NASCAR Preview: Atlanta & Lime Rock Race Weekend

DIVEBOMB Motorsport
Jun 27
7 min read

Written by Gabriel Tsui, Ashleigh McGregor, Sean McKean & Krystal Diane

For the first round of the new “In-Season Tournament,” all three series are on track this weekend at both Atlanta and Lime Rock.

Since the 1960s, Atlanta has hosted one Cup Series race a year. Despite having a usual 1.5-mile, D-oval intermediate layout historically, the track has since been reconfigured into a superspeedway track with increased banking. This weekend will see the Cup and Xfinity Series’ race here.

However, new to the schedule is Lime Rock Park – located in Lakeville, Connecticut. The Northeastern road course is 1.530 miles (2.462 kilometres) in length and features seven distinct corners. With a great variation in the corner styles, from hard-braking to technical, expect to see great racing from the Truck field in their inaugural event here.

Below are the start times for each race plus lap count:

Trucks: Saturday, 28 June, 13:00 local (18:00 UK) – 100 laps
Xfinity: Friday, 27 June, 19:30 local (00:30 UK) – 163 laps
Cup: Saturday, 28 June, 19:00 local (00:00 UK) – 260 laps

Below are the defending winners of each race:

Trucks (Lime Rock): never held
Xfinity: No. 21 - Austin Hill (Richard Childress Racing)
Cup: No. 22 - Joey Logano (Team Penske)

Cup Series: Quaker State 400 Preview

Written by Gabriel Tsui

Following a breakthrough race win from Chase Briscoe in the Poconos, we head back to Georgia for the second race in the Atlanta Motor Speedway. With the playoff picture shrinking yet again, will we see another driver clinch a playoff spot or would we find a playoff driver strengthening his position in the playoff standings?

The drivers will be driving around the one-and-a-half mile long race track for 260 laps, with 60 laps in the first stage, and 100 laps each in stages two and three, totalling a distance of 400 miles run around the track. This will be the second appearance of ATL on the 2025 calendar, with the first race being won by Christopher Bell of Joe Gibbs Racing.

The weather report indicates there will be rain and thunderstorms up until Saturday, but drier conditions will prevail on Sunday so there is an opportunity for the race to be delayed till Sunday. This will be the first Saturday race of the season, commencing on the 28th of June, at 19:00 Eastern (16:00 Pacific, 00:00 British).

Race Predictions

Atlanta is a chaotic race track, and to predict an exact race winner would not be easy. However, there are a few names to look out for. The first includes Chris Buescher, who performs exceptionally in plate tracks, and has a history of top-ten finishes at Atlanta. The RFK mustang has the tools to compete at plate tracks, and they just need the stars to align to find their first win of the season.

Ricky Stenhouse Jr., who has had quite a surprising season so far, is also one to look out for. Stenhouse has finished within the top-15 at Atlanta four times in a row, and there is no reason to believe he won’t make it five with a win. Despite Stenhouse’s tendency to crash and burn brightly, he is still a top tier superspeedway racer. A Daytona 500 in spring 2023, a Talladega 500 in fall 2024, Atlanta 400 in summer 2025? One could imagine.

But the pick for the race is going to be Stenhouse’s opponent in the first round of the in-season challenge, Christopher Bell. Superspeedways isn’t Bell’s bread and butter, and avoiding wrecks ain’t his specialty either. But Bell needs to put on a performance if he wants to beat Stenhouse, and having won the spring race, it is up to him to do it again.

Three things to look out for

In-season tournament begins

Atlanta will be the beginning of the in-season challenge, with the 32 drivers competing for 1,000,000 USD. The 32 drivers in the challenge are paired head-to-head with another driver, with each race eliminating one within the pair based on finishing position. The four drivers who did not qualify for the competition include Shane Van Gisbergen, Cody Ware, Riley Herbst and Cole Custer.

This will provide another layer to the race, and drivers certainly wouldn’t mind having an extra million bucks in their bank accounts. Expect the drivers to approach the race with more intent and aggressiveness, even if they aren’t fighting for wins or top-tens.

Chase Briscoe breaks through

After three consecutive poles spanning from Charlotte to Michigan that resulted in no wins, Briscoe readjusted in Mexico City and began building his breakthrough with a seventh place finish, and on the back of a top-ten finish Briscoe finally found a win and secured a playoff spot.

This certainly wasn’t easy for the 30-year-old, as he described a feeling of “weights of my shoulder” in a press conference. Eleven drivers are currently locked in to the playoffs, with five more spots open as we enter the nine-race countdown to the playoffs.

Connor Zilisch returns

If I told you Connor Zilisch hasn’t had the best of performances in his previous attempts in the Cup, Ryan Reynolds would jump out and tell me that’s just lazy writing. After DNFing in COTA, Zilisch’s appearance in Charlotte was quiet and mostly forgotten.

However, he will get a different opportunity after racing in a road course and an intermediate, racing in a drafting track at Atlanta. Despite DNFing in the spring Xfinity Atlanta race, a different car in a different field might yield different results for Zilisch, who is actively pursuing a spot in the Cup in 2026 against veteran Daniel Suárez

Xfinity Series: Focused Health 250 Preview

Written by Ashleigh McGregor

Before the Xfinity series travels down to Atlanta let’s take a quick look back at what happened during the Pocono race weekend.

Connor Zilisch finally strikes again. It was a matter of when not if he would claim a second win this season. He has come close many times but last weekend it finally all came together.

Racing his childhood best friend, Jesse Love, for the win made it that much sweeter.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. effect

The Xfinity series saw an increase in viewers over the Pocono race weekend. This raised the topic of is Xfinity rising and not just an underdog support series? Are they producing a better show for fans?

Some say yes, some say no way and some claim this was just a one off weekend. Zilisch’s crew chief had to serve a one race ban leaving the position empty. Dale Earnhardt Jr. stepped up to the plate.

As arguably the biggest name in NASCAR, it makes sense for more viewers and fans to tune in and get to the race.

Atlanta Motor Speedway

This week it’s hard racing on a Friday for Xfinity. Qualifying is at 3:05pm EST. With the race start time at 7:30pm EST they will have the last remaining sunlight of the day to race in.

Drivers are racing 251 miles over 163 laps. This will be broken down into Stage 1 and Stage 2 with 45 laps each. The final stage will have 73 laps.

Hill vs. Love

Austin Hill is the defending champion of this track. He has won five of the last six races here. It will be hard to beat this man on track.

Jesse Love who came in second last race out will hope to bring the heat to Hill. Love has been strong all season. He has the pace and skills to get on pole at this track.

He’s proven this in the past but he’s not converting the pole position to wins. Can he finally put it together and put an end to the Hill domination?

Truck Series: LiUNA 150 Preview

Written by Krystal Diane & Sean McKean

An inaugural race is on the horizon, as the Truck Series travels to Lakeville, Connecticut’s Lime Rock Park for the LiUNA 150. With a brand new, technical road course for the relatively inexperienced Truck field to face, this running will surely be a headline-grabber this weekend.

Race Predictions

At Pocono, Layne Riggs finally took his first win of the year. On a track where fuel strategy usually eats up ambition, the late cautions coupled with Corey Heim befalling a flat tyre sealed the deal for the Front Row Motorsports driver. That’s a big shift for Riggs, and even bigger for the No. 34 team, who needed a signature win to stake their playoff claim.

Riggs might be peaking, but the others aren’t sleeping. Corey Heim still looks like the most complete driver in the field. He won Stage 2 at Pocono and would have certainly won, if not for the late puncture. With four wins already this season, Heim’s not chasing momentum, he’s sustaining it.

If you want a roll-the-dice pick, keep an eye on Connor Mosack. He quietly snagged an eighth-place finish last week, still clawing just outside the playoff cut. Lime Rock will be the kind of race where underdogs can sneak in and steal one. He’s overdue for his first career win.

Two storylines to watch out for

Where’s the fire, Gio Ruggeiro?

No one’s panicking, but the whispers are growing. Gio Ruggeiro started the season strong with great results at the superspeedways, but since then, the No. 17 team has been on a steady slide. At Pocono, he finished a quiet 11th and never looked like a factor. That marks four straight races outside the top ten, despite racing in championship-tier equipment. Is it bad luck? Setup issues? Skill issues? With the playoffs looming, Lime Rock might be where Ruggeiro either rights the ship or gives the rest of the field one more reason to pounce.

Tanner Gray puts the field on notice

He’s been hovering just outside the cut line, and after a gritty second-place run at Pocono, Gray is now only a few points behind the final playoff spot. That’s not nothing. Lime Rock’s surely chaotic nature tends to reward opportunists, and Gray is exactly the kind of driver who thrives in the mess. If the No. 15 can survive the shuffling and land a strong stage finish (or even a surprise win), it could completely flip the bottom half of the playoff standings. He’s not the favorite, but he doesn’t need to be. He just needs one big afternoon to make things real uncomfortable for everyone sitting in 12th to 16th.