Food City 500

Food City 500

NASCAR Sprint Cup Series
Venue	Bristol Motor Speedway
Location	Bristol, Tennessee, United States
Corporate sponsor	Food City Entertainment Industry Foundation
First race	1961
Distance	266.5 miles (428.9 km)
Laps	500
Previous names	Southeastern 500 (1961–1975, 1977–1979) Southeastern 400 (1976) Valleydale Southeastern 500 (1980) Valleydale 500 (1981–1986) Valleydale Meats 500 (1987–1991) Food City 500 (1992–2010, 2012–2014, 2016) Jeff Byrd 500 presented by Food City (2011) Food City 500 In Support Of Steve Byrnes And Stand Up To Cancer (2015)
Most wins (driver)	Rusty Wallace (6)
Most wins (team)	Hendrick Motorsports Junior Johnson & Associates (7)
Most wins (manufacturer)	Chevrolet (22)
Circuit information
Surface	Concrete
Length	0.533 mi (0.858 km)
Turns	4

The Food City 500 is an annual 500-lap, 266.5-mile (428.9 km) annual NASCAR Sprint Cup points race held at the Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, Tennessee. This is one of two NASCAR races held at Bristol, the other being the Bass Pro Shops NRA Night Race, and is considered one of NASCAR's best races.^[1] It was the first venue of the 2007 NASCAR schedule to host the fifth-generation NASCAR premiership race car, a race won by Kyle Busch.

In 2008, Bristol Motor Speedway President & General Manager Jeff Byrd requested that NASCAR move the spring race to a later Spring date, to avoid the problems with rain, snow and sleet that hit the area in late winter and early spring. This was not carried out until 2015.^[2] In 2015, the race moved from mid-March to April.^[3]

In 2011, title sponsor Food City announced it would honor former Speedway President and General Manager Jeff Byrd, who died in October 2010, by renaming the 2011 Spring race the Jeff Byrd 500 presented by Food City.^[4]

In 2015, the race was renamed the Food City 500 In Support Of Steve Byrnes And Stand Up To Cancer to support NASCAR on Fox broadcaster Steve Byrnes in his battle with cancer, in association with the Entertainment Industry Foundation.^[5]

Carl Edwards is the defending race winner as of 2016.

Notable races

• 1968: David Pearson won after a lengthy duel with Richard Petty and LeeRoy Yarbrough in a race prominently featured on the television series Car & Track.
• 1971: Pearson won after tagging James Hylton into the wall; Pearson edged Richard Petty after Petty erased a two-lap deficit.
• 1972: Mechanic (and later car owner) Junior Johnson saw the first of a plethora of Bristol wins over the ensuing two decades as Bobby Allison drove his Chevrolet to an easy win.
• 1973: Driving Junior's Chevy, Cale Yarborough led all 500 laps, a feat duplicated by Cale at Nashville in 1978 and by Jeff Burton at New Hampshire International Speedway in 2000.
• 1974: Chevrolets swept the top ten finishing spots led by Yarborough.
• 1975: Richard Petty posted only his second career Bristol win.
• 1977: Cale led all but five laps in a race where five other drivers (including Janet Guthrie) needed relief help.
• 1979: After Cale crashed out with Buddy Baker, rookie Dale Earnhardt took his first win.
• 1981: Darrell Waltrip drove Johnson's Buick and edged Ricky Rudd, who was driving Waltrip's former car, the DiGard Racing Oldsmobile. Joe Millikan got into a wreck with Benny Parsons and said, "I lost my cool," to which car owner Bud Moore vowed, "I'll straighten out Millikan's cool."
• 1984: Waltrip posted his seventh straight Bristol win and the eighth straight for Junior Johnson.
• 1986: Rusty Wallace posted his first career win.
• 1987: Dale Earnhardt was involved in several crashes en route to the win; Richard Petty finished second.
• 1989: Wallace survived a chaotic race with multiple crashes and a wildcard victory bid by Greg Sacks.
• 1990: A spirited event ended in a wild finish; Sterling Marlin was spun out by Ricky Rudd on the final lap while Davey Allison held off a last-lap charge from Mark Martin to win by inches.
• 1991: Grasping for a solution to pit road crashes emminating from numerous incidents in 1990 (and never considering revoking the pit closure rule that was the ultimate cause), NASCAR had banned tire changes under yellow; for Bristol this was replaced with staggering of pitstops based on qualifying line — all "odd" cars (qualified first, third, etc.) would pit first under yellow while "even" cars would pit a lap later; the cars were denoted "odd" and "even" with stickers on their windshields after qualifying; restarts would be double-file based on "odd" and "even" stickered cars. More "even" cars wound up in contention, and this created chaos. Rusty Wallace was able to pass cars under caution to move into his proper restart line, and this helped him come back from two laps down on two separate occasions. The lead changed 41 times, a short track record, as Wallace edged Ernie Irvan at the finish. Sterling Marlin suffered burns in a fiery melee and needed relief help in subsequent weeks from Charlie Glotzbach.
• 1993: Wallace dominated days after defending race (and series) champion Alan Kulwicki died in a plane crash.
• 1994: An ill-timed yellow trapped Geoff Bodine a lap down and put Dale Earnhardt into the lead en route to the win. Bodine had begun dominating the race in the car former owned by Kulwicki and running Hoosier Tires; with the Hoosiers Bodine was able to skip tire changes that Goodyear-shod cars had to make.
• 1995: Jeff Gordon took the win, his third in the season's first six races; the race saw notable performances resulting in top-five finishes for Darrell Waltrip and Bobby Hamilton.
• 1997: Gordon punted Rusty Wallace sideways on the final lap for the win.
• 1999: Wallace ran away at the end, while John Andretti rallied to finish fourth; Andretti's Petty Enterprises Pontiac was impounded after the race as NASCAR had a disagreement with the engine's compression ratio; the engine, though, cleared on reinspection.
• 2000: Rusty Wallace scores his 50th Sprint Cup win.
• 2001: Elliott Sadler edged Andretti for his first win, and the first 1-2 finish for the Wood Brothers and Petty Enterprises since 1977.
• 2002: With NASCAR running high downforce on the cars via big rear spoiler and low airdam clearance, and running very hard tires, Kurt Busch pitted on Lap 325 and never visited the pits again as he edged Jimmy Spencer for the win, his first in Winston Cup. Rusty Wallace was incensed at the manner with which Busch won the race (by not pitting when others did and thus winning on old tires with no drop in speed) enough that he lobbied NASCAR to cut downforce and go to softer tires in later years to force pitstops.
  

  Dale Jarrett's team and fans honor Jarrett before the 2008 race.
• 2005: Slight contact between Bobby Hamilton, Jr. and Ken Schrader on lap 332 triggers a 14-car wreck much like those seen at Daytona and Talladega. While Kevin Harvick wins, 22nd-place Bobby Labonte finishes 32 laps down, something rarely seen since the increasing level of competition beginning around 1990.
• 2007: The Car of Tomorrow debuted. After Joe Gibbs Racing dominated the race, Kyle Busch drove a Hendrick Chevy to the win, then pointedly ripped the poor handling and raceability of the COT in victory lane.
• 2008: Dale Jarrett's last race.
• 2010: Jimmie Johnson finally conquers Bristol by winning there for the first time, and scores his 50th Sprint Cup win.
• 2011: After track president Jeff Byrd's death in late 2010, Food City and Bristol Motor Speedway agree to name the race in memory of Byrd in a one-year only deal.
• 2013: Kyle Busch won the pole with a then-new track qualifying record at 14.813 seconds (129.535 mph). Kasey Kahne won his first Bristol race. The race also marked the start of a feud between Denny Hamlin and Joey Logano, after Hamlin spun Logano during the race.
• 

  Matt Kenseth celebrates after winning the 2015 race.
  2014: Denny Hamlin started on pole with a new track record, his first pole of the season. The race was delayed twice, just like the Daytona 500, for rain. Matt Kenseth was involved in a wreck at lap 163 when Timmy Hill rear-ended into him after a caution was called for a spin by Cole Whitt. Carl Edwards was leading with a few laps left when a mysterious caution was out. During an attempt for a Green-white-checker finish, the rain started falling and the race was unable to be restarted and would end under caution.
• 2015: The race was scheduled to begin at noon ET and be televised by Fox, but rain delayed the start for 79 minutes. A crash between teammates Brad Keselowski and Joey Logano brought out the caution on lap 19. During the caution, rain began to fall again. The rain was delayed until night and, because Fox had other programming, aired on Fox Sports 1. The race resumed at approximately 6:30 p.m. ET, almost 5 hours after the 1st green flag. Although rain threatened to end the race twice, the race was run to completion. Matt Kenseth won, breaking a 51 race winless streak.

Past winners

Year	Date	Driver	Team	Manufacturer	Race distance		Race time	Average speed (mph)	Report
					Laps	Miles (km)
1961	October 22	Joe Weatherly	Bud Moore Engineering	Pontiac	500	250 (402.336)	3:27:02	72.452	Report
1962	July 29	Jim Paschal	Petty Enterprises	Plymouth	500	250 (402.336)	3:19:16	75.276	Report
1963	March 31	Fireball Roberts	Holman-Moody	Ford	500	250 (402.336)	3:15:02	76.91	Report
1964	March 22	Fred Lorenzen	Holman-Moody (2)	Ford	500	250 (402.336)	3:27:46	72.196	Report
1965	May 2	Junior Johnson	Junior Johnson & Associates	Ford	500	250 (402.336)	3:20:10	74.937	Report
1966	March 20	Dick Hutcherson	Holman-Moody (3)	Ford	500	250 (402.336)	3:34:26	69.952	Report
1967	March 19	David Pearson	Cotton Owens	Dodge	500	250 (402.336)	3:17:32	75.937	Report
1968	March 17	David Pearson (2)	Holman-Moody (4)	Ford	500	250 (402.336)	3:14:11	77.247	Report
1969	March 23	Bobby Allison	Mario Rossi	Dodge	500	250 (402.336)	3:04:09	81.455	Report
1970	April 5	Donnie Allison	Banjo Matthews	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:02:42	87.543	Report
1971	March 28	David Pearson (3)	Holman-Moody (5)	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:52:23	91.704	Report
1972	April 9	Bobby Allison (2)	Richard Howard	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:50:18	92.826	Report
1973	March 25	Cale Yarborough	Richard Howard (2)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:57:43	88.952	Report
1974	March 17	Cale Yarborough (2)	Richard Howard (3)	Chevrolet	450*	239.85 (386.001)	3:42:50	64.533	Report
1975	March 16	Richard Petty	Petty Enterprises (2)	Dodge	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:43:53	97.053	Report
1976	March 14	Cale Yarborough (3)	Junior Johnson & Associates (2)	Chevrolet	400	213.2 (343.112)	2:25:24	87.377	Report
1977	April 17	Cale Yarborough (4)	Junior Johnson & Associates (3)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:38:20	100.989	Report
1978	April 2	Darrell Waltrip	DiGard Motorsports	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:53:03	92.401	Report
1979	April 1	Dale Earnhardt	Rod Osterlund Racing	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:55:39	91.033	Report
1980	March 30	Dale Earnhardt (2)	Rod Osterlund Racing (2)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:44:53	96.977	Report
1981	March 29	Darrell Waltrip (2)	Junior Johnson & Associates (4)	Buick	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:58:36	89.53	Report
1982	March 14	Darrell Waltrip (3)	Junior Johnson & Associates (5)	Buick	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:49:52	94.025	Report
1983	May 21	Darrell Waltrip (4)	Junior Johnson & Associates (6)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:51:07	93.445	Report
1984	April 1	Darrell Waltrip (5)	Junior Johnson & Associates (7)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:50:10	93.967	Report
1985	April 6*	Dale Earnhardt (3)	Richard Childress Racing	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:15:42	81.79	Report
1986	April 6	Rusty Wallace	Blue Max Racing	Pontiac	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:58:14	89.747	Report
1987	April 12	Dale Earnhardt (4)	Richard Childress Racing (2)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:31:27	75.621	Report
1988	April 10	Bill Elliott	Melling Racing	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:12:23	83.115	Report
1989	April 9	Rusty Wallace (2)	Blue Max Racing (2)	Pontiac	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:30:18	76.034	Report
1990	April 8	Davey Allison	Robert Yates Racing	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:03:15	87.258	Report
1991	April 14	Rusty Wallace (3)	Penske Racing	Pontiac	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:39:37	72.809	Report
1992	April 5	Alan Kulwicki	AK Racing	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:05:15	86.316	Report
1993	April 4	Rusty Wallace (4)	Penske Racing (2)	Pontiac	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:08:43	84.73	Report
1994	April 10	Dale Earnhardt (5)	Richard Childress Racing (3)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:58:22	89.647	Report
1995	April 2	Jeff Gordon	Hendrick Motorsports	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:53:47	92.011	Report
1996	March 31	Jeff Gordon (2)	Hendrick Motorsports (2)	Chevrolet	342*	182.286 (293.36)	1:59:47	91.308	Report
1997	April 13	Jeff Gordon (3)	Hendrick Motorsports (3)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:33:06	75.035	Report
1998	March 29	Jeff Gordon (4)	Hendrick Motorsports (4)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:13:00	82.85	Report
1999	April 11	Rusty Wallace (5)	Penske Racing (3)	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:51:16	93.363	Report
2000	March 26	Rusty Wallace (6)	Penske Racing (4)	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:01:40	88.018	Report
2001	March 25	Elliott Sadler	Wood Brothers Racing	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:03:54	86.949	Report
2002	March 24	Kurt Busch	Roush Racing	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:14:20	82.281	Report
2003	March 23	Kurt Busch (2)	Roush Racing (2)	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:29:53	76.185	Report
2004	March 28	Kurt Busch (3)	Roush Racing (3)	Ford	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:13:34	82.607	Report
2005	April 3	Kevin Harvick	Richard Childress Racing (4)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:26:20	77.496	Report
2006	March 26	Kurt Busch (4)	Penske Racing (4)	Dodge	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:21:19	79.427	Report
2007*	March 25	Kyle Busch	Hendrick Motorsports (5)	Chevrolet	504*	268.632 (432.321)	3:16:38	81.969	Report
2008	March 16	Jeff Burton	Richard Childress Racing (5)	Chevrolet	506*	269.698 (434.036)	3:00:15	89.775	Report
2009	March 22	Kyle Busch (2)	Joe Gibbs Racing	Toyota	503*	268.099 (431.463)	2:54:35	92.139	Report
2010	March 21	Jimmie Johnson	Hendrick Motorsports (6)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:20:50	79.618	Report
2011	March 20	Kyle Busch (3)	Joe Gibbs Racing (2)	Toyota	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:53:55	91.941	Report
2012	March 18	Brad Keselowski	Penske Racing (5)	Dodge	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:51:52	93.037	Report
2013	March 17	Kasey Kahne	Hendrick Motorsports (7)	Chevrolet	500	266.5 (428.89)	2:53:25	92.206	Report
2014	March 16	Carl Edwards	Roush Fenway Racing (4)	Ford	503*	268.099 (431.463)	3:11:23	84.051	Report
2015	April 19	Matt Kenseth	Joe Gibbs Racing (3)	Toyota	511*	272.363 (438.325)	3:37:54	74.997	Report
2016	April 17	Carl Edwards (2)	Joe Gibbs Racing (4)	Toyota	500	266.5 (428.89)	3:15:52	81.637	Report

• 1974: Race shortened due to energy crisis.
• 1985: The race was scheduled to run on March 31 but was moved to April 6 due to rain.
• 1996: Race shortened due to rain.
• 2007, 2008, 2009, 2014, and 2015: Race extended due to a green–white–checker finish.

Multiple winners (drivers)

# Wins	Driver	Years Won
6	Rusty Wallace	1986, 1989, 1991, 1993, 1999, 2000
5	Darrell Waltrip	1978, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984
	Dale Earnhardt	1979, 1980, 1985, 1987, 1994
4	Cale Yarborough	1973, 1974, 1976, 1977
	Jeff Gordon	1995, 1996, 1997, 1998
	Kurt Busch	2002, 2003, 2004, 2006
3	David Pearson	1967, 1968, 1971
	Kyle Busch	2007, 2009, 2011
2	Bobby Allison	1969, 1972
	Carl Edwards	2014, 2016

Multiple winners (teams)

# Wins	Team	Years Won
7	Junior Johnson & Associates	1965, 1976, 1977, 1981, 1982, 1983, 1984
	Hendrick Motorsports	1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2007, 2010, 2013
6	Penske Racing	1991, 1993, 1999, 2000, 2006, 2012
5	Holman-Moody	1963, 1964, 1966, 1968, 1971
	Richard Childress Racing	1985, 1987, 1994, 2005, 2008
4	Roush Fenway Racing	2002, 2003, 2004, 2014
	Joe Gibbs Racing	2009, 2011, 2015, 2016
3	Richard Howard	1972, 1973, 1974
2	Petty Enterprises	1962, 1975
	Rod Osterlund Racing	1979, 1980
	Blue Max Racing	1986, 1989

Manufacturer wins

# Wins	Manufacturer	Years Won
22	Chevrolet	1972, 1973, 1974, 1976, 1977, 1978, 1979, 1980, 1983, 1984, 1985, 1987, 1994, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, 2005, 2007, 2008, 2010, 2013
17	Ford	1963, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1968, 1970, 1971, 1988, 1990, 1992, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2014
5	Pontiac	1961, 1986, 1989, 1991, 1993
	Dodge	1967, 1969, 1975, 2006, 2012
4	Toyota	2009, 2011, 2015, 2016
2	Buick	1981, 1982
1	Plymouth	1962

Television broadcasters

Year	Network	Lap-by-lap	Color commentator(s)
1985	ESPN	Bob Jenkins	Benny Parsons
1986			Larry Nuber
1987
1988			Ned Jarrett Gary Nelson
1989			Benny Parsons Ned Jarrett
1990
1991
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001	Fox	Mike Joy	Darrell Waltrip Larry McReynolds
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014	Fox/FS1
2015
2016	Fox		Darrell Waltrip Jeff Gordon

• 2014 and 2015: Race started on Fox, but was completed on Fox Sports 1 due to intermediate rain delays.

References

1. NASCAR's Best Races
2. Jayski's Silly Season Site – Bristol Motor Speedway News
3. "NASCAR reveals 2015 schedules for national series". NASCAR. August 26, 2014. Retrieved August 26, 2014.
4. Bristol Sprint Cup race renamed to honor Jeff Byrd
5. Pennell, Jay (April 10, 2015). "April 19 Bristol race renamed to honor FOX Sports' Steve Byrnes". FoxSports.com. Fox Sports Interactive Media, LLC. Retrieved April 10, 2015.

External links

• NASCAR Commentators Crews and Networks
• NASCAR From Bristol Hits 11-Year Ratings Low