Spoiler win makes good on Chris Buescher’s strong record

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. — As one of the best finishers this season and on road courses in the Gen 7 era, Sunday at Watkins Glen was a big breakthrough for Chris Buescher.

Coming into Sunday, Buescher had the best average finish of any driver on road courses in the Gen 7 era (8.8) and an average finish this NASCAR Cup Series season (14.5) that’s better than all but five of the 16 playoff drivers.

Still, no win meant no championship to race for. No championship to race for just meant the playoffs were 10 opportunities to win.

Buescher’s chance at winning arguably got better because he didn’t have a championship to race for. Half of the playoff drivers showed their hand in stage one as they went for stage points instead of the race win, which helped Buescher from 24th at the start to 10th before his stage two stop. Then, when four playoff drivers went for points instead of the win, he moved to sixth for the final stage.

Buescher hung out for the first five green-flag laps of the final stage. Then, after two laps under caution, he had a valuable heat cycle on his tires that let him pick up fifth on lap 50, fourth on lap 53, second on lap 56 and the lead a lap after that.

Buescher stayed smooth up front. He had a clean pit stop on lap 58 and built up a six-second lead during the cycle.

Shane van Gisbergen wouldn’t let go. He cut the gap almost in half by the time a caution fell with 10 laps to go. Then, after two restarts to scope out Buescher’s strengths and weaknesses, Van Gisbergen struck in overtime. He moved Buescher up the track and took the lead in turn one.

Buescher wasn’t done.

He dogged Van Gisbergen and forced him into a mistake in the bus stop on the final lap. Buescher bumped him back and went on to win while Van Gisbergen slid to the checkers in second.

“That one was a lot of fun because it worked out. If we had finished second on the day, I wouldn’t have enjoyed that very much. To be able to in the hunt there at the end, SVG is a phenomenal road course racer. I knew when he got that spot on that last restart that it was going very tricky to get back by him and just wanted to make sure that we stayed in the hunt, that we drove the thing hard and kept pressure on him and made him at least realize we were still there, that it wasn’t going to be a cruise away.”

Buescher didn’t need to worry about photo finish cameras or anyone divebombing the corner and cutting his tire. He had arguably the best car all day and stayed strong to take home his first win of the 2024 Cup Series season. It is his first Cup win since last August at Daytona.

“It’s big for us to get a win on the year. It’s been over a year without a win. We’ve been so close so many times to start off the season at Phoenix and be runner-up there. We knew we had the speed. We carried it over through the offseason, and just haven’t been able to seal the deal,” Buescher said.

“With that, yeah, we’re going to keep after it. Next week is my favorite racetrack, so excited to go to Bristol. Played spoiler there two years ago. We can go do that one again,” he said.

Buescher has a win, two Top-5s, three Top-10s and 187 laps led of the 1500 total run in the three Gen 7-era races at Bristol. In the Gen 7 era, he is tied with Kyle Larson for the second-best average finish in the era (4.0) and is one of five drivers with Top-10s in each race.

“Our sport is not like others in that sense. We’re here to race to win. We’re going to play spoiler as much as we can in the next seven or eight weeks coming up as well,” Buescher said.