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Ross Chastain’s No. 1 automobile featured a Busch Mild design honoring farmers and supporting the nonprofit Farm Rescue
Chastain’s agricultural roots impressed his partnership with Busch Mild, which started after his father requested “beer and tractors”
The Iowa Speedway occasion included a Dierks Bentley efficiency as a part of the model’s Summer season Music Collection
NASCAR’s Ross Chastain is happy with his heritage — and on Sunday, Aug. 9, he made certain to honor not solely his household, but additionally farmers throughout the nation with a particular paint job seen racing across the observe on the Iowa Speedway.
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On Sunday, the Trackhouse Racing driver’s No. 1 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 was wrapped in Busch Mild’s limited-edition “For the Farmers” can as a part of the beer model’s marketing campaign in assist of Farm Rescue, a corporation that gives vital assist to farm households in disaster. However for Chastain, who’s aptly nicknamed the “Watermelon Man” and recognized for smashing the fruit after coming in first, it additionally holds particular that means to him.
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Whereas this isn’t the primary time his inventory automobile has been wrapped in a design highlighting a Busch Mild marketing campaign — from initiatives supporting fishing to nation music, in addition to the beer’s Apple and Lime flavors — the farming can-inspired design was “very intentional,” Chastain, 33, tells PEOPLE contained in the Trackhouse hauler on the grounds of the oval brief observe earlier than the race in Newton.
“I’ve promoted a variety of manufacturers, however if you happen to discover, it is very centered on the farmer that I grew up being and nonetheless am,” says the motive force, whose father, Ralph Chastain, is a generational watermelon farmer from Florida. Moreover, Ross’ youthful brother, Chad Chastain, is knowledgeable motorsports driver and works within the household enterprise harvesting the fruit in Western Indiana.
Ross Chastain’s Chevrolet Camaro wrapped within the Busch Mild farming can on Aug. 9, 2026Credit: Barr Visuals
In response to Ross, they’ve watermelons popping out of Owensboro, Ky., Delaware, Maryland and North Carolina. “So we ship Watermelon 365,” he notes.
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Explaining how that agricultural heritage influenced his ongoing sponsorship with the beer firm, Chastain recollects that years in the past he and his dad first sat down with the Trackhouse gross sales crew.
Throughout that assembly, Ross remembers “spitballing concepts for what we needed to do sooner or later as a result of we felt like we had this clean canvas to go and create no matter we needed on the No. 1 automobile.” Then, at one level within the dialog, Ralph was requested, “What would you want?” His response was, “Beer and tractors.” Not lengthy after that, the sponsorship with Anheuser-Busch was fashioned.
“Every time they wrap this beer can, it might appear, I believe, insignificant to some folks,” Ross, who helped create the “Melon Man” watermelon brand early in his skilled driving profession and was very hands-on with this newest design, says now. “However to farmers, it’s a thanks. And I believe that — nicely, I do know it, it means rather a lot to my household and to households throughout out right here in Iowa.”
Busch Mild’s limited-edition farming cansCredit: Busch Mild
The farming can itself “is saying thanks proper there on their beer,” the motive force continues, noting that lots of the followers, quite a lot of whom he acquired to fulfill within the days prior “all drove in as we speak as they’re in the course of their rising seasons with corn.” And whereas they take pleasure in what unfolds on the observe, Ross provides that every thing his crew and sponsor are doing is “a thanks to them for what they do as a result of, out right here, corn is the massive factor and corn makes the world go round.”
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By the initiative, Busch Mild says it is encouraging shoppers to “Select Beer Grown Right here” in direct assist of American farmers. So far, its partnership with Farm Rescue “has raised over $1.5 million and supported greater than 1,300 households.”
From left: Dierks Bentley with Ross Chastain forward of the NASCAR Cup Collection race on Aug. 9, 2026Credit: Sean Gardner/Getty
Along with Ross racing to a seventh-place end along with his specialty wrap, the model continued its Busch Mild Summer season Music Collection. This time, Dierks Bentley took the stage to carry out quite a lot of hits in entrance of farmers and followers alike on the Iowa Speedway.
“There’s not significantly better than nation music, racing and chilly beer. We had a good time as a part of the Busch Mild Summer season Music Collection,” the nation singer, 50, tells PEOPLE. He provides, “The power of a racing crowd is unmatched and the followers in Iowa introduced it in a giant manner.”
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