Hendrick Motorsports Media Advance: Bristol

Bristol Motor Speedway
Saturday, Sept. 13
0.533-Mile Short Track
7:30 PM ET
Location: Bristol, Tennessee
TV: Fox
Event: NASCAR Cup Series (Race 29 of 36)
RADIO: SiriusXM

5 KYLE LARSON
Age: 33 (July 31, 1992)
Hometown: Elk Grove, California
Last Week: 12th (WWT Raceway)
Crew Chief: Cliff Daniels
Standings: 3rd

No. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM Chevrolet

• Kyle Larson enters the Bristol Night Race having won the last two events at Bristol Motor Speedway (April 2025, September 2024) while sweeping the stages in both races. The Elk Grove, California, native can become the fifth driver to win three consecutive NASCAR Cup Series races at Bristol with a win Saturday night.
• Larson has led 873 laps of 1,000 laps (87%) in the last two Bristol races combined, the most over two races on a short track since 1972 (Bobby Allison led 903 at Bristol). The 33-year-old set a new Hendrick Motorsports record for the most laps led in an event with 462 in last fall’s Bristol Night Race. He’s led 1,762 circuits at Bristol in his career, his most at any venue.
• The driver fo the No. 5 HENDRICKCARS.COM Chevrolet has finished in the top 10 in 11 of his last 12 Bristol starts including top-five showings in all six starts with Hendrick Motorsports. His average finish of 2.8 at Bristol in the Next Gen era is his second best (Indianapolis Motor Speedway, 1.5).
• Larson also has a pair of NASCAR Xfinity Series wins at The Last Great Coliseum (August 2018, April 2025).
• He is two top-10 finishes away from 200 for his Cup career and three away from his 100th with Hendrick Motorsports.
• Larson and the No. 5 team enter this weekend’s Round of 16 finale needing just eight points to clinch a spot in the Round of 12.

9 CHASE ELLIOTT
Age: 29 (Nov. 28, 1995)
Hometown: Dawsonville, Georgia
Last week: 3rd (WWT Raceway)
Crew Chief: Alan Gustafson
Standings: 9th

No. 9 NAPA Auto Parts Chevrolet

• Following his third-place run last weekend at WWT Raceway, Chase Elliott improved to ninth in the NASCAR Cup Series playoff standings, 28 points above the cutline to advance to the Round of 12.
• Regardless of who wins at Bristol Motor Speedway this weekend, the 29-year-old driver would advance with 40 points.
• Elliott’s average finish of 11.82 leads all Cup Series drivers in 2025.
• The 2020 Cup champion’s nine top-10 finishes at Bristol are his second most at a track without a points-paying win. Elliott won the 2020 All-Star Race at the 0.533-mile oval.
• In his five starts at Bristol in the Next Gen era, Elliott has two runner-up finishes and four top 10s with an average finish of 6.8.
• Elliott has one points-paying short track victory in his Cup career, capturing the win at Martinsville Speedway in the fall of 2020. He also won the Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium exhibition event earlier this year.

24 WILLIAM BYRON
Age: 27 (Nov. 29, 1997)
Hometown: Charlotte, North Carolina
Last Week: 11th (WWT Raceway)
Crew Chief: Rudy Fugle
Standings: 6th

No. 24 RAPTOR Chevrolet

• After the second race of the NASCAR Cup Series Round of 16, William Byron is sixth, 39 points above the cutline.
• So far in the 2025 season, the Charlotte, North Carolina, native has led the second most laps (915), run the second most laps in the top five (2,931) and the most in the top 10 (4,315).
• In the Next Gen era on short tracks, Byron has three wins which is tied for the third most. One of those came earlier this year at Iowa Speedway.
• In the last 10 short track races, Byron has two wins, one runner-up result, three top-five finishes, six top 10s and 280 laps led with an average starting position of 10.6 and an average finish of 8.7.
• During the spring event at Bristol Motor Speedway, the driver of the No. 24 earned 31 points, sixth most among playoff drivers.
• Out of 12 starts at the Tennessee short track, Byron has a best finish of third which came in back-to-back races in 2021 and 2022.

48 ALEX BOWMAN
Age: 32 (April 25, 1993)
Hometown: Tucson, Arizona
Last Week: 26th (WWT Raceway)
Crew Chief: Blake Harris
Standings: 15th

No. 48 Ally Open Road Sweeps Chevrolet

• Alex Bowman is making his seventh appearance in the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs and sits 15th in the standings, 35 points below the cutline with one race remaining in the Round of 16.
• He has 14 top-10 finishes in 2025, his most through 28 races in a season, along with six top fives including two runner-up results (Homestead-Miami Speedway, Richmond Raceway).
• Bowman has three top fives and five top 10s in 16 career starts at Bristol Motor Speedway, with a best finish of fourth in March 2024. He’s sat on the pole for each of the last two Bristol races.
• The featured Best Friends Animal Society partner is the Friends of Campbell County, Tennessee Animals, in Jacksboro, Tennessee.
• This weekend at Bristol, Bowman will debut the No. 48 Ally Open Road Sweeps paint scheme, highlighting Ally and HendrickCars.com’s fan sweepstakes promotion.
• Ally and HENDRICKCARS.COM are teaming up again to give fans the chance to win prizes with this year’s “Open Road Sweepstakes.” Fans can win VIP experiences at various races throughout the season and one lucky winner will hit the open road in a Chevy Silverado LT Trail Boss with an Airstream camper. Fans can stop by the Ally Fan Zone to enter the sweepstakes in-person and check out the camper. Fans can also enter at ally.com/sweepstakes/nascar.

Hendrick Motorsports

 
*Most all time
**Tied for most all time

• Hendrick Motorsports engines have won 19 poles (seven in the NASCAR Cup Series, 12 in the Xfinity Series) and 25 races (six in Cup, 18 in Xfinity and one in the preseason Clash) in 2025 and have powered teams to 40 points paying Cup Series victories in the Next Gen era, the most of any organization.
• Hendrick Motorsports has led 2,411 laps through 28 events this year, accounting for 34% of all circuits completed in the Cup Series and 800 more than any other team.
• With 17, the organization leads the series in stage wins. That total is the second most through a season’s first 28 races all time.
• Hendrick Motorsports has had at least one driver finish in the top 10 in 27 of 28 races in 2025.
• All four of Hendrick Motorsports’ drivers qualified for the Cup Series playoffs for the fourth time in the last five years and the seventh time overall.
• The organization is the all-time leader in top fives (72) and top 10s (126) at Bristol Motor Speedway. In the last six races at the 0.533-mile, Tennessee short track, at least one Hendrick Motorsports driver has finished in the top five (longest active streak) and at least two have earned top-10 finishes.
• Last fall in the Bristol Night Race, Hendrick Motorsports drivers combined to lead 496 of 500 laps (Kyle Larson 462, Alex Bowman 34), the largest percentage of circuits paced at any event in company history.

QUOTABLE /
 
Kyle Larson, driver of the No. 5 Chevrolet, on the Bristol Night Race: “The atmosphere is always up for the (Bristol) Night Race. The night race just means more to me, I don’t know if everyone feels the same way but I want to win all the races but I would like to win the night race over the spring one if I had to pick one or the other just because winning under the lights at Bristol is pretty awesome. It’s not considered a crown jewel but in my mind it’s the one I want to win really badly every year.”

Chase Elliott, driver of the No. 9 Chevrolet, on how to improve on last year’s runner up finish at Bristol: “Probably qualify better. Last year, we qualified OK, but you just get put in a tough spot because it’s really tough to pass the leader there. We kind of fell into that last season. So, then your opportunities kind of come up, how else can you get the lead, right? It’s on pit road or on a restart. So, to have a better chance on pit road you’ve got to qualify better to put your team in a better position to try and do that. I think that was probably the missing piece. We had some great pit stops last year from what I remember. I just don’t think we were in a great stall and that puts you at a disadvantage.”

William Byron, driver of the No. 24 Chevrolet, on Bristol Motor Speedway: “Bristol is a track that we’ve always been solid at but just need a little bit more to be consistently good every time we’re there. We have a new tire there this weekend, so that’s a bit of an unknown of how the race will play out. Obviously, we want to win to rack up playoff points, but we need to not put ourselves in a bad spot that may hurt us from moving forward a round. If we execute how I know we can, we should be good.”

Alex Bowman, driver of the No. 48 Chevrolet, on going to Bristol Motor Speedway: “The last two weekends have been tough on our Ally team. I’m really looking forward to getting back to Bristol since we have been strong there in the past. We started on the pole in the last two races there, so we have the speed … We need to have a smooth weekend and hopefully it will be enough to get into the next round.”