Team: No. 6 Progressive Ford Mustang
Crew Chief: Scott Graves
Twitter: @Roush6Team, @RoushFenway and @RyanJNewman
Race Format: 500 miles, 325 laps, Stage Lengths: 105-105-115
Folds of Honor QuikTrip 500 – Sunday, June 7 at 3 p.m. ET on FOX, PRN, SiriusXM Channel 90
ADVANCE NOTES
NASCAR Returns to Action
· NASCAR returns to the track where the schedule originally left off prior to sweeping changes from COVID-19, with all three national series (NCS, NXS, NGROTS) heading to Atlanta Motor Speedway.
· The Cup Series will run 500 miles on Sunday in the sixth event since NASCAR’s return to the track on May 17 in Darlington. Following Atlanta, the NCS will hit Martinsville (June 10), Homestead (June 14) and Talladega (June 21).
· Four weeks of NASCAR action were completed prior to the hiatus with races at Atlanta, Homestead, Texas, Bristol, Richmond, Talladega, Dover and Martinsville postponed.
Bristol Recap, Sunday Preview
· Despite two solo spins in the Castrol Ford, Newman overcame an ill-handling machine to battle for a 15th-place finish on Sunday.
· Sunday’s starting lineup at Atlanta will once again be determined by a random draw based on teams’ order in owner points. Newman and the No. 6 team are 20th in owner points, meaning they will draw for a starting spot in positions 13-24.
Newman Historically at Atlanta Motor Speedway
· Newman makes his 28th start at Atlanta on Sunday, where he carries an average finish of 17.9 with nine career top-10s.
· Newman has a stellar 7.1 average starting spot at the 1.5-mile track with seven career poles, as well as two-straight outside pole starts. In 26 career races Newman has started on the front row 12 times.
· His top finishes came back in 2004 and 2013 when he crossed the line fifth. He’s also finished 10th on four occasions, including most recently in 2015. Last season he ran 13th in the No. 6.
· Newman is a former winner at AMS in the Truck Series winning back in 2008, one of only seven Truck starts in his career.
· Newman also has three starts at AMS in the Xfinity Series, finishing eighth in 2010 and capturing the pole back in 2001.
Scott Graves at Atlanta Motor Speedway
· Graves will call his fourth NCS race at Atlanta on Sunday. In three prior starts, he has a best finish of 13th with Newman last season. He and Ricky Stenhouse Jr., earned the pole back in 2013 before finishing 16th, while he and Daniel Suarez finished 15th in 2018.
· Graves will call his ninth NCS race at Bristol on Sunday. With an overall average finish of 14.5, he led Newman to a ninth-place run in the 2019 spring race.
· Graves also called seven Xfinity Series events at Bristol dating back to 2012, recording one top five with Chris Buescher (2015) and two additional top-10s with Buescher (2014) and Daniel Suarez (2016).
· Graves is a former winner at AMS in the Xfinity Series, taking Kyle Busch to victory lane in 2017 after starting on the pole. He and Chris Buescher earned a fourth-place run in 2015, and he also finished seventh with Suarez a year later.
QUOTE WORTHY
Newman on racing at Atlanta:
“Atlanta is a track where we carry a lot of speed, and makes for some fun yet challenging racing with the different options we have to run. Some guys will keep it up near the wall, while others will try the bottom. We had a couple cautions not go our way last year and still managed a top-15, so we’re hoping for an even better performance this time around and glad to have a new partner in Progressive on the car.”
On the Car
It was announced Wednesday that Progressive Insurance will serve as the primary partner on the No. 6 machine with Ryan Newman this weekend in Atlanta.
