COMMENTARY: Even Kyle Busch’s last-place finishes track a career of greatness
by Brock Beard / LASTCAR.info Editor-in-Chief
PHOTO: Luis Torres, @TheLTFIles
In his life, Kyle Busch scored a combined 234 wins and 17 last-place finishes across NASCAR’s top three national series. The last-place mark ties him with such drivers as Buddy Baker and Cale Yarborough, who each matched Busch’s tenacity on the track in their own Hall of Fame careers. One might not expect it, but a closer examination of these finishes tells just as much about Busch’s success as his victories.
Of those 17 last-place runs, only four came in the O’Reilly Auto Parts Series and Craftsman Truck Series, two divisions he so dominated for over two decades. His two in the O’Reilly Series were separated by 17 years. His first on October 25, 2003 was also his first in NASCAR, the result of a blown engine on his #87 ditech.com Chevrolet after just two laps around Atlanta. The other wouldn’t come until July 18, 2020, and only after he was disqualified from an apparent victory at Texas due to improper left-rear ride height on the #54 Twix Toyota.
In the Truck Series, Busch never finished last a single time through his first 174 starts across 21 years on the circuit, during which he scored 63 of 69 series wins. The streak only ended with a freak incident at Darlington on May 10, 2024, when he slapped the Turn 2 wall while challenging for the lead. That finish, which made him the 45th driver to complete the LASTCAR Triple Crown, was followed by just one more last-place run in last summer’s race at Watkins Glen, the result of early steering issues.
Among exhibition races (which I classify separately), he finished last in exactly one running of the Busch Clash – a crash after 65 laps at Daytona on February 9, 2020, where his M&M’s paint scheme celebrated winning his second series championship. He was last in just one All-Star Race, where on May 17, 2008, he led 18 of the first 50 laps from the pole before the engine let go. He still holds the record for most laps led by a last-place finisher of that event. He never finished last in a single running of the Duel at Daytona, nor in the All-Star Open.
Busch’s other 13 last-place runs came in Busch’s 762 career starts in Cup Series points-paying races. Each proved to be significant turning points in his career.
His first two came with Hendrick Motorsports, and the very first came on October 31, 2004, in the very Atlanta race where his team grieved the loss of their teammates lost in the private aircraft accident near Martinsville. Running the #84 Chevrolet sponsored by Carquest, its hood bearing the photos of those lost, Busch completed 44 laps before timing issues put him out. His only other last-place run for Hendrick came on August 21, 2005 at Michigan, where some of the errant debris blown across the windy track caused his #5 Kellogg’s Chevrolet to overheat, cutting short a day where he led two laps. His first series win came just 13 days later at Michigan’s sister track in Fontana, California.
Busch’s next two last-place finishes came during his breakout season in 2008, his first with Joe Gibbs Racing in the iconic #18 M&M’s Toyota. In a year where he, Carl Edwards, and Jimmie Johnson gobbled up most of the season’s wins, and where Busch became the first Cup race winner for a foreign manufacturer since 1954, one of the only hiccups of his regular season came at Pocono on June 8th. There, he crossed the nose of another car and crashed after 95 laps. More critical was a blown engine after 172 laps at Dover, which set him back in his championship bid. At the time, that Dover race was the second round of the ten-race “Chase for the Championship,” the very format that has returned this season.
Busch then finished last in back-to-back June races at Michigan in 2015and 2016. The first came in only his fourth race since serious leg injuries suffered in his crash at Daytona in February, and put him in danger of not qualifying for the Playoffs. He then won four of the next five races, propelling him to his first Cup Series Championship.
Busch didn’t finish last during his second championship season in 2019, but he then took last at Loudon in consecutive years – both 2020 and 2021 – each the result of wrecks in the first 15 laps. The 2021 finish on July 18th was due to rain that fell soon after the start. Busch was leading teammate Martin Truex, Jr. into Turns 1 and 2 when both lost traction and slid into the wall. Done for the day, Busch bumped the pace car in frustration.
Busch scored two more last-place finishes in 2022, the first season for NASCAR’s NextGen car and his last for Joe Gibbs Racing. At Pocono on July 24th, he finished runner-up to Denny Hamlin, only to be disqualified along with Hamlin for an issue with the facia under the wrap on both cars. Busch had led 63 laps in that race, which happened to be sponsored by M&M’s. The other occurred at Texas on September 25, the result of a crash after 48 laps.
In 2023, after he scored the last three of his 63 career Cup Series victories in his first season with Richard Childress Racing, he scored two more last-place finishes due to crashes later that summer. Again, they came in Loudon and Michigan, which had long been two of his most challenging tracks.
After not scoring a last-place finish in 2024, his last came on June 15, 2025, in the inaugural race at Mexico City, where his #8 was damaged in a rainy pileup not of his making. This made Busch the last-place finisher of the Cup Series’ first points-paying race outside the United States since 1958. That day, he drove the blue Lucas Oil Chevrolet – the same scheme with which he won the final Cup race at Fontana in 2023. It was also the same scheme Busch drove during what turned out to be his final Cup Series start at Dover on May 17, 2026.
