Why NASCAR Made Right Decision to Finish Bristol Race Under Green Flag

When NASCAR threw a yellow caution on Lap 496 for both a crash and light rain, and then a red flag on Lap 506 of Sunday’s race at Bristol, it appeared likely that Matt Kenseth would be declared the winner due to yet another rainstorm of the day.

At that point, the Food City 500 In Support Of Steve Byrnes had already gone six laps longer than it had been scheduled for when the red flag came out, stopping the race.

It would have been easy at that time for NASCAR officials to award the win to Kenseth, as it has done with other drivers in many other races and similar weather conditions over the years.

But with a savvy eye on the weather radar, NASCAR officials saw there was a likely break in the weather after what appeared to be a quick-moving mini-storm, the track could be dried fairly quickly, and the race could be finished under green flag conditions.

And that’s exactly what happened.

To its credit, NASCAR did everything it could to give fans what they came for: a full race decided not just under a green flag, but a two-lap, green-white-checkered shootout to the finish line.

It didn’t make a difference if there were only maybe 30,000 or 40,000 fans left in the stands—if that many.

In the end, Kenseth still won the race. But you have to admit those final two laps off the final restart were rather thrilling with Jimmie Johnson literally coming out of nowhere to challenge—and almost win—the race.

I don’t recall who said it on the telecast—if it was Fox Sports’ Mike Joy, Larry McReynolds or Darrell Waltrip—but one of them even said, “Where did (Johnson) come from?”

Johnson jousted with and got past teammate Jeff Gordon and then set his sights on Kenseth. While he ultimately came up short, Johnson’s surge in the final two laps provided an exciting end to what had been a nine-hour race—including two rain delays within the race, as well as a delay of the start of it.

When NASCAR parked the cars on pit road to ride out the third and final wave of rain, you could see many of the remaining fans making their way to the exit—or at least to get out of the rain.

Wade Payne/Associated Press

After so many delays and time spent waiting, one might think this was further torture on top of the arduous pace of the day thanks to the rain.

But it wasn’t torture by NASCAR. Nor was it a veiled attempt to sell a few more beers or hot dogs at the concession stands for the patiently waiting fans.

Fans paid a lot of money to come to Bristol to see a race, and NASCAR went to great lengths to deliver and give those hearty fans what they paid for.

And for that, I commend NASCAR for staying the course to a true checkered-flag finish.

Gordon agreed.

“I love the fact that that race ended under green,” Gordon told FoxSports.com.

But Gordon admits he was a little concerned that NASCAR carried the race through nine caution laps before pulling out the red flag. Because of that, at least one driver, Austin Dillon, was forced to pit because he was about to run out of fuel.

“What makes no sense to me is when it started raining hard that they ran lap after lap after lap under caution," Gordon said. "I think that they did the right thing, but go ask the 3 car (Dillon). I don't think it was right that they ran that many laps under caution when they started to lose the track."

There have been plenty of weather-shortened races over the years that have finished under a yellow caution, or perhaps finished short of the scheduled length (like last summer’s Coke Zero 400 at Daytona, which went only 120 of the scheduled 160 laps), and NASCAR has awarded the driver in the lead at that particular point in time the victory.

NASCAR could very easily have done that with Kenseth, too, but it chose not to. It’s not that someone wanted to make Kenseth work even harder for the win.

No, it was pretty clear he had the best car in the field in the final 200 laps or so. And even with the red flag, he came right back to prove that in the final two of 11 extra laps once the race resumed.

“I think we all want to see the fans see (a full race), especially a day like today where they stay here ... for nine hours,” Gordon said. “I mean, that's commitment, and you want to give everything back to them. You don't want it to end under caution.

“But you've got to make sense of the whole situation and what's going on from a competition standpoint, as well. So I think they could have managed that slightly better, but all in all, it turned out pretty good.”

Even if it meant Kenseth essentially had to win the same race twice.

Follow me on Twitter @JerryBonkowski