Following Ross Chastain's last-to-first drive to win the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte, the NASCAR Cup Series enters the second half of its 26-race regular-season schedule with the running of the Cracker Barrel 400 at Nashville Superspeedway on Sunday night (7 p.m. ET, Prime Video, PRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
This will be the fifth Cup Series race contested at the 1.33-mile speedway in Lebanon, Tennessee. Each of the previous four races have been won by a different driver, including 2024 winner Joey Logano's triumph in a record five overtimes. After Chastain's surprise win in NASCAR's longest race, anything is possible as the summer stretch of races gets underway just outside of Music City.
While Chastain is riding the high from his first win of the season, these three drivers are in search of a rebound performance following the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte.
Kyle Larson, No. 5 (Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet)
It is safe to say Larson's second attempt at the Memorial Day Weekend double ended with similar disappointment to his first. After a crash on Lap 92 took him out of contention at the Indy 500, Larson was involved in multiple crashes at Charlotte. A single-car spin from the lead in Stage 1 put him behind early before a multi-car crash in Stage 3 left him with a 37th-place finish in the Coca-Cola 600 and his second DNF of the day.
As Larson turns his focus back to the No. 5 team, expect him to return to form this weekend at Nashville. While the 1.33-mile concrete track is unlike any other track the series has visited thus far in 2025, it is an intermediate layout. Two of Larson's three wins this season have come at intermediate tracks. That does not guarantee anything for Larson, but a previous win there (2021) and top-10 finishes in all four races suggest he will be in the running for the win on Sunday night.
Ryan Blaney, No. 12 (Team Penske Ford)
Blaney and the Team Penske organization as a whole lacked speed at Charlotte. A 38th-place finish as a result of the same crash Larson was involved in left Blaney with his fifth DNF of the season. Unlike Charlotte, he has had pace for much of the season, leading double-digit laps in three races and posting five top-fives through 13 races.
Nashville has produced similar results for Blaney, with a pair of top-10s and two finishes outside the top-30 due to crashes in his four starts there. On a positive note, Blaney led 26 laps in the 2024 race and came into Charlotte with four top-fives in his last five points-paying races. The Coca-Cola 600 did not go the way he wanted, but the stretch of races leading up to the 600-miler are encouraging and show some consistency for a team that has been far from it all season.
Carson Hocevar, No. 77 (Spire Motorsports Chevrolet)
The 2024 Rookie of the Year continues to impress and show why he is going to be a star for years to come. While his Charlotte result says he finished 34th, that was only after he was battling 56-race winner Denny Hamlin for the lead as the final stage began. His engine expired shortly after the restart on Lap 308, but he clearly had one of the fastest cars in the field.
That was not the first time Hocevar has been at the front this season. He won his first career pole at Texas, scored a career-best runner-up finish at Atlanta and had a top-five run going at Bristol before a slow stop on pit road took him out of contention. Hocevar only has one prior start at Nashville, but he finished a solid 16th in last year's race. Considering the improvements Spire Motorsports has made this season, it would not be a surprise to see Hocevar top that and be in the mix for the win once again if he can put a complete race together.