MOORESVILLE, N.C. (Sept. 11, 2025) – He only has three collective starts at Bristol (Tenn.) Motor Speedway, but Cody Ware has found a level of comfort at the high-banked, half-mile oval typically earned after a much broader body of work.
The 29-year-old racer from Greensboro, North Carolina, got his first taste of Bristol in April 2018 when he ran a NASCAR Xfinity Series race for Mike Harmon Racing. His first NASCAR Cup Series race at the track came more than four years later when he drove to a 17th-place finish in the 2022 Bass Pro Shops Night Race.
“That was a just a solid race all around for us,” said Ware, driver of the No. 51 Arby’s Ford Mustang Dark Horse for Rick Ware Racing. “We raced some pretty good teams all the way to the end. From start to finish, it was just a good, competitive race where we executed well.”
Ware’s most recent Bristol outing came five months ago in the Food City 500. It resulted in a 36th-place finish and a reminder that despite relative comfort, Bristol can still deliver a humbling experience.
“Bristol is 500 laps of chaos no matter if it’s on a sunny afternoon in April or under the lights on a Saturday night in September,” Ware said. “To be able to walk out of Bristol with a good result is always very rewarding, because you know how hard it is to achieve.”
With corners banked between 24-28 degrees connected by short, 650-foot-long straights, 16-second lap times are common around the .533-mile oval. Bristol demands a sustained level of attention that makes racing there a test of mental stamina.
“Even though the distance at Bristol is not very long – a little more than 266 miles – 500 laps there is a long time,” Ware said. “The mental endurance it takes run at 110 percent and be on you’re A-game from start to finish is key. You have to be laser-focused on hitting your marks, but also ready to adapt.
“Bristol is not like a traditional short track where the bottom lane is dominant throughout the race. You’re going to see people racing the middle line and the high line, and the track conditions are going to play a big part in that. You need to be on the wheel and stay ahead of those changing track conditions, and really pay attention to tire wear and what you’re feeling during the course of a run.”
While the racing at Bristol is physical, with plenty of bent fenders and hurt feelings, the physicality inside the racecar is surprisingly less so.
“With the banking at Bristol, it actually makes a race there a little less physical. You feel more vertical Gs at Bristol and that kind of holds you in place,” Ware said.
“Martinsville is another short track – shorter than Bristol – but it’s flat with very little banking. To me, Martinsville is more physical than Bristol because you feel more lateral Gs there.”
Lap times at Martinsville are about four seconds slower than those at Bristol. That means things happen quickly at Bristol, and despite its short-track status, it carries the trait of a superspeedway race where quick calls by a driver’s spotter can make the difference between a successful night and an early exit.
“Bristol is probably as mentally draining for the spotter as it is the driver,” Ware said. “He’s got to keep you apprised of what’s going on in front of you and behind you because everything at Bristol happens so fast. We all have to be really heads-up because there’s not much time to react, so it’s like Daytona and Talladega in that regard. Being in tune with your spotter and both of us being on our A-game is crucial to surviving the race and being there for the checkered flag.”
Ware’s run toward the checkered flag begins Friday with practice at 4:30 p.m. EDT followed by qualifying at 5:40 p.m. TruTV and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio will provide live coverage of both. The Bass Pro Shops Night Race goes green on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. EDT with flag-to-flag coverage delivered by USA and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio.
About Rick Ware Racing:
Rick Ware has been a motorsports mainstay for more than 40 years. It began at age 6 when the third-generation racer began his driving career and has since spanned four wheels and two wheels on both asphalt and dirt. Competing in the SCCA Trans Am Series and other road-racing divisions led Ware to NASCAR in the early 1980s, where he finished third in his NASCAR debut – the 1983 Warner W. Hodgdon 300 NASCAR Grand American race at Riverside (Calif.) International Raceway. More than a decade later, injuries would force Ware out of the driver’s seat and into full-time team ownership. In 1995, Rick Ware Racing was formed, and with his wife Lisa by his side, Ware has since built his eponymous organization into an entity that competes full-time in the elite NASCAR Cup Series while simultaneously campaigning successful teams in the Top Fuel class of the NHRA Mission Foods Drag Racing Series, Progressive American Flat Track, FIM World Supercross Championship (WSX) and zMAX CARS Tour.
