Sunday’s rain-delayed Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race is underway after morning showers caused a delay of nearly four hours.
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Aiding Stewart-Haas Racing Harvick’s victory were wrecks and mishaps suffered by several other drivers who had legitimate chance to win at the high-banked, half-mile Bristol Motor Speedway track.
Rain drops rest on the covered vehicle of Denny Hamlin as trucks, background, dry the track for a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series auto race, Sunday, Aug. 21, 2016 in Bristol, Tenn. What Else Happened: The race was suspended on Saturday night when rain swept into the area. Behind them, Chase Elliott turned Matt Kenseth, who was hard on the brakes, and Ryan Blaney ended up drilling Kenseth.
Crews scramble to cover cars as rain delayed a NASCAR Sprint Cup Series auto race, Saturday, Aug. 20, 2016 in Bristol, Tenn. Track officials applied a substance to help bring in the lower line that created an additional groove earlier in the week during the Camping World Truck Series and XFINITY Series races. However, NASCAR has made changes since the April race and drivers will be facing a number of challenges to go with track conditions.
Kyle Busch led 256 laps but was knocked out in a crash. Harvick went on to lead most of the remaining laps of the race.
“I wanted him (Stewart) to go on a Victory Lap with me and say goodbye to his fans one last time, but that was pretty cool doing burnouts with him”, Harvick said of the double burnout with Stewart.
Fortunately, for Harvick, he avoided the mayhem for his second victory at Thunder Valley since the spring race in 2005 and his second win in 2016. But he spun on Lap 358 when a part broke and Justin Allgaier, driving in relief of Michael Arnett, hit the No. 18 auto flush to end the defending series champ’s race.
“It’s a shame”, Busch said.
Ricky Stenhouse Jr., Denny Hamlin, Austin Dillon, Chris Buescher, Carl Edwards, Jimmie Johnson, Jamie McMurray, AJ Allmendinger, and Joey Logano rounded out the rest of the Top-10 finishers behind Harvick. “I don’t know. It’s a shame”.
That was the sentiment of many.
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Thanks to the win, Harvick is now third in the point standings and he’ll look to gain more ground on the leaders when he suits up again at Michigan International Speedway on August 28. The remainder of the race was postponed until Sunday. “It was kind of one of those Bristol things”. She beat defending season champion Antron Brown with a 4.169-second pass at 180.21 miles per hour.
