Busch Still Not Sure About Pursuit of Nationwide Title

He’s won three consecutive Nationwide events this year, and currently sits third in points – a mere 66 points behind series leader, Clint Bowyer. Still, Kyle Busch remains undecided as to whether or not he will run the entire Nationwide Series schedule and pursue the championship.

Additionally, Busch currently holds a 35 point lead in the Craftsman Truck Series, with two wins and 3 top-five finishes in the four races that series as run to-date. Still, he has insisted that his intent in that series to run the 14 races that they’ve scheduled him for at Billy Ballew Motorsports, and he will not be going after that series title.

So, the immediate question that comes to mind is, why? Simple. Busch is currently second in the Sprint Cup points race, and by far off to his best start ever in that series, as he forges forward in his first season with Joe Gibbs Racing. He insists that winning the Cup Series championship for JGR remains his priority, and many feel that running a full schedule in either of the other series could pose as a distraction to attaining that goal.

Again, Busch hasn’t decided indefinitely against running the full Nationwide schedule, but if he were somehow able to win the championships in both the Sprint Cup and Nationwide Series’, it would mark the first time that any driver had ever won both titles in the same season. The two guys ahead of him in the Nationwide standings – Clint Bowyer and Carl Edwards – are both also currently inside the Chase field, and both drivers appear to be in pursuit of achieving that historic mark.

In Other News:
- Sprint Cup Series veteran driver and former champion, Bobby LaBonte, was recently asked if he thought that NASCAR should sanction races across American borders. Though the Sprint Cup Series itself hasn’t raced abroad since they held an exhibition event in Japan back in 1998, the Nationwide Series currently holds events in both Mexico City and Montreal. LaBonte said that for the teams to travel that far is very tough on them logistically, and that for NASC AR, all the pieces have to fit just right. He then went onto add that their ventures across North American borders, however, has been great for the sport in that it has added fans and gotten NASCAR some additional attention.

- Last week I told you that professional tennis star, Andy Roddick, had some rather ill-intentioned words regarding NASCAR and that he didn’t understand why the sport had such high ratings. You will be relieved to learn, however, that this sentiment does not appear to be shared across the board by all professional non-racing athletes. It’s been reported that after soccer star David Beckham and wife, Victoria, recently left “the Pink Taco” in Los Angeles, his two children – Brooklyn and Romeo – were in possession of a Tony Stewart diecast. We’re going to take this as a sign of the Beckhams’ love for racing!