After three bad races, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. earned a fourth-place finish on Thursday, and now is at one of his favorite tracks – Bristol Motor Speedway.
BRISTOL, Tenn. — Ricky Stenhouse Jr. could not have had a bumpier return to racing after NASCAR’s 10-week shutdown.
How bad was it? Stenhouse crashed on the first lap of the first race back and finished last.
He followed it with a 25th-place finish at the second Cup race at Darlington Raceway, then was 24th in the Coca-Cola 600. In three races, Stenhouse plummeted seven spots in the standings to 24th.
Stenhouse finally snapped out of it Thursday night in the second race at Charlotte Motor Speedway with a fourth-place finish for his new JTG-Daugherty Racing team.
“It was just really good to just have a smooth race with really no issues,” Stenhouse said. “It was just huge to get a good run in and pass a lot of really good cars.”
Next up is Sunday’s stop at Bristol Motor Speedway – the fifth Cup race since NASCAR resumed May 17 and a decent track for Stenhouse. His six top-10 finishes at Bristol are more than at any track other than Talladega Superspeedway.
This is Stenhouse’s first season at JTG, but he surrounded himself with familiar faces from his Roush Fenway Racing tenure that include longtime crew chief Brian Pattie. The duo is making the transition from racing in a Ford to a Chevrolet, and preparing for events that don’t include practice or qualifying.
