But after finishing 15th at Indianapolis and 36th last week at Pocono, is Busch suddenly vulnerable?
Depends on who you talk to.
"He's been the guy to beat. That's for sure," four-time Cup champ Jeff Gordon, who had six wins last season but has yet to win this year, said Friday. "They might win this week, who knows? That's the kind of year they've had. They've been able to surprise you when you least expect it."
Heading into Sunday's Centurion Boats at The Glen, Busch leads second-place Dale Earnhardt Jr. by 176 points, Carl Edwards by 185 and two-time defending Cup champ Jimmie Johnson by 200.
"Fortunately, we've been lucky enough to win seven races," said Busch, who will start Sunday's race on the pole after qualifying was rained out Friday. "We can only hope that we can win a couple more and just get further ahead of the competition when the final 10 starts."
When the Chase begins, points will be reset at 5,000. With his seven wins, Busch has 70 bonus points, 10 for each victory, which gives him a 40-point cushion over Edwards with five races remaining before the Chase. Only the top 12 drivers in points qualify for the Chase, and of those drivers currently inside the top 12, four have not won yet and four more have only one victory.
"The bonus points that he has, right now I think that's the only advantage he has," said Gordon, who sits sixth. "They just haven't shown to me what they were showing earlier in the season. But going into it with a 70- or a 40-point deficit, which is kind of where we're at right now, that's a lot of points to try to make up when you haven't been able to have the dominating wins like we had last year."
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WATKINS GLEN LEGENDS: Tony Stewart and Mark Martin were inducted into Watkins Glen International's Legends of The Glen on Friday, joining such racing stars of yesteryear as Jackie Stewart, Graham Hill, and Al Holbert.
Stewart, who has won four of the past six Sprint Cup races at the historic road course in upstate New York, was named Driver of the Decade from 1998-2007. Martin won three straight Cup races from the pole and and nine top-5s to take honors for 1988-97.
"Having a string like we've had here, winning four of the nine years I've been here, that's something that we're really, really proud of," Stewart said. "I mean, batting .300 will get you in the (Baseball) Hall of Fame and we're over .400 right now at The Glen."
Stewart also has started outside the top-5 only three times and never worse than 11th, has led 190 of the 812 laps available in his nine starts, and has completed every lap of every race.
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LET IT RAIN: Racing in the rain apparently has caught NASCAR's fancy.
A week after Ron Fellows won the rain-shortened Nationwide Series road race in Montreal, NASCAR officials announced that this week's Nationwide event, Saturday's Zippo 200 at Watkins Glen International, will be staged rain or shine.
"The Glen's elevation changes and slight banking in the turns should keep the water from standing and provide the drivers with challenging conditions," Watkins Glen International president Craig Rust said. "But it will certainly keep the racing exciting."
At Circuit Gilles Villeneuve last weekend, the Nationwide Series competed on rain tires in a points race for the first time in the history of any NASCAR series.
There's a 30 percent chance of showers Saturday, and if they do materialize during the race NASCAR will red-flag it to allow teams to switch to wet-weather gear. Officials will continue to monitor the condition of the track and only stop the race if it becomes unsafe.
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BUSCH'S TRIFECTA?: A year ago Juan Pablo Montoya had a chance to make NASCAR history and failed. Now it's Kyle Busch's turn to try.
No driver in NASCAR history has won three road races in a single season. Montoya won last year at Mexico City in the Nationwide Series and at Infineon Raceway in Cup competition but never threatened to win in either series race at Watkins Glen International.
So far, Busch has duplicated Montoya's feat from a year ago and now has two shots this weekend at The Glen to win his third road race of 2008.
"That would be awesome," Busch said. "But we don't necessarily look toward that. What we look toward right now is making our car the best that we can make it so we can be a contender in the race."
Busch has won 15 races in NASCAR's top three series this season -- seven in Cup, six in Nationwide and two in trucks.
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SPARK PLUGS: Tony Stewart said he would announce the drivers for his new race team sometime in the next week or two. ... Jeff Gordon leads all active Sprint Cup drivers with 530 consecutive starts, one more than Bobby Labonte. ... Michael Waltrip will carry the blue-and-gold colors of NAPA for at least another season. It will mark the ninth consecutive season that Waltrip and NAPA have been together.
Titans sign RT Stewart to multiyear extension
Petty to use 3 drivers in No. 45 in next 3 races
