Ricky Stenhouse Jr. – Bristol Advance
Team: No. 17 Fastenal Ford Fusion
Crew Chief: Nick Sandler
Twitter: @PR17RFR, @stenhousejr, @FastenalRacing and @roushfenway
ADVANCE NOTES
Stenhouse at Bristol Motor Speedway
Stenhouse has five NASCAR Sprint Cup Series (NSCS) starts at Bristol Motor Speedway with an average starting position of 24.4 and average finishing position of 9.2.
Stenhouse earned his best NSCS career finish in the spring 2014 race when he finished second behind former teammate Carl Edwards.
In his five starts at the ‘World’s Fastest Half-Mile track’, Stenhouse has two top-five and three top-10 finishes.
This weekend at Bristol, Stenhouse will make his 100th NSCS start.
Last time at Bristol
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. drove his Ford Fusion to a fourth-place finish in Sunday’s rain stricken Food City 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway. After a flurry of late race multi-car accidents cautions, the field was set for a green-white-checkered finish where Stenhouse Jr. picked up two additional positions in the final two laps to score his first top-five finish of the season.
Fastenal
Fastenal is currently in its fourth season as a primary partner in the NSCS for Roush Fenway. They spent three years on the No. 99 before jumping over to the No. 17 entry, and were the primary partner on the No. 60 XFINITY team that captured the owner’s championship in 2011.
Stenhouse Jr. on racing at Bristol:
“Bristol is my favorite short-track. After our top-five finish there in the spring, we’ve had the Bristol night race circled as the one race that we thought we had an opportunity to get our No. 17 team into the chase. Our short track program has been strong this year. A lot can happen at Bristol so if we can stay out of trouble, I think we have a great opportunity to get our first Sprint Cup win and Fastenal’s first Sprint Cup win this weekend.”
Nick Sandler on racing at Bristol:
“We are looking forward to Bristol this weekend. It is one of Ricky’s favorite tracks and he had his career best Sprint Cup finish there last year so I think the entire No. 17 is looking forward to the race this weekend. We tested there a couple of weeks ago and felt we learned a few things. The key to Bristol is to have a car that can run both the top and the bottom. After the spring race, I’m confident that we can leave Bristol with another solid finish.”
