Chris Buescher reveling in current playoff position heading into home-track shindig
FORT WORTH, Texas — Native to the Lone Star State town of Prosper that was touted right as he took the checkered flag at Richmond in July, Chris Buescher is in unfamiliar territory as he competes at his home track of Texas Motor Speedway on Sunday (3:30 p.m. ET, USA, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App) to begin the Round of 12 in the Cup Series Playoffs.
Matter of fact, Buescher said on Saturday that he was even unfamiliar with the population spurt of his hometown that was noted on that Richmond broadcast.
“Even just the stat from Richmond, the 30,000 population, that was news to me,” Buescher mentioned. “That was 26, 2,800 people was on the sign when I was there, so at this point, I‘m many years, 15 years, removed from there, but still miss it in a lot of ways. It‘s wild to see the growth there, how different it is.”
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After two top-five finishes in the opening round of the playoffs, Buescher reached the Round of 12 for the first time in his eight-year Cup career.
Since rising up the ranks in NASCAR’s national series with Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing, Buescher has seen the heyday, decline and rebirth of the illustrious organization.
Before moving up to the Cup Series with Front Row Motorsports in 2016, Buescher was one of the top prospects in the Xfinity Series and in two full-time seasons with Roush in 2014 and 2015, he earned three wins and took home the championship in 2015.
Buescher noted during Saturday’s media availabilities how competitive Roush was and how his Xfinity team was mad with a top-three finish even though it would be fellow Roush drivers filling the top two.
When re-joining the organization in 2020, this time at the Cup level, Buescher became a driver who was always on the outside looking in for quality results. In his first 72 starts with Roush, he earned just three top fives and 16 top 10s. In the last 64 starts, he’s made since 2012 Cup Series champion Brad Keselowski stepped in as a co-owner for the organization, those results have flipped to 11 top fives, 24 top 10s, and even more noteworthy, four victories.
“Certainly been through some of the tougher years where you‘d be over the moon to be able to try to finish third at times, and that‘s not where we‘re at anymore. I‘m proud to say that. I‘m lucky to say that,” Buescher said.
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Asked whether this season has been a dream for the 30-year-old driver, Buescher wasn’t keen to use that term to describe 2023.
“I don‘t know about dream season. I mean, this is kind of the way you always wanted racing to go. You always want to be competitive every week and be fighting for wins,” Buescher said.
“When you‘re traveling all over the country, and people dread seeing your hauler roll in, that‘s fun and has been for a long time. Haven‘t got to experience that in a while, but where we‘ve come with RFK and with the 17 team, this organization has picked up a tremendous amount of steam in the last two years, 18 months especially, and we‘re seeing a lot of the fruits of the labors that have been put in leading up to this.”
Sunday could be a monumental day for Buescher as he rolls off from the front row in second place alongside pole-sitter Bubba Wallace, who is also in his own first-time trek in the second round of the Cup playoffs.
With how Buescher has performed this season, a potential hometown victory is feasible instead of wishful thinking when his friends and family come to the track.
“It‘s just easier to talk to friends that do come to the races and camp out and go have those conversations,” he said. “It‘s certainly higher spirits and not what-ifs. We‘ve been making this work, and we‘re going to keep doing it. At this point last year, we had a win at Bristol when we weren‘t eligible to make any round of the playoffs at that point and already missed it. We talked a lot about what could‘ve been last year, and it‘s just easier conversations this time around.”
