Food City 500

Food City 500

Venue	Bristol Motor Speedway
Sponsor	Food City
First race	1961
Distance	266.5 miles (428.89 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-) Jeff Byrd 500 presented by Food City (2011)

This article refers to the NASCAR race. For other uses, see Food City (disambiguation).

The Food City 500 is a 500 lap race NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race held on the 0.533 miles (0.858 km) track at Bristol Motor Speedway in Bristol, Tennessee. This is one of two NASCAR races held at Bristol, the other being the Irwin Tools Night Race, and is considered one of NASCAR's best races. It was the first venue of the 2007 NASCAR schedule to host the Car of Tomorrow, 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. Nothing at this time has been decided.

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.

Past winners

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

• 1974: Race shortened due to energy crisis.
• 1996: Race shortened due to rain.
• 2007, 2008, & 2009: Race extended due to a Green-white-checker finish.

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.
• 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.
• 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.
• 2010: Jimmie Johnson finally conquers Bristol by winning there for the first time. It was Johnson's milestone 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.

Manufacturer wins

Rank	Manufacturer	Wins
1	Chevrolet	21
2	Ford	16
3	Pontiac	5
4	Dodge	4
5	Buick	2
5	Toyota	2
7	Plymouth	1

Television broadcasters

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

External links

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