NASCAR Texas Preview

Ford has 16 all-time NASCAR Cup Series wins at the Fort Worth track and 33 overall in the three series combined, which includes a sweep in the track’s inaugural 1997 season. This weekend will mark the return of the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series after a two-week break and will be highlighted by the Cup Series race on Sunday afternoon.

LOGANO GOING FOR TEXAS REPEAT

Joey Logano will be looking for his second straight NASCAR Cup Series win this weekend at Texas Motor Speedway and third overall. That’s because Logano was able to pass Michael McDowell on the backstretch after an overtime restart one year ago. Logano, who has 37 career victories, has won multiple Cup races at 10 different racetracks (Atlanta, Bristol, Kansas, Las Vegas, Michigan, New Hampshire, Phoenix, Richmond, Talladega and Texas).

FRONT ROW COMING OFF SEASON BEST

The Front Row Motorsports trio of Todd Gilliland, Noah Gragson and Zane Smith ended up with solid finishes last week at Talladega Superspeedway. All three took advantage of the final restart with three laps to go to improve their positions and finish in the top 11. Smith took the restart eighth and finished fifth, marking his third top-10 of the year, while Gragson earned his first top-10, improving from 14th to ninth, and Gilliland went from 15th to 11th.

CINDRIC CONTINUES TO RALLY

Austin Cindric’s 2026 season got off to a rough start as accidents in Atlanta and Phoenix contributed to a 30th-place spot in the point standings. But that has changed dramatically over the past five races with Cindric registering three top-10 runs, including a hard-fought eighth-place finish at Talladega in which he and his team overcame damage from a 26-car accident midway through the race. Those results have helped the 2022 Daytona 500 champion climb 14 spots to 16th going into Sunday’s race at Texas Motor Speedway.

NINE ALL-TIME FORD CUP WINNERS

Ford has 16 NASCAR Cup Series victories at Texas Motor Speedway with nine drivers having at least one. Kevin Harvick ran off a streak of three straight playoff victories at the 1.5-mile track from 2017-19 and is tied with Carl Edwards, who had three career Ford wins including a season sweep in 2008. Greg Biffle, Matt Kenseth and Joey Logano have two apiece while Mark Martin, Jeff Burton, Dale Jarrett and Elliott Sadler have one each.

ROUSH SUCCESS

Jack Roush has had his share of victories at Texas Motor Speedway from the very beginning as Mark Martin (in the championship now known as O’Reilly Auto Parts Series) and Jeff Burton (Cup) swept the opening weekend in 1997. Overall, Roush has won nine times in both the Cup and O’Reilly Series while Greg Biffle registered a NASCAR Craftsman TrucK Series win in 2000. Those nine Cup wins are tied for third on the all-time Roush list with Dover Motor Speedway. Only Michigan International Speedway (14) and Bristol Motor Speedway (12) have been more successful.

SITTING ON 749

The next Ford win will be its 750th all-time in NASCAR’s top series. Ned Jarrett is Ford’s win leader with 43 while Bill Elliott is second with 40. Shirtless Jimmy Florian scored the Blue Oval’s first series victory when he upset the likes of Lee Petty, Curtis Turner and Joe Weatherly at Dayton Speedway on June 25, 1950. Florian earned his nickname after getting out of his 1950 flathead Ford without a shirt. Overall, 91 drivers have won at least one series race with Ford, including notable drivers Mario Andretti, Dan Gurney, Parnelli Jones, A.J. Foyt, Richard Petty, and Dale Earnhardt.

RYAN BLANEY: THE LAST COUPLE OF YEARS THERE HAS BEEN A LOT OF ATTRITION. WHAT HAS CHANGED THERE? “I feel like you see a little bit more of that at Texas just because it’s narrow. Everyone is fighting for a couple of lanes through one and two, so you get guys making the bold moves to get in the hole into one or something and then three and four, if you’re trying to hustle it on the top, we’re running so low that there’s that big bump in the middle of three and four, so guys kind of bust their butts over it pretty easy. I think everyone knows that it’s kind of a track position place. It’s hard to move forward when it’s narrower like that, so everyone knows that restarts are a huge key and when you have restarts that are a huge key at a narrower place, you’re gonna get guys fighting for position and contact. We’ll see if the trend continues.”

CHRIS BUESCHER: “Texas is like a home track curse there. We’ve been really fast and have had some wild circumstances wipe us out. As unfortunate as that is, I’m always excited to head back and think about what we’re gonna be capable of. Our mile-and-a-half stuff, we’ve only got two this year under our belt, but both have been really strong, so I’m excited for that one. At this point, we really don’t have anything circled that we don’t feel confident being able to run well at and that’s a huge gain over where we were at early on in my career.”

RYAN PREECE: “Honestly, I don’t think there’s a racetrack right now that our Ford Mustang Dark Horse isn’t solid at. When it comes to short tracks, road courses, mile-and-a-halves, superspeedways we’re consistent and building a notebook. We’ve put a lot of emphasis in trying to make sure this Ford Mustang Dark Horse gets to Victory Lane.”

LOGANO’S LAST LAP PASS

Joey Logano’s first Cup win at TMS came in 2014 in a race that was delayed until Monday because of rain. Logano dominated much of the second half, but a caution with two laps to go forced a green-white-checker finish. He started third on the restart after the leaders stopped on pit road and was able to get past Jeff Gordon on the final lap to claim victory. Logano led 108 of the final 116 laps to claim the first of five wins that season.

BURTON WINS DEBUT CUP RACE AT TEXAS

A couple of firsts happened on April 6, 1997 as Texas Motor Speedway hosted its inaugural NASCAR Cup Series event and Jeff Burton took his first checkered flag. Burton, led by crew chief Buddy Parrott, passed Todd Bodine with 58 laps remaining and beat fellow Ford driver Dale Jarrett to the finish line by four seconds. The race was slowed by 10 cautions, which included a multi-car accident in the first turn of the first lap. Burton went on to win 21 career series races with 17 of those coming in a Thunderbird or Taurus.

HALF OF THE TOP 10

After two weeks off, the NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series resumes its season with five Ford Racing drivers in the top 10 of the point standings, including leader Chandler Smith. The Georgia native won the season-opener at Daytona International Speedway and is coming off a runner-up finish in Bristol. His Front Row Motorsports teammate, Layne Riggs, is fourth in the standings while a trio of ThorSport Racing drivers – Ty Majeski, Ben Rhodes and Jake Garcia are seventh, eighth and ninth respectively.

ON THE POLE

Qualifying has also been a positive for Ford Racing to start the 2026 season, earning three poles in the first six events. Jake Garcia, who is still searching for his first win, has captured two of those (Atlanta and Rockingham) while teammate Ty Majeski has the other (Daytona). Garcia’s qualifying prowess came into focus a year ago when he won poles at Rockingham, Kansas and Bristol.  

FORD’S NASCAR CUP SERIES WINNERS

AT TEXAS

1997 – Jeff Burton

1998 – Mark Martin

2001 – Dale Jarrett

2002 – Matt Kenseth

2004 – Elliott Sadler

2005 – Greg Biffle (1) and Carl Edwards (2)

2008 – Carl Edwards (Sweep)

2011 – Matt Kenseth (1)

2012 – Greg Biffle (1)

2014 – Joey Logano (1)

2017 – Kevin Harvick (2)

2018 – Kevin Harvick (2)

2019 – Kevin Harvick (2)

2025 – Joey Logano

FORD’S NASCAR CRAFTSMAN TRUCK SERIES WINNERS AT TEXAS

1997 – Kenny Irwin Jr.

1998 – Tony Raines

2000 – Greg Biffle (1)