INDIANAPOLIS — Kyle Busch has the kind of trophy collection most NASCAR drivers would envy: monsters, lobsters, even wine.

He has visited Victory Lane 32 times in his Sprint Cup career – and with wins in the last two races and three of the last four, the Joe Gibbs Racing driver is used to raising the ultimate prize over his head.

Kyle Busch celebrates Saturday after winning the Xfinity Series race with a last-lap pass at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. The Associated Press

SPRINT CUP

WHERE: Indianapolis Motor Speedway

DISTANCE: 400 miles (160 laps)

WHEN: 3:30 p.m. Sunday

TELEVISION: NBCSN

But in the series’ marquee races, where a victory stamps a driver for generations, Busch has gone home empty-handed.

• 0 for the Daytona 500

• 0 for the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte.

• 0 for Indy.

Oh, how Busch wishes he could take the checkered flag just once in one of those races. He tries again Sunday at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, where NASCAR’s hottest driver may have his best shot yet at planting a kiss on the famed Yard of Bricks.

“I would love to be able to have those checked off the list and to not be looking for just one victory, but two or three at some of these places,” Busch said Saturday. “Jeff (Gordon) is looking for (six) here at Indy at the Brickyard. That’s pretty remarkable. For me to just be looking for one, it’s a little disappointing that I’ve been around this long and haven’t won those races.”

Busch needs a win – or at least another top 10 – to continue his charge toward a berth in the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship.

He refused to let the thought of a title even dance in his head as he recovered from a gruesome injury suffered in an Xfinity Series race the day before the season-opening Daytona 500. Busch broke his right leg and left foot and missed the first 11 Cup races.

Busch isn’t where he needs to be in the standings quite yet. His three wins are certainly enough to land him in the Chase, but he still has to reach the top 30 in points. He’s 33rd in the standings, 58 points behind David Gilliland for 30th, and has seven races to make up the difference.

Victory Lane sure beats a hospital bed, however.

“At first I was like, ‘I’m never going to race again and I don’t know what I’m going to do,”‘ Busch said. “All those things go through your mind. You just continue to power through and listen to your doctors and those that are around you. I wouldn’t call it painless, there was certainly a lot of pain, but it went really, really well as far as you could say any injury healing goes.”

Busch and first-year Cup crew chief Adam Stevens have found fast chemistry. Stevens got the call in part because of his success with Busch in NASCAR’s second-tier series, where he called the shots for him the last two seasons.

“He’s been a great leader so far,” Busch said.

Stevens said after Busch’s win at New Hampshire Motor Speedway last Sunday that he thought the team could win the championship. It would be the first for Busch.

“I feel like we’ve shown that we have speed and we have solid cars,” Stevens said. “Since Kyle’s come back, maybe it’s put a little bit more speed in them.”

Busch may have offered a sneak preview Saturday when he won the Xfinity Series race at Indy from the pole for his record 72nd victory in that series. Busch took advantage of Ryan Blaney’s last-lap bobble, making an inside pass on the back straightaway to win by 0.421 seconds.

Busch also announced his return to the Truck Series. He has won 42 times in the Truck Series, including seven times last year, and he’ll race next weekend at Pocono Raceway.

The comeback rolls on.

“In sports you do see stories like this where somebody is really hurt, then to be able to come back in this amount of time, it’s a special story,” Gibbs said.

FORMULA ONE: Reigning world champion Lewis Hamilton is collecting pole positions at such a rate that he is dreaming of emulating his childhood idol, Ayrton Senna.

Hamilton won the pole position Saturday for the Hungarian Grand Prix, where he will start at the front for the ninth time in 10 races this season and 47th time overall.

Senna’s total of 65 poles might seem a long way off now, but at this rate Hamilton could be closing in next season.

“As a kid, I always wanted to emulate him, so to say that I’m on par to emulate that is definitely quite neat,” Hamilton said.

He was .575 seconds faster than his Mercedes teammate, Nico Rosberg, and .719 better than Ferrari’s Sebastian Vettel, who has 45 career poles. Michael Schumacher leads all-time with 68.

Hamilton, who can equal Senna’s total of three F1 titles if he wins again this year, has been utterly dominant this week, including topping every practice. He’ll start from pole for the fifth time at the Hungaroring in Budapest and is seeking his fifth victory at the track.

“I love the track, it feels like an old go-kart circuit we used to race on years ago,” said Hamilton, who has 38 career wins.

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