NASCAR: The win drought nobody is talking about
By Asher Fair
Here we are in early October, and Kyle Busch hasn’t won a NASCAR Cup Series race since 2019. But another lengthy win drought from a recent champion is going relatively unnoticed.
Reigning NASCAR Cup Series champion Kyle Busch, who entered the 2020 season having won at least one race in 15 straight seasons, is still without a win through the first 30 races on the 36-race schedule.
Busch, who has endured lengthy win droughts before, has never gone this long into a season without finding victory lane, and the fact that this drought has come on the heels of him winning his second championship has been a surprise to many.
But there is another mounting win drought from another recent champion — in fact, the champion before Busch — that is going largely unnoticed.
More from NASCAR Cup Series
- NASCAR Cup Series: New team set to compete in 2024
- NASCAR: Surprising name continuously linked to new seat
- NASCAR driver at risk of missing the Daytona 500?
- NASCAR set for rare appearance last seen 13 years ago
- NASCAR team adds third car, names driver for 2024 Daytona 500
That win drought, which is nearly as long as Busch’s, belongs to 2018 champion Joey Logano.
When the 2020 season was brought to an abrupt halt for what ended up being a 10-week hiatus as a result of the coronavirus pandemic back in March, Logano had won half of the season’s first four races.
He won at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, the site of this evening’s race, for the second year in a row, and two weeks later, he won a thriller over Stewart-Haas Racing’s Kevin Harvick at Phoenix Raceway. Harvick has won nine times since the sport returned to action in mid-May.
But Logano hasn’t won since, as his win drought has now hit 26 races. Is this a reason for concern for the 30-year-old Middletown, Connecticut native, who has seen his teammates win five times since the sport returned to action?
The only other two drivers who won before the pandemic struck were Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin and Hendrick Motorsports’ Alex Bowman. Hamlin now has six wins this season.
While Bowman is now on a 27-race win drought, he has just two wins in his career and is not a former champion like Busch and Logano, so his win drought is more or less par for the course. In fact, he has never advanced past the round of 12. He entered this year’s round of 12 in seventh place in the championship standings and currently sits in eighth.
Top 10 NASCAR drivers of all-time. dark. Next
Both Busch and Logano are still alive in the playoffs. But while much of the focus has been on whether or not Busch can get back to doing what he does, is Logano in a similar position?