Time is running out for Kyle Busch to reach NASCAR Cup Series victory lane in 2024.

Busch's spin at the hands of Chase Briscoe's rear end while leading at Kansas Speedway was perhaps his last, best chance to grab a trophy before the year is out. Of the six tracks remaining on the schedule, Talladega Superspeedway this Sunday, Oct. 6, is the only one where Busch holds a win since the start of the 2020 season.

That puts Busch's NASCAR streak of at least one Cup win per year in serious jeopardy. He's cashed in at least once for 19 straight seasons on the Cup level, ever since he moved up as a fresh-faced 19-year-old rookie in 2005.

So if Busch's record does come to an end, how impressive is it really?

Every sport has that unbreakable mark, a stat that might stand for decades, even centuries. For example, you have Joe DiMaggio's 56-game hit streak in baseball; no one has even come close to sniffing that mark since it was set in 1941. Cy Young's record of 749 complete games might as well be enshrined forever; current baseball culture pulls a starter the second he reaches a certain number of pitches.

Over in NASCAR, that unreachable number is Richard Petty's 200 Cup victories. David Pearson is the only one close, at 105, and the lone other driver to crack the century mark. Jeff Gordon is next up, with 93 wins, but never had a real chance to catch Petty above him.

That's because The King ran during a time you'd have 55, even 60 Cup races in a single season. It doubled the amount of opportunities at a time the field had fewer competitive cars, the perfect storm for records like 10 straight victories in 1967 (Just to compare to the modern era, Kyle Larson was considered a dominant Cup champion in 2021 with his 10 victories ... over a 36-race span.)

That leaves Petty standing alone with a record set in stone. Busch's mark of 19 straight may not quite reach that level.

As you can see, Logano's the only one in double digits. He extended the streak to 13 seasons with an overtime win at Nashville Superspeedway this summer. That means for Logano to catch Busch, in a best-case scenario, the record would need to end this year and then Logano would need at least one win a year for six more seasons.

That would take us to 2030, a time where Logano turns 40 years old. It's far from a guarantee, especially considering the falloff we've seen for drivers when they've hit the big 4-0. And behind Logano?

No one is close.

Not even the craziest Hamlin fan can see him racing the decade-plus more he'd need to catch Busch. Byron, sitting at four straight seasons, has a lifetime of racing left to go. And a driver like Larson (now at four straight) would need to race until age 47, minimum, to have a shot of catching Busch.

That's where it's getting tricky for anyone to track down this record. The average Cup career is getting shorter; we're no longer seeing the type of 30-year career drivers like Petty, Mark Martin and Ricky Rudd pulled off. The number instead is landing somewhere around 20 seasons; Martin Truex Jr. and Jimmie Johnson look finished after 19.

That means a driver looking to break Busch's streak would have to hit the ground running as a rookie, win at least once that first year and never look back. They could never have an off year like Truex did -- a winless quirk in 2022 where the law of averages goes against you. And a driver would have to do it in an era where two dozen drivers, potentially more at a track like Talladega, have the equipment and the know-how to reach victory lane.

It's a level of consistency we're learning to appreciate as Busch falls short, time and again, over the past two months. We've now seen three clear near-misses since the Olympic break: runner-up to underdog Harrison Burton at Daytona International Speedway, fellow Cinderella Chase Briscoe at Darlington Raceway and then the Kansas race that came apart.

Winning these races, year in and year out, isn't easy. Decades from now, we'll look at Busch's 19 straight (potentially more) and see why.

Here's a few other stats to keep an eye on.

There's no questioning that the Next Gen chassis has brought a greater level of parity to the sport. We've now gone well over a year since a driver pulled off back-to-back wins: Chris Buescher at Richmond Raceway and Michigan International Speedway in August of 2023. The all-time record, according to Trey Ryan, is 45 races, set in 1984-85.

That's the number of lead changes in Sunday's (Sept. 29) race at Kansas, a sleepy 1.5-miler that's been reborn during the Next Gen era. At the start of the 2023 season, the record number of lead changes in a Kansas race was 26, set way back in 2009. Three of the last four Cup races there have eclipsed that number, including a whopping 37 in May of 2023.

Ford to finish inside the top 10 at Kansas: Ryan Blaney (fourth). That's the lowest number for the Blue Oval crowd since Richmond back in early August.

Career pole positions for Christopher Bell, including this past weekend's race at Kansas. He's failed to win any of those races, posting just three top-five finishes despite leading over 500 laps in those events.

That's where Corey LaJoie finished in his first race behind the wheel of Rick Ware Racing's No. 51. It continues one of the best streaks of LaJoie's career despite trying circumstances. He's now got four top 15s in five races across two different teams as he continues to audition for a full-time ride in 2025.