No surprise here; Busch wins Chicagoland

Jimmie Johnson almost pulled off the unthinkable in NASCAR these days – beating Kyle Busch. But almost doesn’t count as Johnson ended the LifeLock.com 400 at the Chicagoland Speedway second to Busch on Saturday night. 

Johnson was leading for a final restart with two laps remaining. Busch, in the No. 18 Toyota, was glued to the bumper of Johnson’s No. 48 Chevrolet, pushing Johnson down the frontstretch as the green flag waved. Entering Turn 1, Busch jumped to the high lane and used the momentum to charge by, taking the lead heading toward Turn 4.

“Jimmie was going to bring us down slow [for the restart],” Busch explained. “I remember this from short track days when somebody was in your mirror and you creep up on them. You stop and they'll go up on you. I pushed Jimmie Johnson to go and was like ‘let's go man, here we go.’ That was the saving grace right there was a good restart. I just had to go to the outside because he was going to block the bottom in Turn 1 and 2. It sucked for me out there.”

Busch swept the weekend races at Chicago, also taking the Nationwide Series race win on Friday night. The win was his seventh this season in Sprint Cup competition. Though challenging at the finish, Busch led a race high 165 laps of the 267-lap event.

Busch lost the point position to Johnson on lap 251. At the time, he was convinced that by allowing Johnson to drive by, he had thrown the race win out the window. But he was given one more shot.

On lap 263 a caution flag waved after the machine of David Gilliland laid oil on the racing surface, setting up the final two-lap run. 

“I knew when Jimmie got us here that clean air was going to be it,” Busch said. “I pretty much had given up by that point figuring he had the race won, but another caution came out and we were able to rebunch up for that final restart and got a great restart on his rear bumper and pulled to his outside. I figured he would protect the bottom as he did on the frontstretch, and I had some momentum and got to his outside on three and was able to complete the pass through four and made it to the finish line first.”

“I wasn't thinking defense,” Johnson said of the finish. “We had such a good car, I thought I would get away from him on the restart and he got a great start and was right there with me and just broke past that bumper through the center of 1 and 2 and that was it.”

“Looking back, if I could do it over again, I would have played more defense on that restart. I thought with how we had been running, I was in good shape.”
 
Past Chicagoland winners Kevin Harvick and Tony Stewart ran well, both sliding into the top 5 at the finish.

Harvick was sitting third at the restart and thought a repeat win may be in his future if only the final battle had played out a little differently.

“I thought I was in a pretty good spot to tell you the truth when the 18 got up on the outside of the 48, the 48 looked like he needed momentum,” Harvick said. “It looked like he needed to carry the momentum all the way to the outside, and the 18 was there and did a good job on the restart and made it stick and made it happen. I thought we were might sneak one through there, but still, a good night for us and exciting finish.”

Harvick was third, Greg Biffle was fourth and Stewart closed out the top 5. 

The first night race at Chicagoland was nearly accident free. There were nine caution flags through the event, the first falling on lap 37 as a competition caution. The final practice was shortened on Thursday in addition to washing out qualifying. The field was set based on points. On Friday night, following the Nationwide race, rain showers again crept into the area, washing any rubber off of the racetrack.

Four other yellows through the race were for debris. Other caution flags were thrown for single car incidents. 

Brian Vickers, Matt Kenseth, David Ragan, Martin Truex, Jr. and Ryan Newman closed out the top 10.

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