Eckes Scores Most Points, Stage Win, and Top-Five at Bristol

Venue: Bristol Motor Speedway

FINISH: 5th

Start: 2nd

Stage 1: 1st

Stage 2: 6th

Laps Led: 132

NCTS Point Standings Position: 5th

Christian Eckes vaulted himself back into championship contention with a stout effort at Bristol Motor Speedway (BMS) on Friday night. The driver of the No. 91 Columbia Bank Chevrolet Silverado RST finished fifth, earned a stage victory and scored the most points of all drivers with 48. Eckes paced the field for 132 of the 250 circuits which helped him advance to fifth in the championship standings, just 17 markers out of the lead.

The Columbia Bank Chevrolet started second after Eckes delivered his best qualifying effort of the year, narrowly missing out on the pole by 0.02 seconds. On lap three, Eckes swiftly claimed control of the event by hooking the bottom of the speedway and held a comfortable lead for 62 of 65 laps in Stage 1. He efficiently navigated lapped traffic to secure his second stage victory of the season and pocketed 10 championship points on lap 65.

In an effort to preserve critical track position, crew chief Dave Elenz elected to keep Eckes on track during the stage caution, along with most lead lap competitors. When the race restarted on lap 79, Eckes jumped out to another lead and reported his handling had moderately improved from the first segment. He held the lead until a caution on lap 118 flipped the race’s script. Eckes pitted for four tires, as did the majority of the field, but restarted eighth on lap 128 after multiple trucks stayed out on older tires. He was able to regain two positions to run sixth by the end of Stage 2 on lap 130 and tally five points.

Eckes stayed on track to begin the final segment and restarted third on lap 142. A sequence of three cautions over the next 25 laps featured mad scrambles on restarts amongst the top four as Eckes vied to retake the lead. After briefly claiming the lead on the lap 179 restart, Eckes and the No. 1 truck made contact racing for the lead, sparking a multi-truck incident in Turn 1, which he narrowly escaped. He restarted as the leader on lap 179 but a loose balance would eventually hamper his pace over the final 27 lap. Eckes took the checkered flag in fifth for his third top-five result of the year and his second-highest point total of the season.

Christian Eckes Quote:

“It was a step in the right direction for sure. I think we led the most laps, had the fastest lap, so we’re bringing fast trucks. Qualified second. Qualifying has been kind of an issue for us for the last couple weeks. I feel like we’re heading in the right direction on there. Just need to clean up a lot of mistakes on my end. I lost the handling a little bit and track position is so important. I just screwed up the restart pretty bad and screwed up the restart before then. Lot of mental decisions I got to make better and we’ll make them at Texas.”