By Jim Pedley | Managing Editor
RacinToday.com

After finishing behind Kyle Busch in the Sprint Cup race at Bristol last weekend, Clint Bowyer jokingly called the winner of that race a “little turd”. Bowyer may soon have to change that to “big turd”.

Busch made it four straight victories in major NASCAR touring series races Friday night when he won the EnjoyIllinois.com 225 Camping World Truck Series Race at Chicagoland Speedway in Joliet, Ill.

Busch, coming off his historic tripleheader victory at Bristol Motor Speedway last weekend, took the lead away from defending truck series champion Ron Hornaday Jr. with 20 laps to go to put himself in position to get the victory.

From there, he held off a challenge by Todd Bodine, who was able to pull even with Busch with seven laps to go.

Busch also survived a green-white-checkered restart to get the victory.

“I was concerned,” Busch said of the restart. “I remember last year it was real tough to get away from side-by-side.  This year, I got clear on him (Bodine) just going down the front straightaway getting into turn one there.  From there on out I was worried that he would get a draft on me.  These trucks, man, they draft so easy.  That’s how I ran him down and got to him the first time.  He just didn’t  quite have enough to pass us. He had enough to hang with us all night and it was fun man. Really cool to be out here.”

Bodine said, nope, just not quite enough.

“It was good racing with him,” Bodine said. “It’s fun to race with a guy you can trust. Of course, he was having to trust me because I was one the behind. It was a good night. I can’t complain. I built the points lead back up to where it was before Bristol. Another good run. You hate to run second, especially to Kyle (Busch), but we’ll take it and we’ll go to the next one.”

Hornaday was third and Johnny Sauter was fourth.

The victory was Busch’s second straight at Chicagoland and his 20th in the series. He led 120 of the race’s 150 laps.

The victory comes the week after Busch made NASCAR history by winning the Camping World, Nationwide and Sprint Cup series races at Bristol Motor Speedway on the same weekend.

It was his fourth victory in nine starts in the series this year.

Bodine padded his points lead over Aric Almirola to 236 points.

“Our philosophy is,” Bodine said, “if you can’t win the race just do the best that you can. And tonight that was second. We’ll take the points. Aric (Almirola) was sixth and that’s kind of flip flop from last week so we gained back what we lost last week at Bristol. We’re proud of our team and how consistent we are and how well we run every week and that’s the mark of champions and a championship team. We’ve just got to keep doing what we’re doing and hopefully a pot of gold will be sitting at the end of the rainbow.”

Sauter moved to third in points and headed out of Chicagoland 303 points behind Bodine.

Bodine has said that the points mean less to him than victories. He backed that up on Friday night.

“I actually had a guy say that to me outside,  he said, ‘You didn’t look like you were points racing when you stuck it on the outside of Kyle’. And we’re not. We’re here to win. That’s what we’re paid to do,” Bodine said. “That’s what burns in each one of us. Every guy that walks through that garage area wants to win and we’re no different. We come here every week we unload that truck and our goal is to win the race. If we can’t win then we evaluate the situation and do the best we can with what we’ve got and get the most points that we can. That’s points racing. Our first goal is to get to victory lane and get the checkered flag.”

The series next heads to Kentucky Speedway where, Busch will still be riding major momentum.

“It certainly is,” he said when asked if the momentum is sweet. “Especially with my own team. It’s great to go out and win in your own equipment. It just makes you feel a little bit better. The hard work and the blood, sweat and tears you pour into it with all of your guys. And how much dedication they have for myself and for this race team.”

Busch said during a visit to Kansas City this week that he is having selling sponsorship for Kyle Busch Motorsports truck operation for next year.

On Friday night, he said the search for dough will continue.

“We’re really looking hard at next year at what we’re doing and trying to sell something sponsorships for that in order to keep this program continuing. I feel like these guys are really, really good at what they do. They deserve to be here and to race in this series.”

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