After 500 laps at Bristol Motor Speedway, the NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs field is four drivers lighter.
An intriguing Saturday evening of high stakes and high tire wear produced a compelling Bass Pro Shops Night Race, the elimination event in the postseason’s Round of 16. The dozen who move on will grid back up for the playoffs’ next phase, which begins a week from Sunday at New Hampshire Motor Speedway (2 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App).
WINNER
Christopher Bell, No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Bell got the best of Zane Smith and Carson Hocevar on the final restart, then fended off Brad Keselowski to lead the last four laps of his fourth win of the Cup Series season. Bell was already in a reasonably safe zone for making the Round of 12 on points, but his Bristol victory gave him an automatic spot, making the math a moot point. The triumph also made it a clean sweep of the opening round for Joe Gibbs Racing, which has won the postseason’s first three races.
Ryan Blaney, No. 12 Team Penske Ford. No driver earned more points than Blaney on Saturday night, thanks to his second straight fourth-place result and first- and second-place finishes at the stages. The former Cup Series champ led three times for 30 laps in his 52-point night, and his No. 12 team was able to sidestep many of the tire issues that short-circuited his fellow competitors. Overall, Blaney has been piping hot in recent weeks, and Saturday’s outcome at Bristol marked his eighth top-10 finish in the last nine races.
Chase Briscoe, No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota. Briscoe managed quite the rally from an uncharacteristically poor qualifying effort, a season-worst 31st for the driver who leads the series with six pole positions. He ended up leading 127 laps — second only to JGR teammate Ty Gibbs’ 201 — and kept his postseason momentum rolling, even after an ill-timed final caution flag trapped him on pit road and cost him a better finish. Briscoe had already advanced to the Round of 12 on the strength of his convincing Southern 500 victory, but he now has three straight top-10 results as the playoffs enter its next chapter.
WHO’S NOT?
Shane van Gisbergen, No. 88 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet. SVG’s oval-track growing pains had an untimely achy night at Bristol, where the affable rookie dipped out of the playoff picture with a 26th-place finish, three laps off the pace. Van Gisbergen was just minus-15 below the elimination line entering the 500-lapper, but lost more ground as the night went on, with a pair of midrace spins just 31 laps apart slowing his progress. A prime opportunity to regroup comes in the next round, where SVG could play the role of playoff spoiler in the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval event Oct. 5.
Josh Berry, No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford. The worst-case scenario spelled an early end to Berry’s brief playoff run, with three Round of 16 races resulting in last-place finishes. Saturday night’s early ouster was a fire that erupted from the No. 21 Ford’s right-front, filling the car’s cockpit with smoke and ending his race after just 75 laps. “We’ll try and win some races here coming up in this stretch,” Berry said, looking at the seven races left on the 2025 calendar. Among those is Las Vegas Motor Speedway (Oct. 12), where he is the Cup Series’ most recent winner.
BUBBLE WATCH
RANK
DRIVER
+/-
4
Christopher Bell
+20
5
Ryan Blaney
+19
6
Chase Briscoe
+10
7
Chase Elliott
+5
8
Bubba Wallace
+1
CUTLINE
9
Austin Cindric
-1
10
Joey Logano
-2
11
Ross Chastain
-2
12
Tyler Reddick
-3
QUOTABLE
“Crazy race. I didn’t have that one on the bingo card going into tonight. I don’t know if anyone did — truthfully. I don’t know. It was wild. I don’t know – I’m still processing what we just did.” — Chase Briscoe, No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, after tire management emerged early as a crucial strategy element.
NEXT RACE
The Cup Series Playoffs re-racks next weekend with the circuit’s lone stop this year at New Hampshire, which returns to the postseason rotation for the first time since 2017. Toyota drivers have won the last three races at the 1.058-mile Loudon oval, including two by the series’ most recent winner — Bell. He’ll be among the 12 remaining title-eligible aces aiming to get the next round of the playoffs off to a substantial start, carrying his Bristol sword into the fray.
BRISTOL, Tenn. — “If anybody said that they knew what was gonna happen tonight, we were all lying to you. We all got it wrong.”
After sweating out a curveball of a Bristol Night Race, Alex Bowman nearly got it right with a walk-off to advance in the Cup Series Playoffs.
However, when the checkered flag waved after 500 rip-roaring laps, Austin Cindric was the last driver to advance to the postseason’s Round of 12 while Bowman was the first driver eliminated, 10 points shy.
The driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet was in one of the best positions to win the race in the latter half, maintaining track position despite a Stage 1 spin. However, a late caution for Bubba Wallace’s Turn 2 incident bunched the field for one more restart with four laps to go. Restarts were the Achilles’ Heel for Bowman all race long and ultimately cost him a berth to the second round as he dropped from third to eighth at the finish.
“I thought our car, when we had some green-flag running, was really good,” Bowman said. “It just cycled really poorly for restarts. I would drive off into Turn 1 and just hope to make the corner. For whatever reason, it just wouldn’t take off. Then after five laps or so, go again. I couldn’t figure it out if it was something that I was doing, not cleaning the tires off enough, but I felt like I was cleaning the tires off too much at some point. I don’t really know what we lacked there.”
Bowman flirted with the cutline on points late as attrition became rampant among playoff drivers.
Most notably, his Hendrick teammate Chase Elliott crashed in the final stage after contact with John Hunter Nemechek. But Elliott was spared a shock upset after fellow playoff contender Austin Cindric suffered a fire in the right-front of the No. 2 Team Penske Ford that forced Cindric to pit road.
As the fire continued and Cindric’s cockpit began filling with smoke, the No. 2 pit crew managed to put on a scuff right-front tire amid the blaze and kept Cindric in the race. It ultimately paid off in Cindric’s favor as he advanced — willing his way to the finish line four laps down in 30th.
“I was gonna wait till I saw a color other than smokey gray,” Cindric said about staying in his hot rod. “I don’t think the stress was there. I think everyone was pretty well prepared with the transfer of information once I got back out on track and with a scuff right-front tire, old-as-hell left-side tires and an old right-rear tire. I got a handle on the car and got all the fire-extinguisher stuff burned off the tires and dripping everywhere, and was able to finish the race. Hectic, and I’m sure it was crazy for a little while on paper.”
Saturday night was a summarization of a difficult 2025 for Bowman, who remains winless since his Chicago Street Course triumph in 2024, and to put the icing on the cake, he struggled to hear his crew chief and spotter all night amid the discombobulation on track.
“My radio didn’t work all night, so I didn’t have a clue what was going on,” Bowman added. “I didn’t know who we were racing on green-flag cycles. I couldn’t hear hardly anything. That was frustrating, but honestly, it didn’t really matter.”
Cindric joins his teammates Ryan Blaney and Joey Logano in the Round of 12, while Bowman was the only Hendrick driver eliminated in the opening playoff round.
Also eliminated after Bristol were Austin Dillon (minus-14), four-time 2025 race winner Shane van Gisbergen (minus-16) and Josh Berry (minus-56).
“Everyone kept their cool,” Cindric said. “Credit to all the guys from the top down, transferring information, being prepared, not getting any penalties for going over the wall. I mean everything that went on there and still being able to come out and only lose a handful of laps and be in the position we needed to. Whenever we do great things, we do it as a team.”
“A top 10 with stage points and a solid day — the guys on pit road did a really good job,” said Bowman, who swapped pit crews with the No. 77 Spire Motorsports team for Bristol. “I’m sure the guys on the 77 did a good job, too. Those guys are like family, so it’s been a rough week. Just got to keep digging, right? There’s a lot of points we can still score. We can still finish way better than wherever we’re at in points right now.”
In a topsy-turvy Saturday night showdown, four drivers were cut from championship eligibility in the first elimination of the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs.
Christopher Bell survived a 500-lap gauntlet with significant tire wear — and a last-lap bump from Brad Keselowski — to win Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway. Bell was among the dozen drivers advancing to the Playoffs’ Round of 12, the next three-race portion of the 10-race postseason.
The clock ran out on the title hopes of Alex Bowman, Austin Dillon, Shane van Gisbergen and Josh Berry. All four entered the Round of 16 below the provisional elimination line.
Berry was the first to be cut, stopping after 75 laps when flames from the right-front filled the cockpit of the No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford. He ended the three Round of 16 races with three last-place finishes. Van Gisbergen spun twice, and he, Bowman and Dillon were unable to offset their points deficit on Bristol’s high banks, while Austin Cindric held on for the final Round of 12 berth.
Joe Gibbs Racing teammates Chase Briscoe and Denny Hamlin had already advanced with victories earlier in the round; Briscoe won the playoff opener at Darlington Raceway and Hamlin prevailed at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway.
Three more drivers locked up their spots in the next round with mid-race clinchers at Bristol. Kyle Larson and Bubba Wallace — the top points-earners without wins after two Round of 16 races — advanced at the end of Stage 1. Ryan Blaney sealed a Round of 12 berth after the second stage.
Below is the list of drivers for the Round of 12, with order based on the reset points.
NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs Round of 12 field:
— 1. Denny Hamlin, No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, 3,034 points — 2. William Byron, No. 24 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, 3,032 points
— 3. Kyle Larson, No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, 3,032 points
— 4. Christopher Bell, No. 20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, 3,028 points
— 5. Ryan Blaney, No. 12 Team Penske Ford, 3,027 points
— 6. Chase Briscoe, No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, 3,018 points
— 7. Chase Elliott, No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet, 3,013 points
— 8. Bubba Wallace, No. 23 23XI Racing Toyota, 3,009 points — 9. Austin Cindric, No. 2 Team Penske Ford, 3,008 points
— 10. Joey Logano, No. 22 Team Penske Ford, 3,007 points — 11. Ross Chastain, No. 1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet, 3,007 points
— 12. Tyler Reddick, No. 45 23XI Racing Toyota, 3,006 points
BRISTOL, Tenn. — With a charge to the lead from fifth place with four laps left in Saturday’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway, Christopher Bell kept Joe Gibbs Racing and Toyota perfect in the 2025 NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs.
Bell survived a hard, square shot to his rear bumper from Brad Keselowski in the final corner and steered straight to the finish line, 0.343 seconds ahead of the Roush Fenway Keselowski Racing co-owner and driver.
Joining JGR teammates Chase Briscoe and Denny Hamlin as winners in the Round of 16, Bell advanced to the Round of 12, which begins Sept. 21 at one of his best tracks, New Hampshire Motor Speedway (2 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App).
The race marked the end of the playoffs for the four drivers who came to “Thunder Valley” below the elimination line — Alex Bowman, Austin Dillon, Shane van Gisbergen and Josh Berry.
Of the four, only Bowman made a significant charge, finishing 10 points below Austin Cindric, the final Round of 12 qualifier.
Six days after complaining bitterly about strategy in a seventh-place finish at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway, Bell was back on top, scoring his fourth victory of the season, his first at Bristol and the 13th of his career.
On fresh right-side tires after a pit stop on Lap 491, the driver of No. 20 Camry took the lead from fifth on Lap 497 of 500 and kept Keselowski, on four new tires, at bay for the duration, even though Keselowski got to Bell’s rear bumper on the final circuit.
With new, softer right-side tires supplied by Goodyear for the race, the extent of tire wear was a shock to the drivers and crew chiefs.
“Well, I’ll tell you what, I was nervous on the two (tires),” Bell said. “I didn’t know if I wanted to be on the bottom or the top, and whenever Brad picked the top (lane) didn’t really give me an option. I had to pick the bottom.
“All night long, I don’t know, old tires just really, really pushed up in the middle of the corners, so I was hoping that those guys (starting ahead of him) on old tires would push up, and they did. They did, and I was able to get by or get underneath them.
“It wasn’t pretty there at the end, but we got her done.”
Keselowski rued his pick of the top lane for the final restart.
“Just the story of our season, just a 50/50 shot on the restart and I got the lane that couldn’t launch,” Keselowski said. “Just frustrating. We had a great car, great strategy, put ourselves in position to, if not win, at least have a really, really solid day, and on that last restart, (we) just rolled the dice and didn’t get anything good.”
Bell’s teammate, Ty Gibbs, led a race-high 201 laps, but overshot pit road on the last green-flag stop and finished 10th. Briscoe was out front for 127 laps and finished ninth after a late green-flag stop for fresh tires.
Non-playoff driver Zane Smith ran third, followed by Team Penske title contenders Ryan Blaney and Joey Logano. Part-timer Corey Heim scored a career-best sixth, followed by non-playoff driver Carson Hocevar and Bowman.
For practical purposes, most of the Round of 16 eliminations were settled early. On Lap 75, Josh Berry brought his No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing Ford to pit road with smoke from the right-front wheel well filling the cockpit.
Berry climbed from the car, finishing last for the third straight event, out of the race and out of the playoffs.
“It’s hard to put into words, but I’d be way more disappointed if we just ran like crap for three weeks,” said Berry, who had qualified 10th and moved forward from his starting spot. “We’ve been up front. We’ve qualified well. We had the issue at Darlington, bottoming out. Last week, we got clipped by the 9 (Chase Elliott), and then tonight the car catches on fire…
“Honestly, I think the way that was playing out, we would have 100 percent had a chance to win tonight.”
By the time Berry exited, Austin Dillon, who entered the race 11 points below the cutline, already had experienced severe cording of his right-side tires. Dillon pitted on Lap 28 and compounded his issues with a pit-road speeding penalty.
Dillon was 30th at the end of Stage 1, the last driver one lap down, with little hope of remaining in the playoffs. By the end of Stage 2, he was two laps down in 33rd. Dillon finished 28th, missing the Round of 12 by 14 points.
Shane van Gisbergen, 15 points down at the start of the race, steadily lost ground throughout the first two stages. The final blow for the New Zealander was a spin in Turn 4 after a bump from William Byron.
Another spin and a 26th-place finish left the Sunoco rookie 16 points behind Cindric in his first trip to the postseason.
Of the drivers who started below the cutline, only Bowman mounted a concerted threat. Recovering from a spin on Lap 100, the driver of the No. 48 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet surged forward on new tires and finished third behind Gibbs and Ryan Blaney in Stage 2.
Bowman had come to Bristol 35 points down, but with the eight points he collected in the second stage, he moved to 11 points behind Ross Chastain for the final transfer spot into the Round of 12 for the start of the final stage.
Chastain recovered a lost lap and finished 19th, preserving his berth in the Round of 12, but Cindric had a close call when his right-front wheel well started spewing flames on Lap 457. Cindric lost five laps on pit road, as Bowman closed with a point of the transfer spot, but the gap widened in the closing laps.
Chase Elliott crashed on Lap 311 after contact with John Hunter Nemechek’s Toyota and finished 38th, but the Hendrick driver had enough of a cushion to move on to the Round of 12.
Other drivers advancing to the next playoff round on points were Blaney, William Byron, Kyle Larson, Bubba Wallace, Tyler Reddick and Logano.
NOTE: Post-race inspection in the Cup Series garage concluded without issue, confirming Bell as the winner. No cars will return to the NASCAR R&D Center in Concord, North Carolina.
BRISTOL, Tenn. — Goodyear tires mattered in a big way Saturday night at Bristol Motor Speedway.
A new, softer right-side tire was brought to “Last Great Colosseum” in hopes the rubber would wear quicker, putting the outcome of the race in the drivers’ and teams’ hands as they had to make their allotted sets of tires last.
The Bass Pro Shops Night Race featured 36 lead changes — third-most all-time at Bristol — in addition to 14 caution periods — the most since 2020.
“The tire worked,” runner-up Brad Keselowski said.
But how did we get here?
Certainly, a softer compound makes the goal of more tire wear more attainable. But in Friday’s practice, most drivers were able to make runs upward of 60 consecutive laps with temperatures hovering near 80 degrees. On Saturday night, with ambient temps in the high 60s when the green flag waved, the cooler track surface became the perfect breeding ground for tire degradation — just like the March 2024 Bristol race that first brought high tire wear into focus.
“The temperature dropped to the threshold and we got a tire-wear race,” Keselowski said. “It’s so freaking … I don’t know. There’s some scientists somewhere that could have, a big study on this one – how, like, a five-degree swing of track temp changes it so dramatically.
“But I thought it was actually a really good race because of the tire wear. The bottom was dominant. A lot of bump-and-run passes. It felt like Bristol from 1995 in that regard.”
Goodyear officials concurred with Keselowski’s observation.
“The temperatures have gotten really cool right now,” Justin Fantozzi, Goodyear’s Global Race Tire Operations Manager, said. “As that temperature has dropped, it’s returned about what we saw in the spring 18 months ago. So the tire is behaving exactly like it should.”
Keselowski settled for second behind Christopher Bell after a shot to his rear bumper entering Turn 3 wasn’t enough to move Bell. Bell said Saturday’s race felt like a carbon copy of the March 2024 event, an event in which he finished 10th.
“Honestly, I thought it was identical. It was the exact same,” Bell said. “I know that the tire that we ran today I think was softer or was supposed to induce more wear than what the tire was that day in 2024. But it felt the exact same, and I thought it raced the exact same.”
His crew chief, Adam Stevens, was certain Saturday’s race would have played out more like the last two Bristol races, in which track position reigned supreme and tire wear didn’t come into play.
“I would have bet my house that it was going to be a normal Bristol race,” Stevens said. “It was about Lap 25, 26 when they were going full tilt — 15.90 (seconds), 16-flat on that first run that guys really started slipping and sliding and coming in way early with no rubber left on their tires.
“I think Bell mentioned it about Lap 27. But he had gone so hard so early that we weren’t able to stretch it as long as other guys, and that’s what got us a lap down early.”
The ability to react in an instant to the pop-up tire issues was a critical factor in who was successful when it mattered most in Saturday’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs event, the elimination race of the Round of 16.
Ryan Blaney finished fourth in the No. 12 Ford after winning Stage 1 and placing second in Stage 2. Atop the pit box, crew chief Jonathan Hassler was responsible for delivering Blaney the proper information on how to manage his tires throughout the course of the event.
“He always has a feel for the balance of the car,” Hassler told NASCAR.com. “But when you’re punishing one tire, the good drivers definitely know what tire they’re hurting and to what extent. And we definitely let him know how long the tires are lasting each run, and he can kind of adapt and choose how hard to push them over time.”
Hendrick Motorsports’ Chase Elliott crashed out at Lap 310, prompting the 10th caution of the evening. But before that, Elliott found himself on opposite ends of the running order — at times contending at the front of the field, at others navigating heavy traffic from the rear. Those situations required different approaches behind the wheel due to the increased tire wear.
“I don’t know that it forced you to change your style as much as just where you were running and how much pace you were pushing,” Elliott said. “We were in such a terrible position getting trapped a lap down there early. We were probably a little late to realize that we needed to stop.
“But on the same token, if it goes green, it probably works out OK for us. So yeah, I got trapped a lap down, and being in the back of the pack versus being up front, certainly there was a big difference in how I was driving the car, and we were working on making our balance suit being out front, and it was slowly getting better.”
The 2020 Cup Series champion welcomed the change in tire, but he also cautioned that what we saw shouldn’t always be the expectation if this same tire package is brought back to Bristol moving forward.
“My quick thought of the situation,” Elliott said, “is if you give these teams an opportunity to set the cars up knowing that the tire wear was going to be this high, I think you would probably see an entirely different race. So let’s not blame the tire yet.”
The increase in wear was so severe from Friday’s practice that Goodyear ultimately allotted teams one additional set of tires midway through the event.
Ryan Bergenty, crew chief of third-place finisher Zane Smith, told NASCAR.com that the addition was “darn near 100% necessary.” Hassler wasn’t as close to that 100% mark but understood the case for it.
“I think we could have made it work without that set,” Hassler said. “It probably would have gotten ugly for a handful of guys, so it certainly alleviated a little bit of the pain, and NASCAR did a decent job controlling the situation. We definitely got extra pace laps here and there to kind of click off some laps.”
If anything is certain after Saturday’s race, it’s that extreme tire wear contributed to a compelling race that tested man and machine. The question is whether the weather will cooperate every time NASCAR heads to Bristol like it did on Saturday night.
The NASCAR Cup Series, Xfinity Series and Craftsman Truck Series head to Tennessee this weekend for some tripleheader playoff action at Bristol Motor Speedway. The Cup Series Playoffs Round of 16 concludes on Saturday night, while the Xfinity Series begins its 12-driver postseason and the Truck Series rolls on with its Round of 10. Bookmark this page and come back often for your race-week essentials — from links to qualifying order, average practice speeds, results and more.
Race day: Saturday at 7:30 p.m. ET on USA Network. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information becomes available.
Tires: Eleven sets for the weekend (nine new race sets, one set transferred from qualifying and one for practice). Teams are also allowed four wet-weather sets.
Race day: Friday at 7:30 p.m. ET on The CW. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information becomes available.
Tires: Five sets for the weekend (three new race sets, one set transferred from qualifying and one for practice). Teams are also allowed three wet-weather sets.
Race day: Thursday at 8 p.m. ET on FS1. The categories listed below will be filled out with links as the information becomes available.
Tires: Four sets for the weekend (two new race sets, one set transferred from qualifying and one for practice). Teams are also allowed three wet-weather sets.
BRISTOL, Tenn. — Josh Berry’s NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs ended in flames at Bristol Motor Speedway on Saturday night.
The No. 21 Ford started showing flames on the right front on Lap 74 and brought his car to pit road two laps later. Smoke billowed into the cockpit, forcing Berry from the car with help from his crewmen as safety personnel worked to extinguish the fire.
Berry entered the Bass Pro Shops Night Race 45 points below the cutline, likely needing to win to advance to the Round of 12. He will end the Round of 16 with three consecutive last-place finishes.
Teams encountered high tire wear with the addition of a new right-side tire, adding to the nuance of Saturday’s cutoff race. The No. 21 Wood Brothers Racing team believes the excess rubber that came off those tires contributed to the mechanical failure Berry experienced Saturday night.
“The best that I can tell is it was the rubber buildup on the header (that caused the fire), and then that just spread to the rocker (panel),” crew chief Miles Stanley told NASCAR.com. “And once the rocker catches, you’re kind of hosed. I didn’t really see how quickly it progressed; it seemed to progress really quickly. And then, like I said, once the rocker was on fire, there really wasn’t a whole lot we could do.”
Berry said the issue began in earnest about seven laps before he brought the car to the team’s attention.
“We started getting some smoke in the cockpit,” Berry said, “and then the longer I went, the darker the smoke got. And obviously by the time we got on pit road, it was completely black smoke. So yeah, obviously something caught on fire.”
The flames never breached the cockpit, Berry explained, but the plumes of smoke became too much to endure.
“A few things happened there,” Stanley said. “Once we got in the box, we tried to get the road crew out to get the fire out on the right side, and then the right-side window got taken out. And when that got taken out, a bunch of oxygen came in, and then all the foam went up (in flames).”
The high tire wear is exactly what Berry believed could have played into his hands. A win in Saturday’s race would have propelled the sophomore driver into the Round of 12 after a dismal start to his first postseason appearance. Instead, he was sidelined before the conclusion of Stage 1.
“Just disappointing, again,” Berry said. “Our car was really good. That was going to fall right into our wheelhouse, I feel like, to have a really good night. We were able to make it pretty long on that first set (of tires) and we were going to be set up in a really good spot, I think.
“This one’s going to be hard to watch because it looks like it’s gonna be a lot of fun.”
Even though the tire wear would have played into his favor, Berry admitted that “it definitely caught me off guard.”
“I was fully convinced it was going to be hammer down,” Berry said. “But I could tell probably 15 or 20 laps into the race, we were running like 16.10s (lap times). And you could see some people start coming back to us, and you can tell, right? I mean, the pace yesterday in practice was 15.70s, 15.80s, hammer down the whole time.
“And when we’re in the 16s that quick, I was like, you can tell that’s going on. You can see the marbles start developing, and yeah, man, it’s crazy.”
Saturday night marked three consecutive weeks of last-place finishes for Berry after early-race mishaps. The playoffs began at Darlington Raceway, where after qualifying third, Berry’s car bottomed out through Turn 2 on the opening lap and spun out, sending him into the garage for repairs. Last week at World Wide Technology Raceway, the No. 21 car went spinning at Lap 36 after errant contact by Chase Elliott. How does Berry move forward after three weeks of worst-case scenarios competitively?
“Better than three last-place finishes,” Berry smiled. “Len (Wood, team co-owner and chief operating officer) was saying before the race he never thought they had two in a row and now we’ve got three in a row.”
If there’s solace to be found, it’s that all three incidents were largely out of Berry’s control. The outcomes have been miserable in recent weeks, but Stanley remains optimistic heading into the final seven races of the season, which includes a stop at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, where he, Berry and Co. won in March.
“We just keep building fast cars and bring fast cars to the race track, and that’s all we can do,” Stanley said. “We’ll try and win some races here coming up in this stretch.”
NASCAR returns to Bristol Motor Speedway on Saturday for one of my favorite races of the year: the Bass Pro Shops Night Race (7:30 p.m. ET, USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App).
The dominant story line for teams, drivers and even bettors will be whether there will be significant tire wear in tonight’s race.
Goodyear is bringing a softer right-side tire for this event in an attempt to accelerate tire wear and put more emphasis on drivers to “save their stuff” and increase passing.
Unfortunately, from what we learned at Bristol in the spring, it’s tough to predict just how significantly tires will wear until the race itself.
With that said, drivers and teams did not see much falloff during Friday’s practice sessions, so the expectation is that tire wear won’t be much of an issue tonight.
Now that we have data to examine, I’m betting on two outright winners for Bristol, as well as a live +2700 long-shot pick to score a surprising top-1o finish.
NASCAR Odds, 3 Best Bet Picks for Bristol
*Odds as of Saturday morning
NASCAR odds from BetMGM show Kyle Larson as the race favorite at bet365 with +300 odds, followed by Ryan Blaney (+350), Denny Hamlin (+450), Christopher Bell (+100) and William Byron (+1300).
My first bet comes from this group of favorites.
When the Cup Series visits Bristol, my mind immediately goes to Hamlin.
Hamlin, who qualified a very solid sixth for today’s race, has finishes of ninth, first, first, fourth and second at Bristol since NASCAR introduced the Next Gen car.
Pretty good.
Throw in the fact that the No. 11 Toyota was one of the fastest long-run cars in practice and we have a driver capable of dominating tonight’s race at a palatable +550 price tag.
We move immediately to Hamlin’s Joe Gibbs Racing teammate, Ty Gibbs, for my second Bristol bet for many of the same reasons.
Gibbs qualified very well — fourth — at a circuit where track position is imperative, was lightning quick in practice and has an impressive history in Thunder Valley.
No, Gibbs has not won here — he still is searching for his first Cup Series win — but finishes of fifth, ninth, 15th and third show he can certainly be in the mix if the car is right.
Riley Herbst was just 29th fastest in qualifying, putting him at disadvantage to start tonight’s race.
However, the 23XI Racing driver showed very impressive race pace in practice, ranking fifth in 20-lap average and second in 25-lap average.
The biggest threat to Herbst is going a lap down early while stuck at the back of the field, but if he can leverage his car’s long-run speed to maneuver forward and not get trapped a lap down at the stage breaks, this bet has serious upside at +2700 odds.
NASCAR Pick: Riley Herbst (+2700) for a top-10 Finish — FanDuel
BRISTOL, Tenn. — For the first time in 41 days, Connor Zilisch ran a NASCAR Xfinity Series race and didn’t win.
While Aric Almirola sailed to Victory Lane in Friday night’s Food City 300 at Bristol Motor Speedway, Zilisch was forced to settle for fifth place in the opening race of the Xfinity Series Playoffs, snapping his four-race winning streak. Zilisch had won seven of the eight races prior to Friday’s event at Bristol.
After leading a race-best 98 laps, Zilisch led a handful of competitors to pit road with just 35 laps remaining after a caution flag waved for Carson Ware’s spin at Lap 263. Eight cars stayed on track to capitalize on track position with older tires, but Zilisch couldn’t overcome the traffic and ultimately worked his way back to fifth by the time the checkered flag waved.
“It’s part of it,” Zilisch said. “We had a winning car today, and we were in the right position. But those late-race calls to pit or not when you’re the leader are just really tough. … Those decisions are tough. And we do our best to make the right calls, but you know, it’s not easy to always make the right calls. We’ll learn from it and move on to Kansas.”
Zilisch may not have celebrated a win this time, but his 52 points earned tied Almirola’s total for the most points accumulated Friday night, in part thanks to a Stage 2 victory and a runner-up effort in Stage 1.
“I feel like we got a lot of points today and built our buffer to the cutline, got a stage win, so overall, good day,” Zilisch said.
The No. 88 JR Motorsports Chevrolet had been on an incredible run, seemingly unstoppable at times over the last eight races. Zilisch’s four-race winning streak was improbable in itself. It began at Watkins Glen International on Aug. 9, when he slipped from his car’s window in a scary Victory Lane fall that resulted in a broken collarbone. Without missing a race, he returned for the Xfinity Series’ next event at Daytona International Speedway on Aug. 22 and started the event before Parker Kligerman subbed in and subsequently won — a victory credited in the scorebook to Zilisch himself.
He followed those two triumphs with respective wins at Portland International Raceway and World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway, two completely unique tracks at which he had never raced.
The 19-year-old seemed poised to do it all over again Friday at Bristol, but fate had something else in mind at the 0.533-mile bullring.
“When you’re upset with fifth place, you’re doing something right,” Zilisch said. “We’ll keep building on it and get better in Kansas. But I know that we are heading in the right direction as a team and things are looking upward. And we’re leading lots of laps and putting ourselves in position.”
Track: Bristol Motor Speedway Location: Bristol, Tenn. Track length: 0.533 miles When: Saturday, 7:30 p.m. ET Where to tune in: USA Network, HBO Max, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio, NBC Sports App Race purse: $10,447,135 Race distance: 500 laps | 266.5 miles Stages: 125 | 250 | 500 Defending winner:Kyle Larson, September 2024 Starting lineup: AJ Allmendinger earns first pole since 2015
“Last Great Colosseum” presents some Round of 16 drivers’ last great opportunity
BRISTOL, Tenn. — The Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol is an event unlike any other.
It is the “Last Great Colosseum” where gladiators stand tall after taming the beast. But after Saturday night’s Bass Pro Shops Night Race, at least four drivers will face the colosseum’s wrath as the NASCAR Cup Series’ Round of 16 comes to an end, eliminating four drivers from championship contention.
Heading into Saturday’s race, the four drivers in the greatest danger are Austin Dillon (11 points below the cutline), Shane van Gisbergen (minus-15), Alex Bowman (minus-35) and Josh Berry (minus-45). But clinging onto title hopes just ahead of them are Austin Cindric (plus-11), Ross Chastain (plus-19) and Joey Logano (plus-21).
It will take 500 laps to determine who moves on to the Round of 12 and who doesn’t. Chastain feels the intensity of this weekend — the nerves of the playoffs, the weight of chasing victory. But he is also letting himself enjoy the moment of competing in one of NASCAR’s most iconic events.
“For me, I equate it to driving through the tunnel at Daytona (or) driving down to Darlington,” Chastain said Friday. “But here, it’s pulling up and seeing the stadium and then also walking through the Turn 3 tunnel. Just never gets old. So cool looking up at the banks and then the steepness of the grandstands. Went up and watched truck practice (Thursday) in the grandstands and then was up in the Food City suite for the race. It’s just amazing just being here. Even if there’s no racing, it’s cool, and you don’t get that everywhere.”
A critical factor in how the race evolves will be a new right-side tire brought to the Tennessee track by Goodyear, a deviation after the last four Bristol races. The hope is that a softer rubber compound leads to more tire wear, ideally putting control of the tire degradation in the hands of the racers. A fast start with disregard for the tire could make drivers a vulnerable passing target later in the run. If a driver waits too long to push, though, he may not be able to track down those ahead of them.
No tire issues arose through Friday’s practice and qualifying sessions, but there remain unknowns about how the tire and track will evolve Saturday night.
“If anyone’s telling you they know what’s gonna happen, they’re making it up,” said Joey Logano.
Christopher Bell expressed his reservations heading into the event but admitted: “It should be very exciting for you guys (the media) and the fans, because we don’t know what to expect at all.”
“It is really unknown, and this is the most unknown race,” he added. “I feel like ‘unprepared’ might be the right word — like just not being able to prepare for something because we don’t know how it’s going to go. We’ve seen the hard tire have issues twice now, between practice last time (in March) and the race a couple years ago. So yeah, for a playoff race, this is probably the biggest question mark I felt in my career.”
In need of a strong defensive showing, Cindric qualified a personal-Bristol-best of third. On the opposite side of that elimination line, Dillon will roll off 23rd; SVG will start 28th; Bowman rolls off 15th and Berry takes the green flag in 10th.
At Bristol, nothing is guaranteed. AJ Allmendinger will lead the field to green, but a slew of hungry playoff drivers in his rearview mirror, like Ryan Blaney, Cindric and Kyle Larson, will be hot on his heels. It’s the allure of the “Last Great Colosseum.” It’s Bristol, baby.
What do crew chiefs have in focus to win Saturday’s race?
N0 team has dominated Bristol Motor Speedway like the No. 5 Hendrick Motorsports group and driver Kyle Larson. They enter the weekend 60 points above the provisional cutline, virtually but not officially locked into the Round of 12.
On less certain ground is the No. 1 Trackhouse bunch and driver Ross Chastain. They enter the Bristol Night Race on the plus side of the cutline — 19 points to the good — but Chastain has struggled to find consistent results at the self-proclaimed “World’s Fastest Half-Mile.”
That leads to two different levels of comfort entering the first elimination race of the 2025 playoffs. No. 5 crew chief Cliff Daniels knows talk of the new Goodyear tires will dominate the ongoing story lines around the on-track action. What he chooses to focus on, however, is what he and the No. 5 crew can impact themselves after leading 873 of the last 1,000 Bristol laps.
“What we can control is taking in the proper information at the right time,” Daniels told NASCAR.com. “Is there going to be a high level of (lap-time) fall-off or not? Do cautions impact what can happen with the strategy and the cycle? And like we saw in Gateway last week, sometimes it’s tough to know. You’re not sitting on a crystal ball to know when the next caution is going to come. So you try to make the best decision you can in the moment with the information that you have.
“We don’t want to be rigid in our thinking and even in what we’ve seen the last two races here. We just want to be very open to taking in the information to make the best decision that we can in the moment. And at the end of the day, we still have to execute on what that is.”
Chastain, Surgen and the No. 1 team qualified 13th for Saturday’s 500-lap affair, just outside of the top 10, which is awarded points at the end of Stage 1 and Stage 2. With a 19-point buffer to the cutline, Chastain and Co. are in decent shape to advance should they dodge trouble. But adding stage points to the day’s tally could go a long way toward securing a spot in the Round of 12.
“It depends on the risk in the moment,” Surgen told NASCAR.com. “I mean, we pass a couple cars and we’re right there. The way the tire acted today in practice, what I expect (Saturday) is we’re going to have a lot of guys willing to stay out on pretty high-lap-count tires, which bodes well for guys willing to take a little risk for stage points.
“Early in the race, if you get a lot of guys on the lead lap, maybe there’s less willingness to take that risk. Maybe at the end of Stage 2, when there’s only 15 cars on the lead lap, let’s say, then there’s a little higher willingness, just because the track position is not going to be as big.”
Ultimately, Saturday’s race may play into the hands of which teams adapt best through a grinding, vehicle-abusing night in the Tennessee mountains.
“Just planning for anything,” Surgen said. “Like I said, the tire is going to fall off (and) going to degrade pretty slowly, and we’re going to see guys willing to stay out. Just playing through scenarios when cautions come out or repeated cautions come out. When do you want to pit? When do you want to stay out? You can’t plan for every scenario, so you just have to have a playbook of what-ifs and that playbook can get pretty deep. Those are the type of things that I’ll review tonight and tomorrow.”
Get to the front by Lap 500. None of the last 17 races at Bristol have gone to NASCAR Overtime. Per Racing Insights, the last Bristol race to go past its scheduled distance was in April 2015.
He may not be the favorite to win, but watch out for …
BRAD KESELOWSKI. The 2012 Cup champion is searching for his first Bristol win since 2020 — and in the midst of a 51-race winless streak. But Keselowski has been stout at the “Last Great Colosseum” in recent years, finishing third in the 2024 spring race where high tire-wear played a factor and leading 109 laps in the 2022 night race. The No. 6 RFK Racing Ford has shown flashes of speed across the last month despite finishing outside the top 10 in four of the last five races. But perhaps the Bristol bullring could bring Brad back to the forefront.
Fantasy update
NASCAR Fantasy Live expert Dustin Albino provides insight for your Saturday lineup.
One of the key story lines entering the weekend was how the new right-side Goodyear tire would hold up. There were no issues throughout practice and qualifying, making it easier to assemble a lineup as track position will likely be crucial. The only changes in my lineup are adding Ryan Blaney, who was fastest over the long haul (best on 15-, 20-, 25-and 30-lap averages) in place of Chris Buescher who qualified 21st. I also dropped Chase Elliott from my lineup and inserted Bubba Wallace as my garage pick.
Lineup: Kyle Larson, Denny Hamlin, Christopher Bell, Ryan Blaney, Ty Gibbs.
Our biggest pieces of the week — get covered for race day from all angles.
•NASCAR at Bristol: Key info, qualifying reports and more from doubleheader weekend | Read more • Racing Insights: Can Bell complete JGR sweep of Round of 16? | Read more
• Bubble Watch: Does a surprise elimination loom at Bristol? | Read more
• ‘Buildup of frustration’ for Bell: No. 20 driver, crew chief Stevens debrief after Gateway outburst | Read more
• Bowman: ‘Mortifying how bad we’ve been’: No. 48 driver enters Bristol below cutline | Read more
• Playoff Pulse: Who’s hot, who’s not ahead of Bristol | Read more • Turning Point to Bristol: Larson leads Hendrick charge to “Thunder Valley” | Read more
• At-track photos: The best shots from night racing at the “Last Great Colosseum” | View gallery
• Paint Scheme Preview: Fresh designs set to shine in Bristol Night Race | View gallery
• Power Rankings: An updated look at where playoff drivers stack | This week’s ranks
