Long: Kyle Busch celebrates first of what could be many wins with RCR NASCAR Xfinity results at Auto Club Speedway John Hunter Nemechek wins Xfinity race at Auto Club Speedway What drivers said at Auto Club Speedway NASCAR Cup Series results: Kyle Busch wins at Auto Club Speedway

A week after one of the biggest disappointments of his legendary NASCAR career, Kyle Busch took his first Cup victory with Richard Childress Racing.

It’s not hard to imagine that this could have been his fourth victory of the year. And it makes you wonder how many more races he will win this year.

“Welcome to RCR, the first (win) of many,” Spotter Derek Nyland said on the radio after Busch crossed the line on Sunday with his fifth Cup win on the track, 61st Career Cup win and 225 -th NASCAR Cup win, Xfinity. and series of trucks.

Bush switched to car number 8 during the off-season, which Tyler Reddick brought to three victories last year. Busch has come close to winning every race he has entered this year with the team.

Sunday difference?

“Nobody ran into me in the first race,” Busch said.

That’s for sure.

• He was sixth in the Clash when contact Joey Logano Bush turned. He recovered and finished third.
• Busch was leading two-thirds of his Dayton qualifying race when a hit from Daniel Suarez destroyed it.
• Busch led the 500 mile mark in the Daytona 500, but Suarez’s spin with less than three laps to go sent the race into overtime. Busch lost the lead in the first overtime and crashed in the second overtime, making the future Hall of Famer 0-for-18 in the sport’s biggest race ever.

Walking out of the infield care center last weekend, Bush lamented his misfortune in Dayton, saying, “It’s just par for the course. Get used to it. Come here every year just to find out when and where I will crash and on what lap I will get out of the help center.

It would have been very fitting for Bush to win the Daytona 500 on his first try with RCR. This was to come 25 years after Dale Earnhardt won his one and only Daytona 500.

Instead, Busch must wait another 51 weeks for his next chance to win this race, but he no longer has to wait to break the record he shared with Richard Petty.

Busch’s victory on Sunday marked the 19th consecutive Cup season in which he won at least one race, passing Petty for the record.

“There aren’t many records that you can break that Richard Petty has, and of course this was one that I set at the beginning a long time ago that I always wanted to reach and get,” Bush said. “So I’m just so grateful for the opportunity to set that bar and would love to keep raising it.”

The next active driver on this list is Joey Logano, who has won at least one race in 11 consecutive seasons. He will have to keep winning until 2031 to lead Bush – assuming the Bush streak doesn’t continue beyond that season.

If Logano fails to surpass whatever mark Bush ends at, it will most likely be in the mid-2030s before anyone else can come close. Chase Elliott Maybe.

This is far in the future, after the end of Bush’s driving career.

By then, we’ll be able to judge how significant a move Bush made to join Richard Childress Racing after spending the previous 15 seasons with Joe Gibbs Racing. When JGR failed to find a new sponsor for their team last year, it set Bush in motion.

A summer of uncertainty drew on Bush, who said last August that the ordeal was “heavy as hell.” He spent days thinking not only about his future, but also about the future Kyle Bush Motorsport and all its employees.

“The last time I changed rides was 15 years ago and it was an educational experience,” Bush said last August in Watkins Glen. “Then it was also hard, but not like now. Then it was just me, me and me.”

The opportunity to run with RCR started with a call from a future teammate. Austin Dillonwho recalled how Bush once offered him a ride with Bush’s Xfinity team.

“It kind of hit me because I’ve always been considered the only reason I get a ride because my grandfather,” Dillon said last September after Bush’s move to RCR was announced. “So he was one of the few guys who offered me a ride besides my grandfather.

“I always remembered that about Kyle.”

The phone call led to Bush getting a chance to bow to a sold-out crowd at Auto Club Speedway on Sunday, the first time since the cup race since winning the Bristol off-road race last April.

Until Sunday, Busch had just four wins in his last 109 Cup races. He had 18 out of 109 races before his recent drought.

One can only imagine what the future will be for Busch and RCR.

“I felt like there was going to be a bit of a learning experience, a bit of a growth model, but also on the other side, I always just looked back and watched some of their results and the success they had last year with Austin,” Bush said. “He was second here last year and Reddick was super-fast. They were fast on the Clash before they broke, the eighth car was.

“It was very, very cool and that was the great part – we’re making history, right, but it’s a great opportunity to get out there and keep winning races with the new team with RCR.”

Couldn’t be happier for @kylebush . This guy is one of the best racers of all time and always will be. I’m glad it only took him 2 races to remind the world.

— Kyle Larson (@KyleLarsonRacin) February 27, 2023

John Hunter Nemechek took his first win of the NASCAR Xfinity Series season Sunday night at Auto Club Speedway.

Three JR Motorsports riders finished in the top five. Sam Mayer was the second Justin Algayer third and Josh Berry fifth. Chandler Smith finished fifth. Daytona Winner Austin Hillwhich remains the leader in points, finished sixth.

Race results: Autoclub Xfinity results

Points report: Xfinity Driver Points after Auto Club

After narrowly losing the season opener to Xfinity last weekend in Dayton, John Hunter Nemechek won Sunday’s race at Auto Club Speedway.

This win was Nemecek’s third in the Xfinity Series and his first since October 2021 in Texas.

MORE: Xfinity results and driver points

Sam Mayer tied his best career finish with a second-place finish a week after he flipped at Dayton. JR Motorsports teammate Justin Algayer took third place for the second race in a row. Chandler Smith was a career-best fourth. Josh Berry placed fifth, giving JRM three of the top five.

Daytona Winner Austin Hill took sixth place.

Cole Custerwinning the first two stages, finished 27th after suffering a flat tire and crashing into a wall on lap 91 of the 150-lap race.

Stage 1 winner: Cole Custer

Stage 2 winner: Cole Custer

Who had a good race: John Hunter Nemechek started the season in second and first place with Joe Gibbs Racing. … Brett Moffit finished ninth in AM Racing, the best result of the team’s career. … Parker Kligerman finished 10th, competing in his first full Xfinity season since 2013.

Who had a bad race: Tyler Reddickraced in the Cup race earlier in the day, finished 36th in a group of 38 cars with a damaged car.

NEXT: The series of races will take place at 4:30 pm ET on March 4 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway.