CONCORD, N.C. -- Hendrick Motorsports will hit Richmond Raceway for the second time this season and will try to sweep wins at the track for 2021 season after Alex Bowman took the checkered flag at the venue in April.
Now the organization is gearing up for the second playoff race of the season and all four Hendrick Motorsports drivers are striving to auotmatically earn a berth into the next round with a Richmond win.
Take a look at some of Hendrick Motorsports' stats as the four teams get ready to take on the Virginia track. The race will begin on Saturday at 7:30 p.m. ET and air on NBCSN.
- Hendrick Motorsports has 52 victories on short tracks, which is 10 more than any other active NASCAR Cup Series team. Eleven of its wins have come at Richmond Raceway including Bowman’s first-place performance there in April. A record-tying six different drivers have won at Richmond for car owner Rick Hendrick, who grew up 100 miles from the track in Palmer Springs, Virginia.
- With Kyle Larson’s second-place result Sunday at Darlington Raceway last weekend, Hendrick Motorsports has recorded 24 top-two finishes through 27 NASCAR Cup Series points races in 2021 – the most by a team at this point in a season since 1956 (34 by Carl Kiekhafer). This year, the four-car Hendrick Motorsports stable has amassed a league-leading 11 wins and finished in the runner-up spot 13 times. It has swept the top-two positions in five events.
- Since its inaugural season in 1984, Hendrick Motorsports has a combined 527 top-two finishes at the elite NASCAR Cup level. The team holds the series records for both points-paying victories (274) and second-place results (253). It has swept the top-two spots in an all-time best 48 Cup races.
- In 13 starts at Richmond Raceway, Larson has one win (2017), two top-five finishes and five top-10s. The driver of the No. 5 HendrickCars.com Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 1LE has finished seventh or better in five of his last eight starts at the Virginia venue.
- On Saturday night at Richmond, Chase Elliott will make his 35th short-track start in the Cup Series. In those previous 34 races, he has garnered one win, 11 top-five finishes, including three runner-up results, 17 top-10s and led 775 laps. In the last six short-track races, Elliott has earned the second-most points (260) behind only Joey Logano (261).
- This Saturday’s race at Richmond will mark William Byron’s seventh Cup Series start at the .75-mile track. He currently has a track-best finish of seventh coming earlier this season and is one of six drivers who have finished in the top 10 in both paved short-track events in 2021. He placed fourth at Martinsville Speedway and was sixth in the Bristol Motor Speedway dirt race.
- Bowman has made 31 paved short-track starts in his seven-year Cup Series career. He has one win (Richmond), two top-five finishes and seven top-10s on these tracks. The Ally driver has collected the fifth-most points (210) at short tracks in the last six events and is the most recent short-track winner in the Cup Series at Richmond.