April 16, 2022 | By Lee Spencer

Cole Custer surprises himself with Bristol Dirt pole

BRISTOL, Tenn.—An unlikely candidate will lead the NASCAR Cup field to green in Sunday’s Food City Dirt Race.

Cole Custer captured the pole by amassing 16 points—seven for passing and nine for finishing second to Tyler Reddick—in Heat 1.

The location of his first career pole even surprised the Stewart-Haas Racing driver.

“The guys did a great job guessing right on the track,” Custer said. “It’s so much different than practice and we hit on it. It’s just awesome, first career pole, I never thought I’d get my first career pole at a dirt race.  

“When you start in the back you have to worry about just not going a lap down in the first run. To be able to start on the pole is a huge deal for our team. The guys did a great job on the car. I was able to get to the top (lane) and kind of start rolling.”  

Custer has one Chili Bowl Nationals start when entered the Super Bowl of Midgets in 2015 but didn’t transfer out of the “J”. He leaned on his SHR teammate Chase Briscoe for dirt advice.

“After practice, the first stop I make is the 14 hauler just trying to see what Chase thinks,” Custer said. “We made our cars extremely similar trying to just have something baseline off of, honestly, because he probably knows a little bit better where the track is gonna go and just what to look for.  He’s definitely been a huge asset to our team and just kind of getting a head start on the weekend and being able to adapt a little faster.”

Christopher Bell starts second. The Joe Gibbs Racing driver came from fifth in Heat 2 and passed Kyle Busch for the lead on Lap 10 to claim 14 points and the win.

Justin Haley scored the win in Heat 3 and Ty Dillon was victorious in Heat 4. Reddick, Briscoe, Kyle Larson, Haley, Ty Dillon, Alex Bowman, Chase Elliott and defending race winner Joey Logano will comprise the first five rows on Sunday.

"I feel like we had the toughest heat race,” said Larson, who started sixth in Heat 4. “I was happy to get to third. My car doesn't feel bad, the track will go through a lot of changes tomorrow, so just keep up with that and adjust your driving style accordingly."

Larson damaged the right side on the No. 5 Chevrolet in practice while rim-riding on Friday. Will he continue to run up top?

“When the track gets to where it was yesterday and dusty kind of on entry the risk is higher,” Larson said. “If the track’s got some moisture on entry, the risk, to me, isn’t quite as much because it’ll hold you a little bit better with the grip up there.

“Obviously, you always want your car handling good to where you can go anywhere, and the safest part of the track is further away from the wall. A lot of times you can find a lot of speed up there, so just like any pavement race you definitely have to weigh the risk versus reward.”

Kurt Busch, who has six wins on concrete at Bristol Motor Speedway, has learned to adapt to dirt at the Last Great Coliseum. Last year he finished 16th in the inaugural event but appeared to pick up the pace during practice on Friday. He rolls off 13th.

“For me, I ran dirt back in the mid-90s in a little dwarf car,” Busch said. “When we found a rhythm with that car at some of the dirt tracks we traveled to, the setup didn’t change much. We just stuck with three or four things to try to make it easy and to make it travel and go to all of the different styles of mud or banking.

“With Bristol being dirt, it’s completely different than the concrete. The spring race had its attitude versus the night race on how it raced. The old Bristol versus the new Bristol with the way the concrete was reconfigured. This Next Gen car—every week—is a fun, new challenge with all honesty. I have over two decades of experience, but I try to throw all of that out and just go with it and just challenge myself with my team to get the best results for the No. 45 Toyota Camry.”