Kyle Busch got to celebrate his 98th career NASCAR Xfinity Series win for about an hour before finding out he had been disqualified for failing post-race inspection. Busch took the checkered flag in Saturday’s My Bariatric Solutions 300 at Texas Motor Speedway, but his #54 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota Supra failed inspection for ride height reasons. As a result, runner-up Austin Cindric was bumped up to first for his third consecutive win.
Busch took the lead in Saturday’s race with ten laps to go and drove off to the victory, his tenth in the second-tier series at Texas. However, his car was found to be too low in the left rear, a violation of NASCAR’s ride height rules. Consequently, he was dropped down to thirty-seventh and last place.
Xfinity Series director Wayne Auton explained, “The left rear was in the red, so the car was low. The right rear, left front, right front, all right.”
The disqualification continues a rough 2020 campaign for the reigning Cup Series champion, who has yet to win a race in his primary gig and currently sits outside the top ten in points. His average finish of 14.6 is his worst since 2014, while his last six races have alternated between finishes inside the top ten and outside the top twenty. Although he scored top fives in his first three Xfinity starts to 2020, including a win in his previous race at Charlotte Motor Speedway in May, the disqualification relegates him to his first last-place finish since 2003.
Busch is the first Xfinity disqualification of 2020 and the third in NASCAR’s national series. Unlike Jimmie Johnson at the Cup level and Johnny Sauter in the Gander RV & Outdoors Truck Series, Busch is the only one to lose a victory. He is also the fifth instance of an Xfinity disqualification since NASCAR began the procedure for post-race failures in 2019.
With Busch falling to last, Cindric continues his string of oval success. The noted road course expert scored his first career oval victories last week with a sweep at Kentucky Speedway.
“It’s obviously great to be able to get my MoneyLion Ford Mustang to Victory Lane no matter how it happens,” Cindric said. “A great points day for that. I just got out of the hauler and getting changed back into my clothes and saw the #54 and everyone and their brother surrounding the scale.”
