HAMPTON, Ga. — After Kyle Busch gave Toyota its first NASCAR Sprint Cup victory, the leaders of Toyota Racing Development finally had something to celebrate after enduring a miserable season in the series in 2007.
Jim Aust, who is retiring as vice president of motorsports for Toyota Motor Sales, USA and president/CEO of TRD, along with Lee White, senior vice president and general manager of TRD, finally have something tangible to show that their decision to come to NASCAR made sense.
But it wasn’t until Toyota added the powerful Joe Gibbs Racing team to its lineup for the 2008 season that it had a legitimate shot at scoring a race victory in NASCAR’s premier series.
“It’s the hard work by everybody that’s been involved in the program,” Aust said. “It’s the guys at TRD working on the engine. Then, of course, it takes more than just the engine to have success. You have to have a great team and certainly Joe Gibbs Racing brings that into the fold.
“It is a great organization, obviously, with a trio of drivers that anybody would like to have. It is a combination of things. I don’t know that we point to any one thing. It is hard work, a great team and great drivers.”
With Busch behind the wheel in a JGR Toyota Camry, he has been close to winning at Daytona, California and Las Vegas before finally finding the path to victory lane at Atlanta.
“Kyle has been very close ever since the beginning of this year,” Aust said, “starting with the Daytona 500 and what could have been. To have Kyle come in and take this one and Tony Stewart finish second, wow, the feeling can’t get any better than that.”
Aust, who retires in July, believes Sunday’s win is the first of many more to come this season.
“I said all along, from the very beginning that I thought the number was somewhere in the area of eight, so I’m going to stick to that and hope my prediction comes through,” Aust said. “With a guy like the coach (Joe Gibbs) here running this thing and J.D. Gibbs, who knows what the rest of the season is going to bring for us?
“This is a fabulous day for Toyota to win in this prestigious series. It is just a fabulous feeling. We are just feeling really great about the whole decision to move into the Cup Series.”