The 2025 Bass Pro Shops Night Race at Bristol was a wild playoff elimination showdown, defined by aggressive tire wear, over 14 cautions, and 36 lead changes. Christopher Bell broke out of the pack with a late caution and a fresh-tire advantage, overtaking worn-tire leaders and going in for the win. That set the stage for a high-stakes, high-contact finale, where Keselowski saw an opening.

In the final lap, Brad Keselowski laid down a classic “bump-and-run” move on Christopher Bell in the final corner, tapping Bell’s rear bumper in a bid to pass. Despite the contact, Bell held on and edged Keselowski by just 0.343 seconds for the win, ending the Round of 16 with a Joe Gibbs Racing sweep. While Keselowski had played the tire game nearly perfectly and managed to stay in contention with fresh rubber on that last restart, the lane choice and timing of that bump ended up being the differentiator, leading to Keselowski fuming after the race, saying, “I’m pi—d.”

Brad Keselowski’s costly nudge sparks chaos under the lights

In a post-race interview, Brad Keselowski acknowledged everything that transpired on a chaotic night of racing. “Oh, there’s a lot happened tonight. You know, first, good year, the tire worked, the temperature dropped to the threshold, and we got a tire wear race,” he said. Indeed, the 2025 Bass Pro Shops Night Race saw Goodyear introduce a new, softer right-side tire, paired with the usual left-side tire, leading to concerns and uncertainty about how it would perform.

However, things got messy on the late restarts. Keselowski pointed out, “Someone pulled out in front of me there and stopped. So I was lead, and I bumped into him and caused some kind of chain reaction, but it caught the yellow.” On Lap 488, Keselowski made contact with Cole Custer, nudging him into Bubba Wallace and triggering a caution with just 12 laps remaining. 8 cars were still on the lead lap, and several drivers, including Keselowski and Christopher Bell, pitted for fresh right-side tires.

Bell, having stopped on Lap 491, with only 9 laps from the finish, vaulted from 5th place to the lead by Lap 497.  He then talked about the final restart, “It’s still going to be fine, and then the restart, the 77 spun his tires, and the 38 cleaned him out. Basically, just all Chris had to do was turn left. I had a shot at him down here on the last lap, and I hit him, but it just didn’t do anything.” 

Finally, Keselowski shared how it felt to come away second after being so close. “Well, I’m just pi—d. We did all the right moves, and just kind of got screwed on the last restart. And it sucks to be that close,” he said.

The drop in track temperature, just a few degrees lower than the day before, helped those tires degrade more significantly, turning the night into a test of strategy and endurance. Keselowski noted, “I don’t know, there’s some scientist somewhere that could have a big study on this one. How a five-degree swing of track temp changes it so dramatically.”

Keselowski then described the racing action as intense due to the tire falloff. “But I thought it was actually a really good race because of the tire wear. The bottom was dominant, a lot of bump and run passes. It felt like Bristol from 1995 in that regard,” he continued. Keselowski has had many strong runs at Bristol before, including 3 wins and 8 top-10s in prior starts. With the bottom groove being so favored by these new conditions, drivers found opportunity for passing, but also risk. Keselowski acknowledged that playing the tire game well was crucial, “But, we played the tire stuff, I thought, perfectly to win the race.”

In losing to Bell, Keselowski did not make it to the Round of 12, while Bell is ranked 4th in points at the moment, with 4 wins, 1 pole, 10 top-5s, 16 top-10s, and has locked in a spot in the playoffs. As Keselowski wrestled with unpredictability, his skepticism for the Bristol tire experiment persisted even before the race.

Confusing for Keselowski, anticipation for others in NASCAR’s Bristol gamble

Brad Keselowski admitted ahead of the 2025 Food City 500 race in April that “We have no idea what to expect,” voicing frustration over Goodyear’s experimental approach. After clinching third place in last year’s spring tire-management spectacle, the RFK Racing driver watched NASCAR’s efforts to replicate the chaos spiral into consistency. “The tire held up really, really well today, but surprised by that. We’ll see tomorrow how it holds up. You know, tomorrow’s made different tests as he gets into the night. More cars on the track at one time. So, our weekly science experiment continues.”

Keselowski’s skepticism came despite a stronger qualifying run at the Bristol Night Race qualifiers, lining up 18th compared to earlier starts in the 30s. Yet his past words echo into the present: “We tested there last February. We saw the tire wear issues. We came back and had tire wear issues. We had another test there in the summer, same thing. We came back for the fall race, and it was great…It’s something you can’t really explain to people or understand until you see it.” The uncertainty left him wary, even as Bristol has historically been one of his best tracks.

As Keselowski grappled with the unknown, other drivers saw a possibility. While the No. 6 driver viewed Bristol as an unpredictable “science experiment,” competitors anticipated the kind of drama that could reshape the playoff structure. Safe to say, all of them were right in their views.