Christopher Bell — winner: “Well, I’ll tell you what, I was nervous on the choose. I didn’t know if I wanted to be on the bottom or the top, and whenever Brad picked the top they really didn’t give me an option and had to pick the bottom. And all night long, I don’t know, old tires just really, really pushed up in the middle of the corners so I was hoping that those guys on old tires would push up and they did. I was able to get by or get underneath Bowman. It wasn’t pretty there at the end, but we got her done. So most importantly, this week’s obviously been a very tough week, and there’s a lot on our mind and and just this one’s for Charlie. We just know that any given week, it could be us, and it hadn’t been us for a long time. But Bristol, baby, tonight, it does!”
Bell: ‘Any given week, it can be us’
Old tires opened the door for Christopher Bell on the bottom of the track and knows that “any given week, it can be us.” Under the lights at Bristol, it was just that.
Brad Keselowski — second: “Just the story of our season, just a 50/50 shot on the restart and I got the lane that couldn’t launch. Just frustrating. We had a great car, great strategy, put ourselves in position to, if not win, at least have a really, really solid day, and on that last restart and just rolled the dice and didn’t get anything good. Just fun. I just enjoy the challenge. You’ve got to run a smart race and got to have really good cars and thought we did both today.”
Keselowski’s Bristol finish emulates Cup season
Brad Keselowski rolled the dice but came up short of the win at Bristol and discusses the joy of the “challenge” of tire management.
Zane Smith — third: “Hat’s off to this whole group at FRM. It’s kind of a home race for our team owner, Bob Jenkins, and it was really cool to have a couple Fords up there battling for it. I could just taste it, but it was crazy there on old tires and a few things just didn’t quite play out. I felt like I did a pretty good job on that restart, but you’re just so loose. I got so loose. I don’t know. You’re picking up marbles there on the back and pulling it up into the 77 and unfortunately that kind of lost our fighting chance.”
Ryan Blaney — fourth: “It was another one of those things where we thought we knew what the tire was gonna do and it did something completely different. I guess that’s happened multiple times and that makes for an exciting race and trying to figure it out on the fly and what to expect what to do and how to strategize and all that stuff. It was a wild night. I wish we wouldn’t have run so many laps under caution. The middle part of that race, two thirds of that race was kind of getting pretty boring, but we were really fast all night. It’s nice to win a stage and good to come home fourth. Overall, I’m really, really proud of the night and the effort. We’ll go on to Loudon next week. I’m looking forward to it. The tires were interesting. No one expected that. I guess that’s what they want. It practices one way and then it races a completely different way, so we just tried to manage tires and ran a bunch of laps under caution and I thought we were pretty good all night and glad to get a good finish.”
Joey Logano — fifth: “On that long run towards the end we were able to drive up to the lead and those cars in front of us, they were tanking before me. They were getting to the cords before me and so I felt like we had a good shot because they all pitted as soon as they got the cords, and I felt like that was gonna give me a good chance to maybe win the race if it stayed green there because the 6 was falling off hard. He was seven or eight tenths off the last two laps. The 12 was starting to tank as well, so I was feeling like I was gonna get them back and then the caution came out and we were out of tires. We had to put old tires back on it, so, overall, a top five and two top fives in a row, which at this point of the season we need to be doing that kind of stuff. I’m proud of the team and proud of the execution. I felt like the win was right there in front of us, but just couldn’t quite grab it. We just fired off really, really bad. It wasn’t really getting acclimated to anything. I felt like even that long run to start, after we got the first green flag cycle, I was like, ‘Alright, we’re pretty good.’ We were just trapped a lap down, so once we got it back we just needed longer runs. There was short run after short run. I can’t believe as much as everyone wants to save tires how much they’re all wrecking each other. It’s kind of crazy.”
Corey Heim — sixth: “Yeah, a good result there. Once everyone kind of realized the situation with the tires, we adjusted accordingly and did all of the right things and kept ourselves in it all day. It was a claw to get back on the lead lap after we had a right front go down in stage one, but can’t thank these 23XI Racing guys enough – they stuck with it. Thank you to Toyota for all of the support that went into my five Cup races this year. All the ups and downs that we had – to end on a high note is pretty special. Hopefully we can take that and move forward.”
Carson Hocevar — seventh: “It sucks, but we had a shot to win. We can only control what we can control. We don’t have a crystal ball up there with the yellows. I am just proud of this No. 77 Chevrolet team. We got caught out really early, and we were able to execute there with tire saving, managing and just executing at a top caliber. If things go green there, we would have had a huge tire advantage, but it just didn’t work out. I’m just super proud of this group. There were a lot of times where I felt like we had a shot to win races, and we were 30th. Man, obviously we really wanted that one to work out there or at least see if it would have, especially for a new pit crew. This team really wants to win, and you can only ask for shots.”
Alex Bowman — eighth: “I don’t think you can really point at something that cost us. Being out of tires at the end isn’t good, right, and honestly, we just played the hand that we could and stayed out. But if I had to pick one thing, our cycle tire restarts were just really poor. I couldn’t go at all. Zero grip. Our restarts on stickers or even when we’d put our qualifying scuffs on and stuff, it was fine, but cycle tires was really bad. Hats off to our whole 48 team. They did a good job throughout the course of the day and trying to be better after a rough last two weeks, and I think we swung it the right direction, and we can continue to do that for the next, what do we have, seven weeks left. We’ve just got to keep digging. Certainly sucks to not transfer, but our back was against the wall coming in here. We knew it was going to be a tough thing to do. Yeah, not a terrible day for us, and we’ll keep digging. Yeah, we’re a plenty capable race team a lot of the time, and just the last two weeks we’ve just not been very good. I thought those tracks would be a little tough for us but not how they were. Even coming here, we were typically a good bit better than we were tonight and yesterday when we come here. We have some work to do on our race cars, but everybody is always working, getting better, and tires change and the field changes. We’ve just got to keep digging to get better. I think this summer we were so fast every week that I’m a little surprised to be down on speed, but the guys work really hard, and we’ll keep digging on it.”
Restarts hurt Bowman’s chances to advance
Alex Bowman recaps his struggles on restarts at Bristol after failing to advance into the Round of 12 but knows his team is capable of putting together solid results in the final seven weeks.
Chase Briscoe — ninth: “It was definitely a wild night. We had a really good Toyota. Thought starting back there was going to be a huge determent – but honestly, how the race played out it was alright I guess. Crazy race. I didn’t have that one on the bingo card going into tonight. I don’t know if anyone did – truthfully. I don’t know. It was wild. I don’t know – I’m still processing what we just did. I wish that last caution wouldn’t have come out. It kind of trapped us – we had just came down pit road. That is the hard part on races like that – one untimely caution can change your whole race. Congrats to Christopher (Bell) – obviously pretty cool that JGR (Joe Gibbs Racing) swept that first round, and hopefully we can do that in the next round.”
William Byron — 12th: “We only had one run that I felt like was weird with the scuffs. Other than that, all the tires felt pretty normal. It was just so weird and hard to predict. It was just chaotic. From around 10th on back, there were just people running into each other, and then you had differences in tires. If they were four laps different, you just couldn’t make the corner and wrecks would happen everywhere.”
Tyler Reddick — 15th: “Just a night of what ifs – we were honestly pretty solid in our Toyota Camry. Stage one – when no one knew the tires we going to be what they were, we just burnt them up too much at the start, and just caught a lap down running 11th – and it seemed the rest of the night we had a hard time getting back on the lead lap, just kept missing the lucky dog. We did get it back at one point, but caution cycle got us again – so that was just how the night was.”
Kyle Busch — 16th: “The No. 8 Chevrolet team battled the entire race tonight at Bristol Motor Speedway, but we came up short. We struggled in qualifying and got a lap down early, but we gave it our all to the end. We battled some front-end issues, and briefly drove our way inside the Top 10, as we worked strategically to manage our tires. We’re leaving Bristol with a 16th-place finish, and we’ll continue to chase the win next weekend in New Hampshire.”
Ross Chastain — 19th: “We survived. For tonight in our No. 1 Chevy, to run those couple laps at the beginning of the race, we were just ripping and rolling along. I saw the No. 16 tank and realized it was a tire wear race. We just had no idea. I think the whole field was caught off guard, but we’ve got to understand when that’s coming. We’ve got some data points now from this track to see what was the same. Across the board, we just survived. We’re qualifying better, and we have to take that to New Hampshire and on. I’ll be leaning on my teammate, Shane van Gisbergen, for the Charlotte Roval. We just have to keep working. The coolest part about this is we’ll wake up Monday morning and go to work.”
Austin Hill — 25th: “Really proud of our Chevrolet team. We had a top-18 or 20 car if we didn’t lose the laps at the beginning of the race, but no one expected the tires to wear like they did. It caught us all by surprise. From that first run, it was just managing the situation the best we could. Everyone worked extremely hard this week and I’m glad we were able to leave with a solid run. This No. 33 group should be proud and we have one more crack at it in Talladega.”
Shane van Gisbergen — 26th: “Yeah, I’m happy but frustrated. Proud; it’s a privilege to be here but also pissed at myself. The last few week I just haven’t been good enough. I’ve been really doing well, getting better at ovals and I just haven’t performed the last couple weeks. Didn’t understand the track early enough there and what the tires were doing and how to save them. I blame myself at the moment, but thanks to the Trackhouse team we’ve had an awesome year and still not over yet, but I need to be better myself and it’s just going to come with time.”
SVG recaps first stint in NASCAR Cup playoffs
Shane van Gisbergen admits he struggled judging the track at Bristol and knows he will continue to improve in the Cup Series with time after being eliminated from the playoffs.
Austin Dillon — 28th: “Well, we didn’t process it fast enough. I just thought we had a flat tire and I was losing the right front. I didn’t know we were cording tires that fast. I just thought we were tight and then I was like, well, fired off fine and it was cording just like they did that one race a year ago so or. It’s unfortunate. I know NASCAR doesn’t want that to be the race for the playoffs because you want to be able to go out and race it out, and our car didn’t have any problems, no tire wear in practice. I’m guessing the temperature change is the biggest thing, and we just weren’t able to race hard. We wanted to be able to race hard and it came in to just a putting-around-trying-to-make-tires-live kind of race and our car wasn’t good for that. And it’s unfortunate. Just wanted a shot to race and didn’t feel like we really had that tonight. The guys were trying so hard to get us back on the lead lap trying to get things to fall right, but truthfully our car, we couldn’t go as long as we needed to, as fast as we needed to. There was opportunities there to be better, but I went hard one run and 21 laps is all I got before I was corded. We were shot really fast. I had to really manage tires and try and keep it underneath me and hope things would have played out. Truthfully they played out good as we could have — if we had run 15th tonight we’d probably transfer, but things hit us fast there at the beginning being the first car to really go through it.”
Austin Cindric — 30th: “Yeah, it’s not ideal. I had the fire there, and definitely held a lot of smoke, but huge credit to all my guys behind the wall, over the wall, to be prepared for a situation like that and to only lose five laps. We had a great car tonight, and definitely with the long run speed and being able to keep tires on the car, I’m not sure I would have been able to tell you that was going to be the game to start the day, but just proud of the effort, and well earned Sunday off for the 2 car. Looking forward to hitting the Round of 12 hard. I want to keep advancing through. This team is capable of a lot. I believe in this team. I believe in myself. I have not been driving as well as I am now in the Cup Series. It’s been a constant climb, and those around me reflect that.”
Cindric credits team for playoff advancement
Austin Cindric credits his team for their quick work of extinguishing a fire that helped him advance into the Round of 12 and hopes to hit it “hard” over the next three weeks.
Chase Elliott — 38th: “It was a game of just how quick could you get to the bottom after a few laps to preserve your tire. And I thought I was doing the smart thing. The Penske guys had got position on me, and I was just trying to get back in line and got a huge shot from behind. I don’t know if he had gotten hit, or I just stacked the lane up that much or what. Nonetheless, it happened and it’s done. Looks like we’re in a bit of a pickle here now. Cross our fingers and hope we get lucky. Sucks, I know that.”
Josh Berry — 39th: “Definitely started smoking a few laps before we pitted. We tried to ride it out a couple of laps, and then when we slowed down. It was getting pretty bad there. Man, just so disappointing. That was going to be a lot of fun. That was right in our wheelhouse. We were moving forward. That’s why we were trying to stick it out as long as we could. Because that could have been our opportunity right there for sure. Man, it’s been a tough couple of weeks, but it hasn’t been because of performance. These guys have been doing a great job. Just want to thank Miles and the Wood Brothers and everyone who’s done a good job on the team. Definitely not the way we wanted this first round to go, but I felt like we executed well and ran well. Just haven’t had the finishes. This is going to be a tough one to watch. That was going to be a lot of fun.
“Maybe seven or eight laps before we came down pit road we started getting some smoke in the cockpit, and then the longer I went the darker the smoke got and then, obviously, by the time we got on pit road it was completely black smoke. Something obviously caught on fire, so probably once again a car burned up for no reason. I don’t think the fire made it inside the cockpit. It was just a lot of smoke. It seemed like the fire stayed in the fender well, which is a good thing, but it’s just disappointing again. The car was really good. That was gonna fall right into our wheelhouse, I feel like, to have a really good night. We were able to make it pretty long on that first set and we were gonna be set up in a really good spot. This one is gonna be hard to watch because that looks like it’s gonna be a lot of fun. … We’ve qualified well. We’ve had good cars. We just haven’t had the good finishes. That’s just part of it. I don’t think you could ever script three last-place finishes in the ways that we’ve gotten them over the last few weeks.”
