Kyle Busch revs engine, bucket list at Daytona 500

On Sunday, it will be four years since Kurt Busch’s rearview mirror fell off with 30 laps remaining in the Daytona 500.

He turned what most would consider a dangerous development into a positive omen.

“I’m not going to have to look in it anymore,” the Las Vegas speed demon said about focusing on the cars in front instead of behind him, and passing every one to finally win the Great American Race after 14 years of trying.

Kyle Busch, who leads his older brother 2-1 in Cup Series championships, is 0 for 15 at the NASCAR Super Bowl. He has come close, having finished second, third and fourth. He also has finished 38th, 41st, 34th, 38th and 34th.

But if you believe in what goes around comes around — a fitting analogy in this case — and signs from above or at least the last turn on the Daytona infield road course, Kyle Busch’s luck might be about to change. He won Tuesday’s Busch Clash exhibition race when reigning Cup Series champion Chase Elliott and Ryan Blaney crashed while racing for the win, handing it to Busch.

Could it be that this is the year his worm makes a left-hand turn?

Absorbing hard knocks

“I don’t know if this is the year or not,” Busch said about Daytona being his elusive butterfly, and coming off a dismal season (for him) during which he won only once and was assigned a new crew chief (Ben Beshore) for 2021. “I’ve certainly been close a few times and have been way far away at other times. I feel like the superspeedway thing has not been my knack over the last few years.”

There’s a difference between a knack and knock, such as the hard one that took him out at Daytona in 2015. Busch suffered a massive compound fracture of his lower right leg in a pileup during the Xfinity Series race, causing him to miss the 500, his hometown race at Las Vegas Motor Speedway and nine others.

Somehow, he bounced back to win his first season title. As happy returns go, this was one that might have made Gen. Douglas MacArthur do a victory burnout.

Busch thought his luck in the big one at Daytona — he won a 400-miler there in 2013 — might be changing last year. He was leading with 20 laps to go. But that was before the Big One — at Daytona, rules governing engine horsepower bunch the cars in packs that tend to flip results (and sometimes the cars themselves) in massive chain-reaction crashes — and his engine let go.

Lots of luck

“It’s a mix of a lot of luck and some skills as well,” Busch said in putting the ingredients it takes to win the Daytona 500 in their proper order. “You can be leading going down the backstretch and have someone drill you from behind and crash you.”

For that reason, NASCAR’s biggest race also is its most whimsical. It would explain why it took a legendary champion such as Dale Earnhardt 18 tries to finally win it — and journeyman Derrike Cope only three. In 1990, Earnhardt was leading heading into the third turn of the final lap when he ran over debris, cut a tire and watched helplessly as Cope drove by him and into the record books.

It explains why Darrell Waltrip won 84 races during his Hall of Fame career but only one Daytona 500. And why his younger brother Michael won just four times in 784 career starts but twice at the 500.

And why Kyle Busch, still the fastest thing on four wheels, according to Fram Oil Filter types, has yet to spray sports drink on his crew after the Great American Race.

“Winning the Daytona 500 would be huge. I would certainly like to think I could get that race checked off my list before it’s all said and done,” he said, silently hoping that he’ll be able to avoid the Big One and finally win the big one Sunday.

Contact Ron Kantowski at rkantowski@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0352. Follow @ronkantowski on Twitter.