His chances took a turn for the worst
LOUDON, N.H. - As he parked the No. 18
The rain started to pour, and Busch left his battered Camry behind, hustling to his hauler faster than his damaged Toyota had limped into the pits. Then after Busch had calmed himself and changed out of his race suit, his crew arrived pushing the battered Toyota. The Camry's front end was caved in and streaked with smudges of black grease, while the right side was pockmarked with doughnuts, the black circular tattoos imprinted by the left-front tire of the No. 42 Dodge.
The points leader had been taken out.
During the final caution of yesterday's rain-shortened Lenox Industrial Tools 301, which was brought out after a wreck between Clint Bowyer and Sam Hornish, some jostling took place between Busch and Juan Pablo Montoya. Busch, under caution, appeared to drift toward Montoya, who was cruising around in the outside groove.
With a jerk of his wheel, Montoya turned his No. 42 into the right side of Busch's Toyota, sending both cars into a spin.
When asked why Montoya made the maneuver, Busch said, "Honestly, I have no idea. I got a run on him earlier, about 50 laps, and got to his outside. He kind of kept coming up a little. I didn't turn down into him. I barely touched his quarter panel. I got by him in [Turns] 3 and 4, then he ran me up the racetrack in my left rear. We come to the caution flag and he thought he beat me to the caution flag."
Then, as Busch explained it, he tried to make his way around the No. 40 Dodge of Dario Franchitti, which was running in the middle of the straightaway. As Busch, who finished 25th, got around Franchitti, the next thing he felt was his car twirling out of control.
"I don't know what his beef is," Busch said of Montoya, who finished 32d. "But NASCAR should probably fix it."
Montoya acknowledged he purposely turned into Busch, retaliating for what he thought was hard racing leading up the incident. The cars had been leaning on each other in the lap prior to the Bowyer-Hornish wreck. Montoya was tagged with a two-lap penalty for the altercation.
"On the restart, I got around the outside of him in Turn 2 and he just went wide like I wasn't even there," said Montoya, the ex-Formula One star. "Then we touched each other and I got beside him to the next corner, and he starts banging on me like he was trying to wreck me. I said, 'OK.' I went into the corner and the wreck happened. I slowed down and tried to say, 'What are you doing?' The next thing that I started to see was that he was hitting me.
"He runs good, yeah. He has great cars, yeah. But I thought we had a decent car today and I don't appreciate when people race me like that."
The No. 18's crumpled conclusion, however, was an appropriate ending for a car that wasn't nearly as strong as it has been for most of the season. Busch entered yesterday's race with a 103-point lead over second-place driver Jeff Burton. Two years ago at New Hampshire Motor Speedway, Busch won this event after leading 107 laps. Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Tony Stewart and Denny Hamlin had also enjoyed success at NHMS, with the No. 20 posting two career Loudon wins and the No. 11 winning once.
But for some reason, the No. 18 wasn't good from the start of the weekend and crew chief Steve Addington couldn't adjust the car to Busch's liking. Friday, Busch turned only the 27th-fastest qualifying lap. Yesterday, while deep-in-the-field drivers such as Stewart (qualified 28th, finished 13th, led a race-high 132 laps) and Casey Mears (qualified 24th, finished seventh, and led 53 laps) picked their way through traffic, Busch couldn't get into the position to challenge for the lead.
"It wasn't something that was going to get fixed on the racetrack. We needed to go to the garage area," Busch said. "We missed something all weekend. I knew it was going to be a dismal day. Just trying to make the most of it."
On the second-to-last caution when Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Jamie McMurray got together at the entrance to pit road, brother Kurt Busch stayed out along with seven other cars. Rather than joining his older brother on the track, the points leader pitted one last time.
"If we stayed out there, we could have won the race," said Kyle Busch. "We could have been where the No. 2 car was. We just didn't feel that was the right way to win a race, just to stay out and play by the rain. We didn't feel like we had a shot to hold off the guys who were going to be behind us."
But instead of fending off the cars behind him, Busch had to tangle with Montoya at his side.
"Frustrating day," said Busch, his lead over Burton trimmed to 64 points. "All we can do is go into next week and try to bounce back."
Fluto Shinzawa can be reached at FShinzawa@globe.com.
