BRISTOL 1
Friday, April 11 — NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series, 7:30 p.m. ET (FS1)
Saturday, April 12 — NASCAR Xfinity Series, 5 p.m. ET (CW)
Sunday, April 13 — NASCAR Cup Series, 3 p.m. ET (FS1)
Bristol Motor Speedway has provided its share of Ford highlights through the years, including Rusty Wallace’s 50th career NASCAR Cup Series victory in 2000 and Elliott Sadler’s first career triumph in 2001 with the Wood Brothers. More are possible this weekend as all three top series will be in action with single races taking place on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
ACTIVE BRISTOL CUP WINNERS
Three current Ford drivers have at least one NASCAR Cup Series victory on the concrete of Bristol Motor Speedway. Brad Keselowski has three wins, including one with Ford in 2020, while Joey Logano owns a pair (2014-15) and Chris Buescher has one (2022). Rusty Wallace and Kurt Busch each had five victories to lead Ford all-time while David Pearson is next with four.
FORD’S BRISTOL TRIFECTA
Two drivers have won at least one race in all three of NASCAR’s top touring series at Bristol Motor Speedway with Ford. Mark Martin was the first to do it as he got Ford’s initial NASCAR Xfinity Series win at the track in 1989, and then followed that up with a Cup Series win in 1993 and Truck triumph in 2006. He did all of those while driving for Jack Roush, who also produced the other name on the list – Carl Edwards. The newest NASCAR Hall of Famer did it in order, winning in the Truck Series in 2004 and then the Xfinity Series in 2006 before completing the trifecta in 2007 at the Cup level. Ryan Blaney can join the duo this weekend if he wins Sunday.
BUESCHER SHOWING CONSISTENCY
Ford’s Chris Buescher is one of seven drivers leading the NASCAR Cup Series with five top-10 finishes in the first eight races. The Texas native is coming off a sixth-place effort last weekend at Darlington Raceway, which helped him maintain his 11th-place spot in the overall point standings. Buescher, who is still looking to lead his first lap in 2025, finished fifth at Phoenix Raceway for his best result of the season.
RYAN BLANEY: “Bristol is tough. It morphs from practice to the race. It’s weird because sometimes you get up to the fence in practice and sometimes you don’t. It just depends on how many marbles get laid down, so you have to really just kind of go back on previous races. I feel like you have to be in the mindset of change there because you go through it all weekend. I don’t think you ever feel fully comfortable at Bristol because it’s changing so often throughout the weekend and the race. All you can do is do the best you can.”
BRAD KESELOWSKI: “The big guessing game is the tires. We went there last spring and the tires didn’t hold up very well. The dynamics of the race shifted fairly drastically and then we came back in the fall and the tires didn’t wear at all. That was another shift in the dynamics of the race, so trying to understand which one of those is going to be the case is probably the biggest question mark.”
CHRIS BUESCHER: “We’ve been really good at Bristol. We’ve had good pace. Scott Graves and our whole group have made great strategy calls to find some track position and be able to make some big gains in that sense. We’ve had race cars that have run the bottom really well when they’ve gotten strung out on the top and been able to pass a lot of cars that way. Ultimately, we’ve had pace. We’ve had maneuverability and that’s led us to being able to make a lot of passes there.”
A THREE SERIES SWEEP
One of the most memorable Ford weekends at Bristol came in August of 2014 when Ford swept all three NASCAR series races – Craftsman Truck, Xfinity and Cup. Brad Keselowski captured his first NCTS victory while Ryan Blaney took the Xfinity event. Joey Logano capped the weekend sweep when he passed Matt Kenseth with 45 laps to go and then had to hold off Keselowski to post his third win of the 2014 season. Logano was in control until caution came out with 69 laps to go. While he pitted for four tires, Kenseth and others stayed out which put Logano sixth on the ensuing restart with 63 to go. With fresh tires, however, he was able to move to the front in less than 20 laps and then hold off his Penske teammate down the stretch. It marked the first time Ford swept all three divisions in the same weekend since 2006 when Mark Martin (NCTS) and Kenseth (NXS and NCS) did it, ironically, at Bristol.
ONE SMALL STEP FOR MAN, ONE GIANT LEAP FOR MANKIND
The date was July 20, 1969 and while Neil Armstrong was uttering those groundbreaking words as being the first man to step foot on the moon, David Pearson was busy winning at Bristol on the first race since the track installed high banking. What made the race even more interesting is that Pearson was relieved during the race by none other than Richard Petty, who was driving a Ford that season and dropped out earlier in the event. Even more ironic is that Petty was chasing Pearson for the championship that season, one in which Pearson eventually won for the second straight time.
FORD DOUBLING DOWN
Ford will be going for its second straight series win at Bristol Motor Speedway this weekend after Cole Custer won the final race of the regular season last year. The victory, which was his first at the track, came after he led a race-high 104 laps and resulted in clinching the number one seed in the playoffs. That marked Ford’s 11th all-time series win and Custer became the 10th different person to reach Victory Lane. The only Ford driver to win twice in the series at Bristol is Mark Martin (1989 and 1996).
RIGGS LOOKING TO GO BACK-TO-BACK
Layne Riggs comes into Friday night’s NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race looking for a second straight triumph at Bristol Motor Speedway after winning last year’s playoff race. That came on the heels of his first career victory one week earlier at the Milwaukee Mile and gave Riggs, who did not make the playoff field, back-to-back postseason wins. Ford has six all-time series victories at Bristol by six different drivers.
FORD’S NASCAR CUP SERIES WINNERS
AT BRISTOL (CONCRETE ONLY)
1963 – Fireball Roberts and Fred Lorenzen
1964 – Fred Lorenzen (Sweep)
1965 – Junior Johnson and Ned Jarrett
1966 – Dick Hutcherson (1)
1968 – David Pearson (Sweep)
1969 – David Pearson (2)
1970 – Donnie Allison (1)
1971 – David Pearson (1)
1988 – Bill Elliott (1)
1990 – Davey Allison (1)
1991 – Alan Kulwicki (2)
1992 – Alan Kulwicki (1)
1993 – Mark Martin (2)
1994 – Rusty Wallace (2)
1996 – Rusty Wallace (2)
1997 – Dale Jarrett (2)
1998 – Mark Martin (2)
1999 – Rusty Wallace (1)
2000 – Rusty Wallace (Sweep)
2001 – Elliott Sadler (1)
2002 – Kurt Busch (1)
2003 – Kurt Busch (Sweep)
2004 – Kurt Busch (1)
2005 – Matt Kenseth (2)
2006 – Matt Kenseth (2)
2007 – Carl Edwards (2)
2008 – Carl Edwards (2)
2014 – Carl Edwards and Joey Logano
2015 – Joey Logano (2)
2018 – Kurt Busch (2)
2020 – Brad Keselowski (1) and Kevin Harvick (2)
2022 – Chris Buescher
FORD’S NASCAR XFINITY SERIES WINNERS
AT BRISTOL
1989 – Mark Martin (2)
1994 – Kenny Wallace (2)
1996 – Mark Martin (1)
1997 – Jeff Burton (1)
2006 – Matt Kenseth (2)
2007 – Carl Edwards (1)
2009 – David Ragan (2)
2014 – Ryan Blaney (2)
2015 – Joey Logano (1)
2020 – Chase Briscoe (2)
2024 – Cole Custer
FORD’S NASCAR CRAFTSMAN TRUCK SERIES WINNERS AT BRISTOL (CONCRETE ONLY)
1995 – Joe Ruttman
2004 – Carl Edwards
2006 – Mark Martin
2014 – Brad Keselowski
2015 – Ryan Blaney
2024 – Layne Riggs
