Kyle busch Fantasy racing season preview

Kyle will return for another season at Joe Gibbs racing with Adam Stevens as his crew chief.  Given the strength of the Toyota camp, the JGR company and Kyle's driving talent, there is no doubt that he will once again be a championship contender.  In 2017, Kyle got off to a somewhat slow start with finishes of 38th, 16th and 22nd in the first three races.  From that point on, the #18 was consistently running near the front of the pack and finishing races in the Top 10.  In fact, starting with the May Talledega race, Kyle led multiple laps in 25 of the remaining 27 races.  In short, he had speed every week.

Looking further at some statistics, Kyle won 5 races in 2017 -- trailing only Martin Truex (8 wins) in that category.  He also led 2,023 laps -- again trailing only Truex (2,253 laps led), but far outpacing the next nearest driver (Kyle Larson with 1,352 laps led).  Kyle had 14 Top 5's and 22 Top 10's and an 11.53 average finishing position -- trailing only Truex and Kevin Harvick.  Lastly, he had a series best 8 pole awards -- more than doubling the next closest competitor in that regard (Harvick with 4 poles).  Once again, Kyle had speed each and every week.

In the last few years, Kyle has had the most success at flat tracks.  His strongest track has probably been Martinsville, where he's won 2 of the last 4 races, scored Top 5's in all 4 of those races and led over 800 laps.  I say "probably" only because he might very well have back-to-back wins at Indianapolis were it not for the restart incident with Martin Truex in 2017.  Recall that those two restarted side by side on the front row late in the race.  Truex lost it into Turn 1 and took Kyle out with him.  Kyle had led 87 of the 110 laps run to that point and looked poised to win again.  He had won the Brickyard 400 the year before while leading 149 of 170 laps.  Both years he started from the pole.  So let's hit the lock button and say Kyle is an auto start at Martinsville and Indy.  I'll add yet another flat track at New Hampshire, where Kyle has won a race, been near the front and led over 400 laps in the last 4 races there.  Lastly, while Kyle doesn't always dominate at the mile and a half tracks, he has seemed to finally reverse his luck at Kansas -- a place where he repeatedly ran into problems and poor finishes in years past.  In the last 6 Kansas races, Kyle has a win, 5 Top 5's, 6 Top 10's and an average finish of 4.8.  In contrast, for the 6 Kansas races before that, he had no wins, just one Top 10, and an average finish of 23.2!  I'd say he has turned the corner and is now safe to use at Kansas.