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We apologize. We are having technical issues with our comment sections and fan community and it is temporarily unavailable. We are actively working on these issues and hope to have it up and running soon. We are also working on enhancements to provide a better forum for our fans. We appreciate your patience and apologize for the inconvenience.
We apologize. We are having technical issues with our comment sections and fan community and it is temporarily unavailable. We are actively working on these issues and hope to have it up and running soon. We are also working on enhancements to provide a better forum for our fans. We appreciate your patience and apologize for the inconvenience.
We apologize. We are having technical issues with our comment sections and fan community and it is temporarily unavailable. We are actively working on these issues and hope to have it up and running soon. We are also working on enhancements to provide a better forum for our fans. We appreciate your patience and apologize for the inconvenience.
We apologize. We are having technical issues with our comment sections and fan community and it is temporarily unavailable. We are actively working on these issues and hope to have it up and running soon. We are also working on enhancements to provide a better forum for our fans. We appreciate your patience and apologize for the inconvenience.
Nine drivers break 15-second barrier; pole is first at Bristol for Busch
BRISTOL, Tenn. — Across the board, drivers marveled at the speed of NASCAR’s Generation-6 cars during qualifying for Sunday’s Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
None more so than Kyle Busch, the fastest of nine drivers to break the 15-second mark on their qualifying lap. Prior to Friday, only three drivers (Ryan Newman, Carl Edwards, Jeff Gordon) had turned a Sprint Cup qualifying lap in less than 15 seconds.
“I like driving it,” said Busch, whose 11th career pole marked his first Coors Light Pole Award at Bristol and the first time he’d qualified higher than ninth on the .533-mile oval. “You can drive it a lot more like the older car we had years ago where you can abuse it a little bit.”
Busch, no stranger to Victory Lane at Bristol, captured the pole with a lap of 14.813 (129.535 mph) seconds in the No. 18 M&Ms Toyota. Newman’s track record, set in 2003, had been 14.908 seconds (128.709 mph).
Each of Friday’s top three qualifiers — Busch, Kasey Kahne and Denny Hamlin — topped Newman’s mark. Hamlin (14.879) looked like he might join his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate on the front row until Kahne knocked him down a peg with his time of 14.875.
Brian Vickers (14.929), Paul Menard (14.949), Jamie McMurray (14.957), Brad Keselowski (14.966), Tony Stewart (14.990) and Martin Truex Jr. (14.997) also eclipsed 15 seconds, with Joey Logano (15.005) rounding out the top 10.
“The car felt great during that lap,” said Busch, who has come from off the pace to win five times (including four of the past eight Cup races) at Bristol. “We’ve never really worried too much about qualifying runs. We unloaded with a really good race car and we just kept fine-tuning to make it a little bit better — and we were able to get it where it was pretty quick in practice.”
For Hamlin, if even for just a couple laps, it felt good to get back to racing. Hamlin had spent recent days embroiled in controversy, after being fined following his comments at Phoenix.
He had no gripe with his machinery Friday.
“I’m pretty happy with what we’ve got,” said Hamlin, who earlier in the day said he had “bigger fish to fry” than worrying about the $25,000 fine. “For my team’s sake, we need to focus on running as good as we can and trying to make this Chase. Any distraction is something that you don’t need — especially when the competition is so close. You just can’t afford anything that hampers your ability to go win, so this is going to be a step in the right direction for us.”
Kahne, driving the No. 5 Great Clips Chevrolet for Hendrick Motorsports, thought he might have challenged Busch had he not been a little tight between Turns 1 and 2.
“I felt like I may have given up a little bit in 1 and 2, which would have made it really close for the pole,” Kahne said. “But still we were very good in 3 and 4. The car was balanced really nice.”
How fast can cars go at Bristol? Maybe closer to 14 seconds than 15, according to Busch.
“I think a lot of it is probably (about the) tire,” he said. “You could certainly put a softer tire on here and go lights-out. You’d have trouble making it very much longer after that, but I betcha you could run somewhere it the low 14s.”
Sprint Cup Series points leader Jimmie Johnson qualified 13th.
Scott Riggs was the lone driver who failed to qualify on Friday. Ricky Stenhouse Jr. was forced to change an engine during practice and will start at the rear of the field despite qualifying with the 28th-fastest time.
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Champ reigns supreme but Toyota cars take four out of top five spots
Apart from Matt Kenseth’s win at Las Vegas last week, Toyotas haven’t enjoyed a ton of success thus far in 2013. If Friday’s Sprint Cup Series practice for the Food City 500 offered any insight, that could soon change.
Led by Kenseth in second, Toyota cars took four of the top five spots on the leaderboard, as Kyle Busch, Clint Bowyer and Denny Hamlin followed. Three of the four (Busch, Hamlin, Kenseth) are Joe Gibbs Racing teammates.
Reigning Sprint Cup Champion and defending Bristol spring race winner Brad Keselowski took the top overall spot, grabbing the lead on his 63rd and final lap in 14.869 seconds and a best speed of 129.047 mph. Kenseth, who inserted himself into seventh in the standings with last week’s victory, ran 53 laps and finished just behind Keselowski at 128.908. Hamlin, who announced Thursday that he elected to not appeal his recent $25,000 fine, ran his 61st lap in 14.952. He won last fall’s race at Bristol.
Current points leader Jimmie Johnson spent plenty of time on the track with 44 laps but posted just the 27th best speed. Teammate Dale Earnhardt Jr. was barely ahead of him in 22nd with a time of 15.098.
Early on in the practice, Busch tried to sneak around David Gilliland but made contact and suffered a half-spinout. On his 24th lap, Ricky Stenhouse Jr.’s No. 17 Ford started billowing white smoke. He did not return to the track.
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No. 3 driver sneaks up leaderboard late; Harvick takes second practice before being involved in crash
Kevin Harvick may have taken the ninth spot in each the morning Nationwide practice and early afternoon Sprint Cup practice, but the third time was the charm for the Chevrolet driver, as he earned the top spot in the second practice for the Jeff Foxworthy’s Grit Chips 300 on Friday at Bristol Motor Speedway in Tennessee.
Harvick ran a total of 55 laps, his 51st being his best with a best time of 15.488 seconds and best speed of 123.889 mph. Justin Allgaier (15.505), Trevor Bayne (15.515), Sam Hornish Jr. (15.531), and Brad Keselowski (15.540) rounded out the top five.
With just over five minutes remaining in practice, Brad Sweet collided with Joey Gase in a near T-bone hit that also involved Harvick and Brad Teague.
Austin Dillon took the first session but finished 16th with a best speed of 122.123. Alex Bowman, who finished second in the morning practice, was seventh in the later session.
Defending race winner Elliot Sadler ran his 62nd lap of the session in 15.716, good for 17th overall.
Practice one recap
Having won three of his last six starts at Bristol Motor Speedway, reigning Sprint Cup champion Brad Keselowski pulled into the garage with the lead in Friday’s early practice for the Nationwide Series Jeff Foxworthy’s Grit Chips 300 race in Bristol, Tenn., but Austin Dillon had other plans.
Dillon’s No. 3 Chevrolet snuck by Keselowski late in the morning session to take the top overall time, spinning its 29th lap in 15.451 seconds with a best speed of 124.186 mph. Keselowski ran his 20th lap in a best time of 15.598 seconds, averaging a best speed of 123.016. Placing third in last spring’s Nationwide race, Keselowski ran a total of 23 laps on Friday.
Alex Bowman also found himself near the top of the leaderboard late, placing second on his 54th lap with a time of 15.495 and speed of 123.833. Regan Smith (123.166) and Kyle Busch (122.584) rounded out the top five.
Elliott Sadler, who won this race in 2012, was 12th overall with a best time 15.780 and best speed of 121.597. Current points leader Sam Hornish Jr., last week’s winner, finished just ahead of Sadler with a time of 15.779. Justin Allgaier, second in points, finished in eighth, achieving a top speed of 122.318.
Travis Pastrana had a disappointing opening session, placing 27th with a top speed of 119.701.
Chris Buescher ran the most laps — 81 — and finished 25th.
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Top lane still might be best route; big impact shortens Nationwide practice
BRISTOL, Tenn. — With plenty of laps still to be turned this weekend at Bristol Motor Speedway, including 500 of them in Sunday’s main event, NASCAR Sprint Cup Series drivers set about trying to find a groove in Friday’s practice. The only issue is that Friday’s groove might not be Sunday’s preferred line.
The short track will host its second race on its newly ground concrete this weekend, and the early indications are that Sunday’s Food City 500 could share the complexion of last August’s slam-bang affair. Hours of Friday practice for Sprint Cup and Nationwide cars put plenty of Goodyear rubber into the racing surface; by day’s end, the groove had already moved three-quarters of the way up the steep banking.
"As far as the race goes, I think we’ll definitely see the top lane come in, for sure," said Kyle Busch, who blasted to his first Coors Light Pole at Bristol with a track-record lap Friday of 129.535 mph. "When or how fast, I’m not sure about that exactly."
Bristol executives opted to overhaul the .533-mile layout between the track’s two annual events last season after hearing a fan outcry — and ensuing internet vote — in favor of altering the track to improve the racing. As a result, the progressive banking was modified and a layer of concrete in the outside line around the track was ground down.
The racing it produced made the high groove the fastest way around, especially after the field wore its tires into the pavement. To gain positions, drivers used the dirt-track tactic of the "slide job," which requires a certain amount of gusto to dive low before sliding up in the turns in front of a rival.
"It does take you back to the dirt track days, even though you aren’t completely sliding it sideways, you are still very committed to that move," said Jeff Gordon, who cut his teeth on dirt speedways. "You are carrying so much momentum to make it work to get ahead of that car; you have no choice but to take it all the way to the wall."
While the opinion in the garage seems to be that the slide-job strategy will return, Dale Earnhardt Jr. said there was no way of knowing last season that removing some portions of the top banking would actually boost its popularity.
"They were trying to eliminate the top groove and ended up making it even stronger," he said. "And so it didn’t really have the intended result, but it was a good result nonetheless. Everybody seemed to enjoy the race. I did.
"So, I think everybody needs to put away the pick-axes and hammers because we really don’t know what makes a good race track. We really don’t need everybody hammering away at the surface of the race track trying to fix it, because nobody really knows what the result is going to be."
Heavy hit
A savage-looking four-car crash red-flagged the second Nationwide Series practice of the day, with Joey Gase and Brad Sweet taking the brunt of the damage.
As Gase slowed to avoid Tony Raines’ spin on the backstretch, his almost-stationary car was slammed from behind by a fast-closing Sweet, lifting Gase’s rear wheels off the concrete. Both drivers were evaluated and released from the infield care center.
"I wasn’t really expecting to see a wreck halfway down the backstretch and it just caught me off guard," Sweet said. "I think I overreacted with my brakes, just locked ’em up and I was kind of along for the ride."
The impact brought a premature halt to Gase’s weekend. The 20-year-old driver for Jimmy Means Racing said his team did not have a backup car for Saturday’s Jeff Foxworthy’s Grit Chips 300.
Gordon goes viral
Jeff Gordon has had plenty of victories through his 20-plus years of NASCAR racing, but one of his biggest might be the viral video that won the internet this week. The web video of a disguised Gordon terrifying an unsuspecting used car salesman in a test drive topped the 18-million views mark Friday, becoming a hot topic at Bristol, where stunt-driving skills might be considered an asset.
"When you are at Bristol, you’re just scaring yourself every other corner," Gordon said. "That’s why this place is so much fun."
The debate quickly ensued over whether the video was real, partly staged or an outright fake. Gordon didn’t do his own driving, though he said he thought he could "pull off 90 percent of it," but no matter how contrived the short film was or wasn’t, the court of YouTube opinion has judged it an online hit.
"I know how much fun I had doing it, but after watching, I thought they did an awesome job editing it, making the whole thing really come together and be a lot of fun," Gordon said. "I laughed my butt off, to be honest. I’ve watched it probably six or eight times, and every time I’ve just cracked up."
Pit notes
Ricky Stenhouse Jr.‘s car went up in smoke during the first Sprint Cup practice, the victim of an engine failure. "A lot better to have it happen during practice than when we get in the race and it really matters," said Stenhouse, who qualified 28th but will drop to the rear of the field Sunday because of the engine change. … Scott Riggs was the only driver who failed to qualify for the 43-car field.
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Last year’s incident has Patrick primed to be aggressive
BRISTOL, Tenn. — It wasn’t quite the helmet throw heard ’round the world, but Danica Patrick made her own dramatic impression last fall in her first NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway. This time around, she’s expecting more rough-and-tumble racing, but hopes to see the Food City 500 through to its full 500-lap distance.
Patrick enters the first short-track race of the season by embracing it with anticipation, hoping to erase the sour taste of lackluster finishes the previous two weeks at Phoenix and Las Vegas. She isn’t expecting her No. 10 Stewart-Haas Racing Chevrolet to have a pristine appearance by the end of Sunday’s race, the fourth this season in the Sprint Cup tour, but she also expects to respond in kind to any bumper tag that her 42 on-track rivals might dole out.
It’s only fair, she reasons.
"If you get taken out, you get taken out. Hopefully that doesn’t happen."
— Danica Patrick
"I don’t mind some beating and banging out there, I don’t mind pushing your way around a little bit. It just happens," Patrick said before Friday’s first practice on the .533-mile concrete bullring. " … I enjoy it. I’ve always said from the beginning that NASCAR is a lot of fun for me because if somebody lays on you, you can lay right back. You aren’t risking your life, like the old days in IndyCar when somebody would do something that was not intelligent to you, I understood that it was a physical risk to try and get them back, because when the wheels are exposed, bad things happen. Not here, though. Not in NASCAR. You can bump and bang all you like."
Patrick found herself on the wrong end of Bristol’s bumps last August. A run-in with Regan Smith sent Patrick’s car hurtling into the inside wall less than 75 laps from the end, destroying a realistic shot at a respectable lead-lap finish in her Bristol debut.
Perhaps taking a cue from her boss, Tony Stewart, whose famous two-hand helmet throw at Matt Kenseth‘s car ignited the crowd into a frenzy earlier in the night, Patrick wasn’t about to let Smith’s actions go without response. She dismounted in a huff, shed her helmet and once Smith’s ominous matte black car passed, Patrick issued the most noteworthy finger wag by a professional athlete since Rafael Palmeiro stared down a Congressional panel at a 2005 steroids hearing.
Theatrics aside, the 434 laps Patrick logged taught her a thing or two about navigating Bristol’s pitfalls. Still, she won’t overcorrect this weekend with a more cautious approach.
"When we are racing nose to tail really close, it’s always more of a risk, of course," Patrick said, "but there is nothing I can do to prepare myself better for the race that would fix the problem from last time of getting taken out. If you get taken out, you get taken out. Hopefully that doesn’t happen. The best thing I can do for that is try and get further up the field so that (I am) around some smarter drivers. Hopefully that happens."
Being further up in the field would be a welcome salve after last week’s showing at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, where Patrick was lapped early and often, limping to a 33rd-place finish — six laps down — with an ill-handling car. The outing made for an all-encompassing debrief session once the team returned to its North Carolina base.
"I went into the shop on Tuesday and there was definitely some thoughts and concepts that they were like, ‘Look, we did this wrong. We need to fix that. Your comments made sense from practice. It didn’t even make sense to me that we needed to do them necessarily for the race,’ " Patrick said. "I think that this car works a little differently in traffic as well. Aerodynamically we have lost a lot of side-force, and I think that plays a role. I think that we have to get all four tires on the ground the way they need to be. We have to get the rear tied down. There’s nothing you can do if you can’t put the power down."
Patrick’s 10-event foray into Sprint Cup racing last season was intended to throw NASCAR’s most treacherous tracks and some of the longest races her way in hopes of accelerating her learning curve ahead of this, her first full Sprint Cup season. Three races in, Patrick’s grade is too early to etch on a report card, but Sunday’s race — all 500 laps of it, she hopes — may provide a better answer of just how far she’s come.
"It makes me appreciate all the races I did last year, and how almost all of them were 500 miles," Patrick said. "It is a different mindset. I feel like no matter what happens — whether it’s a 200-lap race, or a 500-lap race, you find your rhythm. Time goes by fast sometimes, and sometimes it’s slow. All I can hope is the car has a decent balance because when it doesn’t, that’s when the laps seem wrong. If we can just get a decent car, and get into a rhythm, and find ourselves in a good spot, have a consistent car throughout the race, time does go pretty quickly usually."
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