Cup Category

By Holly Cain, NASCAR Wire Service LEBANON, Tenn. – Ross Chastain smiled and conceded, he had no idea how having the No. 1 pit box selection would be for Sunday’s Ally 400 NASCAR Cup Series race at Nashville Superspeedway. “I’d never had it before,’’ he said smiling. Chastain certainly earned it with honors on Saturday, claiming the Busch Light Pole in the No. 1 Trackhouse Racing Chevrolet with a blazing fast 160.687 mph lap in qualifying – a full 1 mph better than the field – earning the right toRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor The NASCAR Cup Series is back in Music City for the third straight year to take on Nashville Superspeedway and Sunday’s running of the Ally 400. Prior to its Cup debut in 2021, the track located on the outskirts of Nashville in Lebanon, Tennessee, was no stranger to hosting NASCAR events with both the NASCAR Xfinity Series and NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series running there from 2001 to 2011 before the track was shuttered. The Nashville track serves as an oddity on the Cup Series schedule, aRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service SONOMA, Calif. – What a difference a year makes.  After struggling mightily last year at Sonoma Raceway in the debut season for NASCAR’s Next Gen car, Martin Truex Jr. pulled off a dominating 180-degree turnaround in Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350.  Overcoming an inopportune caution and leading a race-high 51 of 110 laps, Truex scored his second victory of the season and his fourth at the 1.99-mile road course, most among active drivers and second only to Jeff Gordon’s five in track history.  Truex’s 33rd careerRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service SONOMA, Calif. – Denny Hamlin made the most of a second lap in the final round of Saturday’s qualifying to edge Tyler Reddick for the pole position for Sunday’s Toyota/Save Mart 350 at Sonoma Raceway (3:30 p.m. ET on FOX, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Running the fastest lap of the day, Hamlin toured the 1.99-mile road course in 77.719 seconds (92.178 mph) to earn his second Busch Light Pole Award of the season, his first at Sonoma and the 38th of his career. Reddick hadRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor The second half of the NASCAR Cup Series regular season rolls on as the West Coast comes calling this weekend, with Sonoma Raceway playing host to Sunday’s running of the Toyota/Save Mart 350. A 12-turn technical road course situated about 30 miles north of San Francisco, Sonoma is one of six road courses on the 2022 schedule, with Sonoma first joining the circuit back in 1989. Over the years, the course at Sonoma Raceway has gone through a few configuration changes. When the track was firstRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service MADISON, Ill. — Kyle Busch collected his 63rd NASCAR Cup Series victory on Sunday at World Wide Technology Raceway, but the driver of the No. 8 Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet had to work hard for the first-place money. Busch, the pole winner, survived five restarts in the last 40 laps of the Enjoy Illinois 300 and beat Denny Hamlin to the finish line by .517 seconds after Bubba Wallace’s broken brake rotor caused the 11th caution on Lap 236 and sent the race toRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service MADISON, Ill. — Saturday’s NASCAR Cup Series qualifying session at World Wide Technology Raceway broke a long dry spell for two-time series champion Kyle Busch. Rocketing around the 1.25-mile irregularly shaped speedway in 32.802 seconds (137.187 mph), Busch won his first Cup pole position since Nov. 10, 2019, when he was first on the grid at Phoenix Raceway. Earning his first Busch Light Pole Award for Richard Childress Racing, Busch edged Monday’s Coca-Cola 600 winner Ryan Blaney for the top starting spot by .008Read More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor For the second year in a row, the NASCAR Cup Series heads to the banks of the Mississippi River to take on World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway for Sunday’s running of the Enjoy Illinois 300. Located just across the river from St. Louis, the 1.25-mile oval resembles the layout of Darlington Raceway from overhead, with different radius corners on either end of the track. Turns 1-2 are also banked differently than Turns 3-4, providing a unique challenge for the drivers to tackle. The massive demandRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor When the NASCAR Cup Series takes the green next Sunday at World Wide Technology Raceway at Gateway, Chase Elliott will not be a part of the field after he was handed a one-race suspension on Tuesday. The penalty comes a day after he and Denny Hamlin had a run-in on lap 185 of the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte in which Elliott’s No. 9 Chevrolet bounced off the Turn 4 wall and then drove down the track into the right-rear quarter panel of Hamlin’s No. 11 Toyota,Read More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service CONCORD, N.C. – Finally.  Breaking a 59-race drought in Monday’s rain-delayed Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, Ryan Blaney gave team owner Roger Penske his first same-year sweep of IndyCar’s biggest race and NASCAR’s longest. With a dominant No. 12 Team Penske Ford that gained long-run speed as the race progressed, Blaney led a race-high 163 of 400 laps and held off polesitter William Byron for his first victory on the 1.5-mile Charlotte oval and the eighth of his career. A day after JosefRead More