NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series Overview
Event: Vankor 350 (Race 5 of 23), 147 Laps – 35/35/77; 220.5 Miles
Location: Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth (1.5-mile oval)
Date/Broadcast: March 29, 2019 at 9 p.m. ET on FS1, MRN and Sirius/XM NASCAR 90
What You Need to Know
- Owner-driver Kyle Busch is now three-for-three in NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series starts in 2019. At Martinsville (Va.) Speedway last weekend, he claimed the clock in a dominating performance in the No. 51 Cessna Toyota Tundra, leading a total of 174 of 250 laps and earning his second NGOTS win at Martinsville. It was his 54th NGOTS win, and his 201st NASCAR national series win.
- Busch has 12 total NGOTS starts at Texas Motor Speedway in Fort Worth, Texas, and has three wins (2009, 2010, 2014), eight top-five and eight top-10 finishes. Rowdy’s last five starts at the Texas track have been as an owner-driver for Kyle Busch Motorsports (KBM), with his most recent start in the Truck Series in 2014. His average starting position at the 1.5-mile oval is 6.4 and his average finishing position is 10.9.
- In addition to Friday’s Vankor 350, owner-driver Busch is scheduled to make one final NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series start in the No. 51 for KBM in 2019 at Charlotte (N.C.) Motor Speedway on May 17.
- 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 25 wins, 22 poles, 59 top-five and 93 top-10 finishes across his 117 races calling the shots for the organization. Working with Fugle in 2013, Busch collected five wins, eight top-five and nine top-10 finishes across 11 Truck Series starts.
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Kyle Busch, Driver Q&A
Do you have a target career-wins total for the Truck Series?
“Yes and no. I’m only allowed five (races) a year so it’s going to be tough to accumulate too many in the foreseeable future. Just keep doing what we do. If we can win four or five of the five each and every year, then it’ll hopefully add up over the course of the next 10 years or whatever. That’ll put you right around 100.”
You have Texas and Charlotte left this year in the Truck Series. Do you have a good chance to make it five for five?
“Yes, obviously working with Rudy (Fugle, crew chief) – working with any of our crew chiefs, they’re all really good. I worked with (Mike) Hillman (Jr.) last year and won races. I’ve worked with Marcus (Richmond) before that and won races. Jerry Baxter, every one of our guys that’s been at KBM. Rudy since ’13. I’d like to think that Texas is a good place. We saw how fast Todd (Gilliland) was there last year. He was really, really good. I think that our guys have a good baseline. We’ll go to Texas and work on our stuff and try to improve it in practice. The same thing as we always do and put a good piece out there for the race. Charlotte is always one of my best tracks, favorite tracks. I enjoy running there with the trucks especially. There’s a good opportunity to be able to go five for five.”
Kyle Busch Career Highlights
- Busch has a total of 148 NGOTS starts and is ranked first in NGOTS wins (54), second in laps led (6,782) and fourth in poles (22). Busch has a total of 96 top-five and 117 top-10 finishes with an average start of 7.2 and an average finish of 6.9.
- The 33-year-old driver has now won 36.48% (54/148) of the NGOTS races he has entered and finished first or second in 54.05% (80/148).
- Busch stands alone as the leader in all time career wins in NASCAR’s national touring series with 201 total victories. He has earned 53 Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series (MENCS) wins, 94 NASCAR XFINITY Series (NXS) wins, and 54 NGOTS 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 No. 51 Cessna Tundra:
KBM-055: The No. 51 Cessna team has prepared chassis KBM-055 for Friday’s Vankor 350 at Texas Motor Speedway. This machine was last piloted by Kyle Busch to the victory at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway in February. Prior to that, the vehicle had been raced only once by Noah Gragson in the season finale at Homestead-Miami (Fla.) Speedway in 2018, where he finished third.
| Starts | Wins | Average Start | Average Finish | Laps Led |
| 2 | 1 | 5.0 | 2.0 | 126 |
KBM Notes of Interest
- In 41 starts at Texas Motor Speedway, KBM drivers have collected five wins (Kyle Busch, Nov. 2010 and 2014; Erik Jones, Nov. 2015; William Byron, June 2016; and Christopher Bell, June 2017), two pole positions, 12 top-five and 27 top-10 finishes, with a collective average starting position of 8.8 and an average finish of 10.6.
- The No. 51 is the winningest number in the KBM stable with 27 trips to victory lane in Truck Series action
- KBM holds the NGOTS records for most career wins (71) 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 NGOTS Box Score:
