Contested over 334 laps on the 1.5–mile (2.4 km) quad-oval, it was the seventh race of the 2013 Sprint Cup Series championship.

By also winning the Friday night Nationwide Series race, Busch completed his second weekend sweep of 2013, having also accomplished this at Fontana.

A Texas man committed suicide by putting a gun to his head and shooting himself after an argument with another fan near an infield.

[11][12][13][14] Because of the sponsorship, Senator Chris Murphy asked Rupert Murdoch, whose News Corporation owns Fox Sports, which was scheduled to air the race, to not broadcast it.

[15] Fox broadcast the race as scheduled, not least because failure to do so would have been a breach of the network's contract with NASCAR.

However, Fox only used the official sponsored name once per hour (the minimum mandated by NASCAR) and otherwise referred to it generically (in this case as the "Texas 500"), the network's usual practice when a race's title sponsor does not buy ads during the race broadcast; the NRA reportedly did not seek to purchase any such ads.

[17] During the first practice session, Martin Truex Jr., for the Michael Waltrip Racing team, was quickest ahead of Earnhardt Jr. in second and Johnson in third.

[18] Edwards, Jeff Burton, Kenseth, Biffle, and Casey Mears rounded out the top ten quickest drivers in the session.

[19] Juan Pablo Montoya, Burton, Biffle, Paul Menard, and Keselowski followed in the top ten.

[21] Earnhardt, Johnson, Jeff Gordon, Edwards, and Montoya completed the first ten positions on the grid.

56 Michael Waltrip Racing car of Martin Truex Jr. was fined six driver points and Michael Waltrip was penalized six owner points for the front car height failing to meet NASCAR specifications.