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<p>LONG POND &#8212; A little over a month ago, Kyle Busch was primed to scratch off Pocono Raceway from his to-do list only to have pit strategy go awry.</p><p>On Sunday, pit strategy played a huge role in his victory.</p><p>Busch was able to carve up the field on fresh tires late in the race, easily outdistancing his closest competitors over the final 17 laps to win the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Overton&#8217;s 400.</p><p>Busch won for the 39th time in his career and for the first time at Pocono, leaving Charlotte as the only track where the 13-year Cup veteran remains without a victory. The win was the second of the season for Joe Gibbs Racing and the 100th for Toyota in the Cup series.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s pretty cool to get it down to one,&#8221; said Busch, who posted his first win of the season. &#8220;We&#8217;ve certainly have had fast race cars and been really close at a lot of these tracks. Feels good to get this one and hopefully it snowballs from here.&#8221;</p><p>Busch credited crew chief Adam Stevens for making the pit call which allowed him to run free with new tires while others doing the same had to race each other and also-rans for the most part.</p><p>&#8220;Adam made a great call,&#8221; Busch said. &#8220;When all those guys ducked off, we knew they were all going to be bunched up together coming off pit road and in lapped traffic with fresh tires.&#8221;</p><p>Kevin Harvick finished second. Martin Truex Jr. was third. He led 31 laps, second only to Busch who was at the front for 74 of the 160 laps.</p><p>&#8220;(Busch) was the best car, especially at the end,&#8221; Truex said. &#8220;I feel like he was just really fast and, obviously, with a different strategy with fresher tires. Nothing spectacular (for me) this weekend, but definitely a solid weekend.&#8221;</p><p>Back in June at Pocono, Busch led 100 of 160 laps. But the team gambled with a differing pit strategy late, resulting in a nine-place finish and giving Ryan Blaney his first career win.</p><p>Busch started the final stage on Lap 105 in fifth behind Truex, Denny Hamlin, Harvick and Chase Elliott.</p><p>&#8220;I got into Turn 1 and for some reason it just slid out from under me and I fell back to sixth,&#8221; Busch said. &#8220;That was really frustrating. I though that was the moment of the day when it was like, &#8216;OK, there&#8217;s another Pocono race.&#8217; I tried to forget about that and focus forward on trying to get back past those guys in front of me.&#8221;</p><p>Fifteen laps into the final stage, it was obvious the race was going to come down to Truex, Harvick and Busch.</p><p>Busch took the lead on Lap 126, but surrendered it nine laps later for fuel and four tires. He took control on Lap 143, tapping Harvick coming out of Turn 3 to take the lead.</p><p>&#8220;There was no battle. He was way faster than we were,&#8221; Harvick said. &#8220;In the lap he happened to catch me, in my head I was thinking, &#8216;All right, I need to stay on the bottom&#8217; and I got sideways going into (turn) three and tried to park it. And he was going to the throttle at the same time and got into the back of me a little bit. But that was just me trying to keep it on the bottom.</p><p>&#8220;There was no battle. He was in a league of his own.&#8221;</p><p>Busch proved it over the final 17 trips around the 2.5-mile tri-oval. He built his lead to 3.1 seconds over Harvick with 12 laps left and won by 6.1 seconds.</p><p>&#8220;(Busch) just had a really good car,&#8221; Harvick said. &#8220;He could get through traffic and I got hung up with a couple lapped cars and it took me a while to get around (Hamlin). Everything took a lot longer than what it took him.&#8221;</p><p>All four JGR drivers finished in the top 10. Denny Hamlin was fourth, rookie Daniel Suarez was eighth and Matt Kenseth was ninth.</p><p>Kenseth, who will be leaving JGR after the season, battled back from being part of an eight-car crash on the first lap. Suarez picked up his third consecutive top-10 finish. Both are seeking their first wins of the season.</p><p>&#8220;He&#8217;s had three straight top 10s now,&#8221; Gibbs said. &#8220;Who knows how things can work out for him.&#8221;</p><p>Dale Earnhardt Jr.&#8217;s final race at Pocono was uneventful. He narrowly missed an eight-car crash on the opening lap, received a penalty for speeding down pit road and ran in the middle of the pack for most of the race.</p><p>Earnhardt managed to pop in the top 10 on a couple of occasions, but finished 12th and 31.9 seconds behind Busch.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Kyle Busch pits during a NASCAR Cup Series race Sunday at Pocono Raceway. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/web1_AP17211770150842-1.jpg</photo0><caption0>Kyle Busch pits during a NASCAR Cup Series race Sunday at Pocono Raceway. </caption0><photoCredit0>Matt Slocum | AP photo </photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/web1_BUSCH.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Kyle Busch celebrates after winning the NASCAR Cup Series race Sunday at Pocono Raceway. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/web1_BUSCH.jpg</photo1><caption1>Kyle Busch celebrates after winning the NASCAR Cup Series race Sunday at Pocono Raceway. </caption1><photoCredit1>Matt Slocum | AP photo </photoCredit1></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><subheadMeta></subheadMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By John Erzar</p><p>jerzar@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach John Erzar at 570-991-6394 or on Twitter @TLJohnErzar</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Kyle Busch gets elusive Pocono Raceway win