Kyle Busch was as frustrated as it comes leaving New Hampshire last weekend. A tire went down on his No. 18 Toyota on Lap 15 and he would crash out in Turn 3, finishing last. While a playoff spot was all but secured with a good enough gap from himself to the bubble, he just wasn’t happy with how they were racing.

Then, Michigan brought themselves a breath of fresh air.

His Joe Gibbs Racing teammates said that everyone in the JGR camp was frustrated. Yes, they had six wins this season, but all of those were between Denny Hamlin (5) and Martin Truex Jr. (1). They lost their advantage from last year.

Credit a couple of factors for that. The competition improved and the lack of practice time has cost JGR the development to improve themselves.

That’s why Busch who is riding a 22 race winless streak still isn’t satisfied. He’s won 56 times in his NASCAR Cup Series career. He’s used to winning. He’s not used to being shut out this long.

But, he also feels that after scoring a top five finish in both races at the Michigan International Speedway this weekend, that it can build some much needed momentum to find his way to victory lane soon.

“We come to Michigan not normally looking for top-five days, but this has been a good two days,” Busch said following Sunday’s race. “Hopefully we can keep some momentum rolling here and get ready to go next week and turn right and turn left. Yesterday and today, the car drove great. The best driving car I’ve had here at Michigan.”

Busch, brought his No. 18 Toyota home fifth in Saturday’s race. He was fourth on Sunday. He just didn’t have enough for the top cars to seriously contend though.

“The long runs went away later in the race and that’s just what we had,” Busch continued. “We got about all we could get out of the day. I felt like the 4 (Kevin Harvick) was the best car. The 2 (Keselowski)  was second-best. The 11 (Denny Hamlin), there at the end showed up and was pretty fast, but the 19 (Martin Truex Jr.) and myself were really even. That was about all we had.”

Busch, still needs to find a way to get some more playoff points. He’s stuck with one. Meanwhile, Harvick has 35. Hamlin has 29. Keselowski and Logano have 21 and 14 respectively. If Busch gets to the Round of 8, that’s a tall hill to climb to beat them on points. He would in theory likely have to win in that round.

He’s won just once in his last 44 tries.