Three former NASCAR Cup Series winners at Indianapolis Motor Speedway come into this weekend still looking for their first victory of the 2020 season – four-time Indianapolis winner Jimmie Johnson, two-time Indianapolis winner Kyle Busch and Ryan Newman with his single Brickyard win.
Johnson leads the former Indianapolis victors with four wins (2006, 2008, 2009, 2012), but he also has the second longest winless streak of the group as the Hendrick Motorsports driver hasn’t visited Victory Lane since 2017 – 110 races ago. Johnson can change all that this weekend though, he has made 18 starts at the Brickyard posting four wins, six top fives and seven top 10s. His average finish at Indianapolis is 16.5.
Joe Gibbs Racing’s Kyle Busch is currently ranked 11th in series driver standings following the doubleheader at Pocono, but the two-time series champion is still looking for his first win of the season. Busch has won in every fulltime Cup season he has competed in dating back to 2005 and he hasn’t posted less than four wins a season since 2015. But, Busch heads to Indianapolis this Sunday looking snap his winless streak that dates back to the 2019 season finale in Homestead, 15 races ago. This season, Busch has posted seven top fives and eight top 10s; including three runner-up finishes. Busch has made 15 starts at Indianapolis Motor Speedway putting up two wins (2015, 2016), five top fives and 11 top 10s. In 2016, Kyle Busch became the first driver in history to sweep both the NASCAR Xfinity Series race from the pole and the NASCAR Cup Series race from the pole in the same weekend at Indianapolis.
Of the three drivers looking to break their winless streak, Roush Fenway Racing’s Ryan Newman has been waiting the longest. The Indiana native (South Bend), Newman, last won in the NASCAR Cup Series at Phoenix Raceway back in 2017 when he was driving for Richard Childress Racing – 119 races ago. Due to his injury at the beginning of this season, he has competed in 113 of them, but this weekend he looks to get back to his winning ways and not only snap his winless streak but also that of Roush Fenway Racing’s that dates back to Ricky Stenhouse Jr.’s last victory at Daytona – 106 races ago. Newman has made 19 series starts at Indianapolis posting one win (2013), three top fives and six top 10s. His average finish is 16.0.
