After difficult run at N.H., Busch vows 'we'll recover'

2004 Cup Series champion Kurt Busch will share his thoughts in a weekly blog during the Chase for the Nextel Cup:

Bad Timing

After such a great run these past nine weeks, maybe you could say we were due for something to go wrong. But after having such a strong car for the first 100 laps or so at Loudon, it was difficult to accept a 25th-place finish in the first Chase race. The good news is that we have plenty of time to recover from it and only have to look back to last year to see that the 48 car finished worse in this race and still won the Nextel Cup.

The Miller Lite race team started the weekend out great by grabbing the third spot in qualifying, which was a huge accomplishment considering we weren't very good early in practice. We brought a new car to Loudon, and the first few setups we tried just didn't work for us. Pat Tryson and the team made the right adjustments to the Avenger and we picked up about 25 hundredths of a second between practice and qualifying. We also went out third-to-last in the order, which certainly didn't hurt. Going into the Sunday race, I was confident we'd have a car capable of winning -- our COT program has come so far since the first time we were in New Hampshire.

Early in the race we ran top-two for a bunch of laps and only fell back a bit because we took four tires during a yellow-flag pit stop when most cars only took two. We moved right back into the top-five and felt great about the Miller Lite Dodge until I felt something in the engine around Lap 120. I originally thought we dropped a cylinder, but wasn't too sure. All I knew was that we had lost some power, and it was frustrating falling back through the pack waiting for the next pit stop.

We waited out a yellow flag, which fell on Lap 149, and got under the hood to discover we had a carburetor problem. All we could do at that point was trouble-shoot throughout the race, which PT and the Miller Lite team did a great job of doing. We got a 25th out of it, which with engine problems could easily have been a 43rd. We'll recover.

Our team can't wait to get to The Monster Mile this weekend. I look back on that first Dover race now and I have to point to it as a major turning point for our season. It was a perfect example of us saying to ourselves, 'We've got to get it in gear and we've got to make this Chase.' It feels like an eternity ago because of all the good things that have happened in between -- most importantly hiring Pat.

Like I said earlier, our COT program is so good right now and we really like the car we're putting on the track at Dover. Obviously, starting the Chase the way we did at Loudon wasn't optimal, but this team will bounce back and get into the same groove that carried us through the last couple of months. Hopefully by the time the Chase is done, we'll be looking back at this race as just a minor hiccup on the way to a championship.

Until next time.
KB