Skip navigation
Favorites
Sign up to follow your favorites on all your devices.
Sign up

Xfinity points leader Chris Buescher is not in a hurry to get where he’s going

NASCAR XFINITY Series Subway Firecracker 250

NASCAR XFINITY Series Subway Firecracker 250

Chris Trotman

In September 1992, country music band Alabama released its hit single, “I’m in a hurry (and I don’t know why).”

One month later, Chris Buescher was born.

Fast-forward to today and the Prosper, Texas, native is in the middle of his second Xfinity season. He leads the points, has earned three series wins heading into tonight’s race at Daytona International Speedway on NBCSN, and enjoyed a five-race stint earlier this year in the Sprint Cup Series as a replacement driver for Front Row Motorsports.

Despite that, the Roush Fenway Racing driver is not in a hurry to get to Cup and he knows exactly why.

“I have looked back through the years and you see guys and girls come up too quickly and maybe not in their minds - at the time they maybe thought it was the right move - but it seemed like more often than not if you got rushed into the next level and weren’t ready, that was your one shot,” Buescher said.

“I can think of several (drivers) in my head, but I don’t want to call anybody out on it. I like the pace we have gone and it has been comfortable.”

Buescher’s lack of a rush is in contrast to that of Ty Dillon, who is second in points to Buescher. Despite only having one win in two seasons in the Xfinity Series (Indianapolis, 2014), Dillon and Childress are frequently asked when he will be in a full-time Cup ride.

“I think my progression through stock car racing has been a little bit slower than a lot of guys that are racing or have been racing, and I am okay with that,” Buescher said. “I like being able to get a lot of experience in each series before I transition into the next level.”

Buescher debuted in the Xfinity Series part-time in 2013 after spending four years and two full-time seasons in the ARCA Series, where he raced for the Roulo Brothers and earned 10 wins by 2013. By his last full season, Buescher, at 19, was joking with ARCA driver Frank Kimmel that they were the two veterans in the garage.

Kimmel is 53.

“I can count on one hand the amount of late model races I ran and on the other the amount of ASA Truck races I ran,” Buescher said. “That was the extent of my big car experience before ARCA. It was a big learning curve, but I feel like the amount of time spent there and what I learned with the Roulo Brothers carried over into the Xfinity side.”

Buescher said the plan to “take it easy” as his career escalated has been in place from the start. It also helps that the 22-year-old driver is learning with a solid foundation at Roush. Meanwhile, Dillon enters Saturday’s Firecracker 250 at Daytona with a new crew chief, Nick Harrison, after a mid-season swap.

“There is a comfort level from our side knowing we have a good group of guys that have been together since the beginning of last year,” said Buescher, who works with crew chief Scott Graves. “The majority of them are the same people. We had a couple guys come off the road due to building families but it has been neat to have a group of guys and build that chemistry and they have done a great job.”

Buescher’s doesn’t have anymore Sprint Cup races scheduled for this year and probably won’t know for several months what his plans are for 2016.

But with an Xfinity championship on the line, why start rushing now?

Follow @DanielMcFadin