BRISTOL, Tennessee — Things are looking up for Joe Gibbs Racing.
Matt Kenseth ended a 51-race winless streak Sunday outlasting a wreck-fest and the rain at Bristol Motor Speedway, taking the checkered flag nine hours after the start on a green-white-checkered finish.
Carl Edwards came close to getting his first victory for JGR before becoming one of a multitude of drivers to find the wall and get collected by high-speed traffic jams.
Erik Jones, considered one of the JGR’s future stars, got his first seat time in a Sprint Cup car and fared OK under tough circumstances. Due to Denny Hamlin’s neck spasms, Jones was called up — literally. After getting off his couch in North Carolina and arriving on a helicopter during the long rain delay, Jones kept a Toyota with a cockpit designed for Hamlin out of harm’s way — no small task on this day and night multiple-hitter.
It’s too bad that due to rain so few ticket buyers got to see this Bristol revival — one where the possibility of rain, different pit strategies and fuel mileage sustained the suspense. Who’s going to crash and/or get collected before rain ends it all?
Ninth-placed Danica Patrick’s Chevy got spun twice in the second half of the race, for one example, but she still managed another Top 10 finish.
It looked as if Kyle Larson might collect his first victory instead of Kenseth getting his 32nd. The 2014 Rookie of the Year gave the Chip Ganassi Chevy team one of its best runs of the season, driving a unique high-low line while keeping Kenseth at bay, dashing through traffic like an artful dodger and watching for rain. When the rain didn’t materialize, Larson was forced to give up the lead and pit under green, which took him out of contention.
On a day when Penske Racing driver Juan Pablo Montoya retained his lead in the IndyCar points at Long Beach, the “trade” by Ganassi to Larson in place of the Colombian continues to look good — for both sides.
For once, the steadiest and swiftest got picked off. Kevin Harvick, Brad Keselowski, Joey Logano and Martin Truex Jr. all got swept up in crashes, ending their run of Top 10 finishes. It was Bristol at its most unpredictable, fastest and finest. Or it was a high-speed lottery, depending on your point of view.
It was a shame only a smattering of fans remained when the rain fell one last time prior to the last two laps of green. Bristol has suffered the whims of change in a sometimes fickle NASCAR fan base after it was re-paved with progressive banking in 2007. That took away the single low groove that led to more fender-banking than a demolition derby. Fans hated the multiple grooves and the absence of contact and crashing. They dumped season tickets once harder to get than a Master’s badge.
During the gladiator days, the big draw was the Saturday night race in August. Fans bought the spring race tickets as part of a season’s package. Once the summer race lost favor, the spring race got collected. Tickets went unwanted. The grandstands reaching to the sky turned into echo chambers.
After a modification in 2012, it’s polite to say Bristol is a one-groove track — a fop to fans who prefer it that way. Though the high groove is fastest, the lower groove is a passing lane. New arrival Larson proved in his duel with Kenseth that a driver can use both on the same lap to retain the lead in traffic. In any event, this one had enough accidents to please any crash junkie.
Possibly the most forlorn of the victims was Kurt Busch, a regular winner at Bristol who needs a victory to get into the post-season after missing the first three races of the season on a dubious charge of domestic abuse. He ended up ramming Edwards’ spinning car on the penultimate restart after the Missouri driver lost the handle in a battle with Jeff Gordon.
On an adventurous night, Busch had a pit road penalty for an errant tire and also had a solo spin — if dodging a field of cars while sliding sideways can be considered that. Yet, Busch drove back through the pack and into the lead. A decision to take four fresh tires on the penultimate yellow flag, which gave the lead to Kenseth, took Busch out of contention. (His team was worried about long green flag runs and deteriorating handling might have opened the door for Kenseth anyway; alas, no other lead lap cars followed Busch’s Stewart-Haas Racing Chevy down the pit road.)