Carl Edwards led more than half of the Food City 500 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race at Bristol Motor Speedway on Sunday, running up front for 276 laps of the 500-lap distance on his way to his first win of the season and the fourth of his career at Bristol.
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Carl Edwards scored his first win of the season to become the third Joe Gibbs Racing driver with a playoff berth virtually clinched – this just eight races into the 2016 season.
“It’s one of the hardest things in sports to get a great chemistry between two guys, particularly at what they do”, Gibbs said. But after I started bending around, it starting hurting.
Busch, a five-time Bristol victor, was three rows behind Dale Earnhardt Jr.at the start of the race when Earnhardt lost power.
“We had a dead battery at the start of the race”, Earnhardt said after a second straight runner-up finish.
“There were never very many thoughts that crossed my mind that I did not want to come back”.
Battling back onto the lead lap, Earnhardt hit the top 10 by Lap 219 before hitting some luck in the final restarts to sneak into second. Just like the previous restart, this one did not last long, as Brian Scott got loose and ended up in the wall for the 10th caution of the race. Even the sometimes ill-tempered Busch, who like teammate Matt Kenseth had tire troubles that put him into the wall, was not casting about to place blame. Goodyear engineers want to determine if there was an issue with the tires, or with the setup, that caused all the failures.
“We just kept blowing right front tires and I don’t know why”, said Kenseth, the defending race champion. The first one was a little confusing. Jones earned the pole during qualifying and led every lap in the first heat – ironically with Larson and Busch finishing 2-3 behind him – before setting the early pace in the main event. We’ll take the tires back to the lab and get a thorough analysis. “I feel really good about chance in the race because of the race trim we ran”.
The final 150 laps saw six cautions flags, each one giving the Stewart-Haas Racing duo of Kevin Harvick and Kurt Busch a shot at the lead. Busch was able to take the lead for 41 laps, while Harvick 13 laps earlier. “Both restarts I had today were absolutely horrendous”, Busch said. Just so excited about the win and to be here in Victory Lane and beat those guys.
“Coach taught me long ago that it’s all about people”, Rogers said, “and that’s why I’m having so much fun”. So I went to the infield medical center and got checked out.
The 20-year-old raced his way up to the ninth spot by lap 110 in the No. 24 Kelley Blue Book Chevrolet SS. J.’s deli claimed a career best fourth that they Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet and Trevor mane drove the Roush Fenway racing Ford. “We were close, but unfortunately not close enough”. “For me, it was a really though race in the auto”.
“If there’s a track I can choose to run good at it’s Bristol”, Bayne said.
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“I just had a really good Kelley Blue Book Chevrolet today”. I was hoping we didn’t have any more cautions after that. He credited that with helping have the team bounce back this week after making the mistake at Texas last week.
