Next, on Wednesday night at Bristol Motor Speedway, he had another disappointing setback when he was penalized for jumping the restart of the Camping World Truck Series race while leading the event and fell off the lead lap. “I really don’t know what happened”, Custer said.
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While Harvick has led a series-high 1,406 laps this season, 685 more than second-best Kurt Busch, he hasn’t won since the fourth race of the season at Phoenix. He is a comfortable 55 points in front of the cutoff line, but a win would clinch him an automatic berth so he wouldn’t have to sweat out the points in the final two races before the Chase. He is also the active leader in top-five finishes (17), top-10s (25), laps led (2,730) and average starting position (7.7) at the track dubbed “The World’s Fastest Half-Mile”.
Crafton, who was leading when the race was red-flagged for 45 minutes for rain on lap 166, faded to seventh in the melee at the end.
Win or lose, Gordon is prepared to put on one final show for the Bristol fans.
“We had a chance, and that’s all you can ask for is a chance”, Blaney said. He’s driving for Team Penske in Friday night’s Xfinity Series race and for the Wood Brothers in Saturday night’s Sprint Cup Series race. It would probably smarter to watch the final 20 laps and wait for the fireworks to occur, but you have to get that entire story of what’s happening in the race. That is, not until Ty Dillon got together with Ben Kennedy in turn 3 to bring out the fifth caution and send the race into a green-white-chequered finish, with the field closed up sufficiently to allow Blaney one last crack at Crafton. Bristol is a prime place for Smith to gain ground on his young adversaries.
The highest finisher of four drivers – Regan Smith, Elliot Sadler, Daniel Suarez and Ryan Blaney – will win the $100,000 prize. He has two wins and 16 top 5s this year. “We’re looking forward to it”.
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Kenseth won the April race to give him four for his career. Ricky Stenhouse Jr.is 100-to-1 this week, but his Bristol history sure doesn’t suggest he’s a 100-to-1 type driver. He had the swagger of winning twice already and finishing in the top-two in six of seven races prior. Hamlin won this race in 2012, for his only win over the Bristol track. When the green flag came out, the #88 struggled to get back up to speed, gifting the lead to Blaney who seized it with both hands to claim his fourth victory in 57 Truck starts and his first win of 2015 and his first visit to victory lane at Bristol.
