LEBANON, Tenn. — Don‘t ask Chris Buescher about points. The native Texan is solely focused on chasing checkered flags with RFK Racing.
“I adamantly hate points racing so much,” Buescher said on Saturday at Nashville Superspeedway. “If it didn‘t happen to roll up on (X) feeds because I‘m scrolling, I wouldn‘t have a clue. I don‘t like that it consumes so much of the conversation. I want to go to the track on a weekly basis and try to figure out how to win that, knowing that everything comes with winning races. It‘s a pretty basic concept.”
However, Buescher was pleased to hear on Wednesday that the National Motorsports Appeals Panel amended the L1-level penalty issued to the No. 17 team following the Cup Series race at Kansas Speedway last month. He was in Nashville to promote the race weekend during the hearing.
Regaining 30 of the 60 points, Buescher jumped seven spots in the Regular Season Championship standings, slotting in 16th. Entering Sunday night‘s Cracker Barrel 400 at Nashville Superspeedway (7 p.m. ET, Prime Video, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio), he‘s six points behind RFK teammate Ryan Preece for the provisional bubble spot with half the regular season remaining.
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“It put us in a little better spot on that side of things, but ultimately, it doesn‘t change our year,” Buescher said of the addition of 30 points. “We have the second half of the regular season to win some races. I believe that ultimately, it‘s going to take wins to get you over the playoff bubble.”
Team co-owner Brad Keselowski was pleased with the ruling. But, like Buescher, he believes it‘s going to take a checkered flag to punch a ticket to the postseason, thinking that drivers below the elimination line will win their way in.
“It‘s a good thing to move [Buescher] up in points,” Keselowski stated. “The reality of the series and the way it‘s judged with the way the playoff format works, I think our mindset is that we need to win races to be relevant and to guarantee we‘re going to the playoffs. It wasn‘t a bad thing, but I don‘t know that it really changes anything for us.”
What has changed for RFK is the allocation of a few roles and responsibilities within the organization to ensure there is no oversight of the NASCAR rule book moving forward, Keselowski mentioned in his Saturday press conference, without delving into details. In addition to Buescher‘s penalty, Ryan Preece was disqualified from a runner-up finish at Talladega Superspeedway at the end of April for a spoiler modification, setting the No. 60 car back.
“The situations at hand were not what I would call pushing too much, as I would call not having any regard to understanding the rule book and all of its complexities,” Keselowski stated. “Ultimately, that burden falls on us, so we‘ve had those conversations internally. Everyone knows what is expected of them.”
Through the first half of the regular season, Buescher has six top-10 finishes, more than the likes of reigning Regular Season Champion Tyler Reddick (four) and defending Cup champion Joey Logano (three). It‘s the same amount as two-time 2025 winner Denny Hamlin.
That said, Buescher has a single top-five finish (Phoenix in March) since last visiting Victory Lane in September at Watkins Glen International. The path forward is to perform better.
“What we wanted so badly this year was to improve our first 10 races,” Buescher added. “Proud of the fact that we have been better; there‘s no doubt about that in my mind. We‘ve been able to measure that in a lot of ways, and it may not show in all of the results, but we‘ve been a lot better.
“We haven‘t been able to get the win that we hoped for in the first handful like we hoped for. We‘ve been in the hunt across all three of our teams. All things considered, it‘s been a fairly successful beginning of the season, call it a B-plus, with a lot of room for improvement to get to the point to where we can win every week.”
Looming after Nashville and on the radar are visits to Michigan International Speedway, where Buescher is a recent winner, and Mexico City, where the No. 17 car should be a strong contender.
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