Old school NASCAR is back at Bristol

Joey Logano won Saturday's Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol Motor Speedway, but third-place finisher Carson Hocevar left the track as the conquering hero. Hocevar got the best of Logano's teammate, Ryan Blaney, with their on-track contact and the fight after the race. There wasn't the flag-to-flag excitement through the first two stages of the race, but the final 75 laps made up for it. There was plenty of intense racing for the lead, overly aggressive moves, a fantastic finish and the post-race antics. Ty Gibbs attempted to go in the middle of Cole Custer and Alex Bowman for a 3-wide pass. It resulted in a hard crash for Bowman and minimal damage for Gibbs. With 43 laps to go, Blaney made a pass of Hocevar and then moved down the track in an attempt to block him. Hocevar wasn't backing off and the contact since Blaney hard into the turn 1 wall. Blaney was fuming after the accident "We got crashed," Blaney said. "I left him plenty of room for a lap before that. I didn't chop him. I didn't run him into the fence or nothing like I easily could have. I protected the bottom and he just decided he wanted to be there and didn't lift and wrecked me." Hocevar saw the contact differently and placed more of the blame on Blaney. "I thought we were racing fine. I went to cross him over just to try to get to the bottom, and I thought it was going to work out fine," Hocevar said. "You just can't turn left. I was full on the brakes, but you can't really stop with that big head of steam." The end saw Hocevar, Kyle Larson and Gibbs all racing for the lead and Logano getting past all three. Logano, a three-time NASCAR Cup Series champion, went on to win. Overlooked was Larson edging Hocevar for second play. Blaney was waiting until after the race and came to confront Hocevar on pit road. Blaney grabbed Hocevar's uniform. Hocevar quickly landed two punches and knocked Blaney to the ground. Blaney got up and made his way through the crowd to land a punch of his own on Hocevar. Clearly, Hocevar got the better of the fight. He turned to the fans who had gathered at the bottom of the grandstands and raised his hands to acknowledge them. He was loudly cheered and later left the track nicknamed the "Last Great Colosseum" much like he was riding on a chariot. As they left the track and drove between fans lined up for autographs, Hocevar was treated as the hero again. He high-fived several of them, and later his souvenir trailer was packed with fans. A master marketer, Hocevar offered a 12 percent discount (Blaney's number) on his merchandise. Over the last couple of years, Hocevar has drawn the ire of the garage, but become one of the fans' favorites. Blaney is another of the most popular drivers in the sport. In the end, the fight overshadowed the finish, but was ultimately good for BMS and the sport. It wasn't just the Cup race. Jesse Love's aggressive driving in the O'Reilly Series put Justin Allgaier in the wall, and set up another exciting ending. Sheldon Creed survived the chaos to win in a green-white-checkered finish. The clips of the racing and the post-race antics will be shown for years to come. Retired driver Kenny Wallace explained it simply that one wants to go to a race to see something exciting. Bristol Motor Speedway certainly delivered that throughout the weekend.