More – Labonte’s debut 10 years ago and….: Three drivers competing in today’s race at Dover made their first Winston Cup start at there. #18-Bobby Labonte made his big-league NASCAR start there in 1991, the year he won the Busch Series title, while #17-Matt Kenseth showed his future potential in 1998 and #97-Kurt Busch made his debut run just last season. Labonte picked Dover for his inaugural run because the car count is always down after the high-dollar Coca-Cola 600. Labonte raced a car owned by his family at Dover and had his Busch Series crew pull double duty that weekend. Labonte was going to run five Cup races that season but stopped after two events. He finished 34th in his debut at Dover. Kenseth made his first Winston Cup start in place of Bill Elliott, who attended a family funeral(his father passed away) on that weekend in 1998. Kenseth scored a top-10 finish(6th) and showed the makings of a future Cup star. Since that first start, he has completed 1,599 of 1,600 possible laps at Dover. Roush threw Busch into the Cup fire in last year’s second race at Dover. Busch replaced Chad Little in Roush’s #97 entry. He spent most of the 2000 season in the Truck Series. Busch finished 18th and showed enough promise to get a full-time Cup ride with Roush this season(Daytona Beach News Journal)(6-3-2001)
