It took the late Dale Earnhardt 20 tries before he finally won NASCAR’s biggest prize, the Daytona 500, in 1998. Kurt Busch could empathize with Earnhardt as it took him 17 tries before he finally won the 500 in 2017. And even though it’s been over eight years since Busch did so, the soon-to-be NASCAR Hall of Famer still remembers the day like it was yesterday.
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Busch competed in the 500 21 times, finishing second three times (2003, 2005 and 2008) before he was finally able to put it all together in 2017 — essentially being in the right place at the right time.
Busch was a guest on this week’s Backstretch Banter with RFK Racing podcast and recalled in vivid detail how he was fortunate enough to win the Great American Race. But first came the 500 win that got away from him in 2009.
“I was in the Penske Miller Lite Dodge. I’m running right behind Jimmie Johnson and here comes Brad Keselowski around the outside,” Busch said. “I’m like, ‘Oh, man, Brad. I’m going to go and just jump in front of him, use him. He’s going to push me to the win and I’m going to finally win a restrictor plate race.’
“(I) get in front of Brad and (went into the) inside fence that fast, done. That one decision, to jump out and try to win, backfired and it took a championship run away. That put this mindset that a plate win will happen when it happens, but don’t hurt your playoff chances.”
That very valuable lesson stuck with Busch in the next eight editions of the 500. And staying patient and keeping that mindset finally allowed him to break through in the 2017 Daytona 500.
Busch and most of those on the lead lap pitted with about 50 laps to go, but unless there was a late caution, it was going to be a crap shoot if anyone could finish the race on that final tank.
Busch had been closing in on the lead and was running third when first Chase Elliott, then Martin Truex Jr., and then Kyle Larson, all ran out of gas, paving the way for Busch’s win.
“And as I came off Turn 4, it was all black and white everywhere, I remember it so vividly. There was no colors, no nothing,” Busch said. “It was just black and white and I just saw all the flashbulbs going off and I was like, ‘We made this happen and we made this happen for a long time.’”
Busch won the race for Stewart-Haas Racing, followed by Ryan Blaney, AJ Allmendinger, Aric Almirola and Paul Menard.
