PERSONAL PROFILE
	Hometown: Las Vegas, NV Birthdate: August 4, 1978

For the second straight season Kurt Busch will have a daunting task ahead of him as he attempts to win rookie of the year honors in NASCAR’s top division, following up his 2000 rookie of the year campaign in the Craftsman Truck Series. The young Las Vegas native is backed by the powerful Jack Roush conglomerate, which engineered a sweep of the top-2 positions in the CTS last season.

Busch is on a raging hot streak in NASCAR racing. In consecutive seasons he won the Featherlite Southwest Series Rookie of the Year Award in 1998, became the youngest FSWS championship in 1999, finished second in the championship and won the rookie of the year award in the CTS and also made his Winston Cup debut in 2000.

Busch stepped into the No.97 John Deere Ford formerly driven by Chad Little at Dover in September when Roush released Little. Busch competed in seven events to maintain his rookie eligibility and had two top-10 starts and a best finish of 13th, in the high profile UAW-GM Quality 500 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway in October.

In the truck series he truly was a diamond in the rough, however. He tied for second in the Bud Pole standings with teammate Greg Biffle, with four pole awards. He won his first race in his 14th start and won a total of four races, including the season finale Motorola 200 at California Speedway. He logged an impressive 13 top-5 and 16 top-10 finishes in 24 starts.

Busch began his racing career at 14, driving a Dwarf Car owned by his father at Pahrump Valley Speedway, a quarter-mile clay track outside Las Vegas. In 1996, Busch was the NASCAR Weekly Racing Series Hobby Stock champion at The Bull Ring at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, among three titles he won at the 3/8-mile paved venue. Busch won the Nevada Dwarf Car championship in 1995 and was Legends Car National Rookie of the Year in 1996.