Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Tag

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service TALLADEGA, Ala. – Two factors threw the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs into chaos on Monday afternoon—Talladega and Ryan Blaney. By .007 seconds—the sixth closest finish in series history—Blaney edged Ryan Newman to win Monday’s rain-delayed 1000Bulbs.com 500 at Talladega Superspeedway, which took a big bite out of most other Playoff contenders and set up a scramble for the six remaining spots in the Round of 8 next Sunday at Kansas Speedway. With his first victory of the season, his first at TalladegaRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service TALLADEGA, Ala. – In a helter-skelter finish at the end of Lap 55, William Byron held the lead to win Stage 1 of Sunday’s 1000Bulbs.com 500 at Talladega Superspeedway to advance his cause in the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs. The winner of Stage 2 and the race, however, won’t be decided until Monday. Rain arrived during the first stage break and sent fans in the frontstretch grandstands scurrying for cover. A subsequent break in the rain wasn’t long enough to dry theRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service TALLADEGA, Ala. – Led by pole winner Chase Elliott, Hendrick Motorsports reasserted its domination of superspeedway qualifying on Saturday at Talladega. The winner at Talladega in April, Elliott toured the 2.66-mile track in 46.692 seconds (192.707 mph) to win his second Busch Pole Award at Talladega, his fourth of the season and the eighth of his career. Hendrick Motorsports swept the top four starting spots for Sunday’s 1000Bulbs.com 500 (2 p.m. ET on NBC, MRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). Alex Bowman qualified second atRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor TALLADEGA, Ala. – Back in the spring, Chase Elliott gave the fans at Talladega a thrill by scoring the victory. Nearly six months later, the Hendrick Motorsports driver is hoping to channel some of that same energy into another win on the 2.66-mile superspeedway to punch his ticket to the next round of the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs. This time around, a good performance is needed even more after retiring just six laps into the Round of 12 opener at Dover last weekend,Read More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor TALLADEGA, Ala. – Though Ricky Stenhouse, Jr. will be leaving the cockpit of the No. 17 Roush-Fenway Racing Ford at the end of the season, there is still work to do for the 32-year old Mississippian over the final six races of the year. Sunday’s 1000Bulbs.com 500 at Talladega could be the most important race of those remaining in 2019 as Stenhouse has had success on the superspeedways, claiming his two Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series wins at Daytona and Talladega in 2017. Stenhouse notedRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor TALLADEGA, Ala. – The opening day of on-track activity at Talladega Superspeedway was all about practice, with both the NASCAR Gander Outdoors Truck Series and Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series rolling out for a pair of 50-minute practices for both series. Austin Hill, Harrison Burton Lead Toyota Truck Series Practice Sweep While the first half of the opening Truck Series practice featured single car runs and a few drivers teaming up in tandems, business really picked up in the latter half of practice as multipleRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service TALLADEGA, Ala. – More than 18 years ago, Kevin Harvick was thrust into a career change he could not have anticipated a week earlier. After Dale Earnhardt’s death on the final lap of the 2001 Daytona 500, Harvick took over Earnhardt’s vaunted Richard Childress Racing ride the following week at Rockingham—albeit in a Chevrolet sporting the No. 29 in lieu of the trademark No. 3. In his third start in the car, Harvick won at Atlanta, the first of 48 career victories to date.Read More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor TALLADEGA, Ala. – Round One of the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoffs had the Charlotte ROVAL as the big wild card and this weekend the wild card race of the second round of the Playoffs looms large as the series rolls into Talladega Superspeedway for Sunday’s running of the 1000Bulbs.com 500. Racing at Talladega has always been crazy from the time the track opened back in 1969. From the driver boycott of the first race that led to unknown driver Richard Brickhouse scoring hisRead More

By Luis Torres, Staff Writer The latest piece of the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series puzzle has been placed as Stewart-Haas Racing announced Thursday that Aric Almirola will continue piloting the No. 10 Smithfield Foods Ford Mustang in 2020. After a biggest breakthrough campaign of his career in 2018 where he scored a win at Talladega last October and finished a career-high fifth in points, it has been a rather quiet 2019 campaign for the 12-year veteran. Although Almirola scored a pole at Atlanta and making the playoffs for the third timeRead More

By Seth Eggert, NASCAR Correspondent Contact under caution was the ‘highlight’ of the day for Clint Bowyer. The Drydene 400 was uncharacteristically quiet in regard to cautions at Dover International Speedway. With just one natural caution, the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Playoff Grid drivers had little chance move up the running order. Bowyer’s No. 14 ITsaavy / Haas Ford Mustang started mid-pack. While several of his playoff competitors had trouble early, the Stewart-Haas Racing driver quietly moved forward. Bowyer didn’t break into the top-10 until the end of theRead More