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Hurricane Helene: Bristol Motor Speedway sustains damage in storm

Nick Profile Picby:Nick Geddes•09/27/24•

NickGeddesNews

Bristol
Randy Sartin-Imagn Images

Bristol Motor Speedway was one of many areas in east Tennessee and the southeastern United States to sustain damage from Hurricane Helene.

The “It’s Bristol, Baby!” sign that sits in the parking lot outside the racetrack received the bulk of the damage. Today, it reads “Istol Baby!” as half the sign was damaged by Helene’s gusty winds.

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Helene made landfall in Florida’s Big Bend Thursday night as a Category 4 hurricane. The fast-moving storm quickly made its way into Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee and the surrounding states, leaving a devastating impact in its path.

Had Helene come one week earlier, it’s safe to say that the Round of 12 race at Bristol would have been impacted. That race, however, is long official with Kyle Larson the victor after leading 462-of-500 laps. His dominant performance hasn’t exactly been met with the greatest of reviews.

Bristol Round of 12 race panned by fans, NASCAR community

The race featured just eight lead changes and saw almost nonexistent tire fall-off. Larson recorded a 7.1-second margin of victory and put together the third most dominant Bristol win of all-time. With only four leaders, the 2024 Bass Pro Shops Night Race joined the 2023 Bristol Dirt and 2022 spring Martinsville as races with the fewest number of cars pacing the field in the Next Gen car era. With tires not wearing as much as they did in the spring, drivers were posting similar lap times making it hard to pass.

The lack of tire fall-off left NASCAR wondering where they and Goodyear went wrong.

“We’re baffled, to be perfectly honest,” said Elton Sawyer, NASCAR senior vice president of competition, on SiriusXM NASCAR Radio Tuesday. “We felt like we had a recipe there from the spring that gave us what we’re looking for in our short track racing, putting kind of the tire management back in the driver’s hands.

“We’ve seen some great racing throughout the year. Richmond comes to mind. Watkins Glen, just a week ago with great tire fall-off. The anticipation, as we rolled into Bristol, was that we would see something very similar. Obviously, we didn’t see that as the weekend started to unfold.”