Despite struggling much of the race and losing spots more than once during pit stops, Buescher still came away with a respectable 11th place finish.
Unfortunately, the other seven playoff drivers all finished ahead of him, including Kyle Larson, who won the race and became the first driver to lock a position in the Championship 4.
The result means Buescher is eighth in the playoff standings and 23 points behind Denny Hamlin, who currently holds the fourth and final transfer spot with two races remaining to qualify.
“We got shuffled back a little bit in some dirty air and it was a struggle back there for a little bit,” Buescher said. “We got back going and needed some longer runs and green flag cycles to sort it out and we didn’t get it that way.
“We were able to make some decent work out of it and get a pretty decent finish out of the day.”
About the issues on pit road, Buescher said, “It’s hard to get (spots) back (on the track). The pit box was super slick today and that really made it difficult.
“We lost a lot of spots and trying to get them back was just tough on the day. We’ve got our work cut out for us now.”
While Buescher and his No. 17 RFK Racing team struggled much of the race, his teammate and co-owner Brad Keselowski finished in the top-10 in both stages and was at times in contention for the win, leading five times for 38 laps.
Keselowski, however, was eliminated from the playoffs following last weekend’s race at the Charlotte Roval.
“There will be plenty to dive into and study,” Buescher said about learning something from Keselowski’s performance. “But we’re a pretty open book so we’ve got a lot of info going back and forth between the groups all the time.
“We’ll figure out how to be better for next week.”
