Darlington Raceway Tag

By David Morgan, Associate Editor After a wild weekend in Daytona to wrap up the regular season and set the 16-driver field for the Playoffs, the NASCAR Cup Series heads to one of the crown jewels on the circuit, Darlington Raceway, for this weekend’s running of the Cook Out Southern 500. A staple of the Cup Series since 1950, there are many elements to Darlington that make it a special track. From the egg-shape of the track that features one end narrower than the other as a result of building theRead More

By Luis Torres, Staff Writer DARLINGTON, S.C. – On a weekend symbolizing a sense of normalcy in the NASCAR world, Kyle Busch certainly had an eventful Sunday afternoon. He overcame an early spin to pull off a superb rally, good enough for a third-place finish in the Goodyear 400 at Darlington Raceway. Before the 293-lap race commenced, Busch had one of the loudest reactions among the 37-car field. As you’d expect, a mixed reception for last Sunday’s Kansas winner. For a brief moment in Stage 1, Busch was on topRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor Martin Truex, Jr. was in a league of his own during Sunday’s NASCAR Cup Series race at Darlington, but in the closing laps of the Goodyear 400, Kyle Larson did his best to give the 2017 series champion a run for his money, eventually coming home with a runner-up result. Starting the day in 14th place, Larson worked his way up to fourth by the end of the first stage, but following a pit road speeding penalty, he would be back at square one for theRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service DARLINGTON, S.C. – In the final stage of Sunday’s Goodyear 400, Kyle Larson turned a Martin Truex Jr. cakewalk into a study in suspense, but Larson couldn’t keep Truex out of Victory Lane in the 12th NASCAR Cup Series race of the season. Truex swept the first two stages and led 248 laps to win his third event of the season and remain the only multiple winner in the series this year.  But after the final sequence of pit stops, Larson — who gainedRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor After Saturday’s NASCAR Xfinity Series race at Darlington Raceway, it looked as if Noah Gragson would be walking away with another $100,000 Dash4Cash bonus following his fourth-place finish in the Steakhouse Elite 200. That is, until his No. 9 JR Motorsports Chevrolet failed post-race inspection, leading to a disqualification and ruining his streak of winning the first three Dash4Cash bonuses. Per NASCAR Xfinity Series Managing Director Wayne Auton, Gragson’s car failed Section 20.14.c of the rulebook, which states: “All suspension mounts and mounting hardware must notRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service In a dramatic two-lap overtime shootout, Justin Allgaier squeezed past JR Motorsports teammate Josh Berry and held on to win Saturday’s Steakhouse Elite 200 NASCAR Xfinity Series event at Darlington Raceway. Allgaier chose the outside lane for the final restart and had to fend off Berry, who edged ahead entering Turn 1. But Allgaier shot the gap to the outside off Turn 2 and pulled away to win by .422 seconds over his teammate. Allgaier had wrestled the lead from Berry from the bottomRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service After a 17-truck wreck effectively ended Kyle Busch Motorsports’ stranglehold on the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series, Sheldon Creed outdueled Ben Rhodes on the final two restarts to win Friday night’s LiftKits4Less.com 200 at Darlington Raceway. Driving a No. 2 GMS Racing Chevrolet whose paint scheme was an homage to the late Jason Leffler, Creed took the lead from runner-up Rhodes in a side-by-side battle after a restart on Lap 140.  After Danny Bohn’s spin brought out the 11th caution of the race onRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor Like Doc Brown and Marty McFly in Back to the Future, the NASCAR Cup Series is time traveling this week, making the jump from the future with the unveiling of the Next Gen cars to celebrating the past with Throwback Weekend at Darlington Raceway. A staple of the Cup Series since 1950, there are many elements to Darlington that make it a special track. From the egg-shape of the track that features one end narrower than the other as a result of building the track aroundRead More

By David Morgan, Associate Editor Darlington, March 1988. Proving that persistence pays off, Lake Speed finally made good on his last name that seemed destined for a racing greatness by dominating at one of the toughest tracks on the NASCAR Cup Series circuit to capture what would be his one and only win at NASCAR’s highest level. Before getting his start in NASCAR in 1980, Speed’s greatest claim to fame was winning the World Karting Championship in LeMans, France two years prior, defeating a future three-time Formula 1 champion, the lateRead More

By Reid Spencer, NASCAR Wire Service New tracks, road courses and a dirt race—NASCAR fulfilled its mission of expanding its sphere of influence with the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series schedule, announced Wednesday afternoon. With the addition of road course races at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course, Circuit of The Americas (COTA) in Austin, Tex., and Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wis., NASCAR has doubled the number of road-course events on the schedule—retaining the races at Sonoma Raceway, Watkins Glen International and the Charlotte Roval. For the first time sinceRead More