Joey Logano was able to defend his 2014 IRWIN Tools Night Race win by capturing the checkered flag for a second year at Bristol Motor Speedway for a second time in the NASCAR Sprint Cup series.

When NASCAR hits the short track of Bristol it is always a battle with the chance for any driver to win. Saturday night (8/22) was not an exception. However, there were not as many accidents that made it the kind of battle typically seen at Bristol. There were eight caution flags for a total of 52 laps in the race. However, five of those cautions were for either single car incidents or debris on the track.

The battle this time around seemed to be getting the car good enough to actually pass other cars. Good cars back in the field were able to pass slower cars fairly easily. However, when drivers got to a certain point moving forward the ability to pass seemed to only come if the car ahead made a mistake of some kind and had to get out of the gas to avoid wrecking.

The result was that the IRWIN Tools Night Race at Bristol only saw five different NASCAR drivers lead the race. Kyle Busch led a race high 192 laps of the race after starting on the outside of row one. He and pole sitter Denny Hamlin led all the laps through nearly the first half of the 500 lap race. However, that would not be the case for the second half of the race.

Joey Logano started showing the speed in his car taking the lead for the first time on lap 225. He would dominate the second half of the race leading a total of four times for 176 of the second half laps. Kevin Harvick was also looking very strong in the later stages of the race. With the laps winding down, Kevin was able to get to the bumper of Joey’s car many times. However, he just couldn’t find the line that would allow him to pass Joey. I kept waiting for Kevin to do the “bump and run” to take the lead. He never did.

That left Joey to make the final laps with the lead and capture his second win in the IRWIN Tools Night Race at Bristol for the second consecutive year. Kevin ended the race with the runner up finish. Denny Hamlin was able to score a third place finish. Jimmie Johnson and Clint Bowyer finished the race in fourth and fifth place respectively. See the complete race results for the IRWIN Tools Night Race here.

Joey Logano moves from the fifth seed to the third seed on the Chase Grid by capturing his third win of the 2015 NASCAR season. The five drivers on the bubble of the grid without a win heading into Bristol remain on the Grid since the winner of the race was not a new winner for 2015 and they all gained enough points to stay ahead of the drivers behind them.

Kyle Busch also remains on the Chase Grid with his four wins and holding steady at 29th in the point standings. He also expanded his lead over 31st place to 46 points. That is just over a single race worth of points from being knocked out of the top 30. With two more races before the Chase starts he could still be knocked out of the top 30 in the point standings and therefore fall off the Chase Grid. See how the NASCAR Chase Grid looks after Bristol here.

The NASCAR Sprint Cup drivers will have the coming weekend off before hitting Darlington Raceway for the first of the last two regular season races in the Bojangles’ Southern 500 Sunday, September 6th.

By: Buck Stevens