NASCAR Cup Series — Race No. 29 — 500 laps / 266.5 miles
NASCAR Xfinity Series — Race No. 26 — 300 laps / 159.9 miles
NASCAR Camping World Truck Series — Race No. 18 — 200 laps / 106.6 miles
Bristol Motor Speedway (0.533-mile oval) — Bristol, Tenn.
Fast Facts for September 16-18, 2021
Tire: Goodyear Eagle Speedway Radials
Set limits: Cup: 10 sets for the race;
Xfinity: 4 sets for the race;
Truck: 4 sets for the race
Tire Codes: Left-side — D-4860; Right-side — D-4962
Tire Circumference: Left-side — 2,223 mm (87.52 in.); Right-side — 2,250 mm (88.58 in.)
Minimum Recommended Inflation: Left Front — 20 psi; Left Rear — 18 psi;
Right Front — 45 psi; Right Rear — 40 psi
Storyline — Bristol presents a triple challenge for NASCAR teams: When it comes to racing at Bristol Motor Speedway, teams face a trio of challenges. First, the high banks around the track create higher speeds and loads than at the other, relatively flatter short tracks these teams will race late in the season, including last week‘s stop at Richmond Raceway and the upcoming Martinsville Speedway. Second, Bristol has a full concrete surface, which wears tires fairly aggressively when the track is “green,” with no rubber built up on it. Goodyear designs its tread compounds for Bristol to take the right amount of rubber to create multiple racing grooves, but not so much that it upsets the cars and trucks. And third, Goodyear, NASCAR and the track operations staff will work together to apply the PJ1 grip compound to the lower four feet of both sets of corners for this weekend‘s races. This will speed along the development of a second racing groove, giving drivers an alternate lane to pass.
“While only a half-mile in length, Bristol is a different animal than the other short tracks we have on the NASCAR schedule,” said Greg Stucker, Goodyear‘s director of racing. “The amount of banking Bristol has creates very high speeds and high loads, which more closely aligns with some of the bigger tracks we race on. Then you have the concrete surface, which we only race on a handful of times throughout the season. Laying rubber on concrete is a special challenge and is one that we have worked hard on over the past many years to get the right balance.”
Notes — Back to concrete tire set-up at Bristol: Teams in all three NASCAR national series will run on the same tire set-up at Bristol this week . . . this is the same combination of left- and right-side tires that teams in all three of these series ran at Bristol in 2020 . . . this is the only track at which Cup teams will run either of these two tire codes in 2021 . . . unlike on most NASCAR ovals one mile or less in length, on which teams generally do not run inner liners in their tires, teams are required to run liners in their right-side tires only at Bristol . . . air pressure in those inner liners should be 12-25 psi greater than that of the outer tire.
— Goodyear Racing —
