NASCAR viewer’s guide: Charlotte Motor Speedway

By Zach SturnioloMay 25, 2022, 10:00 AM EDT

The longest race of the season is upon us as NASCAR heads to Charlotte Motor Speedway for the Coca-Cola 600.

That means the second half of the regular season begins. The opening 13 races of the Next Gen era have provided plenty of storylines heading into Charlotte.

Parity highlights opening half

Eleven different drivers have gone to victory lane in 13 races this season, tied for the second-most number of winners in that span in Cup history, according to Racing Insights.

Among those include drivers you’d expect to see celebrating: Kyle Larson, Kyle Busch, Denny Hamlin, Joey Logano and Chase Elliott. But the list of victors also includes names you probably didn’t expect: rookie Austin Cindric winning the Daytona 500; Chase Briscoe winning at Phoenix; Ross Chastain and William Byron tied with two wins apiece as the series’ leaders.

With the exception of Chastain at Trackhouse Racing and Kurt Busch at 23XI Racing, the winners are still coming from the sport’s traditional powerhouses: Hendrick Motorsports, Joe Gibbs Racing, Team Penske and Stewart-Haas Racing.

But a rotating cast of characters have been in the mix throughout the year, including Richard Childress Racing’s duo of Austin Dillon and Tyler Reddick, Petty GMS Motorsports’ Erik Jones and JTG Daugherty Racing’s Ricky Stenhouse Jr. Stenhouse has three straight top-10 finishes, tied for the longest streak of his career and the longest streak for JTG.

Expecting another 11 drivers to win between now and the regular season finale at Daytona is unreasonable. But perhaps the parity produces some more surprises heading into this year’s playoffs.

Trials of the winless

While the list of 2022 winners is long, there are some notable absences this season, including past Cup champions Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski and Martin Truex Jr.

Harvick is in the midst of a 56-race winless streak, the second-longest of his career and a span dating back to the Bristol night race in September 2020. Since that win, the 2014 champion has finished runner-up four times with scored 13 total top-five finishes.

Keselowski’s streak is over a season long, sitting at 39 races since his Talladega win in April 2021. At RFK Racing, Keselowski has just one top 10 — ninth in the Daytona 500 — and six top 15s.

Truex has contended for multiple wins this season, most notably at Las Vegas and Richmond. His winless streak sits at 21 races, dating back to Richmond in September 2021.

Hendrick headway

The cars have changed, but Hendrick Motorsports remains the same — dominant.

All four Hendrick drivers have won this season thanks to wins at Auto Club (Larson), Las Vegas (Alex Bowman), Atlanta (Byron), Martinsville (Byron) and Dover (Elliott). The team has also won four of the last five races at 1.5-mile tracks.

Last year’s Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte was a Hendrick playground, as Larson won the race and each stage from the pole, and HMS cars ran first and second for 356 of the 400 laps.

While that appears less likely to happen this year, the team shows it can’t be counted out.

Entry lists

Thirty-seven cars will compete in the Cup race this weekend. The No. 50 The Money Team Racing Chevrolet and driver Kaz Grala are the lone open entry this weekend.

Noah Gragson will pilot the No. 16 Kaulig Racing Chevrolet and Josh Bilicki returns to the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet. Ryan Preece will drive the No. 15 Ford for Rick Ware Racing.

NASCAR Cup Series Entry List — Charlotte Motor Speedway

The Xfinity Series sees 42 cars on its entry list for 38 positions, meaning four cars will fail to qualify. Preece will pilot the No. 5 car for BJ McLeod Motorsports. Nick Sanchez will be Preece’s teammate driving the No. 99 entry.

Trevor Bayne will drive the No. 18 Toyota for Joe Gibbs Racing. Austin Dillon will drive the No. 48 Chevrolet for Big Machine Racing, which got its first victory last week at Texas with Tyler Reddick.

NASCAR Xfinity Series Entry List — Charlotte Motor Speedway

In the Camping World Truck Series, 37 vehicles are entered for 36 spots, meaning one will fail to qualify.

Ross Chastain is back in the No. 41 truck for Niece Motorsports, while Kyle Busch returns to the No. 51 Kyle Busch Motorsports Toyota. In a triple-duty effort, Preece will drive the No. 17 Ford for David Gilliland Racing.

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Entry List — Charlotte Motor Speedway

This weekend’s schedule and forecast

(All times Eastern)

Friday, May 27

Forecast: AM thunderstorms likely, then chance of PM scattered thunderstorms, high of 77 degrees, 90% chance of rain

12 – 12:45 p.m. — ARCA practice and qualifying
1:30 – 2 p.m. — Truck practice (FS1)
2 – 3 p.m. — Truck qualifying (single vehicle, one lap, FS1)
3:30 – 4 p.m — Xfinity practice (FS1)
4 – 5 p.m. — Xfinity qualifying (single vehicle, one lap, FS1)
6 p.m. — ARCA race (100 laps/150 miles; FS1, MRN)
8:30 p.m. — Truck race (134 laps/201 miles; FS1, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio)

Saturday, May 28

Forecast: Partly cloudy, 15% chance of rain, high near 80 degrees, winds west at 5-10 mph

1 p.m. — Xfinity race (167 laps/250.5 miles, FS1, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio)
7 – 7:45 p.m. — Cup practice (two groups, FS1, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio)
7:45 – 9 p.m. — Cup qualifying (single vehicle, one lap, two rounds, FS1, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio)

Sunday, May 29

Forecast: Partly cloudy, high of 84 degrees, light winds

6 p.m. — Cup race (400 laps/600 miles; FS1, PRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio)

Corey LaJoie calls fourth-place finish ‘huge’ for him, Spire Motorsports

By Dustin LongMar 20, 2023, 7:00 PM EDT

HAMPTON, Ga. — With about 30 laps left in Sunday’s Cup race, Joey Logano looked around and suddenly saw Corey LaJoie’s car near the front.

“Oh, there he is,” Logano, the eventual winner, said he thought to himself. “Where has he been all day?

“Corey just kind of popped up there.”

LaJoie took a methodical approach — he ran in the top 10 for only 13 of the first 167 laps — and found himself toward the front for the third consecutive race since Atlanta Motor Speedway was reconfigured.

His career-best fourth-place finish Sunday continued his strong runs at Atlanta, but also showed the growth in his Spire Motorsports team. While it’s only five races into the season, LaJoie is 14th in the points. He’s never finished better than 29th in Cup.

LaJoie placed fifth at Atlanta in March 2022 and was passed by Chase Elliott for the lead two laps from the finish in the July 2022 race there. Sunday, his push launched Logano on the final lap to pass Brad Keselowski for the win.

While LaJoie continues to seek his first career Cup win, he was excited about his result.

“Hell, yeah, there’s moral victories,” he said after Sunday’s finish. “If you get … smashed 35 weekends out of the year, here’s an opportunity where you can win. When you can run fourth, there are so many good things wrapped up in that. … For me, it’s huge. For our team, it’s huge.”

Also significant was that LaJoie was the top-finishing Chevrolet.

“That’s a really big deal for us,” crew chief Ryan Sparks told NBC Sports. “Just kind of prove ourself and hopefully continue to build a relationship with Chevrolet. It’s always great to be (Chevrolet’s) top finisher. Obviously, we want to win the race. We’re getting closer. I think we’ll get up there for the year is done.”

After failing to make the feature in the Clash at the Coliseum exhibition race, LaJoie finished 16th in this year’s Daytona 500. He followed that by placing 14th at Fontana, California and then was 20th at Las Vegas and 26th at Phoenix before Sunday.

He has an average finish of 16.0 in the first races of the season. He’s never had an average finish better than 24th in his previous full-time Cup seasons.

His performance this year has him in a playoff spot and ahead of in the standings:

Three cars from Stewart-Haas Racing
Both cars from 23XI Racing
Both cars from Legacy Motor Club
Both cars from Front Row Motorsports
All the Hendrick cars (although their penalties will be appealed)
Both Kaulig Racing cars

“We’ve started the year off really, really solid,” LaJoie said. “I don’t think we could have started any better. We messed up at Phoenix, but we came back and rebounded and put a good payday in the bank and a couple of points around the guys we are racing as well.

“It’s inevitable that a lot of the guys we’re in front of are going to catch us, those guys are the ones that run top 10 and top 15 consistently, so we have to get to where we can, on any given intermediate or any given short track, run in the top 15 a little bit better. We’re getting there. Days like this give us more confidence.”

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Sunday’s race matched two drivers who are among the best in the sport at speedway style racing dueling for the win in former teammates Joey Logano and Brad Keselowski.

It marked the first time they had finished 1-2 in a speedway style race, as Logano passed Keselowski on the last lap to win Sunday at Atlanta.

“I feel like Brad is one of the top five best speedway racers on the racetrack,” Logano said. “I feel like I’m in there. A few others that are in there that you just know are really, really good at it.

“We were kind of duking it out back and forth, side by side, side drafting each other. Okay, this is what you would expect. It’s fun going up against the best like that.

“He works really hard at it. He studies it. He’s really smart at speedway racing, for sure. When you think of driver and spotter combinations, you’re going against two of the best right there, right? Whether it’s T.J. (Majors) and Brad or myself and Coleman Pressley) , if I’m picking a couple pairings of people that understand the draft, those two groups are the best at it. So it was fun to kind of go back and forth there at the end.”

Said Keselowski of racing Logano: “We know each other’s moves pretty well, for sure, but it’s just a matter of how the cookie crumbles and it kind of came his way there at the end and he made a good move. Kudos to him.”

It was a much different ending from their duel on the final lap of the 2021 Daytona 500. Logano led Keselowski when they made contact, triggering a multi-car crash and allowing Michael McDowell to win the race.

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Brad Keselowski’s runner-up finish continued his improved start to the season compared to last year.

“We’re right there, though, as our team just continues to improve and show what we’re made of,” Keselowski said, “so I’m proud of that.”

A look at how much better this season has started for Keselowski compared to last year:

His average finish in the first five races of this season is 13.2 compared to 19.2 at this time last year.

He’s run in the top 15 in 85% of the laps run this season compared to running in the top 15 in 37.4% of the laps in the first five races of last season.

His average running position in a race is 9.5 this year compared to 18.3 at this time last year.

Several Cup drivers running extra race at COTA

By Dustin LongMar 20, 2023, 5:22 PM EDT

Seven Cup drivers will do double-duty this weekend at Circuit of the Americas.

Four Cup drivers are entered for Saturday’s Xfinity Series race at the road course in Austin, Texas. They are:

Aric Almirola (No. 08 SS Green Light Racing)

AJ Allmendinger (No. 10 Kaulig Racing)

William Byron (No. 17 Hendrick Motorsports)

Ty Gibbs (No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing)

Three Cup drivers are entered for Saturday’s Craftsman Truck Series race at COTA. They are:

Alex Bowman (No. 7 Spire Motorsports)

Ross Chastain (No. 41 Niece Motorsports)

Kyle Busch (No. 51 Kyle Busch Motorsports)

In the Cup Series, there are 39 entries that includes a few road racing specialists:

Jordan Taylor (No. 9 Hendrick Motorsports)

Jenson Button (No. 15 Rick Ware Racing)

Kimi Raikkonen (No. 91 Trackhouse Racing)

Also entered this weekend is Jimmie Johnson in the No. 84 for Legacy Motor Club and IndyCar driver Conor Daly in the No. 50 for TMT Racing.

COTA Cup Entry List

COTA Xfinity Entry List

COTA Truck entry list

Winners and losers at Atlanta Motor Speedway

By Mike HembreeMar 20, 2023, 7:00 AM EDT

A look at winners and losers in Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Atlanta Motor Speedway:

WINNERS

Joey Logano — Logano had won 31 Cup Series races entering Sunday’s 400-miler, but none had come at Atlanta. He changed that statistical column in a big way, leading 140 laps and making a risky move around leader Brad Keselowski on the final lap to record win No. 32.

Brad Keselowski — Keselowski’s struggle to return RFK Racing to prominence has taken many months, but he has had impressive runs this year. He led 47 laps Sunday and was on the verge of victory.

Christopher Bell — With better organization from the Toyotas at the front, Bell would have had a shot at a win. He finished third and has been in the top six in four of the season’s five races.

Corey LaJoie — Sunday’s fourth-place run was LaJoie’s best in 205 Cup starts, and his smart start to the season is an indication that better things might be ahead.

LOSERS

William Byron — Byron’s two-race winning streak ended with a thud — literally — Sunday as he was involved in a multi-car crash and finished 32nd.

Kevin Harvick — From one instant to the next, Harvick fell from first place to out of the race. He lost control of his car in tight racing with Ross Chastain and hit the wall. He finished 33rd.

Kyle Larson — Larson fought the good fight with the more dominant Fords much of the day in the top 10, but his car was damaged in a crash with Aric Almirola. Larson parked and finished 31st.

Long: One lap, 30 seconds of action with so much at stake at Atlanta

By Dustin LongMar 19, 2023, 9:23 PM EDT

HAMPTON, Ga. — As they began the final lap of Sunday’s Cup race at Atlanta Motor Speedway, Brad Keselowski led Christopher Bell by a car length. Joey Logano ran third, with Corey LaJoie on his rear bumper in fourth, and Tyler Reddick beside LaJoie in fifth.

So much was at stake over the final 1.54 miles and would be determined in the next 30 seconds on a brisk day at a track that looks like an intermediate speedway but races like Daytona and Talladega.

Here’s what mattered for each:

Keselowski sought to end a 66-race winless streak that stretches nearly two years.
Bell looked to score his third win in the last nine Cup races, which would have been more than any other driver in that span.
Logano sought a win in a season that Fords have had few chances to do so.
LaJoie was focused on winning his first Cup race.
Reddick looked to earn his first victory with his new team.

It started with Keselowski, who is in his second year as owner-driver at RFK Racing. The organization fought through struggles last year before teammate Chris Buescher won the Bristol night race.

Keselowski was going for his first Cup victory for his team in what has been a markedly better start to this season compared to last year.

“You need days like this,” Keselowski said afterward. “You just wish they were wins. We were right there, just didn’t come together at the end.”

Bell is proving to be the under-appreciated ace in the Cup series.

He twice needed to win to advance in the next round of the playoffs last year — and did so. Both victories were overshadowed. The focus at the Charlotte Roval was on Chase Briscoe eliminating Kyle Larson from the playoffs instead of Bell’s win. Ross Chastain’s video game move was the talk of Martinsville instead of Bell’s triumph that day.

Nobody had won this year in Cup except Chevrolet drivers. That made this a key race for Ford and Toyota drivers.

“We haven’t had the start to the season we’d want or hope for,” said Paul Wolfe, crew chief for Logano. “The West Coast swing was pretty rough on us. We had speed at times, but not really where we need to be on any of those tracks. So we’ve got our work cut out for us.

“We know the speedways with all the aero changes to all the manufacturers, the speedways are probably the strengths for the Fords right now. I think we saw that in Daytona as well. If you look at qualifying (Saturday), that will probably point to that same sign.

“We have to take advantage of these races right now. If this is our strength, we got to make sure we execute. That’s probably what I’m most proud of, is we were able to come here and get the win. Now we’ve really have to squeeze hard to get more speed out of our cars on the downforce tracks.”

LaJoie finished fifth in this race a year ago and was passed for the lead with two laps to go. He entered Sunday’s race winless in 204 career Cup races. He had three top-20 finishes in the first four races of the year, solid performances for his Spire Motorsports team. He’s gained some attention for those efforts.

“If we have a good car like we saw at Fontana or Las Vegas,” LaJoie said earlier this week of his 14th at California and 20th at Las Vegas, “then I can go get the job done and be up front. So, certainly a crucial beginning part of the season for me with the future of my career. I want to make sure people know what I’m capable of, no matter whether it’s an intermediate or a short track or superspeedway.”

Reddick is in his first season with 23XI Racing and it has been a rough start to the season. He was eliminated by accidents in the first two races of the year. He scored his first top 10 of the year last week at Phoenix and looked for even more Sunday.

It is what all those situations hovering as the white flag waved to begin the final lap.

The key moment came with LaJoie planted on the back of Logano’s rear bumper on the inside lane.

“Joey got such a huge run down the frontstretch,” Keselowski said. “There was nothing I could do to stop it other than wreck all of us.”

Logano said that LaJoie “clobbered me at the start/finish line, gave me such a big run.”

That energy allowed Logano to go from the bottom lane to the top lane — while narrowly slipping between Keselowski and Bell.

“When you get a run like that on the last lap, you can’t lift, you just can’t,” Logano said.

He knew he needed to move up the track to avoid having Keselowski block him on the bottom lane.

“I had to get up there and slip to his outside,” Logano said. “Ultimately, that’s the move that was going to win the race.

“If I got to his inside, you have a chance, maybe a 20% chance of winning the race depending on what kind of push you get down the backstretch. Most likely we were not going to win the race.”

He did and Keselowski finished second.

“We know each other’s moves pretty well, for sure, but it just matters how the cookie crumbles and it kind of came his way at he end and he made a good move,” Keselowski said. “Kudos to him. We’re right there, though, as our team just continues to improve and show what we’re made of, so I’m proud of that.

Bell finished third and was left to wonder what if.

“I had the position (Logano) had and I decided to bail on it and go to the top,” Bell said. “To come so close is disappointing.”

LaJoie finished a career-best fourth.

“Hell, yeah, there’s moral victories,” LaJoie said after Sunday’s finish. “If you get … smashed 35 weekends out of the year, here’s an opportunity where you can win. When you can run fourth, there are so many good things wrapped up in that. … For me, it’s huge. For our team, it’s huge.”

For Reddick, a day that started with John Hunter Nemechek on standby because Reddick wasn’t feeling well, ended with Reddick scoring his second consecutive top five.

“I was trying to create an opportunity to where myself Christopher Bell and Denny Hamlin could all break away and take advantage of momentum,” Reddick said. “It didn’t quite work out timing-wise where it needed for that. All in all, an OK day.”

Parity highlights opening half

Trials of the winless

Hendrick headway

Entry lists

NASCAR Cup Series Entry List — Charlotte Motor Speedway

NASCAR Xfinity Series Entry List — Charlotte Motor Speedway

NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Entry List — Charlotte Motor Speedway

This weekend’s schedule and forecast

Friday, May 27

Saturday, May 28

Sunday, May 29

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WINNERS

LOSERS

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