The win is Busch’s third NASCAR Cup Series win of 2023 – tying fellow Team Chevy driver William Byron’s series-leading win record for the season.
·Busch now sits at 63 victories in 657 career starts in NASCAR’s premier series.
·The victory is Chevrolet’s first NASCAR Cup Series win at World Wide Technology Raceway – coming in just the series’ second appearance at the 1.25-mile oval.
·The winningest manufacturer in NASCAR Cup Series history, Chevrolet now sits at 842 all-time wins in NASCAR’s premier series.
·Chevrolet swept the NASCAR doubleheader race weekend at World Wide Technology Raceway with Grant Enfinger and the No. 23 GMS Racing Silverado RST team taking the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series win.
Kyle Busch starts from the pole. Had a lot of work in the middle to get there, Kyle, but you complete the perfect weekend.
“Yeah, absolutely. That was pretty awesome. Man, to sit on the pole, lead a lot of laps and have my guys do such a great job today was pretty phenomenal for us. Great for RCR. Just win, baby!
Thanks to Team Chevy, appreciate 3Chi. Don’t forget, guess what, the No. 8 special – free chicken tenders at Cheddar’s on Monday! All the fans go out and celebrate with us. We’re going to have a great time with this one. This one is pretty cool.”
7th Daniel Suarez, No. 99 Freeway Insurance Camaro ZL1
8th William Byron, No. 24 Axalta Camaro ZL1
TOP-FIVE UNOFFICIAL RESULTS:
POS. DRIVER
1st Kyle Busch (Chevrolet)
2nd Denny Hamlin (Toyota)
3rd Joey Logano (Ford)
4th Kyle Larson (Chevrolet)
5th Martin Truex Jr. (Toyota)
The 2023 NASCAR Cup Series season continues at Sonoma Raceway with the Toyota / Save Mart 350 on Sunday, June 11, at 3:30 p.m. ET. Live coverage can be found on FOX, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Channel 90.
YOU GUYS WORKED ON THIS ALL DAY LONG. I KNOW FOURTH ISN’T EXACTLY WHAT YOU WANT ANY WEEK, BUT THIS HAS TO FEEL PRETTY GOOD.
“It does, it does. I want to be upset with fourth after running second there the last little bit of the race and having a shot to lineup on the front row for a green-white-checkered. For a lot of the day, I thought I was going to run 20th on back. Huge thank you to Cliff Daniels (crew chief) and everybody on the No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevy team for making the right adjustments. I don’t know if we were still amazing, but the strategy calls were perfect and at the right time and the late cautions fell at the right time. I think the car would have been fine had we just ran those last 50 laps under green.
Proud of the effort today. It’s been a couple tough races. We’ve been so good all year long and the last few have been pretty bad and we’ve had to work on it quite a bit. The team got us in a place where we could contend for the win, so you can’t ask for much more than that.
Thank you to HendrickCars.com, Hendrick Motorsports, Chevrolet, Valvoline – everybody that helps on this car. It’s a whole team effort. And congrats to Kyle (Busch). It was fun chasing him down. I wish I would have done a better job. When I was the leader, I hadn’t been at the front all day, so I didn’t know what to expect. I didn’t know where people were running on restarts and I didn’t know how hard they could go. I just got kind of caught off guard and lost the control.”
CARSON HOCEVAR, NO. 7 SCHLUTER SYSTEMS CAMARO ZL1
Broken brake rotor during Stage Two forced the No. 7 Camaro ZL1 team to retire early from the race.
Finished: 36th
What a day you had going. How would you assess your first time in a Cup car today up to that point?
“I thought it was great. I had a blast. Just so thankful for the opportunity. I don’t have a job for next year. I know Al Niece and Cody Efaw wants me to run for them and I will forever run a race or however many. But man, I’m just so thankful that they gave me the opportunity – the opportunity to drive a Xfinity car and now driving a Cup car. I was running 16th.. just so surreal for the first time ever. I thought we were going to have a good day and be in a good spot for Schluter Systems, Celsius, Spire Motorsports, Ryan Sparks and the No. 7 Chevy team. Hopefully that call for a Cup ride isn’t the only one I get in my life.”
“Just an up-and-down day for the No. 43 Bommarito.com Chevy team. Didn’t end up how we wanted it to go, but we’ll go to work and get the car a bit better. I thought we had good speed, just didn’t have things go our way. We’ll work on it and hopefully go to Sonoma (Raceway) and have a solid day.”
RICKY STENHOUSE JR., NO. 47 NOS ENERGY DRINK CAMARO ZL1
Sidelined by damage sustained in an accident in the final stage.
Finished: 32nd
“Our No. 47 NOS Energy Drink Chevy was really good all day. We kept our track position just like we wanted to. We got stage points and I felt like we had a top-eight or so car, which was a big difference from last year. Obviously we’re striving to be better everywhere. We had a really good streak going of really good runs. It looked like the No. 2 (Austin Cindric) just, for some reason, right-reared the No. 3 (Austin Dillon) and took both of us Chevy guys out, so that’s a bummer. We definitely had a top-10 car today.”
DANIEL SUAREZ, NO. 99 FREEWAY INSURANCE CAMARO ZL1
Finished: 7th
YOU HAD A STRONG RUN AND RAN AROUND THE TOP-TEN ALL DAY LONG.
“Yeah, the entire weekend was very solid for us. We barely missed the second run in qualifying and really, we missed it because of me and not because of the car. The car was capable of advancing. In the race, the car was strong right away. I can’t thank enough everyone at Trackhouse Racing, the No. 99 team, everyone at Freeway Insurance, and all the people that help us have a strong performance on the track.
It was fun today and we really needed this as a team. We needed a result that we deserved, and I felt like lately it’s been a little difficult on us when it comes to that. Today, I felt like we deserved a top-10 or top-five and we came home seventh, so we will take it.”
YOU GUYS HAVE MOMENTUM GOING INTO SONOMA WHERE YOU WON LAST YEAR.. THAT HAS TO MAKE YOU FEEL GOOD
“Definitely, man. Every time we head to a road course, whether it’s Sonoma (Raceway), or somewhere else, I am excited. I feel at home and I am excited to go back to a place where we had great memories last time and hopefully we can repeat it.”
TEAM CHEVY RACE HIGHLIGHTS:
Stage One
·Kyle Busch and the No. 8 3CHI Camaro ZL1 team led the field to the green in today’s Enjoy Illinois 300 Presented by TicketSmarter at World Wide Technology Raceway – Busch’s first NASCAR Cup Series pole win of the 2023 season.
·With just three laps in the books, the race was brought under red flag conditions for a lightning hold – lasting 1:45:10.
·Once the race resumed, Stage One continued caution-free with polesitter Busch taking the green-white checkered flag at the stage end – his first stage win of the season.
·Team Chevy Stage One: Top-10
1st Kyle Busch, No. 8 3CHI Camaro ZL1
7th William Byron, No. 24 Axalta Camaro ZL1
8th Ross Chastain, No. 1 Moose Fraternity Camaro ZL1
10th Daniel Suarez, No. 99 Freeway Insurance Camaro ZL1
Stage Two
·The first round of pit stops took place during the stage break with crew chief Randall Burnett calling Kyle Busch to pit road for four tires, fuel and an air pressure adjustment. Winning the race off pit road, Busch elected the outside lane of the front-row to take the green for Stage Two.
·In his first career NASCAR Cup Series start, Team Chevy’s Carson Hocevar was running in the 16th position when a broken brake rotor brought the No. 7 Schulter Systems Camaro ZL1 team’s day to an early end.
·Busch and the No. 8 3CHI Camaro ZL1 team led Bowtie brand to the end of Stage Two in the second position. Six Team Chevy drivers collected stage points in the stage:
2nd Kyle Busch, No. 8 3CHI Camaro ZL1
4th William Byron, No. 24 Axalta Camaro ZL1
5th Daniel Suarez, No. 99 Freeway Insurance Camaro ZL1
6th Ricky Stenhouse Jr., No. 47 NOS Energy Drink Camaro ZL1
9th Ross Chastain, No. 1 Moose Fraternity Camaro ZL1
·During the stage break, the lead pack hit pit road for the next round of scheduled pit stops. William Byron pit from the fourth position for four tires and fuel with the No. 24 Axalta Camaro ZL1 team picking up two spots on pit road for a front-row restart position.
·Byron quickly powered his No. 24 Axalta Camaro ZL1 to the lead on lap 149. Holding onto a strong gap in front of second-place, a timely caution fell allowing the No. 24 team to address a concern of a possible right-front tire going down.
·Crew chief Cliff Daniels opted a pit strategy for track position, calling Kyle Larson down pit road for a two-tire only stop. The No. 5 HendrickCars.com Camaro ZL1 team picked up seven spots on pit road to lead the field back to the green with 58 laps to go.
·With four fresh tires, fellow Team Chevy driver Busch quickly contended Larson for the lead, ultimately taking the top position with 55 laps to go.