The smell of burning rubber will engulf the Bristol Motor Speedway this coming Sunday, as racers look to pocket the 43 points up for grabs in this year’s staging of the Food City 500. This race has been a tossup in recent years with different drivers taking home the checkered flag in the past six editions of this event.
For more about this race, you can also check out who the experts are predicting to win in Bristol this Sunday.
Somebody stop Kyle Busch. Currently standing alone atop the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Driver standings with 259 points, Busch has won each of his last two races, placing first at Martinsville and Texas. While he only keeps a 13.5 average finish at Bristol Motor Speedway, those back-to-back wins obviously has more influence in bookmakers’ decision to make Busch the chalk to win the Food City 500. In addition, how can you ignore Busch’s impressive nine top five finishes over his last 10 Sprint Cup events?
Kevin Harvick
After nine-straight top 10 finishes, including a win in Phoenix last March, Harvick’s form sagged a bit. He was 17th in Martinsville and 10th in Texas, but you can expect big things from the 2014 Sprint Cup champion in Bristol. For one, he has six top 10’s in 13 short-track races since 2014. Harvick also knows what it’s like to win in Bristol, having done that in 2005, when he edged all racers for the first place in that year’s edition of Food City 500.
Hamlin has been a volatile driver of late. He zoomed into a win in Daytona to open the season in 2016 but has failed duplicate the feat since. Nevertheless, Hamlin deserves a long look after podium finishes at the Auto Club Speedway and at the Phoenix International Raceway. He started sixth in and finished 12th last week at the Texas Motor Speedway.
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Keep trusting Dale Earnhardt. Following a dismal 36th-place finish in Daytona, Junior was able to rack up four top 10’s and a couple of top 14’s in six races. Part of that stretch was an impressive second place finish off a 16th-place start. Earnhardt has seven top five finishes out of 32 races in Bristol in his career.
Long Shot
Austin Dillon
Credit Dillon for getting an average finish of 15.5 at Bristol despite a 20.0 average start in four career races there. However, Dillon wasn’t in that kind of form last week, when he finished 19th off a 10th-place start at Texas Motor Speedway.
