Columnist Brian Hilderbrand: Kyle Busch to race July 3 at Bullring at LVMS

Tuesday, June 24, 2003 | 9:58 a.m.

Brian Hilderbrand covers motor sports for the Las Vegas Sun. His motor sports notebook appears Friday. He can be reached at bh@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4089.

Budding NASCAR star Kyle Busch will return to his hometown next week and compete at The Bullring at Las Vegas Motor Speedway during the track's July 3 "Night of Fire" racing card.

Busch, who finished second in his NASCAR Busch Series debut last month at Lowe's Motor Speedway, will drive a Dick Cobb Racing-prepared Super Late Model in the 75-lap main event and will run one of Alex Haase's Legends Cars in the 20-lap Pro/Master Legends Cars feature.

"Growing up in Las Vegas and racing at The Bullring for pretty much my entire life, I'm pretty excited to get back there," Busch said. "No matter what I do and where I race, I guess I could never get completely away from Super Late Model and Legends Cars racing in Las Vegas."

Busch, the younger brother of NASCAR Winston Cup driver Kurt Busch, finished second to Mike Cofer in a Super Late Model main event at The Bullring back in February before starting his driving career with Hendrick Motorsports.

Busch, 18, owns two Automobile Racing Club of America (ARCA) victories this season in addition to his runner-up finish in his Busch Series debut. Busch's next Busch Series start is scheduled for July 26 at Pocono (Pa.) Raceway.

Vasser will pilot the No. 30 Entervan.com Dodge for Braun Racing in his second Busch Series race this season. Vasser qualified fifth for the season-opening race at Daytona International Speedway and was running sixth when he was tapped from behind by Todd Bodine and crashed. Vasser finished 28th.

"Jimmy has a vast amount of racing experience and we are thrilled to be teaming with him again,' team owner Todd Braun said. "We are confident Jimmy will do a great job."

Vasser, the 1996 CART champion, won a CART race at The Milwaukee Mile in 1998 and has seven top-10 finishes there in the Champ Cars.

Jeff, who eventually finished second, said he was flabbergasted when he saw that Robby had passed his teammate after the caution had come out -- which Jeff called a breach of a "gentlemen's agreement."

"To me, that makes it even worse (doing it to a teammate)," Jeff said. "If me and my teammate were racing out there and he raced me harder getting back to the caution than he did under green and he actually passed me, I tell you what, we'd have a little discussion somewhere."

To which Robby replied, "I have no idea why Jeff would even comment on the issue because it had nothing to do with him. If I had passed Jeff Gordon under the caution, I could see why he might be concerned. As far as I'm concerned, he should mind his own business."

When asked if he would have a discussion with Jeff, Robby added, "He's not big enough to have a discussion with me."

There has been bad blood between the two drivers, who are not related, since Robby bumped Jeff to take the lead late in the 2001 season-ending race at New Hampshire International Speedway. On the following lap, Jeff retaliated by bumping Robby during a caution period. Jeff was penalized a lap and Robby went on to win the race.