Kyle Busch surprised by his mid-season NASCAR Cup form

The Joe Gibbs Racing driver missed the first 11 races of the year with a broken leg, but he has bounced back from that and a slow return - which included a pair of accidents in his first four races - to become NASCAR's form driver.

His second crash, at Michigan, was followed by his first victory of the season at Sonoma last month, and Busch subsequently secured back-to-back victories at Kentucky and New Hampshire.

"I never would have guessed it," he said of the run.

"If somebody would have said, 'You're going to come back and you're going to win three of four', I would have said, 'Yeah, right, you're crazy'.

"It certainly has been a perfect storm, if you will, to get back into fast race cars.

"Everything is working in our favour right now. We're doing the right things at the right times."

With his New Hampshire victory, Busch moved to within 58 points of the 30th place in the standings he requires to qualify for the Chase for the championship.

Busch was 179 behind when he started his first race of the season at Charlotte, and 173 adrift before Sonoma.

"It's certainly doable," he said of making the Chase.

"In my mind, the opportunity put in front of me was to run 20 championship weeks from here until the end of the year.

"We're making the most of that right now. I certainly didn't do a very good job of that at Dover and Michigan.

"We'll continue to make sure that we're smart."

If he can do enough over the next seven races to make the Chase, Busch is bullish about his prospects of claiming a first Cup title.

"This certainly feels good," he said. "I'm probably running 100 per cent

"I don't know if everybody else is running at 100 per cent, but if they are, then we're beating them. My 100 is better than theirs.

"If there's guys out there only running at 80 per cent and they're finishing third, fourth, fifth, we better watch our backs for when they do turn up the wick and Chase time hits."