NASCAR Cup Top 10 Rundown: Bristol Spring Race 2026

BRISTOL, Tenn. — Sunday's NASCAR Cup Series race at Bristol came down to a photo finish between Ty Gibbs and Ryan Blaney that ultimately saw Gibbs get his first career win.

Gibbs won in overtime, leading four Toyotas in the top-10, while Blaney finished second and led four Fords in the top-10. Kyle Larson, who led the most laps and swept the stages in the race, led a pair of Chevrolets in the top-10s.

Under caution with 20 laps to go in the scheduled 500-lap distance, Gibbs and four other drivers stayed out while everyone else on the lead lap pitted for fresh tires. That set up two restarts, with 15 laps to go and two laps to go in overtime. 

Here's a rundown of the top-10 finishers in Sunday's NASCAR Cup race at Bristol:

1. Ty Gibbs

The day has finally came where Ty Gibbs won a Cup race.

Gibbs led the final 25 laps, including five laps of overtime, and nipped Blaney to win by 0.055 seconds.

The win let him become the first Cup winner born in the 2000s and was the first for the No. 54 since Lennie Pond earned his first Cup win at Talladega in 1978.

The only other driver to win a Cup race in the No. 54, Jimmy Pardue, also earned his first Cup win in the No. 54 car, at Richmond in 1962. A year later, he drove the No. 54 in his second and final win, this time at Dog Track Speedway in Moyock, North Carolina.

Gibbs sits fourth in points, 105 points behind Tyler Reddick and 105 points above the Chase cutline.

2. Ryan Blaney 

Sunday was essentially Ryan Blaney vs. (insert name here).

Blaney vs. Kyle Larson: Larson took the lead from polesitter Blaney on lap 44. As the race went along, crew chief Jonathan Hassler worked on Blaney's No. 12 car, allowing him to pick up the battle again on lap 338 when he retook the lead from Larson.

Blaney vs. his pit crew: Once again, the No. 12 team cost their driver multiple spots, forcing Blaney to work even harder to get back to the front. However, the crew did redeem themselves near the end. Their last two stops saw them retain the lead from Blaney and put him in a position for his final battle:

Blaney vs. Ty Gibbs: With 15 laps to go, Blaney worked his four fresh tires to try and use the inside lane to pass Gibbs, who stayed out on older tires. After all of the battles Blaney fought and won all day, however, he couldn't win the war against Gibbs, coming up short of his first Bristol Cup win in overtime.

While Blaney didn't win, he and crew chief Jonathan Hassler showed their strength. What's next is for the reportedly 35th-ranked pit crew to pick up their pace.

3. Kyle Larson

For as much as Larson has looked slightly off this season, you could've sworn it was business as usual for the No. 5 team at Bristol. He led 284 laps, swept the stages and looked untouchable for most of the race.

However, as teams made adjustments and the track changed, Blaney and Gibbs pushed Larson back to third.

Larson had a say in the finish of the race on two fresh tires, hanging around Blaney and Gibbs and waiting for them to make a mistake but he had to settle for third.

By earning the second-most points Sunday, Larson jumped from eighth in points, 147 points out of the lead, to sixth, 126 out. Larson's points position means he's in one of the six coveted Chase seeds that teams believe they'll need to contend for the title.

4. Tyler Reddick

For someone who has won half of the races so far, finishing fourth doesn't seem like much.

At a track like Bristol, where Reddick has struggled, finishing fourth was huge.

For the first time in the NextGen era, Reddick finished on the lead lap in a Bristol Cup race. He also tied his best Bristol Cup finish, set back in the 2020 night race.

The road to lap 500 wasn't easy. Although Reddick started second, a speeding penalty on lap 64 sent him back to 26th at the end of stage one, on lap 125.

Reddick and his team kept their heads down and finished 12th in stage two, on lap 250, before getting back into the top-10 with a great stop in the second stage break.

What his pit crew didn't do ultimately got him a top-five finish. Crew chief Billy Scott kept Reddick out with 20 laps to go, allowing him to hold strong on the outside lane through two restarts to finish fourth.

Reddick may have lost 20 points from his slowly, decreasingly-ironclad points lead but Bristol showed truly how ironclad the No. 45 team continues to be this season.

5. Chase Briscoe

Another driver who needed a good day at Bristol got it. 

Briscoe earned his third top-10 finish of the season after picking up a pile of stage points throughout the day. He earned a total of 13 stage points (seven in the first stage, six in the second) that boosted him to the fourth-highest points total of any driver.

As a result, Briscoe is just one out of a Chase spot. That puts him in Chase contention for the first time since finishing second at EchoPark Speedway Atlanta in late February. 

The driver of the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota is 84 points out of the top-six, meaning he is inching back into championship contention.

6. Todd Gilliland

The Toddfather was made an offer he couldn't refuse and it netted him one of the best finishes of his Cup career.

After finishing stage one 31st, one lap down, and getting in a crash in stage two, the final stage was much nicer to Gilliland. With 110 laps to go, crew chief Chris Lawson put two fresh tires on his No. 34 Front Row Motorsports Ford to put him fourth for the restart. Gilliland then hung and found himself in the top-10 when the next caution flew.

Lawson brought Gilliland for fresh tires that put him back on sequence. He took advantage of it, jumping from eighth before the caution to sixth at the finish.

Sixth-place is Gilliland's best finish at a non-drafting track since getting sixth at Indianapolis last year. In 152 career starts, Gilliland now has 16 career top-10 finishes, five of which are sixth or better.

(Stat: Gilliland has finished sixth or better in all but one of his four career starts at Indianapolis: fourth on the road course in 2022, sixth on the oval in 2024 and 2025)

7. Joey Logano

Like Gilliland, the driver of the No. 22 Team Penske Ford had a race that didn't start well at all but seemingly changed in almost an instant.

Logano started 20th and slid to 25th in the first stage, appearing to be in rough shape similar to what he dealt with at Darlington. 

Then, after two quick restarts in the second stage, Logano was in the top-10 and found himself in sixth by around lap 183.

From there, Logano was a yo-yo. Poor long-run speed sunk him back to eighth at the end of stage two. Then, his pit crew got him up to fourth to start the final stage before he sunk again. On another restart, Logano got up to third before losing spots.

The yo-yo ultimately lifted at the right time. With fresher tires for the final 15 laps, he made his way from ninth/10th in overtime to seventh at the finish.

Logano has three top-10 finishes and consecutive top-10s for the first time since the last two races of 2025. He is 12th in points, 42 points above the cutline and 168 points behind the leader.

(Stat: Logano hasn't earned more than three consecutive top-10s since races 22 through 25 in 2022)

8. Ryan Preece

Preece's No. 60 RFK Racing Ford was largely unremarkable in the first half of the race, starting 17th and finishing 18th and 16th in the stages.

Then, in the final stage, an air pressure adjustment elevated him to 11th and into the top-10 after a pit stop under the lap 313 caution. 

In the ensuing green-flag run, the No. 60 car was as high as eighth. He slipped a bit before another caution on lap 383 gave him the perfect reset for his long-run speed to return in that subsequent run.

Preece entered pit road inside the top-10 and left with two fresh tires. The last two restarts ultimately shook him out to eighth.

Through eight races, Preece has a pair of top-10 finishes and an average finish of 13.6, improving upon a 15.7 last season so far.

Preece is 13th in points, 33 points above the Chase cutline and 177 out of the points lead.

9. Denny Hamlin

Coming off of nearly winning at Martinsville and compared to some of his flashier Joe Gibbs Racing teammates, the driver of JGR's No. 11 Toyota had a relatively quiet day.

Hamlin started 11th but spent much of the day in the top-10. He finished sixth and third in the stages and was one of a few drivers to stay out late in the race.

What separated him from his teammates was how his race ended. After Hamlin floundered on the first late-race restart, crew chief Chris Gayle called him in for new tires for overtime. Hamlin restarted 14th and ultimately made it to ninth at the finish.

Hamlin gained eight points on the lead and is still third in points, a coveted position for the eventual Chase seeding.

10. Carson Hocevar

All the driver of Spire Motorsports' No. 77 Chevrolet and his team have needed to do this season is to minimize mistakes, woes and run-ins and keep up their speed.

At Bristol, they kept that going.

Hocevar started 10th, finished seventh and fourth in the stages and was consistently one of the top-five best cars all day. 

Crew chief Luke Lambert also kept Hocevar out late, giving him a chance to possibly restart second in what was shaping up to be a fiery battle between him and Gibbs.

However, Hocevar picked the outside lane and maintained his track position in the short run that followed, before picking the inside lane for overtime and sinking back to 10th.

Hocevar earned 38 points on the day, tying Atlanta for the most he's earned in a single race this season. He is now 33 points above the Chase cutline and 177 out of the points lead.