It’s not hyperbole to describe Sunday night’s Cook Out Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium as an unequivocal success.
That was the overwhelming consensus of race fans and competitors alike after Chase Elliott outlasted hard-charging Ryan Blaney to win the season-opening exhibition race for the first time.
That said, here are three top-line conclusions drawn from Sunday’s race.
The Clash can travel comfortably
It’s hard to imagine a starker contrast than the one between Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and Bowman Gray Stadium.
After three years in the shadow of the Hollywood Hills in one of America’s largest urban markets, the Clash moved to a much smaller venue in a hotbed of NASCAR fandom.
Before the Clash arrived, the L.A. Coliseum had never hosted a NASCAR race, requiring a temporary quarter-mile track to be constructed at field level.
Bowman Gray, on the other hand, is a traditional NASCAR short track that has featured weekly racing throughout its history.
Nevertheless, both the debut event at the Coliseum in 2022 and the return of NASCAR Cup racing to Bowman Gray this past weekend produced electric atmospheres on both sides of the country.
Los Angeles proved out the coliseum concept, broadening the potential reach of NASCAR racing into a variety of urban markets. Bowman Gray, on the other hand, showed emphatically that NASCAR’s top division can revisit its roots and stage a satisfying show.
Size doesn’t matter when it comes to Clash venues
The Los Angeles Coliseum can accommodate 77,500 fans. The seating capacity at Bowman Gray Stadium is 17,000.
When the Clash debuted at the Coliseum, approximately 70 percent of those in attendance were watching a NASCAR race for the first time.
At Bowman Gray, the sellout crowd was a mixture of hard-core regulars and those who had traveled—some from considerable distances—to see a Cup race at the iconic venue. The throng that packed the grandstands included representatives from 44 different states, five different countries and three different continents.
According to Elliott, the enthusiasm of the crowd made a difference.
“It was an extremely special moment,” he said. “I think the people in the crowd here made it that. I’m thankful for that.
“Yeah, it was a moment I’ll never forget, for sure. It’s not every day you not only race in an environment like that, but to have the opportunity to win and kind of share that moment with the crowd, it was really cool.”
If and when the Clash returns to Bowman Gray, competition for tickets will doubtless be ferocious. Bottom line? It’s the atmosphere that enhances the experience, not the size of the crowd.
And in the case of both the Coliseum and Bowman Gray, the atmosphere was not lost on a much broader national television audience.
NASCAR has made considerable progress with the short-track package
Yes, Elliott led 171 of 200 laps on Sunday night, with only green-flag laps counting. That wasn’t surprising. From the start of the weekend to the checkered flag in the main event, Elliott had a superior car.
At the opposite end of the spectrum, however, Blaney relied on a driver points provisional to start the race, lined up 23rd and by the end of the event was battling Elliott for the win.
So, the driver who started first narrowly beat the driver who started last to the finish line.
Blaney may have earned the “hard-charger” award, but there was plenty of movement within the field. Bubba Wallace, for instance, advanced from 14th to finish fifth.
Against conventional wisdom, the outside lane at Bowman Gray proved workable, so much so that, on restarts, the second-place driver lined up on the outside of the front row as often as he chose the bottom of the second row. Both options proved viable at various points in the race.
Tire management was also an important factor. After leading the first 96 laps, Elliott surrendered the top spot to Denny Hamlin, but through adjustments at the halfway break and subsequent tire conservation, the 2020 Cup champion regained his edge.
“I think I probably didn’t save enough through the first hundred laps,” Elliott said. “I really wasn’t sure how much to save. Sometimes when you’re the leader in that scenario, you’re kind of setting the pace, and those guys can judge off you how hard to run.
“I think that Denny and Tyler (Reddick) and a few of ’em did a better job—Ryan—saving their tires to have something left there in those last 20 laps in that first one.”
It remains to be seen if the racing will be that good on the larger, faster short tracks later this year, but it’s clear that NASCAR and Goodyear are moving in the right direction.
