyle Busch Motorsports No. 51 Toyota Tundra 2019 Gander Trucks Box Score:
