Busch, Hornaday Boast NASCAR Streaks Worth Watching

Just as we've settled into NASCAR's "Modern Era" -- a time of network television, million-dollar sponsors, the COT and mega-teams fighting for the championship in the most competitive atmosphere the sport has ever had -- Ron Hornaday and Kyle Busch have delivered a refreshing retro-NASCAR interruption.

The two drivers have been setting records and notching consecutive finishes more reminiscent of the sport's early glory days.

Hornaday's current five-race win streak in the Camping World Truck Series is a series record and the first time a driver has won that many straight in one of NASCAR's Big Three touring circuits since Richard Petty and Bobby Allison did it in 1971 at the Cup level.

Busch has nine consecutive finishes of first or second place in the Nationwide Series, tying the mark set by Jack Ingram in 1983. A top-two finish Saturday on the Watkins Glen, N.Y. road course and the record's all his.

Add to that Jimmie Johnson going for an unprecedented fourth straight Cup title and, all of a sudden, the NASCAR vibe is more like bell bottoms and David Bowie than "skinny" jeans and Britney Spears.

Obviously Johnson's quest for a fourth consecutive championship is a feat few would have expected to occur in this ultra-competitive era with a new playoff format that resets the points standings and makes it a 10-race all or nothing.

But on a race-to-race scale, Hornaday and Busch have been simply amazing; their performances impressive even to their competitors. It's never been easy to win at such a clip. And it's never been more difficult.

"Man, what both those guys are doing, it's really tough. They're on their game every time they're in a car or in a truck in Hornaday's case," Kasey Kahne said.

"What Ron has done, five straight wins, you have to be really on it because there's so many times -- you hear it all the time -- a driver says, I would have won a race if that wouldn't have happened. Well, that happened, and you didn't win, so who cares. You finished third. You hear that about every interview, each weekend somebody says that.

"Hornaday doesn't have to say it. He won five races legit, straight up. Things happen and he gets back to the lead, and that's tough to do.

"So I think winning five straight is tougher than what Kyle has done. I think what Kyle is doing is pretty crazy in itself."

Let's take Hornaday's run of five wins.

All five victories came from pole position and on a variety of tracks -- both short and intermediate and a two-mile speedway.

Petty won five straight in the 1971 season, on two tracks a third-mile or shorter and, similar to Hornaday, started each of those races from the second row or better. Allison scored his five wins on larger tracks including Charlotte, Dover and Michigan plus the Riverside, Calif. road course. He also started from the front row in each of the wins.

Also in 1971 -- a 46-race season -- Petty won three consecutive races twice. He still holds the all-time record of 10 straight set in 1967, when he won 27 races.

Hornaday can take some solace. That 27-win season, Petty earned $150,196. In just the five-race win streak Hornaday has made $256,425.

"You can never compare to The King (Petty) and Bobby Allison, but I'm just glad to be in the same book as they are," said the 51-year old Hornaday, who drives the No. 33 Chevy for Kevin Harvick Racing.

As for the 24-year old Busch, his string is equally as impressive considering the depth of competition in the Nationwide Series -- often a Saturday afternoon playground for the Cup regulars in addition to the Nationwide full-timers trying to make a name for themselves.

Busch's nine-race run has taken place on tracks from Daytona's super-speedway to Indy's short track and the Milwaukee Mile, with the record in grasp this week at Watkins Glen, where Busch finished second in the Nationwide Series last year and won the Cup race.

Ingram's nine-race streak happened on similarly diverse tracks. His string was snapped at Indianapolis' O'Reilly Raceway Park with a 20th place finish, only to see him record top-three finishes the next four races. Interestingly, he finished third in the race just prior to his run of nine top-two efforts.

Busch has three wins in his streak, and second place in the other six, by a combined 11 seconds.

"We tied a record for the most first- or second-place finishes for nine weeks in a row, but if we could have won those races, then we would have broke another record which is the most wins in a season,'' said Busch, lamenting the near-misses as much as celebrating the achievement.

"When you finish second a couple times in the year, it's fine and when you win a couple times it's good too,'' Busch added. "But when you have eight second-place finishes and there's only one more guy you got to beat that day and you don't get it done ... your team wants to win. You want to win.''