Hey everyone! It's Bristol baby and here's my take on what happened. Trucks were off again this time.
Saturday was the Nationwide race. Kyle Busch won with 120 laps led, followed by pole-sitter Kyle Larson with 2 laps led, Kevin Harvick, Truck regular Ryan Blaney and Matt Kenseth with 178 laps led. Rounding out the top-10 were rookie Ty Dillon, Brendan Gaughan, Trevor Bayne, rookie Chase Elliot and Regan Smith. Bayne and Elliot came back from a lap down. Bayne, the hometown boy as he's from Knoxville, the nearest metropolitan area which is about an hour and a half away got within one point of Smith's points lead. He's been top-10 in all four races this year. Rookie Ryan Reed whose sponsor also was the race's sponsor wrecked quite late in the race, on 258.
Sunday was the Cup race. They got rain delayed. Carl Edwards was the winner with 78 laps led followed by Ricky Stenhouse, Jr., Aric Almirola, Tony Stewart and Marcos Ambrose. Rounding out the top-10 were pole-sitter Denny Hamlin with four laps led, Jeff Gordon, Kasey Kahne with 16 laps led, Brian Vickers and rookie Kyle Larson. Thirteenth place Matt Kenseth led 165 laps. Brad Keselowski led 40 laps and finished 14th. Clint Bowyer led five laps before a 15th place finish. Jimmie Johnson led 44 laps before a 19th place finish. Joey Logano led 12 laps before a power steering issue relegated him to 20th place. Kyle Busch led 73 laps be finished 29th. His older brother Kurt Busch led 28 laps but finished 35th because he was off the track a while. Jamie McMurray led 10 laps but had an accident and was 38th. Kevin Harvick led 28 laps but was 39th due to an accident. Rookie Ryan Truex, as well as Timmy Hill had accidents as well.
Only Vegas was unaffected by rain. It's suggested the Daytona 500 should always be a night race and Bristol go back to April, as it was a few years ago, as March nights are cool at the track for it to be a night race as it falls in the schedule now. The second races at these tracks are night races, so they do have lights. Another NASCAR track, Richmond's always a night race track. The trend of 4 different winners in as many races may fail as the track types are about to repeat. The track lengths so far have been 2.5, 1, 1.5 and .5 mile and the next track will be another mile and a half track. The winners will take more risks as well and this may pay off. 2011, was the most different winner in recent years with 15, which included 5 (I think it was 5) first time winners.
I bet rain is bad for car racing. Are there more accidents when it rains?
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ReplyDeleteThey go under caution and if it's bad enough, they stop until the rain's over and the track's dry, if rain happens while they race. They have these driers to dry the track, which they send out after the rain stops. If the race is at least half over and they can't restart that day, it's official. If they raced in the rain, it would cause accidents. I think they tried rain tires once and it wasn't pretty. A rain delay means they had a late start due to rain or there was a rain induced stop and restart.
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