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2024 Top NASCAR Storylines: Kyle Busch’s 19-Year Winning Streak Comes to An End

Caleb Barnes

When Kyle Busch became a full-time NASCAR Cup Series driver in 2005, he earned the first of 63 wins over the course of 19 years.

Some seasons, Busch won eight races. Other years, he only had one triumph. But for 19 straight seasons, Busch recorded a win in the stat column, setting a new record for most consecutive seasons with a win.

In 2024, however, Busch failed to record a Cup win, ending the streak and marking the first time ever that Busch did not reach victory lane over the course of the season. Not only did Busch go winless in 2024, he also had his worst average finish (18.3) since that rookie season (21).

Read all of Frontstretch‘s content looking back on 2024 here

Based on the eye test alone, Busch didn’t seem to have the same type of race-winning speed from past years. Even in 2023, Busch had race-contending and -winning speed on a couple of occasions. 

Richard Childress Racing as a whole remained a mid-pack team at best (outside of Richmond Raceway in the summer), but in a season when 18 different drivers visited victory lane, Busch had – and missed – quite a few opportunities to extend his streak. 

Busch led laps in each of the first three races in 2024. While he survived the Big One in the Daytona 500, a bad decision to jump out of line sent Busch to the back of the remaining contenders just before the white flag.

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In 2023, Busch ended questions about his winning streak in just the second race, winning at Auto Club Speedway. He almost repeated that feat this year at Atlanta Motor Speedway. Though the No. 8 crossed the stripe in a photo finish, Busch wound up third in the fantastic three-wide thriller.

The abbreviated West Coast swing really gave a preview to what the rest of Busch’s season would look like. Both RCR and the No. 8 actually had some speed in Las Vegas Motor Speedway, but a pit road penalty in the final stage relegated Busch to the back half of the field. At Phoenix Raceway, however, Busch went for a spin at one point, and he hovered around the mid-20s for the majority of the race.

A Bristol master, Busch could not decipher the mysterious tire issues that plagued the majority of the field, bringing out two cautions, and finishing 25th. The following week, Busch drove to a top 10 at Circuit of the Americas.

Fast-forwarding a few weeks, Busch earned a pole and top five at Dover Motor Speedway, followed by another top 10 at Kansas Speedway. In fact, Busch ran fourth, but he spun on his own to bring out the final caution that would set up the epic overtime finish.

While the Kansas spin didn’t ruin Busch’s race, it foreshadowed what was to come in the summer months: great runs marred by driver errors, an uncharacteristic mark for the driver of the No. 8.

This trend of driver-induced misfortune truly took off at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway. After the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Busch was 14th in points, just inside the playoff cut line. On the final lap of stage two, however, Busch, running seventh, had a run-in on the front straightaway with Kyle Larson.

Fault could be placed equally on each Kyle, but Busch’s frustrations certainly played a role in the crash, which left him with a 35th-place DNF, falling to 17th in points and even further with Austin Cindric’s surprise win. Yet another top-10 run went away in Iowa Speedway when a water pump issue with 80 laps left Busch with another 35th.

Things went sideways – literally – at New Hampshire Motor Speedway when the No. 8 turned into a self-destructing wrecking ball. Busch spun twice before the rain, and he crashed hard under yellow and exited the car before racing even resumed in the rain.

After three 35th-place finishes in three weeks, Busch looked poised to reverse his momentum as he drove up to fourth in the closing laps at Nashville Superspeedway. Unfortunately, overtime(s) had other plans. Busch caught a break in the first overtime, but crashed in overtime three.

Two weeks after Nashville, Busch fell victim to a struggling Corey LaJoie and crashed at Pocono Raceway. 

While the majority of the previous incidents happened just after a restart, Busch crashed at the end of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway race the following week. With three laps left at the end of a long green-flag run, Busch endured a self-inflicted spin from battling Denny Hamlin for fifth.

Keep in mind, each of these five incidents took place over the span of eight races. The crash at the Brickyard ended up leaving Busch with a sprained wrist, and the No. 8 was 19th in the playoff standings, 112 points and in need of a win in the worst way. 

Indianapolis marked the end of the summer slide, and Busch nearly earned that win to extend his streak.

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After a fourth at Michigan International Speedway, Daytona came down to a battle between Busch and Harrison Burton. In overtime, however, the No. 62 Chevrolet driven by Parker Retzlaff lined up behind Burton and ended up pushing the No. 21 past Busch to victory lane.

With one more shot at the playoffs on the line, Busch tried his best to track down Chase Briscoe at Darlington Raceway. He simply could not find enough to get over the hump and into victory lane.

Though Busch’s misfortunes kept him out of the playoffs, the driver of the No. 8 came close a couple of times to continuing his winning streak in the final 10 races of the year. Perhaps his best final shot took place at Kansas Speedway in September.

Once again, Busch showed great mile-and-a-half speed. In the final stage, it became obvious the race would be decided between Busch and Ross Chastain, and the two traded the lead in a great battle.

Just when it looked like Busch would get that key victory in extending his winning streak, the No. 8 went for a small gap on the extreme high lane, just on the outside of Briscoe. The No. 14, a playoff car, stood his ground, and Busch made contact with the wall before spinning. 

While Busch had a shot at Talladega the following week, Kansas truly looked was the best race – and the best opportunity – for Busch to pick up the streak-extending win. Just as all season, however, Busch made a mistake on his own to take himself out of contention. 

Going back and looking at the races this season, Busch and the No. 8 definitely ran inside the top 15 much more than you might initially realize. However, the team – and driver – continued to make mistakes that took them out of contention for wins.

Not only did Busch record his worst average finish since he was a rookie, Busch also had 5 DNFs and was involved in at least 18 incidents throughout the season.

The streak is over. Who knows if anyone else will come near to the mark of reaching victory lane for 19 consecutive seasons? Busch certainly doesn’t have enough time to equal that mark again.

When 2025 rolls around, though, Busch has the opportunity to start fresh and build on a few bright moments from this past year. If he can clean up his own on-track decisionmaking, Busch could win multiple races again next season. 

With RCR backing on superspeedways, Busch could very well start a new streak with a victory in the 2025 Daytona 500.

About the author

Caleb began sports writing in 2023 with The Liberty Champion, where he officially covered his first NASCAR race at Richmond in the spring. While there, Caleb met some of the guys from Frontstretch, and he joined the video editing team after graduating from Liberty University with degrees in Strategic Communications and Sports Journalism. Caleb currently work full-time as a Multi-Media Journalist with LEX 18 News in Lexington, Kentucky and contributes to Frontstretch with writing and video editing. He's also behind-the-scenes or on camera for the Happy Hour Podcast, live every Tuesday night at 7:30!

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Kevin in SoCal

I feel so bad for Kyle. He started out 2023 awesome with three wins, and then RCR went to hell except for a small stretch in August. And most of it looks self-inflicted.

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