Turning of the ‘Tide’

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In: NASCAR Cup Series News

About 100 miles west of Talladega (Ala.) Superspeedway sits the campus of the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa, home of the 2009 and 2011 NCAA football national-championship-winning Alabama Crimson Tide. About 100 miles to the southeast of the 2.66-mile superspeedway tri-oval is the campus of Auburn University, whose Tigers captured college football’s national title in 2010. That’s a streak of three national titles and counting for the state of Alabama.

It’s by no coincidence that Kyle Busch, driver of the No. 18 M&M’s Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing (JGR), heads into Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Aaron’s 499 at Talladega with a laser focus on the 2012 Sprint Cup championship. And he’s riding the momentum of last weekend’s first win of the season at Richmond (Va.) International Raceway that turned the tide for Busch and the No. 18 team after a rather tumultuous start to the season.

Busch has conquered mammoth Talladega oval just once in his career, his lone win coming in April 2008. In 14 starts at the track, he has just three other top-15 finishes and five outings that ended with an accident. So, as he heads to Alabama just days after his 27th birthday on Wednesday, Busch knows the winner of Sunday’s 500-mile race will not only need to have a strong car, but also have luck on his side in order to survive the usually inevitable multicar accident on NASCAR’s longest track.

Despite winning the season-opening non-points Budweiser Shootout, Busch and the M&M’s team had some tough luck to slow their start to the season in the Sprint Cup point standings. Accidents at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway and Martinsville (Va.) Speedway, usually strong tracks for the No. 18 team, proved to be major setbacks. But since leaving Martinsville a month ago, Busch has finished 11th or better over the last three races and jumped from 16th to his current position of 11th in the series standings.

So, it certainly seems the tide is finally turning for Busch and Dave Rogers his crew chief this season, as they look to keep riding their momentum into Sunday’s Aaron’s 499. While Busch feels he has great equipment underneath him via the No. 18 M&M’s Toyota provided to him by JGR, and with driver-crew chief communication as strong as ever, he also knows he will need a little bit of luck to survive a Talladega race and repeat his lone triumph there from 2008.

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Speedway Digest Staff
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