Posted on by Zack Albert

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Matt DiBenedetto‘s best day in NASCAR’s top series nearly ended with the ultimate buzzkill.

 

Driving back Sunday from Bristol Motor Speedway after salting away a career-best sixth-place finish and becoming the provisional leader for feel-good story of the season, the 24-year-old driver saw flashing blue lights not far from his home in Hickory, North Carolina.

 

“Ah, dang, that sucks after a good day,’ ” DiBenedetto recalled thinking as he pulled to the side of the road.

 

But DiBenedetto didn’t think he was over the posted speed limit, a notion that was confirmed when law enforcement approached him.

 

“The cop comes up to me and says, ‘Hey, I have one question for you: I just want to know why you were going so darn slow?'” DiBenedetto said. “So then I realized it was a prank.”

 

The best of pranks as it turns out. The second-year driver for BK Racing drove the rest of the way with a police escort and with his parents following him home, where he expected a small, muted observance of his stirring Sunday drive.

 

That didn’t happen, either, not with the secretive planning of sponsor and close chum Constantine “Cosmo” Kogan, who rallied DiBenedetto’s circle of friends into a boisterous welcoming committee, complete with party favors and uncorked bubbly.

 

“There were probably 30-40 people out in our neighborhood,” DiBenedetto said with a smile Monday from his BK Racing shop in north Charlotte. “Silly string everywhere. My car was covered. Champagne, the little party popper things — it was out of control. It was absolutely hilarious. Only my friends, that’s just cool to see how much they care and they were all so excited.”

 

DiBenedetto’s hard-fought sixth-place finish made its own viral turn Sunday, thanks not only to the underdog rooting interest for one of the circuit’s smaller teams but also for the unabashed emotion that the driver showed in post-race interviews. As he watched his family wipe away tears off camera, the tremble in his voice became more pronounced.

 

“I couldn’t quite hold back the emotion,” DiBenedetto said. “I would be lying if I said that I was fighting off the tears, but unfortunately just couldn’t hold it back. That was a dream come true for me. I know it wasn’t a first-place finish, but for us that was like a win to finish up there in sixth in the Cup Series, which I’ve dreamed of racing in since I was 5 years old. Just to be here in the first place is a dream come true.”

 

Living dreams

 

Making it to the sport’s big leagues seemed like destiny, but so often fate takes the curvier road. DiBenedetto seemed earmarked for stock-car racing glory early on as part of the first NASCAR Next class in 2011, then called the NASCAR Next 9. What followed after a successful first season in the K&N Pro Series was a hodgepodge of spot duty in the XFINITY Series, sitting in the driver’s seat one week and out the next.

 

“It seem like it’s all kind of gone by in a blur,” DiBenedetto said. “I was racing K&N, part of the NASCAR Next and then thought my career was done five times in between then and now. It’s been so up and down so many times. For me to be here, it’s still surreal to think back.”

 

Opportunity for DiBenedetto meant pounding the phones and knocking on doors. His big break came shortly before the 2015 season in the form of a race-to-race agreement with BK Racing owner Ron Devine. DiBenedetto said Devine took a substantial chance in hiring a driver without Sprint Cup experience, but the risk was modestly rewarded — the week-to-week deal turned into a full season with just one DNF and a return invitation for 2016.

 

“Being a rookie in Sprint Cup is way tougher than I gave it credit for,” DiBenedetto said of the learning experience. “It’s just a whole different level of racing. You have to be so perfect at every single thing you do, down to the level of not losing a half-second on pit road. You have to drive your tail off every single lap of the race to make sure you stay on the lead lap — everything.”

 

Driving his tail off makes for a suitable description of Sunday’s spirited drive at Bristol. Carl Edwards captured the checkered flag and punctuated his celebration with his trademark backflip, but he was also head over heels about DiBenedetto’s accomplishments, saying, “They finished sixth? Man, that’s unbelievable. That’s probably tougher than what we did.”

 

The driver of the No. 83 Toyota wasn’t about to draw a direct comparison with Edwards’ feat, but was quick to spread the credit for a banner day among his BK Racing shopmates.

 

“To win in the Sprint Cup Series among the 40 best is incredibly difficult and that takes an amazing amount of talent like Carl Edwards has,” DiBenedetto said. “I don’t know if I want to say it was harder than what he did, but we’re definitely proud of what we did. I’m more proud of all the guys that work on the team, proud of my crew chief … I’m just more proud of my guys, not myself. They’re the ones that deserve that good of a finish. They’re the ones that are working late nights and dedicating their lives to doing best job they can and putting a good race car underneath me.

 

“It is lot of hard work like Carl did say. That’s a total team effort. That’s a lot of hard work by my guys. I was just happy to be the one holding the steering wheel and able to drive it up there for them.”

 

The camaraderie among the tight-knit group is what made BK Racing‘s post-race cheer all the more jubilant with hugs all around. That celebration spread to the shop Monday, with DiBenedetto springing for pizza during the team’s lunch break.

 

“A lot of that emotion is shared by this whole team,” said Ryan “Frenchie” Dubois, in his second year as BK Racing‘s general manager. “We work really hard here and face a lot of obstacles that a lot of other teams aren’t faced with. For us to overcome those obstacles and come out of there with a sixth-place victor-, er, sixth-place finish, it’s like a victory for the team right now and what we’re trying to do for the future.”

 

Dubois caught himself, but “sixth-place victory” has a certain ring to it.

 

“To jump to sixth was great,” he added. “If we can back that up next week, that’ll be a Cinderella story for sure. We just want to be consistent, do everything right. We’ve got fast cars this year, that’s the positive thing. We’ve got the right people in place, and it’s about putting everything together. Once we do all that, we’ll get those outcomes more often than not.”

 

It’s an opinion shared by veteran crew chief Gene Nead, who began working with DiBenedetto in the second half of last season and was atop the pit box for nine Camping World Truck Series victories with Ted Musgrave at the wheel from 2002-05.

 

“It’s a definite David and Goliath story, you know what I mean, for a team this small without enough proper funding,” Nead said. “You walk out in the shop, there’s 60 people. You go into Gibbs’, there’s 600. It’s pretty hard to do what you did with 10 percent of their people.”

 

Basking in Bristol

 

Fittingly enough, DiBenedetto was savoring the moment before ever turning a lap Sunday. The California native decided to have some fun with Bristol Motor Speedway‘s unique system of drivers selecting their own music for pre-race introductions, taking a page from his wedding reception last August.

 

During his reception, each member of the wedding party selected their own entrance music. His father’s comedic take, entering to ZZ Top’s “Sharp-Dressed Man” in full beard, hat, sunglasses and guitar, clearly resonated. With his dad’s permission, DiBenedetto reprised the role Sunday with gusto, donning the full costume and earning some of the biggest pre-race laughs.

 

“You’ve got to enjoy it every step of the way, you’ve got to do fun stuff,” DiBenedetto said. “That’s what the fans want to see and to get them riled up before the race. That’s what it’s about.”

 

That spirit has been contagious, one that’s extended to all corners of the BK Racing shop and that’s helped boost the team’s morale.

 

“With Matt, for one his attitude is always positive,” Dubois said. “He’s a very humble driver and very appreciative of the opportunity that he has. We’ve seen from the beginning with him that he’s constantly improved. He’s not plateaued like some other drivers have and so we’re constantly building with him. We think he’s the future of our team and yesterday was a perfect example of what we see, and hopefully everybody else was able to see that, too.”

 

Plenty did, based on the outpouring of support on social media and the congratulations he’s received privately from well-wishers. DiBenedetto pulled out his phone to show 202 text messages he hadn’t had time to respond to, part of the 300-plus pings he estimated he’d accumulated in less than 24 hours.

 

This season’s most improbable finish at one of the series’ toughest tracks gave DiBenedetto more than TV time, a police escort and a silly-string serenade. It also gave him the rewarding feeling that comes with taking a dark-horse team into the stratosphere usually reserved for the sport’s heavyweights.

 

That’s why sixth on Sunday meant so much.

 

“Just because we’ve worked so hard to get here,” DiBenedetto said. “To do this without any major funding behind me or family money or anything of that nature, to do it just based on hard work and what teams thought I could do behind the wheel, that’s nearly unheard of. To fight that hard and to get here makes you appreciate it that much more.”

Posted on by Reid Spencer

BRISTOL, Tenn. — If Matt DiBenedetto had done a burnout alongside race winner Carl Edwards, no one would have blamed him.
 
That’s how unexpected DiBenedetto’s sixth-place finish was in Sunday’s Food City 500 at Bristol. After going a lap down, the driver of the No. 83 BK Racing Toyota got a free pass as the highest-scored lapped car for a restart on Lap 345, and subsequent cautions kept him on the lead lap.
 
On the final three late-race restarts, DiBenedetto lined up 14th, 10th and eighth — all in the preferred top lane — and took full advantage of the fast way around the .533-mile concrete oval.
 
On the final restart with five laps left, the NASCAR Next alumnus passed Kevin Harvick for sixth and held the spot to the finish. That result was a career-best for both DiBenedetto and BK Racing.
 
“That’s unbelievable for a team like us to be growing this much and for us to get a sixth-place run,” said DiBenedetto, who came to driver introductions disguised as ZZ Top lead guitarist Billy Gibbons, beard and all.
 
“I’m sorry I’m so emotional. It’s just this is like a win for us. I’m so excited. I see my family back here — my wife, Taylor, my brother is in town from the military and I’m so glad he got to experience this. This is jus t… this is incredible. I’m so blessed to be here.”
 
Race winner Carl Edwards had made a point of congratulating DiBenedetto on his 20th-place run in Phoenix in the fourth race of the season, but Edwards wasn’t aware of the driver’s strong run behind him.
 
“They finished sixth?” Edwards asked, incredulous. “Man that’s unbelievable. That’s probably tougher than what we did.”

For DiBenedetto, the celebration continued on Sunday night when he came home to a impromptu gathering of neighbors, complete with horn honking and silly string. (Video courtesy of Cosmo Motors’ Twitter account, @cosmo_motors)

Contributing: Staff reports

Posted on by

RELATED: Full results from Bristol

BRISTOL, Tenn. — Coming off a career-best Sprint Cup Series finish of fifth at Texas last weekend, Chase Elliott has outdone himself, earning a fourth-place finish in Sunday’s Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.

 

The 20-year-old qualified 19th for the short track event, Elliott’s second-lowest qualifying spot since the start of his rookie season. But that was only motivation for the young rookie to battle his way up through the field.

 

“We started off real slow,” Elliott said post-race. “We didn’t qualify as well as we’d like to on Friday but I thought we hit on a couple things yesterday in final practice that, fortunately, we carried over to today and were able to kind of run our way up through there.”

 

Elliott ran as high as second during Sunday’s race, but he didn’t get there without a few bumps at “The Last Great Colosseum.”

 

The Hendrick Motorsports driver experienced a loose wheel early in the 500-lap event, causing him to come down pit road while the green flag was out. But thanks to his No. 24 pit crew, Elliott didn’t fall too far behind.

 

“Hate to have a loose wheel,” Elliott said. “But the guys did a good job overcoming that with a fast pit stop under green, only losing two laps, so that was big to keep us in contention there and try to get back on the lead lap. So, definitely a long afternoon, but that was the biggest thing that kept us alive.”

 

Despite Elliott’s strong finish at Bristol, as well as four other top-10 finishes this season, he’s got fellow Sunoco Rookie of the Year contender Ryan Blaney to battle with week after week. The No. 21 driver also has been running in the top 10 consistently, with an average finish of 19.2 through eight races (Elliott’s average finish is 15.8).

 

Even though Blaney also had a strong showing at Bristol, running in the top five and top 10 and ultimately finishing 11th, the Wood Brothers Racing driver felt his Ford deserved better.

 

“It was good until the end,” Blaney said. “We should have run fifth, easy. … We had a good race car and got stuck on the bottom for three straight restarts and went backward. That’s pretty disappointing when you know you have a top-five race car.” 

 

For Blaney, the Food City 500 was not the 22-year-old’s first go-around at Bristol in the Sprint Cup Series. Blaney made a start in the No. 21 Ford in 2015 for Bristol’s fall night race, finishing 22nd.

 

This was Elliott’s first Cup Series start at Bristol, a track his NASCAR Hall of Famer father Bill Elliott earned his first short-track victory at in 1988. The younger Elliott’s only other short track experience in the Cup Series was his run at Richmond in 2015, where he finished 16th.

Posted on by Nascar

BRISTOL, Tenn. – NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver Aric Almirola and crew chief Trent Owens met with NASCAR officials after the completion of Sunday’s Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
 
The post-race meeting was at the sanctioning body’s request.
 
Almirola and Owens met with officials to discuss a Lap 437 accident involving the Richard Petty Motorsports driver, Austin Dillon (Richard Childress Racing) and Martin Truex Jr. (Furniture Row Racing).
 
Almirola’s No. 43 Ford eventually came to rest after being struck by the Truex entry. But rather than drop his window net to signify that he was not injured, Almirola apparently no longer had reverse gear in his car and wanted a push from the emergency crew.
 
Almirola eventually finished 34th. He and Owens and others that met with officials left without commenting to the media.
 
NASCAR officials would only say that the reason for the meeting was the driver’s “failure to follow proper protocol following his incident on the track.”

Posted on by Nascar

RELATED: Full results from Bristol

BRISTOL, Tenn. – While Carl Edwards was celebrating in Victory Lane, the rest of his Joe Gibbs Racing teammates were left trying to decipher what caused multiple tire failures during Sunday’s running of the Food City 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway.

It also left Goodyear officials more than just a bit interested and by the end of the day, the official tire supplier had obtained tires from the teams of Denny Hamlin, Kyle Busch and Matt Kenseth to evaluate further.

Busch, the defending series champion and winner of back-to-back Sprint Cup races heading into Bristol, was the first to have a tire issue, his No. 18 Toyota breaking loose in Turn 2 barely 50 laps into the 500-lap event.

“Blew a right-front (expletive) tire,” Busch relayed over his team’s radio.

A second No. 18 spin was the result of contact from another car, but when a third incident unfolded at Lap 259, also for a tire issue, the car was too damaged to continue.

“I’m not sure what started it, but we were a little snug early on in the first run of the race,” Busch said. “As the car would run more and more laps it would get tighter and tighter, that’s the weirdest thing that I’ve felt all day and all weekend we haven’t had that problem. Not sure what happened.”

Kenseth led three times for 142 laps and appeared to be a favorite before his No. 20 Toyota slid up into the wall after a second tire problem on Lap 323. He was in third at the time of the Turn 2 crash. The team was able to make repairs, but he finished 36th, 40 laps behind the race winner.

RELATED: Kenseth’s rough 2016 continues after tire problems



“We just keep blowing right front tires, I don’t know why,” Kenseth said afterward. “The first one was a little confusing, I knew I blew a right front, but I thought they were telling me it wasn’t flat so I was a little confused.

“This one just blew a lot earlier and the angle was a lot worse hitting the wall.”

Hamlin eventually had a tire go down, too, and got into the wall with less than 100 laps remaining.

Jason Ratcliff, crew chief for Kenseth, said it didn’t appear to be a wear issue and the bead temperatures weren’t overly concerning.

“But evidently it was just hot and we were working it hard and it just could’t take it,” he said. “That’s all I know.”

If the failure was a result of excessive heat, Ratcliff said, his team would have to do a better job of cooling its tires in the future.

“I can try to take some camber out to transmit the heat across the tire better – it’s not like it’s wearing out,” he said. “But the thing was, in practice we kept an eye on it and things looked really good. Same settings we ran last year with it and it was fine. It kind of caught us by surprise.”

Greg Stucker, Director of Race Tire Sales for Goodyear, said officials obtained tires from the three JGR Teams. The tires will be transported back to Akron, Ohio, for “thorough” analysis.

“Obviously, we’re working with the team to try to understand what it might be and solve the problem together,” Stucker said.

“The important thing is to try to help the team understand what is going on, and ourselves, as well.

“Until we get the tires broken down and get a good look at them [we won’t know]. They (JGR) understand nobody else is having the same issues. We need to try to understand that.”

Busch finished 38th while Hamlin wound up 20th.

His teammates’ tire issues didn’t go unnoticed by Edwards or his crew, but the race winner said crew chief Dave Rogers kept him abreast of the situation.

“I was nervous about it, but Dave did a good job of talking to me about how hard we were pushing the tires and what we had going on there,” Edwards said, “So I felt pretty comfortable.”

Posted on by Nascar

RELATED: Full race results

 

BRISTOL, Tenn. — Dale Earnhardt Jr. spotted the field two laps and then nearly won the race Sunday.

 

Well, maybe not won. But he did spot the field two laps, thanks to an unspecified electrical issue. And he did run as high as second with only five of the 500 laps remaining in the Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.

 

But it would have taken quite a turn of events for the Hendrick Motorsports driver to overtake leader and eventual race winner Carl Edwards.

 

Not that he and crew chief Greg Ives didn’t try. Instead, Earnhardt wound up with his second consecutive second-place finish and his third of the season.

 

Earnhardt said it was an issue with the braking system that caused the engine to shut off practically at the drop of the green flag. With no power, his No. 88 Chevrolet was nearly run over from behind by the No. 43 of Aric Almirola (Richard Petty Motorsports), which in turn was nearly run over by the No. 23 of David Ragan.

 

“If your throttle is stuck and you mash the brake to a certain (pressure) — you’re going to mash the (expletive) out of that brake when the throttle sticks; it’ll shut the motor off. That’s a system; that’s one of the two systems that you have to choose from in this sport.

 

“The other is a button on the steering wheel. I don’t like the button on the steering wheel because when the throttle sticks, I ain’t going to think, ‘Mash a button.’ I’ll be in the fence before it’s over with.”

 

Ives said officials were still evaluating the situation after the race. “It looks like the engine might have just went into protection mode,” he said. “They’re still diagnosing it … we’re just double-checking everything before we claim (that) was the real issue.”

 

Once the problem was corrected, if not entirely solved, Earnhardt Jr. began the long, arduous task of racing his way back into contention on a speedy half-mile where passing options are limited and mistakes are often costly.

 

He gained one of the lost laps by taking the wave-around during the first of 15 caution periods during the race. When the yellow flag appeared a third time at Lap 116, he once again remained on the track and was back on the lead lap when green-flag racing resumed.

 

Late restarts were beneficial since for nearly each one, Earnhardt restarted in the preferred outside row. A position or two here, a position or two there and suddenly, with five laps remaining, he shot from fourth to second. A misstep by Edwards and the No. 88 team would have been in Victory Lane.

 

But Edwards didn’t waver and both Earnhardt and Ives knew they didn’t have the best car.

 

“We had a really good car last week, a top‑three car,” Earnhardt said. “This car wasn’t that good, but we kind of understand why. We’re going outside the box as far as what we typically run here for setup.

 

“And that’s good. The setup didn’t quite work but you still had a good day and you can go home and learn and try to science it out and make that setup work.”

 

Ives agreed. The car was good enough, he said, to allow his driver to make passes and “do what he needed to do.”

 

“But I don’t think we had a second-place car or a top-10 car,” the crew chief said. “I felt like we were probably 12th to 15th at best with the race car. Just Dale working the traffic and doing what he needed to do got us in position there at the end. That really allowed us to get a second-place finish, but I definitely need to bring better cars.

 

“Obviously we want to run well and win races, but if you just keep on bringing the same stuff year in year out you’re not going to learn anything.”

 

Earnhardt hasn’t won since last fall’s Phoenix race, however he and the team have five top-10s in the season’s first eight races. As a result, he sits sixth in points and is poised to head back to the Chase for the Sprint Cup at the end of this season. Not that he’s taking anything for granted.

 

“Going to Victory Lane is important to our sponsors and it’s obviously fun,” he said. “But it’s good for our team to set ourselves up to not have to worry about the Chase anymore.

 

“Even though you know you’re a top‑five team or top‑10 team that should make the Chase without any issue, you can’t help but count them points to 16th or 17th each week.”

Posted on by Nascar

This was expected to be a big year for HScott Motorsports, with the addition of veteran Clint Bowyer to its driver lineup and a closer working relationship with Stewart-Haas Racing helping to stabilize a team that is only in its third full season of full-time competition.
 
While Bowyer’s stay at HSM will be brief — he leaves to take over the No. 14 entry at Stewart-Haas Racing next year — he had expressed hopes of being able to help HScott improve its program before his departure.
 
Such has not been the case, however.
 
Through the first seven races, Bowyer is 32nd in points and understandably frustrated.

There has been no increase in the level of support provided by Stewart-Haas, in light of that four-team organization’s impending move to Ford in ’17, an announcement made in late February by team co-owners Tony Stewart and Gene Haas.
 
That wasn’t expected to be the case when Bowyer was introduced as the newest driver addition to HScott late last year. At that time, relationships with Stewart-Haas and Hendrick Motorsport were said to be key factors in the decision-making process for all involved.
 
“I’m looking forward to the marriage that (team owner Harry Scott) has with Hendrick (Motorsports), with Stewart-Haas, that is very strong and it’s something that I’m looking forward to building on,” Bowyer said at the time. “I’ve got the best of the best when you talk about equipment. We’ve got Hendrick engines; we’ve got ties to Stewart-Haas Racing. These are the guys that are winning all the races. I now have that bond, that connection to this kind of equipment.”
 
Bringing Bowyer, an eight-time winner in NASCAR’s premier series, on board even for only one year was seen as a step up the competitive ladder for HScott, which struggled on the track with teammates Michael Annett and Justin Allgaier in ’15. Additional support from a group as successful as SHR would be a boon to the smaller outfit.
 
Instead, Bowyer had a single top-20 finish (18th at Auto Club Speedway) and an average finish of nearly 29th heading into Sunday’s Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway. Bowyer would finish eighth Sunday, for his best showing of the season.
 
For a driver who has rarely been outside the top 20 in points in 10 seasons of full-time competition, it’s been a frustrating start.
 
Contacted by NASCAR.com, Stewart-Haas officials said via email this week that “There isn’t a formal alliance between Stewart-Haas Racing and HScott Motorsports, but SHR does collaborate with HScott and offers technical support when it can.”
 
HScott has obtained limited technical support from SHR since 2015 while also purchasing many of the cars in its fleet from the organization.
 
But those close to the HScott situation say the technological tether that tied the teams of Bowyer and Annett to SHR appears to have been severed with the Ford announcement.
 
It may also be a byproduct of the growing divide between the Chevrolet-branded Hendrick group and SHR as the latter outfit begins working toward the manufacturer change. At some point this season, the data sharing and flow of information between Hendrick and SHR will begin to cease; HScott, with a driver soon to be making the move to a rival Ford team, is perhaps caught in between.
 
Changes in the relationship between Hendrick and Stewart-Haas were noted earlier this year by Stewart, who said, “the dynamic of it was kind of already changing this year anyway” and that “the technical side of it has changed quite a bit going into this season.”
 
“It’s like parents who are going through a divorce,” one HScott representative said of the situation, “and this team is caught in the middle.”
 
Stewart-Haas fields four Sprint Cup Series teams and its drivers have won two of the last five series championships, all under the Chevrolet banner. Its engines and chassis come from Hendrick, as well as technical information and extensive engineering support.
 
Hendrick Motorsports fields four Sprint Cup Series teams and has won 11 Sprint Cup titles overall and six of the last 10.
 
Although its chassis currently come through SHR, HScott leases engines from Hendrick, an arrangement that was already in place when Scott purchased the team from former owner James Finch in September of 2013. But the link between Hendrick and HScott ends there, according to Hendrick officials. The Hendrick/HScott relationship, they say, has not changed in light of the Stewart-Haas Ford announcement.
 
In a statement provided to NASCAR.com, HScott officials noted the abundance of adjustments the organization faced heading into the 2016 season.
 
“The challenges so far this season have primarily been the elements of change. Change has been a constant and it’s had an effect. The team relocated its shop from (Spartanburg) South Carolina to (Mooresville) North Carolina in January. We have a new driver and crew chief combination, a new fleet of cars and a new aero package.” 
 
The support system between Hendrick and Stewart-Haas, and Stewart-Haas and HScott, isn’t unusual. Similar alliances abound in NASCAR, each varying to some degree.
 
Furniture Row Racing had a “technical alliance” in place with Richard Childress Racing before this season. When the Denver-based team made the switch to Toyota, it aligned itself with Joe Gibbs Racing, which provides chassis as well as engineering support. A comparable arrangement exits between the Ford entities of Team Penske and Wood Brothers Racing.
 
That teams would begin to “wean” themselves from such alliances as they work their way through the process of changing manufacturers is understandable considering what’s at stake — not the least of which is proprietary information and data that cannot be obtained without extensive research and development, and at much cost.
 
While the current partners have benefited from their individual relationships, at the end of the day it remains a very competitive business.
 
All of which leaves HScott and its teams trying to make the best of what appears to have become an unexpectedly harsh situation.

Posted on by Staff Report

The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series and NASCAR XFINITY Series will head to Richmond International Raceway this week while the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series is off. Check out the full weekend schedule below.


Note: All times are ET



SUNDAY, APRIL 24:

ON TRACK
— 12:30 p.m.: Driver introductions
— 1 p.m.: Presentation of Colors by: Ft. Lee Color Guard
— 1:00:20 p.m.: Invocation by: Joe Ellison
— 1:01:00 p.m.: National Anthem: Trent Harmon
— 1:02:30 p.m.: Flyby TOT: Team Bandit (Turn 1 to Turn 4)
— 1:07:30 p.m.: “Driver’s, Start Your Engines” by: Robert “Dell” Wilson
— 1:14 p.m.: Green flag: NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Toyota Owners 400 (400 laps, 300 miles), FOX (Results)



PRESS CONFERENCES (Watch live)
— 4 p.m. (approx.): NSCS post-race


DAILY ROUNDUP
— See at-track photos from Richmond
— Stewart cuts tire in first Cup return
— Edwards pulls bump-and-run on JGR teammate for Richmond win
— Watch Edwards’ last-lap shove to the No. 18
— Ky. Busch dodges questions of Edwards’ shove post-race
— Edwards: ‘I thought, I’m gonna give him a little nudge’

FRIDAY, APRIL 22:

ON TRACK
— 11 a.m.-12:25 p.m.: NASCAR Sprint Cup Series practice, FS1 (Results)

— 12:30-1:55 p.m.: NASCAR XFINITY Series practice, FS1 (CANCELED, weather)
— 3-3:55 p.m.: NASCAR XFINITY Series final practice, FS1 (CANCELED, weather)

— 4:15 p.m.: NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Coors Light Pole Qualifying* (CANCELED, weather), FS1 (Lineup)

*Lineup was set by the rule book


GARAGECAM (Watch live)
— 10:30 a.m.: NASCAR Sprint Cup Series
— 2:30 p.m.: NASCAR XFINITY Series (CANCELED, weather)


PRESS CONFERENCES (Watch live)
— 9:30 a.m.: Ryan Blaney
— 9:45 a.m.: Matt DiBenedetto
— 10 a.m.: Kurt Busch
— 10:45 a.m.: Erik Jones
— 12:30 p.m.: Carl Edwards
— 1 p.m.: Denny Hamlin
— 5:15 p.m. approx.: NSCS post-qualifying

DAILY ROUND-UP
— Stewart climb into No. 14 Chevy for first time in ’16
— Harvick tops rain-shortened Richmond practice
— Rain puts halt to activity at Richmond
— Harvick on pole after qualifying rained out at Richmond
— Hamlin: Drivers Council ‘didn’t agree’ with fine

SATURDAY, APRIL 23:

ON TRACK

— 9-9:50 a.m.: NASCAR XFINITY Series practice, FS1 (Results)
— 9:35 a.m.: NASCAR XFINITY Series Coors Light Pole Qualifying*(CANCELED, weather), FS1 (Lineup)

— 10:30-11:50 a.m.: NASCAR Sprint Cup Series final practice, FS1 (Results)
–12:30 p.m.: NASCAR XFINITY Series ToyotaCare 250 Heat #1 (35 laps, 26.25 miles), FS1 (Results)

–1:10 p.m. (approx): NASCAR XFINITY Series ToyotaCare 250 Heat #2 (35 laps, 26.25 miles), FS1 (Results)
— 1:45 p.m. (approx): NASCAR XFINITY Series ToyotaCare 250 main race (140 laps, 105 miles), FS1 (Results)

*Lineup will be set by the rule book

PRESS CONFERENCES (Watch live)
— 3 p.m. (approx.): NXS post-race


DAILY ROUND-UP
— Allgaier tops Richmond NXS practice
— Cup Richmond pit stall assignments
— See at-track photos from Richmond
— Johnson tops final Cup practice at Richmond
— Dale Jr. holds off T. Dillon for Richmond win

Posted on by Staff Report

RELATED: Full race results


Fans were treated to a thrilling Food City 500 Sprint Cup Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway on Sunday, with Carl Edwards sealing the win.


Drivers took to Twitter to talk about their respective runs after the race and, in some cases, clear some air.



NASCAR Nation also made sure to comment on the career-best run for Matt DiBenedetto (6th) and the emotional post-race interview he gave on pit road.



It was also a season-best finish for Clint Bowyer, who fought back for an eighth-place finish.

Posted on by Staff Report

Defending race-winner Matt Kenseth didn’t repeat after going behind the wall to fix damage incurred on Lap 327 of Sunday’s Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.

 

The Joe Gibbs Racing driver had rebounded from an early race brush with the wall after a right front tire went down to get back into the top three, but a similar issue cropped up with a little less than 200 laps to go to send the No. 20 car hard into the outside wall, where it sustained significant damage.

 

“We just keep blowing right front tires, I don’t know why,” Kenseth told FOX after the second incident.

“The first one was a little confusing, I knew I blew a right front, but I thought they were telling me it wasn’t flat so I was a little confused. This one just blew a lot earlier and the angle was a lot worse hitting the wall. We really weren’t very tight, our Dollar General Camry was pretty fast today. I was encouraged again today even though we don’t have the result.”

Goodyear will be taking the tires that had issues from the JGR teams of Kenseth, Kyle Busch and Denny Hamlin for further analysis. All three drivers had tires go down on them during the race. Despite his teammates’ struggles, Carl Edwards led 276 laps and won the race at Bristol.

 

Kenseth returned to the track at Lap 363. He was scored in 35th position and was 36 laps down at time, despite having led 142 laps on the day.

The 2003 champion finished in 36th place.