Forth Worth, TX — November 10, 2009

Raybestos® NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Rundown:
 
Kurt Busch was in the right place at the right time and came away a winner Sunday night at Texas Motor Speedway.
Busch was running a distant second behind leader Kyle Busch in the Dickies 500 when his little bother ran out of gas three laps from the finish.  Kurt flashed by to take the lead crossed the finish line a whopping 25.686 seconds ahead of second-place Denny Hamlin.

The victory was the first in 14 starts at Texas for Busch and his first since March 8 at Atlanta (Ga.) Motor Speedway.  He posted his 20th victory in 236 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series races.
There were 13 lead changes among four drivers in a race that took 3 hours, 24 minutes and 18 seconds to complete.  Five cautions slowed the race for 26 laps dropping Busch’s average speed to 147.137 mph.
Scott Speed scored an 18th-place finish and took Raybestos® Rookie of the Race honors for the eighth time this season.    

“We had a great car all race,” Speed said.  “There was one run where we were way off but we fixed it and there at the end we were as fast as the leaders, I mean really holding our own.  It’s great.  It’s great for all of us.  It gives us more momentum and we’re figuring it out and reassuring us that yeah, we are getting it and we can go fast [smiles].
“We’re getting better.  For three months we’ve definitely been better.  I mean if you look about where we are right now than where we were a year ago it’s like, are you kidding.  It’s kind of cool to be a part of, honestly, because not many people get that opportunity to do something and to really learn it and see the results.  But clearly we’re learning it and clearly we’re getting better and that’s great.”
         
Joe Gibbs Racing Rundown:
 
Dave Rogers, Kyle Busch’s crew chief, said after the race they knew it was going to be close on fuel but didn’t expect the tank to run dry when it did.  Busch ran out at the entrance to Turn 3 on lap 331 of the 334-lap race.  He immediately dove to pit road for a splash of gas returned to the track to collect an 11th-place finish.

 
“Looking at our numbers there, looking at the lap time that he had fallen off from the previous run, I thought for sure that we were going to make it until maybe off Turn 4 on the final lap,” Rogers said.  “I don’t know if we didn’t get the car full or the fuel cell just didn’t pick up what we thought it could but we had several green flag runs in this race so we were pretty confident we knew what we had for fuel mileage.  I’m not sure what happened.  We’ll take it back and look at it, learn from it.  We’re trying to focus on how well we ran and not where we finished.

 
“We’re not points racing.  We really didn’t have anything to lose.  If we would have pitted the 2 car [Kurt Busch] certainly would have beat us.  Our only shot at winning it was to stay out so we gambled.  Sometimes you gamble you lose.  We lost but we had a really fast car, really proud of this M&M’s Toyota race team and pleased with our effort on the racetrack.”

Hamlin stretched his fuel economy plus overcame a brush the wall to finish second.  He grabbed his 13th top-five of the season and jumped three positions in the series championship standings to eighth place, two points ahead of ninth-place Ryan Newman and 77 ahead of 10th-place Kasey Kahne.

“Mike (Ford, crew chief) said we were half a lap to the good, even if I ran hard like I did the previous run,” Hamlin said.  “I got in the wall and just made a mistake.  We struggled on pit road and really got ourselves back in the pack.  Mike came through and had a great pit strategy.  All those guys were short-pitting and he decided to put our FedEx Office Camry out there for a while.  When we decided to pit, it was just in time.

“I felt like we had a really, really good car.  We just hurt ourselves real bad on pit road today.   We lost a ton of spots.  Track position means so much at this racetrack.  I was frustrated and we were behind, so I tried to make something happen, got into the wall, and hurt our car.  As soon as that happened, we were just in fuel save mode.   Luckily, it went green the rest of the way.

“The good part about that is I was able to save fuel because there was no pressure from behind,” Hamlin said.  “I was able to save fuel and our Camry got the best fuel mileage it got all day. It played out in our favor, for sure.  Usually, these fuel mileage races don’t go our way.

Joey Logano posted a 19th-place finish at Texas and leads Scott Speed by 36 points (237-201) in the Raybestos® Rookie standings.  Logano lost a lap early in the race and couldn’t make up the lost distance. 
“This is just a tough joint for me,” Logano said.  “Everyone did a good job.  We worked hard all day.  We got caught down a lap one time and never had the opportunity to get the lucky dog back.  That time we went down a lap we could have waved around but we had 20 laps on the tires already.  We chose to get the lucky dog and the air gun broke when we tried to do that.  That put us way back there and of course the caution came out two laps after that.  If we would have waved around or if the air gun didn’t break we probably could have got lucky dog and been on the lead lap.  We missed out on that opportunity.  The track cooled off and got more grip and we started getting more speed and by the end of the race our speeds weren’t that bad.  We were just far behind from during the day.  We’ve got to figure out how get around these less grip racetracks.”

Raybestos® NASCAR Nationwide Series Rundown:
 
There was little doubt Kyle Busch had the best car in the O’Reilly Challenge Saturday afternoon at Texas.  Busch led 179 of the 200 laps and outran Casey Mears to score the victory, taking the checkered flag 3.154 seconds ahead of his rival.

Busch stretched his lead in the NASCAR Nationwide Series championship standings to 272 points over second-place Carl Edwards.  He won for the eighth time in 2009 and for the fourth time in 10 races at Texas.  Busch is the second driver to win four straight NASCAR national series races at the 1.5-mile speedway, joining Brendan Gaughan (2002-2003) who accomplished the feat in the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series.

Busch averaged 126.790 mph in race that took 2 hours, 21 minutes and 58 seconds to complete.  There were 11 lead changes among five drivers.  Seven cautions slowed the pace for 34 laps. 

 
Gaughan posted a 16th-place finish and took top Raybestos® rookie honors for the second consecutive race and for the eighth time in 2009.  His chances for a top-10 went away when he scrubbed the wall and was forced to make an unscheduled pit stop on lap 166.  Two laps later the sixth caution of the event waved for debris and Gaughan received the free pass back on to the lead lap but with a damaged race car he couldn’t make a run for a top-10. 

Gaughan trails Justin Allgaier by eight points (228-220) in the Raybestos® Rookie standings and knows time is running out to catch his rival. 

“With only three or four guys in the race that are running for Raybestos® Rookie that only gains me a one or two points,” Gaughan said.  “It’s not enough.  We had a good enough race car to be top-10 and really make a dent in the rookie points.

“It could have been a way worse day but it could have been way better.  We should have been about a seventh-place race car.  That gives us 13 or 14 Raybestos® Rookie points and cuts that lead right in half again.  It wasn’t what we talked about where I get those wins to win this thing but at least it would have been a good championship points day and good Raybestos® Rookie points day. Now it’s just mediocre.”

Gaughan said part of his problems came from hard racing with James Buescher, who was making his first-ever Nationwide Series start.

“That kid in the 1, I know he’s going to be a Raybestos® Rookie next year but somebody is going to have to sit him down,” Gaughan said.  “I’ve heard a lot of people have tried to talk to him and teach him respect but he doesn’t have much.  I was driving the car, my own fault, but I got right-sided pretty hard and it looked like we broke a track bar mount or something.” 

    
  Allgaier was involved in an accident on lap 121 that also collected fellow rookie Michael McDowell and veteran driver Mike Wallace.  After extensive repairs, he returned the race and was credited with a 25th-place finish.

“We felt like the Verizon Wireless Dodge was pretty good,” Allgaier said.  “I got a little bit loose after I got over the bumps and did everything I could to save it and chased it three or four different times back and forth and finally just couldn’t hold onto it any more and come down in front of the rest of the field and that’s what happens.  I hate it for those guys.  We ruined their day and made their day short and hurt our chances for fifth in points so not the day we wanted for sure.  I’m all right and we’ll come back the next two races and hopefully we’ll have the good luck that we needed today and we can get fifth back and still win the Raybestos® Rookie of the Year championship.”

The rest of the class: John Wes Townley (18th), Michael Annett (22nd),   McDowell (29th), and Terry Cook (41st).            
 
Raybestos® NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Rundown:
 
Kyle Busch took the lead from Ron Hornaday Jr. with 50 laps to go to win the WinStar World Casino 350 Friday night at Texas. 

Busch held off a late charge by Matt Crafton in the closing laps but try as he might, Crafton could get no closer than a few truck lengths.  Busch crossed the finish line .995 seconds ahead of Crafton to score his first win in seven races at Texas.

The victory was the seventh for Busch this season and his 16th in 67 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series races.  He has won in each of his last five starts in the series dating back to Bristol in August. 

 
Busch led twice for 54 laps and averaged 146.296 mph for his night’s work.  There were three cautions for 14 laps in a race that featured 10 lead changes among seven drivers.  The official time of the race was one hour, 30 minutes and 26 seconds.

Johnny Sauter took Raybestos® Rookie of the Race honors with a sixth-place finish, his 11th top-10 of the 2009 season.  He collected his ninth top-10 in 21 career NASCAR Camping World Truck Series superspeedway starts.  Sauter grabbed top rookie honors for the second consecutive race and for the 12th time this season.  He leads Tayler Malsam by 45 points in the overall Raybestos® Rookie standings.

The rest of the class: Ricky Carmichael (12th), James Buescher (17th), Tayler Malsam (18th), Brent Raymer (26th) and Chris Jones (27th). 
 
Raybestos® Brakes Status Sheet:
Dickies 500                                            
1.  Kurt Busch                6.  Tony Stewart                                                                                                  
2.  Denny Hamlin            7.  Clint Bowyer                                                                           
3.  Matt Kenseth             8.  Greg Biffle            
4.  Mark Martin              9.  Jeff Burton                         

5.  Kevin Harvick          10. AJ Allmendinger

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Points:

1. Jimmie Johnson             6,297
2. Mark Martin                 6,224        
3. Jeff Gordon                   6,185
4. Kurt Busch                   6,126 
5. Tony Stewart                6,119
6. Juan Pablo Montoya     6,061          
7. Greg Biffle                    6,050  
8. Denny Hamlin               5,975
9. Ryan Newman              5,973       
10. Kasey Kahne              5,898

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Raybestos® Rookie of the Year:
 
1. Joey Logano                    237
2. Scott Speed                     201
3. Max Papis                       140

NASCAR Nationwide Series Raybestos® Rookie of the Year:

1. Justin Allgaier                  228
2. Brendan Gaughan            220 
3. Michael McDowell          192
4. Michael Annett                190
5. Erik Darnell                     156 
6. Scott Lagasse Jr.             154
7. John Wes Townley          135
8. Ken Butler III                    87
9. Terry Cook                       55 

NASCAR Camping World Series Raybestos® Rookie of the Year:

1. Johnny Sauter                 223   
2. Tayler Malsam                178
3. James Buescher              164
4. Ricky Carmichael            133
5. J R Fitzpatrick                   97
6. Brian Ickler                       95 
7. Chris Jones                       87
8. Brent Raymer                    79