Pit Stops : Atlanta Motor Speedway

• Thursday, February 20th, 2025
• NASCAR Wire Service - Holly Cain

NASCAR Cup Series carries season-opening momentum to Atlanta

While last weekend’s 2025 NASCAR Cup Series season-opening DAYTONA 500 provided all the drama expected of The Great American race, fans have every reason to anticipate the same sort of high-excitement in Sunday’s Ambetter Health 400 (3 p.m. ET on FOX, PRN and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) at Atlanta Motor Speedway.

Last year’s three-wide photo finish among winner Daniel Suarez and runners-up, Ryan Blaney and Kyle Busch creates huge excitement for both fans and teams returning to the recently-revised 1.5-mile Atlanta high-banks that race like a small superspeedway.

Suarez’s 2024 victory – by less than the blink-of-the-eye at .003-second – actually turned out to be just one of the amazingly close finishes of the season topped only by Kyle Larson’s win at Kansas by .001-second over Chris Buescher last May. Suarez has now finished first or second in the last three Atlanta races.

“It was a lot of fun,” Suarez smiled and recalled of the Atlanta race. “Even more fun for me, right, because I was the one that won the race. Probably wouldn’t have been that much fun if I finished second or third.”

Teams arrive this weekend after a full contact edition of the DAYTONA 500, won for the second consecutive year by Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron. Tyler Reddick, last year’s Regular Season Champion, was runner-up and seven-time series champion Jimmie Johnson was third in his best outing since stepping back from fulltime competition.

Last year’s Atlanta February race final standings read like a typical superspeedway event – those drivers who are up front at Daytona, were largely in the group up front that next week at Atlanta.

For example, reigning series champion, Team Penske’s Joey Logano, who led 43 laps last week in the 500, has a pair of Atlanta wins (2023-24) as does Daytona winner Byron (2022 and 23). They along with Hendrick’s Chase Elliott (2022) and Penske’s Blaney (2021) are the other most recent Atlanta winners – always contending for wins at Daytona as well.

Austin Cindric, whose 59 laps out front were most in the DAYTONA 500, was fourth in this spring Atlanta race last year. 23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace, who also led laps Sunday, was fifth at Atlanta. Former DAYTONA 500 winners Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Michael McDowell, as well as Daytona summer race winner Chris Buescher all had top-10s at Atlanta as well.

Joe Gibbs Racing’s Denny Hamlin (2012), RFK Racing owner-driver Brad Keselowski (2017 and 2019) and Richard Childress Racing’s Kyle Busch (2008 and 2013) are the other active drivers with Atlanta trophies too.

This race last year, featured a record 48 lead changes by 14 drivers – a full-on day of tight racing. And that’s exactly what the field expects Sunday. The pass for the win at Atlanta has come in the final two laps in four of the last five races there; including this one a year ago.

The work out front last week by Austin Cindric, Logano and Team Penske teammate Blaney was impressive at Daytona and makes them favorites again this week. They all three led at least 20 laps on the superspeedway – something a team has accomplished only four times in series history. In just the last two years, the Penske team has combined to lead 898 laps – more three times that of any other team on drafting tracks such as Daytona, Atlanta and Talladega, Ala.

“It’s amazing how much Atlanta has changed from the repave, and then to the new version of the car and how much we’ve had to adapt to the new style of racing at Atlanta,” Suarez’s Trackhouse Racing teammate Ross Chastain said. “It’s kind of wild to think how Atlanta is now a drafting a track but it has created some exciting finishes. You look back at last year’s race with my teammate Daniel’s win and how close that finish was. It’s cool to see the fan’s excited for the racing at Atlanta and I hope to be the guy in Victory Lane this weekend.”

Blaney’s seventh-place finish at Daytona combined with good stage points, gives him a single-point edge over Byron and three-point lead over his teammate Cindric atop the NASCAR Cup Series championship standings.

There is no practice session this week and Busch Light Pole Qualifying is set for 11 a.m. ET on Saturday – the broadcast available on Amazon Prime.

Michael McDowell won the pole position at both Atlanta races in 2024 driving a Ford. However, this year Toyota returns to the track hoping to extend a mark of six consecutive poles dating back to October last year, when JGR’s Christopher Bell started the streak at Las Vegas. Chase Briscoe won the pole position for last week’s DAYTONA 500 in his first start for the JGR Toyota team.

• Atlanta Motor Speedway
• Ambetter Health 400
• Busch Pole Award Pole Winner: Ryan Blaney
• Age: 31
• Team : No 12 - BodyArmor Zero Sugar Ford
• Owner: Roger Penske
• Crew Chief: Jonathan Hassler
• Ryan Blaney won the Pole Award for the Ambetter Health 400 with a lap of 30908 seconds, 179371 mph
• This is his 11th pole in 344 NASCAR Cup Series races
• This is his first pole and first top-10 start in 2025
• This is his first pole in 14 races at Atlanta Motor Speedway
• Austin Cindric (second) posted his second top-10 start of 2025 and his sixth in eight races at Atlanta Motor Speedway
• Josh Berry (third) posted his second top-10 start at Atlanta Motor Speedway It is his first in two races this season
• Riley Herbst (27th) was the fastest qualifying rookie

• Sunday, February 23rd, 2025
• NASCAR Wire Service - Holly Cain

Christopher Bell snatches first Cup Atlanta win in wild overtime

Christopher Bell prevailed in overtime to claim the victory in Sunday’s Ambetter Health 400 at Atlanta Motor Speedway – officially leading only the final lap and getting the photo nod in a three-wide run as a caution flag came out on the last lap to end the NASCAR Cup Series race.

It marks the second year that this race featured a three-wide run to the checkered flag. This time Bell got the nod out front over second-year driver Carson Hocevar and 2021 series champion Kyle Larson as the final caution flag flew. It was the 30-year old Oklahoma native Bell’s 10th career series victory and first on a drafting-type track like Atlanta, Daytona or Talladega, Ala. It also marked the first victory for Joe Gibbs Racing since June of last year.

“I’ll tell you what, that right there is what you dream of,” an elated Bell said afterward. “To be able to re-start on the first or second row on a re-start at a speedway you never know how those things are going to play out.

“But,” he added looking directly into the FOX television cameras with a huge smile, “I’ll be the first to tell you, ‘I love superspeedways.’

“I don’t know,” he conceded, “but this style of racing has always been a little bit of a struggle for me. Throughout the beginning of the day, obviously today we were just stuck way in the back. But [crew chief] Adam [Stevens] and these boys just did an incredible job of getting this thing fixed up so I could just hold my foot down and you’ve got to be able to just stay in the throttle and that last half of the race we ran our best.”

Despite his near-miss third-place showing, Larson was pleased with the finish. He’s 0-for-48 in speedway-type races, including 16 previous DNFs. So all said, it was a successful, if eventful, day. He had contact with one of the race’s strongest cars, Austin Cindric’s No. 2 Team Penske with three laps remaining to make the overtime finish necessary, but led 12 laps.

Hocevar’s runner-up finish was a career high mark for the 22-year old driver of the No. 77 Spire Motorsports Chevrolet.

However, shortly after the young Californian climbed out of his car, he was confronted post-race by both Ross Chastain and former series champ Ryan Blaney in separate discussions. Although Chastain refused to share what was said, Blaney confirmed he suggested to Hocevar to work on his decision making.

“I just said, ‘Hey, you got to calm down. I told him a couple moves he made earlier in the race that were really, really sketchy,” said Blaney, who rallied to a fourth-place finish after being spun out after contact with Hocevar with 27 laps remaining.

“Obviously, me getting spun. He should know better than to hit me in that spot. He can’t just run into my bumper as I’m turning into a corner. I’m going to wreck. So, I just told him you got to calm down. You got a lot of talent, but you got to be a little bit easier in this certain moment. Be smarter.”

Hocevar, who also said he preferred to keep the two conversations with his veteran competitors to himself, but immediately offered an apology for any contact with Larson on the final lap.

“I didn’t realize we weren’t racing back to the line,” he said of the last lap fender-rub with Larson, adding, “Some stuff I’ve got to learn and clean up a little bit, but I feel like we put ourselves in a perfect opportunity to win a race and I’ve never really had that opportunity before, especially on super speedways. So, thanks to everybody at Spire Motorsports.”

Certainly, the early portion of the race was dominated by the Ford contingent, which included 10 of the top 11 qualifiers including Blaney’s pole position in the No. 12 Team Penske Ford. Blaney’s teammate, reigning series champion Joey Logano led a race best 83 laps – the second time in as many races this season he out-paced the field, but finished 12th.

Fords led all but one of the first 140 laps. Ultimately, however, pit strategy and manufacturer alliances – at least early in the race – gave way to late race push and better handle on the cars for the rest of the competition.

The final yellow flag flew to end the race when Josh Berry – who won Stage 1 – Justin Haley and Ryan Preece collided on the backstretch during overtime.

HYAK Motorsports’ Ricky Stenhouse Jr. finished fifth, followed by Denny Hamlin, a strong showing for the veteran who like his JGR teammates all started 25th or worse on the grid.

Richard Childress Racing’s Kyle Busch was the only one of three cars (also Blaney and defending race winner Daniel Suarez) in last year’s three-wide photo finish not to be collected in an accident. The two-time series champion finished seventh, followed by Trackhouse Racing’s Ross Chastain, 23XI Racing’s Bubba Wallace, and Legacy Motor Club’s John Hunter Nemechek, who scored his second top-10 finish in as many races this year – already half of his single season high in two previous fulltime seasons at the NASCAR Cup Series level.

With his fourth place showing Sunday, Blaney now leads the championship by 12 points over DAYTONA 500 winner, Hendrick Motorsports’ William Byron. Kaulig Racing’s A.J. Allmendinger set the Fastest Lap of the race.

• Drivers Entered: 39
• Laps Scheduled: 260
• Laps Actual: 266 - NASCAR OVERTIME!
• Margin of Victory: Under Caution Seconds
• Time of Race: 3 Hours 27 Minutes 37 Seconds
• Average Speed: 118.384
• Cautions: 11 for 63 laps
• Lead Changes: 50
• Green Flag Passes: 10,579 (52.1 passes per green flag lap)

• Atlanta Motor Speedway
• Ambetter Health 400
• Race Winner: Christopher Bell
• Age: 30
• Team : No 20 - DEWALT Toyota
• Owner: Joe Gibbs
• Crew Chief: Adam Stevens
• Christopher Bell won the Ambetter Health 400, his 10th victory in 182 Cup Series races
• This is his first victory and first top-10 finish in 2025
• This is his first victory and fourth top-10 finish in ten races at Atlanta Motor Speedway
• Carson Hocevar (second) posted his first top-10 finish in three races at Atlanta Motor Speedway It is his first top-10 finish in 2025
• Kyle Larson (third) posted his fifth top-10 finish in 15 races at Atlanta Motor Speedway
• Riley Herbst (17th) was the highest finishing rookie
• Ryan Blaney leads the point standings by 12 points over William Byron
• This is Joe Gibbs Racing's 12th Cup win at Atlanta Motor Speedway, tied with Wood Brothers Racing for the second-most
• Today's race produced 50 Lead Changes - a new track record - and 15 different leaders - second-most at Atlanta, record is 20 set in 2022
• Xfinity Fastest Lap Bonus Winner: #16 - AJ Allmendinger