Sunday’s NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway was an all-day affair due to rain which delayed the start by two hours and then again had a three and a half hour delay on lap 125 due to more rain. For those who stuck it out though they witnessed some of the best racing that NASCAR can offer.
Bristol used to be a one lane track where the only way to make a pass was to use the bumper or wait for the driver ahead to make their own mistake. It was short track racing at it’s grittiest best. Then the track went to progressive banking which was supposed to make the racing better at the World’s Fastest Half-Mile but all it really seemed to do was move the preferred grove from the bottom of the track to the top and make it more of a finesse track.
Well on Sunday, portions of the Food City 500 had to be exactly what Bristol Motor Speedway was hoping for when they changed the track. There was very competitive racing throughout the pack with three-wide and even a few times drivers looking to make it four-wide. It seemed like the best racing occurred after the rubber had been washed off the track due to the rain.
Goodyear and NASCAR seemed to have brought a great tire compound to the track which made tires mean something. When the track had the rubber washed off due to rain, the first few runs after that when the rubber was being laid back down, drivers really could utilize the entire track and make passes where they saw fit.
Toward the end of the 500 lap race the track had rubbered in again and the proffered grove moved back to the top and passing looked much more difficult in the final 100 laps. Also tire wear became less as the race went on due to the track rubbering in. Carl Edwards and his crew chief Jimmy Fennig played the right card by staying out when cautions flew with about 75 and 50 laps to go which gave Edwards the lead and then he dominated by running his grove and working lap traffic to perfection.
Overall the race at Bristol was very entertaining and it leads to the question of why hasn’t anyone tried to build another Bristol? Dale Earnhardt Jr posed the question over the weekend in an interview and it is a good one. Fans love the short track racing and so do the drivers. Another high-banked short track would be a great addition to the Sprint Cup Series schedule. So who wants to build one? Any takers?
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