Kurt Busch begins Round of 8 with blown engine

KANSAS CITY — Kurt Busch’s Hollywood Casino 400 came to an unexpected end after his engine expired at the 1.5-mile Kansas Speedway Sunday (Oct. 18th).

While running on the lead lap, Busch’s engine expired on lap 197 as he was racing in Turn 1.

“We’re running hard here,” Busch said. “We were running top-five and there’s a ton of RPM down the front-straightaway with the tail wind. We were right in the mix. We were doing the deal.”

Busch entered the race 21 points behind the cutline and now leaves Kansas in a must-win situation in order to advance to the Championship 4 race at Phoenix.

Under the current playoff format, adopted in 2014, Busch has never advanced to the race as a title contender.

At the remaining tracks on the Round of 8 schedule, Busch has won at Texas once and Martinsville twice.

“We’ll go to Texas to win,” Busch said. “We knew we were going to have to win either here or Texas. Martinsville we have a shot at it, too.

“The odds are stacked against us, but hey, we’re in the top-eight for a reason.”

Martin Aragon contributed to this report.