Weekend Race Preview: Kansas Speedway

The Monster Energy NASCAR Cup and Camping World Truck Series heads to Kansas Speedway for the KC Masterpiece 400 and the 37 Kind Days 250. The 37 Kind Days 250 will take place on Friday while the KC Masterpiece 400 will take place on Saturday. The NASCAR XFINITY Series will be off for the next two weeks.

The Camping World Truck Series entry list features 33 drivers and one truck will be going home after qualifying. Some of the drivers on the weekend entry list include 1-Joey Gase, 02-Austin Hill, 4-Kyle Busch, 8-John Hunter Nemechek, 15-Robby Lyons, 20-Darrell Wallace Jr., 36-Bailey Currey, 50-Jamie Mosley and 51-Brandon Jones.

Qualifying for the 37 Kind Days 250 at Kansas Speedway will happen at 5:10 p.m. ET. on FOX Sports 1.

The Camping World Truck Series will then go racing at 8:30 p.m. ET. The 18th annual event will be 167 laps, 250.5 miles in length and will air live on FOX Sports 1 and MRN.

Kyle Busch will be back in the Camping World Truck Series to make his third start of the year. Busch, a native of Las Vegas, will be piloting the No. 4 Cessna Toyota Tundra for his own racing team.

In his last start at Las Vegas, Busch scored the pole and later went to victory lane for his 50th career truck series win.

“No, there’s nothing about hitting 50 that makes it special. Fifty-two would be special,” said Busch. “As far as how many truck races would I continue to run or wins would I like to hit, no because it’s my own team and I’d like to always get out there and have the opportunity to race with my own team. Everybody thinks I just like to go out there and pad my stats and everything else. It’s not like that. It’s entirely to work with the people and try to educate the people. We’ve got three new engineers – two new engineers on our team this year and other new crew members and things like that and so you try to work out the bugs with those guys.”

Busch holds two career victories and three top 10 finishes in four truck races at the 1.5-mile oval.

Darrell Wallace Jr. will join the Camping World Truck Series fold on Friday to pilot the No. 20 Andy’s Frozen Custard Chevrolet with Young’s Motorsports. Wallace’s last start in the series last year at Michigan resulted in a surprise win after starting ninth that day.

Having 45 starts in the series since 2013, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series driver holds six wins and 27 top 10 finishes.

Kyle Busch and Matt Crafton are the only previous winners at Kansas Speedway in the field.

The KC Masterpiece 400 entry list includes 38 drivers. That means there will be no DNQs after round one of qualifying on Friday. Some of the drivers on the list include 00-Landon Cassill, 15-Ross Chastain, 51-BJ McLeod, 55-Reed Sorenson and 66-Timmy Hill.

Qualifying for the 400-mile race on Saturday will take place Friday at 6:45 p.m. ET. on FOX Sports 1 and MRN radio.

The KC Masterpiece 400 will take place on Saturday at 8:00 p.m. ET. live on FOX Sports 1 and MRN radio.

Martin Truex Jr. enters the weekend looking to make it three in a row at Kansas Speedway. The reigning premier series champion won both races at Kansas last season and enters Saturday looking to score his second win of the year.

Along with the win at Richmond earlier this year, Truex has six top five and top 10 finishes with an average result of 13.5.

Matt Kenseth returning to the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series this weekend has everyone talking. Kenseth will kick-off a part-time schedule sharing the No. 6 Ford with Trevor Bayne throughout the season moving forward.

“My goal is to help the team improve, so the first thing I need to do is understand where we’re at currently,” said Kenseth. “I really won’t know that until we start turning some laps and working together, and for me, that starts Friday morning. Kansas has been a good track for me over the years. We’ve won there before with RFR. But, right now, I’m just looking forward to getting back to the track and getting to work.”

In 24 previous starts at Kansas, Kenseth holds two wins, seven top five and 13 top 10 finishes along with three pole starts.

Kevin Harvick and Kyle Busch are both hot as they head to Kansas Speedway. Harvick, in 11 completed races this year, has four victories and nine top 10 finishes. He also enters the 1.5-mile oval with a win last weekend at Dover International Speedway.

“I feel like this has honestly been one of our best race tracks as I’ve gone through the years and especially since I’ve been with SHR,” Harvick said. “I feel like we haven’t won as many races here as we should have, some of our own doing and some of it just circumstance but we’ve always just run really well here and I look forward to coming here for a number of reasons.”

Kyle Busch enters Kansas with three wins and nine top 10 finishes this season and looks to tie Harvick in the amount of wins as the series nears the halfway point of the regular season.

Until 2014, Kansas Speedway wasn’t too kind to the series veteran. But since then, Busch has scored five top five finishes in the last six races there including a win in 2016.  

Last time out there he went on to score a 10th place finish after starting seventh.

Brett Winningham
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