Rain in the Bristol, Tennessee area forced NASCAR to stop the Food City 500 yesterday (4/15) at Bristol Motor Speedway and finish it today, Monday (4/16).
Rain in the area delayed the start at “The Last Great Coliseum” as the crews dried the track. NASCAR hoped that they would be able to get to at least halfway in the 500 lap race before the rain took over again. Had they completed the first two stages of 125 laps each (250 in total) that would make it an official race by NASCAR rule and not require completing the race today.
It did not take long for the drivers to find themselves in trouble on the rain-washed track. Lap four saw an incident on the track that involved nine cars.
There were three more on track incidents that brought out the yellow flag. The last one was on lap 117 when some lapped cars got together and collected race leader Ryan Blaney. Ryan had led 100 laps in the race to that point, pretty much dominating the race. Unfortunately that ended his chance of continuing the domination today and winning the race. Brad Keselowski was able to get out front and win stage one of the race after they cleaned the track from that incident.
The caution period following stage one was turned to a red flag for rain and then ultimately forced NASCAR to schedule the finish of the race to take place at 12 PM central time (1 PM eastern time) today, Monday, April 16th.
By: Buck Stevens
