Austin Dillon and Kyle Larson have the same goal — reaching the second round of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs — but divergent paths to get there at Bristol Motor Speedway.
Entering Saturday night’s 500-lap cutoff race at the treacherous short track in Tennessee, Dillon is on the verge of being one of four drivers eliminated from a field of 16. He is 11 points behind 12th-ranked Austin Cindric in the last provisional transfer spot, but the Richard Childress Racing driver believes he's within “striking distance” to force the drivers ahead of him into mistakes that help erase the gap.
“If we apply pressure, then we can transfer to the next round, and pressure is running up front and scoring stage points,” Dillon said. “With just a solid day, we can make it happen. But if you win, it also takes care of all this, and we’re going to be aggressive as we can be to put that pressure on.”
The scenario is simpler for Larson, who is 60 points above the cutline and the highest-ranked playoff driver behind the Joe Gibbs Racing duo of Chase Briscoe and Denny Hamlin (who already have advanced with wins at Darlingtonand Gateway to open the first of four rounds).
With in-race points awarded for finishing in the top 10 after Bristol’s first two stages of 125 laps apiece, Larson can lock into the next round by gaining eight points before the checkered flag.
That should be an easy task for the 2021 Cup Series champion, who has two consecutive victories at Bristol while leading 873 of the past 1,000 laps on the 0.533-mile oval.
“I just feel I’ve got a natural feel for the pace and rhythm that it takes to be good there,” Larson said. “When I go to Bristol, I always look at it as an opportunity to have a great weekend. So I hope our car is close again, and we can execute a good weekend like the last two times there.”
Though he finished 12th at Gateway, the Hendrick Motorsports star is coming off “the best race in months” for his No. 5 Chevrolet after qualifying second and leading 52 laps before a restart incident with Bubba Wallace.
It’s the first double-digit total led by Larson since May 25 when he led 34 at Charlotte Motor Speedway.
“We didn’t get the finish to show for the speed that we had, but I didn’t let that get me down at all,” said Larson, who is in a season-long drought of six consecutive races without a top five. “I was very, very happy after Gateway, leaving there way more confident about the rest of the playoffs. And just really excited.”
He is enthused just by racing at Bristol, which is his favorite track on the Cup circuit. Billed as “The Last Great Colosseum,” the high-banked concrete surface is ringed by 146,000 seats with overhead views of cars whizzing by on 15-second laps and sparks flying under the lights.
“It’s just a fun, fast place,” said Larson, whose March 16 win at Bristol kicked off a season-high streak of four consecutive top fives. “I think everybody in the sport really looks forward to Bristol, and it’s always fun, whether you’re a mechanic, a pit crew member, a driver or a spotter. It’s just a cool place.”
Dillon refers to Bristol as “the eighth wonder of the world,” but it’s been less kind to his No. 3 Chevrolet. His only top five there was fourth nine years ago, but he is encouraged by a win at Richmond Raceway last month and a 10th at Bristol in March.
His team plans to radio often with real-time updates on the points standings to help guide his approach Saturday night.
“I definitely feel like it’s going to be a fluid race,” said Dillon, who is below the first-round playoff cutline with Alex Bowman, Shane van Gisbergen and Josh Berry. “I just want a car that I can drive hard. If we can give me something I can work with, I feel like my heart, will and grit will take us as far as we need to go.”
After disastrous pit stops in each of the first two races of the playoffs, Bowman will have four new crew members changing tires Saturday night on his No. 48 Chevrolet.
Hendrick Motorsports vice president of competition Chad Knaus told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio that the decision was made after some “tough conversations” about a pit crew that he still believes is one of the best in Cup. “We have to make something happen, and we all know it’s a momentum-based sport,” Knaus said. “It’s a good reset for everybody.”
Larson (+240) is the betting favorite for Bristol, per BetMGM Sportsbook. Denny Hamlin, who has a series-leading four wins at Bristol, is listed at +425 with Christopher Bell and Ryan Blaney at +800. … For the first time in four races at Bristol, a new right-side tire will be used in hopes of making it easier to pass. The last Bristol race featured only four lead changes, the track’s fewest since August 2008. … Experience matters at Bristol, where the past 23 races have been won by drivers with at least 200 starts in Cup.
AP auto racing: https://apnews.com/hub/auto-racing
Kyle Larson (5) steers into Turn 3 during a NASCAR Cup Series auto race at World Wide Technology Raceway, Sunday, Sept. 7, 2025, in Madison, Ill. (AP Photo/Connor Hamilton)
It was at a relatively minor event in upstate New York in September 2022 that Ilia Malinin, the self-anointed “Quad God" who was fast becoming the biggest name in figure skating, finally landed the jump that so many people had thought impossible.
Others had tried quad axels in competition over the years. All of them had fallen. That extra 180 degrees of rotation — necessary for the only jump in skating that starts with a forward-facing entry — proved to be a half-revolution too much.
So when Malinin landed it inside the arena made famous by the U.S. hockey team's upset of the Soviets at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, it not only sent shockwaves through the tight-knit skating community but made headlines around the world.
“My mind was just blown,” said two-time Olympic skater Jason Brown.
Yet by conquering the gravity-defying jump, Malinin also raised an important question: What comes next?
The six main jumps in figure skating have been standard since the early 1900s. The only difference between then and now is the number of revolutions. Dick Button landed the first double axel in 1948, and the first triple jump four years later. Kurt Browning landed the first quad, a toe loop, in 1988, and it was 10 years before Timothy Goebel landed the first quad salchow.
By landing the quad axel, Malinin may have maxed out the boundaries of human performance. Most sports scientists agree that the speed and amplitude necessary for five-revolution jumps truly is impossible, leaving figure skating at a crossroads, where a dearth of innovation threatens to take the shine off a sport already fighting to maintain popularity.
“I think it's kind of natural that we were going to get to this point,” said Malinin, the overwhelming favorite to win gold for the U.S. at the Milan Cortina Olympics. "But I haven't reached my top, whether it's in the technical and how much I can jump and spin, but also in the creativity.”
Malinin, 20, points to his signature “raspberry twist,” a somersaulting spin unlike anything that anybody else does. He created it himself, and it tends to bring down the house whenever he throws it down near the end of his programs.
Yet the flashy maneuver also underscores one of the inherent problems with trying to be creative: It doesn't get rewarded.
The International Skating Union has rigid requirements for both short programs and free skates, and it rarely pays off to deviate too far from the script. Malinin might not get a lot of extra points for landing his raspberry twist, for example, since it is not one of the six standard figure skating jumps, but a failure to land it could cost him dearly.
“Absolutely, there are a lot of things I've wanted to try,” Malinin told The Associated Press, “because I think it would be really cool and appealing. But it's a bigger risk for the program itself, and the system and scoring means it doesn't make sense.”
In other words, what's the point in trying to innovate?
“There are so many rules in your programs that you don't have too much wiggle room,” said Alysa Liu, the reigning world champion. “A lot of these rules really restrict us. Like, all of our spins look the same now, but they could look so different."
“One of my training mates, Sonja Himler, does these incredible programs," added Amber Glenn, a three-time U.S. champion, and along with Liu one of the favorites to win Olympic gold for the American team in February.
“Like, she spins the other way, jumps the other way — really cool things that, you know, someone who's watched a little bit of skating will be like, ‘Oh, I’ve never seen that before,'” Glenn said. “Whereas if I go and do, you know, the norm, and do it well, versus what she does, my scores will be better, even though what she does is way more impressive, in my opinion.”
Justin Dillon, the manager of high performance at U.S. Figure Skating, acknowledged having had hard conversations with some skaters about their programs. They may have planned something unique or interesting, but the risk wouldn't be worth the reward.
“I encourage individuality, and bringing it to the ice,” Dillon said, “but if they do something so avant-garde that it doesn't check those boxes, then it really doesn't serve them. It doesn't always mean throw it out, but what can we do to make it a home run?”
To its credit, figure skating's governing body has loosened some restrictions in recent years. The backflip, which was long banned in competition because of its inherent danger, is allowed now, though it also doesn't carry a whole lot of scoring weight.
Is that hold-your-breath element of risk and uncertainty the next big step in skating?
“I mean, you're cringing. It legit scares me," Glenn said of the backflip. “If you can do it, great. I think it's so fun. I want to learn it once I'm done competing. But the thought of practicing it in like, a warmup or in training, it just scares me.”
Brown has never been able to consistently land quad jumps in competition. Instead, he relies on near-perfect execution of triple jumps, along with arguably the best artistry in figure skating, to consistently challenge for podium placements in major competitions.
Maybe, Brown mused, the next innovation in figure skating has nothing to do with extreme feats of athletic ability.
“I have so much respect for the ways in which people are pushing the sport technically,” he said, "but I think the more that people fixate on executing an element, the less risk people take artistically, because they’re already taking these risks technically. And it is very hard to do both. So maybe the next step for figure skating is to reward the story we're trying to tell."
AP Winter Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
Amber Glenn skates during the "Making Team USA" performance at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Amber Glenn skates during the "Making Team USA" performance at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
Ilia Malinin skates during the "Making Team USA" performance at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Ilia Malinin competes during the men's free skate competition at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Saturday, Jan. 10, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Jeff Roberson)
Ilia Malinin competes during the men's short program at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, Thursday, Jan. 8, 2026, in St. Louis. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
