Early leader Ryan Blaney exited Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race early after a Lap 198 crash with Ty Dillon damaged his No. 12 Team Penske Ford at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Blaney started fourth in the Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500 (FS1, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) and led twice for 60 laps in the early going. But the 26-year-old driver lost control while running second and his No. 12 Ford sustained heavy front-end damage in a collision with Ty Dillon’s No. 13 Germain Racing Chevrolet.
“Take it to the truck. We knocked the radiator out of it,” the No. 12 crew told Blaney, who nursed the rumpled car back to the garage area. Both Blaney and Dillon were sidelined.
Blaney was the race’s first retiree and will be scored last in the 40-car field. Dillon managed to complete two additional laps before ending his day in 39th place.
“I was way high and that’s obviously not where I wanted to be, but I didn’t think I was that high getting in there. It might have just been trying to get too much and got in the marbles and spun out,” Blaney said of his initial trouble. “I thought we were gonna be OK and then we got destroyed about six seconds later, so that’s just Bristol and a part of Bristol. I probably shouldn’t have been pushing that hard, but trying to get back to the lead. I thought we found some speed up there, just a mistake on my part.
“After having two strong weeks, you go and you wreck not even halfway, so that’s just a bummer. We’ll go to Atlanta and see what we can do.”
Both drivers had a brief discussion after being checked and released from the infield care center.
“Just how he was trying to get slowed up, ” Blaney said that Dillon explained. “It’s just one of them things at Bristol. Things happen fast and just couldn’t get slowed up enough and turn and miss me. I think we’re both out of it, but I shouldn’t have been sitting there sideways on the track anyway. That stinks, but I thought we were gonna be OK and just can’t seem to avoid things here. It’s hard to do, but I hate it for everybody on our crew. We had a good car and I just kind of overstepped it and cost us.”
Chase Elliott swept the stages Sunday at Bristol Motor Speedway, taking both green-and-white-checkered flags in the Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500.
The No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports driver came alive late in Stage 1 and found his way back to the lead once again by Lap 204 of Stage 2, leading a total of 74 laps thus far.
Elliott was trailed by Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick, Joey Logano and Kyle Busch in order to round out the top five.
A big wreck unfolded with 20 laps remaining in the stage, bringing out the red flag. Jimmie Johnson got into the left rear of the Ricky Stenhouse Jr.’s No. 47, spinning the JTG-Daugherty entry and sparking a pileup from oncoming traffic. Cole Custer, Alex Bowman, Kurt Busch and Tyler Reddick were also involved and took heavy, race-ending damage.
During a battle with his teammate for the lead, Ryan Blaney lost control of his No. 12 Team Penske Ford and appeared set to get away from the incident before being clipped by Ty Dillon’s No. 13 Chevrolet. Blaney exited the race and will finish 40th. Dillon ran two more laps than Blaney and will finish 39th.
Ryan Preece also got into the wall late in the stage to bring out the final caution on Lap 239.
Finish
Driver
Team
Points
1
Chase Elliott
Hendrick Motorsports
10
2
Denny Hamlin
Joe Gibbs Racing
9
3
Kevin Harvick
Stewart-Haas Racing
8
4
Joey Logano
Team Penske
7
5
Kyle Busch
Joe Gibbs Racing
6
6
Clint Bowyer
Stewart-Haas Racing
5
7
William Byron
Hendrick Motorsports
4
8
Erik Jones
Joe Gibbs Racing
3
9
Brad Keselowski
Team Penske
2
10
Chris Buescher
Roush Fenway Racing
1
STAGE 1
Chase Elliott took home his fourth stage win of the season in Stage 1 of Sunday’s Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
The Hendrick Motorsports driver, who is the series’ most recent winner at Charlotte Motor Speedway, paced the field for 22 laps after taking the lead on Lap 106.
Elliott’s close friend, Ryan Blaney, finished runner-up in the stage in the No. 12 Team Penske Ford, followed by Brad Keselowski (No. 2 Team Penske Ford), Aric Almirola (No. 10 Stewart-Haas Racing Ford) and Joey Logano (No. 22 Team Penske Ford) to round out the top five.
Kyle Busch’s No. 18 Toyota and Daniel Suarez’ No. 96 Toyota were caught speeding during their trips to pit road during the second competition caution. Suarez was then black-flagged and was forced to serve a pass-through penalty. They finished the stage 17th and 34th, respectively.
Matt DiBenedetto stayed out during the second competition caution and led the field to green on the ensuing restart but was shuffled back to seventh by the stage’s end.
The first caution came on Lap 7 when a spinning Ryan Newman brought out the yellow flag. There were two competition cautions in the first stage as well, on Laps 20 and 60.
The race began with no practice or qualifying. Keselowski started first after a random draw.
Two cars failed pre-race inspection twice at Bristol Motor Speedway and will drop to the rear of the 40-car field before the start of Sunday’s Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500 (3:30 p.m. ET on FS1, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Ryan Preece’s No. 37 JTG Daugherty Racing Chevrolet and Gray Gaulding’s No. 27 Rick Ware Racing Ford both failed tech twice. Preece was supposed to fire off 33rd, while Gaulding was to be 30th. The starting lineup was set by a random draw among groups, based on team owner standings.
Brad Keselowski will start from the pole position in his No. 2 Team Penske Ford. Last year’s spring Bristol winner, Kyle Busch, will line up seventh.
This race is the fifth since NASCAR resumed its 2020 Cup Series season amid the COVID-19 outbreak, which paused the at-track schedule for more than two months. It’ll be a 500-lap event around Tennessee’s .533-mile short track with stage breaks coming after Lap 125 and 250 — respectively.
Bristol Motor Speedway holds a special place in my NASCAR betting heart. As an undergrad at Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C. — which is about 60 miles from Thunder Valley — I attended the 2001 spring race at Bristol (won by Elliott Sadler), working a credit card booth for a fraternity fundraiser.
I walked into that racetrack knowing nothing about NASCAR and left with it instantly moving to the top of my list of favorite sports.
The NASCAR Cup Series returns to Bristol on Sunday for the Supermarket Heroes 500, a race that is sure to provide plenty of beating, banging, excitement and angry drivers.
Here’s how I’m navigating Sunday’s race from a NASCAR betting perspective.
NASCAR at Bristol Best Bet Picks
*Odds as of 7:30 a.m. ET on Sunday
As of Sunday morning, I’m still waffling on which favorite to bet, or to bet one at all.
If you simply look at average finish, Blaney’s performances at Bristol are nothing to write home about, but it’s the underlying metrics that make him so appealing on Sunday.
Over the past four races at Bristol, his 14.0 average finish ranks just 11th among all drivers, yet Blaney has the second-best driver rating, has run the third-most fast laps and has led the most laps in the series.
This four-race sample is important because the race package they’ll use this weekend is closer to what was run in 2018 than last season, so it’s important to not solely look at last year’s results as the way the cars will drive on Sunday could be significantly different than 2019.
After finishing third at Charlotte on Wednesday, Blaney is also third in line picking his pit stall, which is huge at Bristol due to a very tricky pit road.
Busch has six career wins at Bristol, including the 2018 night race, which was run with a race package very similar to what the Cup Series is using at short tracks this season.
Kurt also finished fifth on Wednesday at Charlotte, meaning he’ll have one of the best stalls on pit road.
History of success at Bristol? Check. Fast car this season? Check. Good pit stall? Check.
I know, I just said we shouldn’t lean solely on last season’s results at Bristol due to an aero package change, but that’s trickier than meets the eye with DiBenedetto.
Matty D. moved from Go Fas Racing to Leavine-Family Racing prior to the start of the 2019 season, which was a significant upgrade in the quality of his equipment.
DiBenedetto now drives for Wood Brothers, which is solid equipment as well, so looking at his Bristol stats prior to 2019 doesn’t accurately reflect how good he is here — although he has consistently over-performed his equipment in Thunder Valley throughout his career.
Last season, only three drivers — Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin and Kurt Busch — had a better average finish at Bristol than DiBenedetto. He also led the fifth-most laps en route to the ninth-best driver rating, indicating he was clearly a top-10 car over the course of both races.
Remember, betting is about the value in the number, and here we’re getting a driver who finished second the last time the Cup Series visited this track, knows how to lead laps and will start ninth at 25-1 odds.
Reddick has never run a Cup race at Bristol, but man was he fast there in the XFINITY Series.
Tyler had the best driver rating in the spring XFINITY race at Bristol last season en route to a second-place finish, and improved upon that in the fall by winning in incredibly impressive fashion.
After failing pre-race inspection, Reddick was forced to start last, then make a pass-through penalty lap as soon as the race started, which meant he had to come down pit road, under pit road speed, while the rest of the cars were racing on the track at full speed.
This put him almost two laps immediately to start the race. In response, all Reddick did was climb back onto the lead lap, then work his way through the entire field before eventually winning the race.
Reddick is just too good here to pass up at the longshot price of 70-1.
NASCAR Finish Line, a free-to-play gaming app from Penn National Gaming, is back with the resumption of the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series season. Each week, there will be six groups of five drivers for the upcoming race. Users will predict which driver will finish first among each of the six groups and then the overall race winner and second-place finisher for a chance to win $25,000 if all eight scenarios are correctly selected.
The third of six groups for Sunday’s Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500 race at Bristol Motor Speedway (3:30 p.m. ET on FS1/FOX Sports App, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) consists of a strong mix of youth vs. experience — Alex Bowman, Clint Bowyer, Matt DiBenedetto, Jimmie Johnson and Erik Jones.
For a stats look, NASCAR.com has compiled the average finish of the last two races at Bristol, the average finish from the two races held at Darlington Raceway, the average finish from the two races just held at Charlotte Motor Speedway and the drivers’ overall average finish for their career at Bristol to see who is the best play to make in Group 3.
A points system has been assigned, starting with one point for the best finisher and counting up to six points for the worst finisher. Those numbers were then added up. The lowest total signifies the strongest driver (green), and the highest total represents the weakest driver (red) — in recent years.
Driver
Last 2 Bristol races‘1
Career Bristol
avg. finish
Both 2020 Darlington races
Both 2020 Charlotte races
Total
Alex Bowman
Avg. finish: 19.0 (4)
Avg. finish: 20.9 (5)
Avg. finish 10.0 (2)
Avg. finish: 25.0 (3)
14
Clint Bowyer
Avg. finish: 7.0 (1.5)
Avg. finish: 14.1 (2)
Avg. finish 19.5 (4)
Avg. finish: 27.5 (5)
12.5
Matt DiBenedetto
Avg. finish: 7.0 (1.5)
Avg. finish: 17.9 (4)
Avg. finish 11.5 (3)
Avg. finish: 16.0 (1)
9.5
Jimmie Johnson
Avg. finish: 14.5 (3)
Avg. finish: 13.3 (1)
Avg. finish 23.0 (5)
Avg. finish: 25.5 (4)
13
Erik Jones
Avg. finish: 23.0 (5)
Avg. finish: 16.0 (3)
Avg. finish 6.5 (1)
Avg. finish: 18.5 (2)
11
Although DiBenedetto didn’t light the world on fire with finishes of 17th and 15th at Charlotte, he still managed to get the best average finish in that category, which shows he has some momentum on his side. Tying Bowyer with the best average finish the past two races at Bristol, it’s his heartbreaking second-place finish in last year’s night race to Denny Hamlin that makes him a trendy pick for Sunday. Wood Brothers Racing always brings a good car to the half-mile Tennessee track and DiBenedetto knows how to wheel it around that place.
You could make a case for Jones with the speed he has showcased in the No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota at Darlington and Charlotte, but it’s risky given his lackluster performances at Bristol. Although Bowman has been fast all season, not sure he’s the best choice out of the bunch for Sunday.
The NASCAR Cup Series heads to the Tennessee hills for its first short-track race since the COVID-19 shutdown. Bristol Motor Speedway will play host to Sunday’s Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500 (3:30 p.m. ET, FS1, PRN, SiriusXM), an event originally scheduled April 5 before its postponement.
As with other events held since NASCAR returned to action after the coronavirus outbreak, the 500-lap race will be held without fans in attendance, and only a limited amount of essential personnel will be permitted on the track’s grounds. It will mark the fifth Cup Series race in NASCAR’s return and the ninth race overall this season.
With plenty to sort out ahead of NASCAR’s first trip of the year to “The Last Great Colosseum”, here’s a primer with helpful information for Sunday’s showdown on the last day of May.
Smith (left) and Allen in 1961. (RacingOne | Getty Images)
Bristol Motor Speedway is a .533-mile oval that held its first Cup Series event on July 30, 1961. Jack Smith was credited as the winner of that day’s Volunteer 500, but Johnny Allen took the checkered flag as a relief driver after Smith exited his No. 46 Pontiac with heat exhaustion and burns on his foot. Both drivers celebrated in Victory Lane, but Smith’s name sticks in the record books. Allen drove the final 209 laps.
The track’s concrete surface measures 650 feet long in the straightaways and the variable banking in the turns ranges from 24 to 28 degrees. The frontstretch is banked from 5 to 9 degrees and the backstraight is angled at a 4- to 8-degree tilt.
Sunday’s 500-lapper will be the 119th race for NASCAR’s top division on the Tennessee track.
Stage 1 is set to end at Lap 125, Stage 2 at Lap 250, and the final stage is slated to conclude on Lap 500.
STARTING LINEUP
Sunday’s Supermarket Heroes 500 will be held without practice and qualifying as NASCAR tries to limit exposure for on-site personnel to control the spread of coronavirus. Wednesday’s lineup was determined by a random draw among groups in the team owner standings:
Positions 1-12: Random draw from charter teams in those positions in owner points
Positions 13-24: Random draw from charter teams in those positions in owner points
Positions 25-36: Random draw from charter teams in those positions in owner points
Positions 37-40: Open teams in order of owners points
Pit-stall selection for Sunday’s race will be based on the finishing order from Thursday’s Cup Series event at Charlotte Motor Speedway. For more information about starting-lineup procedures for national-series races scheduled without qualifying, click here.
RULES PACKAGE
The 2020 NASCAR rules package for short tracks will be in effect with a tapered spacer used to set a target of 750 horsepower. The cars will use a reduced downforce package with a shorter spoiler, a shorter splitter overhang and other aerodynamic changes.
GOODYEAR TIRES
Bristol is not your average short track: There are three factors that stand out when it comes to racing at Bristol Motor Speedway. First, the banking creates more speed and load than the “flatter” Martinsville Speedway or Richmond Raceway. This makes Bristol race more like a speedway than a short track in some ways. Second, Bristol has a full concrete surface, which wears tires fairly aggressively when the track is “green” with no rubber built up on it. Goodyear designs its tread compounds for Bristol to take the right amount of rubber and not “cake up” on the surface, leaving cars with a good level of grip. Third is the fact that Goodyear, NASCAR and the track operations staff will work together to apply the PJ1 grip compound to the lower four feet of both sets of corners for this weekend’s races. While this does impact tire wear, its primary purpose is to give drivers a competitive, alternate lane late in the race after many cars work their way up the track and make the upper lane the fastest way around.
“Bristol provides several unique challenges for both Goodyear and the race teams,” said Greg Stucker, Goodyear’s director of racing. “We have worked hard in recent years to refine the tread compounds that we bring there, as well as the other concrete tracks on the circuit. The key with concrete is to get it to take rubber, but just the right amount of rubber. It is easy to see that process once the race starts as the track turns from white to black, and lighten again as cars pick up some of that rubber when they are not at speed under cautions. Also, the tire constructions we bring to Bristol are more similar to what is run on speedways because of the speed in the high-banked corners and the level of load placed on the tires. You also have to consider that PJ1 comes into play at Bristol. While the track has progressive banking, adding the grip compound to the bottom lane in the corners gives the drivers a viable, second groove. Teams will likely stay down low early in the race, but as more cars move up top and work that third groove into the fastest lane, the bottom will remain comparable and be a place where drivers can go to make passes.”
New right-side tire for Cup, Xfinity at Bristol: Teams in both the NASCAR Cup and Xfinity Series will run the same tire set-up at Bristol this week . . . these teams ran this same left-side tire code in both races at Bristol last year, but this is a brand new right-side tire code . . . compared to what Cup and Xfinity teams ran at Bristol in 2019, this right-side features a construction update that Goodyear has been rolling into most speedways . . . this is the only track at which these teams will run either of these two tire codes in 2020 . . . unlike on most NASCAR ovals 1 mile or less in length, on which teams generally do not run inner liners in their tires, teams are required to run liners in their right-side tires only at Bristol . . . air pressure in those inner liners should be 12-25 psi greater than that of the outer tire.
STATS TO KNOW
— Brothers Kyle and Kurt Busch have a firm grip on the top reaches of Bristol Motor Speedway’s win list among active drivers. Younger brother Kyle leads the way with eight Bristol wins, just ahead of Kurt’s six. Matt Kenseth, who recently rejoined the Cup Series full-time, is next on the list with four career wins at the Tennessee track. Darrell Waltrip’s 12 Bristol wins head the overall record book.
— Bristol Motor Speedway is known for full-contact racing, and the amount of caution periods typically backs that notion. The last 15 Cup Series races have each had at least eight yellow flags. Bristol races have hit 20 cautions on three occasions (1989, 1997, 2003). Only once in the track’s history has a Bristol race gone green from wire to wire: “Chargin’ ” Charlie Glotzbach was the winner of that caution-free event in July 1971, leading 411 of 500 laps to best runner-up Bobby Allison by a three-lap margin of victory in the Volunteer 500.
— Kevin Harvick kept his grip on the Cup Series points lead after a 10th-place result Thursday night at Charlotte Motor Speedway, but he also kept his streak of top-10 finishes to start the season intact. The Stewart-Haas Racing veteran is the only driver to claim top 10s in every race this year; his overall streak dating back to 2019 stretches to 13 straight top 10s. Harvick has also accumulated the most points of any driver in NASCAR’s four-race return since the pandemic outbreak. He has also led the most laps (391) this season.
— Martin Truex Jr. has won three of the Cup Series’ last four races on short tracks, including a season sweep last year at Richmond Raceway and a postseason triumph at Martinsville Speedway. The lone defeat in that stretch: A 13th-place outcome in Bristol’s night race last August, when he pitted with a flat right-front tire in the final stage. Overall, Joe Gibbs Racing has won the Cup Series’ last five short-track events — the three wins from Truex, plus one each from Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin.
— Hendrick Motorsports’ surge in speed this season has pushed the organization to the top of several statistical categories. Hendrick Motorsports has led the most laps of any team this season, pacing 692 laps in the eight races so far. It’s a significant edge over Team Penske (512) and Stewart-Haas Racing (478) in the early going. Hendrick drivers have also won eight of the 17 stages in 2020. HMS driver Alex Bowman leads the series with four stage wins, having amassed three of those during the most recent two events at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
Source: NASCAR statistics, Racing Insights
LIVE COVERAGE
Tune in to television coverage from Bristol Motor Speedway on FS1 (Sunday, 3:30 p.m. ET) and the FOX Sports App. For full radio coverage, listen in to PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio on-air.
For a more interactive experience, head over to NASCAR.com or the NASCAR app to check out an enhanced Race Center, live Lap-by-Lap coverage, the customizable live leaderboard with Scanner (which is FREE for both races), and the return of Drive (featuring in-car cameras).
Kyle Busch drove away from a five-car crash on Lap 2, taking a dinged No. 18 Toyota to victory in the Food City 500. He held off his brother, Kurt, to register his eighth Bristol Motor Speedway triumph and his 54th in the Cup Series.
The starting lineup for Sunday’s Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500 NASCAR Cup Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway (3:30 p.m. ET, FS1, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) is set.
Brad Keselowski will start on the pole in the Team Penske No. 2 Ford and be joined on the front row by Stewart-Haas Racing’s Aric Almirola to lead the field to green for the 500-lap, 266.5-mile race.
See where your favorite driver will pit in Sunday’s Food City presents the Supermarket Heroes 500 (3:30 p.m. ET on FS1, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Chase Elliott often has been his own worst critic when absorbing defeat, no matter how directly involved he was in the outcome. Sunday’s loss in the waning moments of the Coca-Cola 600 was none of his own doing — a late caution flag, a decisive pit call and a deficit too much to overcome in a two-lap overtime dash.
Any internalizing by either himself or No. 9 team crew chief Alan Gustafson got some measure of erasure in Thursday night’s Cup Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway, as Elliott capped a roundabout week and a half with a 2020 breakthrough win. It helped to ease not just his heart-wrenching runner-up finish as he pursued a signature win in Sunday’s 600, but also his crash from contention after a midweek run-in with Kyle Busch at Darlington Raceway.
So Thursday, after Elliott took command for the final 28 laps to the finish, a familiar feeling crept in — dread. Anything going awry by then would’ve probably been met by a familiar response — his overly memed one-finger salute, borrowed from Darlington.
“Honestly, it really just keeps you grounded, to be completely frank, especially after Sunday,” Elliott said after a rainy last two days at the 1.5-mile track. “You’re just kind of waiting on something to happen. It just kind of keeps you grounded, and the fact that it’s never over until it’s over, we’ve been reminded of that quite a lot, and that’s a lesson I’m never going to forget.”
Gustafson didn’t wilt either, even with Sunday’s hard lessons to soak in from his perch atop the No. 9 pit box. His call to stop for tires at the end of the sport’s longest race left his driver with an insurmountable gap to close, after many other front-runners opted to hold their positions on older tires for the final restart.
Gustafson said he took the loss hard, but that the post-race conversations with Elliott in the days that followed were encouraging, providing the reassurance that both driver and crew chief were “in lockstep” with their strategy.
“You know, I don’t base my self‑worth on other people’s opinions or if I’m doing a good job based on what other people say, but certainly I’m a human being, too, and when you get that many rocks thrown at you, it doesn’t feel great,” Gustafson said. “But yeah, it was a long couple days, but at the end of the day, you’ve just got to look past it and move on.”
The chance to get over the heartache came sooner than usual with a Thursday event, washed out from its originally scheduled Wednesday date by rain, but part of NASCAR’s efforts to pack in make-up races after the coronavirus shutdown. A measured return of Elliott’s stride came Tuesday with his first Gander Trucks victory in three years, a triumph that bested Busch to clinch a six-figure donation for charity.
Thursday, Gustafson added his part to the cause, making the right adjustments on the final pit stop to make Elliott’s car take off at full sail. Elliott passed a fading Kevin Harvick to take the lead for the only time all night.
Elliott then kept the dread at bay for 28 more laps, and Gustafson avoided any more cast stones or second-guesses.
“I think you have to be a little bit hard‑headed to do this job, and you have to find a way to improve, and just you have to kind of shake it off,” Gustafson said. “Professional sports are super fickle, and one day you’re good and one day you’re terrible, and you just get used to that.”
Matt DiBenedetto finished 15th in the Alsco Uniforms 500 at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Thursday.
DiBenedetto’s result added 30 points to his season total.
DiBenedetto started in fourth position and led 10 laps in the race, holding the lead a total of two times. The sixth-year driver has accumulated four top-five and 13 top-10 finishes in his career.
Thursday was DiBenedetto’s ninth career start at Charlotte Motor Speedway. Though he’s completed six of those races, he has never finished inside the top 10 at the track.
The Grass Valley, California native’s starting and finishing positions compared favorably to his career averages, starting 22 spots higher than his career mark of 26.4 and completing the race nine places ahead of his 24.5 career average finish.
DiBenedetto competed with a field of 40 drivers on the way to his 15th-place finish. The race endured seven cautions and 37 caution laps. There were 14 lead changes.
Chase Elliott earned the win in the race, and Denny Hamlin finished second. Ryan Blaney placed third, Ricky Stenhouse Jr secured fourth, and Kurt Busch finished off the top five.
After Joey Logano won the first stage, Alex Bowman drove the No. 88 car to victory in Stage 2.
