SONOMA
Saturday, July 12 — NASCAR Xfinity Series, 4:30 p.m. ET (CW)
Sunday, July 13 — NASCAR Cup Series, 3:30 p.m. ET (TNT)
After running on the streets of Chicago last weekend, the NASCAR Cup and NASCAR Xfinity Series return to the road as Sonoma Raceway hosts its annual event on Saturday and Sunday. Ford drivers Ryan Preece and Zane Smith will be looking to advance in the In-Season Challenge on the Cup side while Ford’s Xfinity drivers continue their march toward the postseason.
PREECE HAVING CAREER YEAR
Ryan Preece is in the midst of his best NASCAR Cup Series season as he comes off a Ford-best seventh-place finish in Chicago. Preece, who is in his sixth year running a full-time schedule, goes into Sunday’s road course race at Sonoma Raceway with five top-10 efforts in the last eight races. Overall, the Connecticut native has eight top-10 runs this season, which is three more than his previous single-season high of five that he set last year with Stewart-Haas Racing. This weekend will be the fifth time Preece has started a Cup race at Sonoma. His best finish came two years ago when he was 13th.
IN-SEASON CHALLENGE UPDATE
Two Ford drivers remain alive as the inaugural In-Season Challenge reaches the quarterfinal round this weekend at Sonoma Raceway. Ryan Preece, who eliminated fellow Ford driver Noah Gragson in the Round of 16, will be matched against Tyler Reddick. Zane Smith, who saw his run continue after he edged Chris Buescher by four spots in Chicago, will face Ty Gibbs with a berth in the semifinals on the line.
HALL OF FAME TIES
Ford has won eight times at Sonoma and the one thing all of those winners have in common is that their owners are members of the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Robert Yates (Class of 2018) won this event three times (Davey Allison, 1991; Ernie Irvan, 1994; and Ricky Rudd, 2002), while Jack Roush (Class of 2019) has two victories (Mark Martin, 1997 and Carl Edwards, 2014). Bud Moore (Class of 2011) took Geoffrey Bodine to Victory Lane in 1993 while Roger Penske (Class of 2019) did the same with Rusty Wallace in 1996 and Tony Stewart (Class of 2020) with Kevin Harvick in 2017.
JOEY LOGANO: DO YOU LIKE HAVING ROAD COURSE RACES BUNCHED TOGETHER OR WOULD YOU RATHER HAVE THEM SPREAD OUT? “We’ve got to do them, so I’m kind of good either way. I just think in the playoffs you need to have a good mixture of racetracks throughout the 10 weeks, but the other regular season races, I mean, if we’re gonna do them, then I don’t really care. Whatever works best for the schedule and weather and fans and that type of stuff is fine with me.”
RYAN BLANEY: “I don’t think it’s any more difficult than going different places week to week. Whether it’s road course to oval or road course to road course, you just understand the schedule and you know what to do and you understand the flow of it. I think it’s actually nicer that we can go two road courses in a row because it just keeps you in that mindset of a road course. Every track layout is different no matter what it is, so that’s already difficult, but I think it’s actually better just staying in that mindset for a couple of weeks.”
CHRIS BUESCHER: “We talk about momentum in our sport all the time and while it’s made up in some people’s minds, it works more times than not and, to me, it means that if you can get momentum on your side for these early road courses, then I think it can carry over into Sonoma and the Glen as well. So, I’m curious to see how it all plays out. We’ll kind of get some feedback from the industry and from our fans and see where their mind is at, but I’m on board right now.”
RYAN PREECE: “I’m a big fan of having back-to-back road courses. I feel like after Mexico we’ve been really good. We were good at COTA in the race and then transferred that to Mexico. I feel really confident about where our team is at as far as continuing to build and the direction we’re heading for road courses. Some people look at road courses as a wild card where you don’t really know what you could have. I look at it as an opportunity to attack.”
EDWARDS NETS FIRST ROAD COURSE WIN
Recent NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee Carl Edwards held off Jeff Gordon on the final lap to post the first road win of his NCS career in 2014 with car owner Jack Roush. He did it thanks to a two-stop strategy and a timely caution. Edwards had just pitted on lap 70 when NASCAR threw a caution for debris one lap later. While most of the field decided to pit for new tires, Edwards and fellow Ford driver Marcos Ambrose stayed out and gained the necessary track position that put both in position to win. Ambrose took the lead from Clint Bowyer on lap 81 and brought Edwards with him, but another restart with 25 to go saw Ambrose and Edwards sharing the front row. Edwards got the jump and took the lead, which he never surrendered, although a hard-charging Gordon made it interesting on the final lap.
RUDD RUCKUS
When Ford took the checkered flag at Sonoma Raceway for the first time it came in controversial fashion. That’s because Davey Allison, the man credited with winning the Banquet Frozen Foods 300 in 1991, was sent spinning by Ricky Rudd as they were approaching the white flag. Even though Rudd, one of the most recent inductees into the NASCAR Hall of Fame, ended up crossing the finish line first, he received the black flag from NASCAR for rough driving and awarded Allison with the trophy. The win was Allison’s first and only one on a road course and snapped an eight-race streak that had seen either Rudd or Rusty Wallace in Victory Lane at Watkins Glen International or Sonoma Raceway.
MAYER AND CREED DO IT AGAIN
The Haas Factory Team duo of Sheldon Creed and Sam Mayer have come out of the box strong in their first season with the new organization. Even though both drivers are still looking for their first win of the year, they have been consistently in the mix as evidenced by last week’s race in Chicago. Creed led nine laps and won the second stage before finishing third while Mayer ended up eighth. That represented the sixth time both drivers have finished in the top 10 of the same race (Daytona, Las Vegas, Homestead, Martinsville, Nashville and Chicago). Mayer, who is a Ford-best third in the series point standings, comes to Sonoma after a third-place finish a year ago. Creed, who is eighth in points, was the runner-up in this event last season.
FORD’S NASCAR CUP SERIES WINNERS
AT SONOMA
1991 – Davey Allison
1993 – Geoffrey Bodine
1994 – Ernie Irvan
1996 – Rusty Wallace
1997 – Mark Martin
2002 – Ricky Rudd
2014 – Carl Edwards
2017 – Kevin Harvick
FORD’S NASCAR XFINITY SERIES WINNERS AT SONOMA
2023 – Aric Almirola
The Ford Mustang, celebrating its 61st anniversary in 2025, is the world’s best selling sports car. It is also one of the planet’s most popular race cars. With Mustang-based race cars competing in international sports car competition (GT3 and GT4), NASCAR, NHRA, Formula Drift, in Australian Supercars, at the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb and in its own bespoke one-make series – Mustang Cup and Mustang Challenge – the platform has an unprecedented global reach. This weekend, 38 Mustang race cars are scheduled to race across all disciplines. Learn more at FordPerformance.com.
