Catchfence

WIX Filters

Busch became the first driver to win in all three national series in the same weekend.  He also won the Aug. 18 O’Reilly 200 Camping World Truck Series race and the Aug. 20 Food City 200 Nationwide Series event.

Cars equipped with WIX Filters, a member of the Affinia Group family of brands, swept the first seven positions at Bristol and have now won 16 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series wins in 2010 (including the Daytona 500, Brickyard 400 plus the Budweiser Shootout and Gatorade Duel special event races).

Busch started 19^th and didn’t take the lead until he passed Jimmie Johnson on lap 172 of the 500-lap event.  From there, Busch dominated the race, leading 282 of the final 328 laps and pulling away down the stretch, taking the checkered flag .677 seconds ahead of second-place David Reutimann.

“It’s so cool to be here three nights on this weekend,” Busch said.  “The pit stops tonight were flawless.  Jimmie [Johnson] beat us out one time just because of pit selection.  We had a really fast race car.  Coming through the field was fun. Passing in front of those guys and working traffic the way you had to work traffic and just kind of pick and choose your way, do you go high or do you go low.  You had to have a car that would really work anywhere.

“Dave [Rogers, crew chief] gave me a great car today.  It’s his first win here so that’s pretty cool.  I’m happy for him, of course, and the rest of the guys to be able to repeat and come back from our win here last year and do it again.”

Rogers said he made a phone call early Saturday to Jason Ratcliff, Busch’s crew chief in the Nationwide Series, which gave him confidence in changes that he made to the No. 18 Toyota prior to the race.

“I’ve got to give Jason Ratcliff a lot of credit,” Rogers said.  “I called him up this morning and said look, man, you were the race-winning car in practice; what did you do?  He told me what he did to work on his car to make it better which gave me more confidence in making the changes I needed to make today.”

One of the few challenges Busch had in the second half of the race came from Jamie McMurray.  McMurray tracked Busch down under green and passed him on lap 389 but Busch beat McMurray on a green flag pit stop on lap 401.

Busch said that when he saw McMurray peel off the banking for pit road, he followed, although it was two laps ahead of when the team planned to pit.

“In this day and age with this car, you know, when anybody comes in and puts on fresh tires they’re normally about a second faster,” Busch said.  “So you can’t give up that time.  If McMurray came in and got off pit road, he’d be able to run a second faster lap time than I would have, which is an awful lot of distance.  I knew I needed to come in with him.  I was able to out-brake him and get to his outside and get to pit road, get slowed down and we had a really good pit stop.”

Reutimann cycled through as the race leader on lap 404 then the final caution of the night waved for debris on lap 410.  The race restarted on lap 415 and Busch made his race-winning pass around Reutimann 14 laps later.

Busch won the fourth time in 12 races at Bristol and for the 19^th time in 210 career starts.  He claimed his third victory of the 2010 season and gained five spots in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series championship standings, moving up to third-place, 72 points behind second-place Jeff Gordon and 57 ahead of fourth-place Carl Edwards.

Busch averaged 99.071 mph in a race that took 2 hours, 41 minutes and 24 seconds to complete.  There were 15 lead changes among nine drivers in a race that was slowed by seven cautions for 39 laps.

Since 1939, WIX® Filters, a member of the Affinia Group family of brands, has been an innovator in filtration products. WIX designs, manufactures and distributes products for automotive, diesel, agricultural, industrial and specialty filter markets. Its product line includes oil, air, cabin interior, fuel, coolant, transmission and hydraulic filters for automobiles, trucks and off-road equipment. WIX, a member of the Affinia family of brands, is the number one filter in NASCAR and an exclusive NASCAR Performance Product. Its NASCAR relationship also includes the WIX Filters Lap Leader Award, which recognizes the drivers leading the most laps in each race. For more information, visit www.wixfilters.com.

Affinia Group Inc. is an innovative global leader in the design, manufacture, distribution and marketing of industrial grade products and services, including extensive offerings of aftermarket parts for automotive and heavy-duty vehicles. With more than $2 billion in annual revenue, Affinia has operations in North and South America, Europe, Asia and India. For more information, visit www.affiniagroup.com.

*Affinia Group Inc.’s affiliated companies include Brake Parts Inc. WIX Filtration Corp LLC, Affinia Products  Corp LLC and other high quality manufacturers of the Affinia family of brands.

- Camp & Associates, Inc., for WIX Filters, Press Release