FORT WORTH, Texas (AP) — Kyle Busch passed German Quiroga off a restart in a two-lap shootout in the Camping World Truck race Friday night at Texas Motor Speedway for his seventh victory in nine series starts this year.
Ninth on a restart with five laps left, Busch moved to third in one lap and was running second behind Quiroga when Jeb Burton sent ThorSport Racing teammate Johnny Sauter spinning through the infield grass, forcing the green-white-checkered finish.
“Driving up through the middle there, the seas sort of parted ways a little bit, and they were already three-wide, and I’m like, ‘There’s a gap there. I’m taking it.’ And that put us four-wide. But in those situations, with that many laps to go, you’ve just got to do it.”
Busch restarted on the outside of Quiroga and pulled away easily before another caution ended the race on the final lap.
“I thought the 17 (Timothy Peters) was in the catbird seat there,” Busch said. “I figured he had the perfect strategy — two tires and he was going to be on the outside, get through those guys and get out front.”
Quiroga was involved in the last-lap wreck, dropping him to 17th.
Jeb Burton was second, followed by Peters, Tyler Reddick, points leader Matt Crafton, Joey Coulter, Max Gresham, Joe Nemechek, Ryan Blaney and Cameron Hayley.
Busch led 80 of the 152 laps for his third series victory in the 1 1/2-mile oval.
Racing in the series for the first time since winning at Chicagoland on Sept. 13, Busch has 42 wins in 124 Truck races. He has 140 victories in NASCAR’s top three series, winning 29 times in Cup and a record 69 times in Nationwide. He has 14 victories this year, also winning once in Cup and six times in Nationwide.
Kyle Busch Motorsports has won 12 of the first 20 races this season, with Darrell Wallace Jr. winning three times and Erik Jones twice. Wallace, the winner last week at Martinsville, dropped out with a blown engine while racing Busch for the lead with 42 laps left.
Busch also helped Toyota wrap up its seventh manufacturers’ championship.
Defending series champion Crafton to increase his lead to 23 points over Blaney with two races left. Crafton won the June race at the track.
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