NASCAR: Kyle Busch Wins Enjoy Illinois 300 at Gateway – Full Race Results

It took quite a while to get there, but Kyle Busch eventually swept the weekend at World Wide Technology Raceway, winning the race from pole position. It is the third win of the season for the Richard Childress Racing driver, and one that he wanted badly. Busch led 66 laps in the inaugural race at Gateway last year, but finished runner-up to Joey Logano. Today it was Busch that earned the victory, while Logano settled for a 3rd place finish for Team Penske.

Denny Hamlin rebounded from a brutal Coca-Cola 600 last weekend, when he was taken out deliberately by Chase Elliott, sending him head-first into the wall in the dogleg at Charlotte Motor Speedway. His runner-up finish today was a great morale boost for the team, as they keep searching for their next win. Kyle Larson was battling at the front in the final few restarts, but ended up finishing 4th while Martin Truex Jr had another solid run and rounded out the top-five.

Ryan Blaney followed up his win last weekend with a 6th place run today while Daniel Suarez got a much-needed 7th place result for Trackhouse Racing. William Byron continued his strong season with another top-ten finish. It is the sixth consecutive top-ten for Byron, who hadn't finished worse than 7th since the April 16 race at Martinsville. Michael McDowell had a great run for Front Row Motorsports to finish 9th, as Kevin Harvick completed the top-ten on Sunday.

This race was all about red flags and broken brake rotors. The race began with a crash on Lap 3 followed by a nearly two-hour hold for lightning in the St Louis area. Once the race got going again, several drivers suffered issues with brake rotors that sent them hard into the outside wall. It was a rough afternoon for 23XI Racing as Tyler Reddick spun in the opening laps of the race, and again towards the end to finish 35th. Teammate Bubba Wallace was five laps away from scoring another top-ten before a brake rotor failed on his No. 23 Toyota, putting a damper on his day.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr was another driver that was having a solid race before fate intervened. He was collected in an incident late in the race, sending him to a 32nd place finish despite running inside the top-ten for most of the day. Corey LaJoie did an admirable job filling in for the suspended Chase Elliott, finishing 21st for the Hendrick Motorsports organization.

Previous Gateway winners

2022: Joey Logano