NASCAR at Atlanta race results: Kurt Busch wins Cup race

Kurt Busch emerged from his car Sunday with a massive grin on his face and a line ready for the cameras.

“Hell yeah, we beat Kyle!” the elder Busch said on NBCSN after climbing from his No. 1 Chevrolet.

Busch secured his first win of the season at Atlanta Motor Speedway by leading 144 laps of the 260-lap event and holding off his younger brother Kyle through the final stage.

The victory lifts the elder Busch into the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs. He was sitting on the bubble of the 16-driver cutoff prior to Sunday and 327 points back from series leader Denny Hamlin, but the win locks the driver into the postseason in his final year with his Chip Ganassi Racing team. Team owner Chip Ganassi will sell his operation to Trackhouse Racing at the end of the season.

No. 1 crew chief Matt McCall said that the recent news of the team’s sale came as a surprise to team members, but the organization has continued to work hard to turn playoff aspirations into reality. McCall called it “just the beginning.” Busch called it a huge “feather in the cap.”

Busch, who is rumored to be a candidate for Denny Hamlin’s 23XI Racing team and a top consideration for the second seat at Trackhouse, said he’s doing all he can to lock down his plans for next season in an “owner’s market.”

“This shows that I can win at any age at any time,” Busch, 42, said. “It takes a team though.”

A little help from his friend

Teammate Ross Chastain was a critical component to the Ganassi win. In the final stage, Kurt surged to the lead as Kyle slowed with just under 25 laps to go approaching Chastain riding in his lane. Kyle reduced the lead to half a second in the final 20 laps, but could never quite get back by Kurt.

Kurt said he didn’t expect to travel back home to Charlotte with his brother as the two typically do after a race, but for him, the trophy was worth the lost ride. He said the close racing with his younger brother reminded him of past races and that although the “best of the best” was driving in his mirror, he said that, “I can giggle to myself that, yeah, I taught him everything he knows.”

The Busch brothers battled through each stage of the race. Kyle, 36, won the first stage and Kurt behind him. Kurt then emerged ahead of Kyle to open the second stage, and was able to hold the lead through a long green flag run and eventually regain the top spot after green flag pit stops. It was Kurt who won the second stage followed by Kyle.

In the final stage, the two continued to exchange the lead. Kyle was chasing Kurt, but a savvy call to pit a lap before the leader allowed Rowdy to sail to take first as his brother came off pit road. Kurt continued to put pressure on Kyle, and Chastain’s heads up maneuvering eventually gave the No. 1 the advantage.

Kyle said post-race that he didn’t have enough front end with laps on tires and that he “smoked” his car behind Chastain’s No. 42 Chevy.

“Shows you what kind of driver he is,” a frustrated Kyle said, digging at Chastain. “And just tried to fight hard after that when I got passed and had one valiant effort off of (Turn) 2 but didn’t have enough momentum to drag him down and make him go high in 3 and 4. And after that the tires were smoked.”

Kurt only gave props to his teammate and soaked in the win.

“This was the last little bit of the old school (racing),” Kurt said. “And I’m glad an older guy won the race today.”

Last race before the repave

Despite clouds hanging overhead throughout the race and reports of light sprinkles in part of the track, it was the old surface rather than the weather that brought out the red flag. NASCAR called cars to a halt at the start of the final stage to repair a large chunk of track that came up and left a gaping hole in the frontstretch. The red flag lasted around 25 minutes.

Kurt said he appreciated the old surface, but he acknowledged that it’s time for a face lift. The subject of repaving Atlanta Motor Speedway has long received pushback from drivers who enjoy the track’s slick, 24-year-old surface, but the track announced earlier in the week that it will undergo a repave and reprofile ahead of NASCAR’s return with the Next Gen car in 2022.

While many drivers have gotten on board with the planned resurfacing, they remain opposed to narrowing the track. Furthermore, multiple drivers expressed frustration over their lack of inclusion in the decision-making process.

“I’m of the opinion that they (Speedway Motorsports) just don’t care,” Kevin Harvick said Sunday. “They just do what they want.”

But driver outcry won’t halt the modifications. Preparation for the changes began immediately after the race. Instead, drivers will only have a memory of the “old” Atlanta going forward.

For Kurt, he’ll have a piece of the track to take home. He was awarded a chunk of the surface as a parting gift from the speedway after a race that dignified the old.

Race results

This story was originally published July 11, 2021 at 7:22 PM.

Alexandra Andrejev

The Charlotte Observer

NASCAR and Charlotte FC beat reporter Alex Andrejev joined The Observer in January 2020 following an internship at The Washington Post. She is a two-time APSE award winner for her NASCAR beat coverage and National Motorsports Press Association award winner. She is the host of McClatchy’s podcast “Payback” about women’s soccer. Support my work with a digital subscription