Alex Bowman provides health update after return from vertigo at Bristol

With a pair of finishes outside the top 20 to begin the season before he was credited with a 36th-place finish at COTA, Bowman's return offered much of the same at Bristol.

To his credit, it is so hard to immediately return to battling toward the front in a series that is as competitive as the Cup Series. Bowman faced a tall task already, but especially at a track like Bristol that is taxing both physically and mentally across 500 laps.

Bowman is an eight-time winner at the Cup Series level, all of which have come at different tracks. He may not always be as flashy or have the wins that his Hendrick Motorsports teammates do, but Bowman has showed how versatile he can be on multiple track types. 

He does not have a win at Kansas Speedway — the site of Sunday's race (2 p.m. ET, Fox, HBO Max, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio). However, Bowman has six top 10s in his last seven starts there, including a career-high 107 laps led in the 2022 fall race.

It does not help that he did not compete at the other 1.5-mile race at Las Vegas earlier this season. Additionally, Bowman currently sits 36th in points — last of the full-time drivers — and is 153 points behind Shane van Gisbergen for the 16th and final Chase spot as things currently stand.

There is still a lot of racing left before the 10-race Chase even begins, but with consistency so important and the field as close as it has ever been, Bowman cannot waste any time if he wants to have any shot at contending for a Chase spot.