Kyle Busch wins 100th Xfinity race with Tennessee Lottery 250 victory

Kyle Busch has joined Richard Petty and David Pearson in sharing a historic milestone: triple-digit wins in a NASCAR national series. Busch dominated Saturday’s Xfinity Series race at Nashville Superspeedway from the pole, leading 122 of 188 laps en route to his 100th victory in NASCAR’s second tier.

While Busch qualified on the pole, six drivers were sent home: Chad Finchum, Timmy Hill, Jeffrey Earnhardt, Colby Howard, Dillon Bassett, and Gray Gaulding.

Despite Busch’s pole and his eventual win, Austin Cindric would dominate the first stage as he led every lap. Busch finished second followed by Daniel Hemric, Harrison Burton, Justin Allgaier, Brandon Jones, A.J. Allmendinger, Jeb Burton, Josh Berry, and Myatt Snider. However, Snider’s race took a turn when his car lost power and necessitated a trip to the garage for a battery change; by the time he returned, he was 22 laps down.

Echoing a pattern from the previous day’s Camping World Truck Series race, the first two stages saw nearly every lap led by one driver in each. After Cindric did so for Stage #1, Busch did so for the second as he led all but one lap; Joe Gibbs Racing team-mate Hemric led the lone non-Busch lap under caution on lap 75 following Stefan Parsons’ wreck. By the end of the segment, Busch kept Allgaier at bay to win; Hemric, Burton, Michael Annett, Berry, Jones, Cindric, Justin Haley, and Noah Gragson closed out the top ten.

The final stage ramped up in incidents as Busch continued to lead, with the first caution of the segment coming for debris that ended his run on top. Joe Graf Jr. and Jade Buford wrecked on lap 156 to produce another caution, followed by a larger incident involving much of the leaders like Cindric that eliminated him from the race. At the front, Busch traded the lead with Allgaier.

Landon Cassill‘s wreck on lap 183 set up overtime, and Busch held off Allgaier in the two-lap dash to score the win in the Xfinity Series’ first race at Nashville since 2011. Busch won at the track in 2009 en route to the series title.

“I think one day you just hope that you can make it, and then when you make it, you are like, ‘Okay, let’s go win some more races and let’s go win a championship,'” Busch said. “Being around for as long as I’ve been around, it’s a great opportunity in this position and to get this many wins is really, really cool.

“There’s a lot of great people over the years that have gotten me to this point, whether it be Hendrick Motorsports or Joe Gibbs Racing, most of it has obviously come with JGR for as long as I’ve been there, that just makes it all worth while and I wouldn’t say it has all came full circle. It would be nice to keep going, but everybody’s tired of me being here, so we hit the century mark and we will see if we can get 102. I don’t know what the plan is for next year yet.”

In 2017, when he was still at win #89, Busch commented about the possibility of retiring from Xfinity competition once he reaches the 100 barrier. He still has two more races in 2021 that could bolster that total to 102, while his 2022 plans in the series have not been confirmed.

Berry finished fourth in his final scheduled start for JR Motorsports as Sam Mayer takes over the #8 for the rest of the season. Finishing ninth was Truck regular Austin Hill and Hattori Racing Enterprises in their first of six Xfinity races for 2021. Will Rodgers placed fourteenth in his first Xfinity start since 2019.

Race results

Finish	Start	Number	Driver	Team	Manufacturer	Laps	Status
1	1	54	Kyle Busch*	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	189	Running
2	11	7	Justin Allgaier	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	189	Running
3	3	20	Harrison Burton	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	189	Running
4	22	8	Josh Berry	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	189	Running
5	5	16	A.J. Allmendinger	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
6	7	19	Brandon Jones	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	189	Running
7	6	10	Jeb Burton	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
8	10	9	Noah Gragson	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	189	Running
9	15	61	Austin Hill*	Hattori Racing Enterprises	Toyota	189	Running
10	20	98	Riley Herbst	Stewart-Haas Racing	Ford	189	Running
11	23	51	Jeremy Clements	Jeremy Clements Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
12	21	1	Michael Annett	JR Motorsports	Chevrolet	189	Running
13	4	18	Daniel Hemric	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	189	Running
14	14	26	Will Rodgers	Sam Hunt Racing	Toyota	189	Running
15	17	31	Tyler Reddick*	Jordan Anderson Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
16	13	39	Ryan Sieg	RSS Racing	Ford	189	Running
17	29	36	Alex Labbé	DGM Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
18	28	6	Ryan Vargas #	JD Motorsports	Chevrolet	189	Running
19	12	11	Justin Haley	Kaulig Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
20	19	44	Tommy Joe Martins	Martins Motorsports	Chevrolet	189	Running
21	26	92	Josh Williams	DGM Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
22	31	07	J.J. Yeley	SS-Green Light Racing	Chevrolet	189	Running
23	18	02	Brett Moffitt	Our Motorsports	Chevrolet	188	Running
24	34	66	David Starr	MBM Motorsports	Toyota	187	Running
25	32	5	Matt Mills	B.J. McLeod Motorsports	Chevrolet	187	Running
26	36	23	Natalie Decker	Our Motorsports	Chevrolet	187	Running
27	35	78	Jesse Little	B.J. McLeod Motorsports	Toyota	187	Running
28	27	47	Kyle Weatherman	Mike Harmon Racing	Chevrolet	187	Running
29	25	4	Landon Cassill	JD Motorsports	Chevrolet	182	Accident
30	30	74	Bayley Currey	Mike Harmon Racing	Chevrolet	177	Running
31	8	2	Myatt Snider	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	165	Running
32	2	22	Austin Cindric	Team Penske	Ford	160	Accident
33	9	48	Jade Buford #	Big Machine Racing	Chevrolet	153	Accident
34	33	17	Joe Graf Jr.	SS-Green Light Racing	Chevrolet	152	Accident
35	16	68	Brandon Brown	Brandonbilt Motorsports	Chevrolet	140	Brakes
36	24	99	Stefan Parsons	B.J. McLeod Motorsports	Toyota	69	Accident

Italics – Competing for Rookie of the Year
* – Ineligible for Xfinity points