Coming off of a solid race on NASCAR’s most electrifying oval track, the stars of the NASCAR Cup Series got a brief reprieve from points racing to prepare them for the longest oval race of all: the Coca-Cola 600.
That title of “longest oval race of all” doesn’t just extend through NASCAR, but every racing series on Earth. 600 miles takes 400 laps to complete, spread out over four 100-lap stages that’ll test the mettle of each and every one of the 40 drivers entered for a chance at victory.
The Coca-Cola 600 holds a special spot as the closer of the most important date for motorsports, The Day of Racing, which starts for most with Formula 1’s Monaco Grand Prix before easing race fans into the Greatest Spectacle in Racing, IndyCar’s Indianapolis 500, until giving way to the evening where stock cars come to play.
Tonight’s race is likely to offer a number of different wrinkles as the race goes from lit up by the hot Sun to lit up by the bright lights hanging above the speedway as the track temperature fluctuates.
Not only that, the aging surface provided by Charlotte Motor Speedway will allow drivers to spread out from the apron to the wall in order to find speed, meaning drivers could find themselves in trouble anywhere on the track at any time of day.
With a Crown Jewel on the table and a playoff spot on the line, what will these drivers do to put themselves in the annals of NASCAR history at Charlotte Motor Speedway? Let’s find out.
A Couple of Weeks Ago at Kansas…
Though much of the worldwide media attention aimed at Kyle Larson have focused on his Indy exploits, the 2021 Cup Series champion returned to his day job by setting on the pole for Kansas.
An interesting race developed behind Larson as he set the pace for 221 of the race’s 267 laps, though his car and his advantage weren’t entirely unflappable as his teammate Chase Elliott contended with him through the race’s first 200 laps.
A bad pit stop for Elliott sank him down the running order, allowing Larson to speed into the distance where he claimed a narrow victory over Christopher Bell and Ryan Blaney. The win was Larson’s third triumph of 2025, and for a more detailed breakdown of that race, check out Jey’s recap of the event.
Last Week at North Wilkesboro…
Rather than make it a tripleheader All-Star weekend, NASCAR decided to bring the Craftsman Truck Series along to North Wilkesboro where the race featured great action through the field all day.
If you’d like to read more about that race, I took the liberty of crafting a detailed breakdown of the Window World 250 that includes all the controversy surrounding the finish.
The NASCAR Cup Series made their third trip to the hallowed grounds of North Wilkesboro Speedway tucked away in rural North Carolina for the 41st running of the NASCAR All-Star Race.
Just like last year’s iteration of this event, Joey Logano’s No. 22 Shell Pennzoil Ford showed the way for most of the night with Christopher Bell’s No. 20 Mobil1 Toyota always following in his tire tracks.
In the end, the dreaded promotor’s caution thrown by Michael Waltrip tipped the scales in Bell’s favor, allowing the 20 team to fit their Camry with two fresh right-side tires for the final 30 laps.
Logano’s robust defense fell apart as Bell climbed his way back to second, and the motor oil matchup went the way of Bell after nudging Logano up the track in turns 1 & 2 with less than 10 laps to go to claim his first All-Star Race victory.
In Case You Missed It (NASCAR Edition)
Since we’ll be covering two weeks of NASCAR news, this part of the newsletter receives a change for this week to make sure everything is covered.
When the penalty report dropped after Kansas, NASCAR levied an L1 penalty to Chris Buescher and the No. 17 RFK Racing team, docking them 60 driver and owner points, fining them $75,000, and suspending crew chief Scott Graves for two races. RFK Racing has since filed an appeal for the front bumper violation.
Kyle Larson’s quest to conquer the Indianapolis 500 and the Coca-Cola 600 in one fell swoop became complicated by a crash in practice last Friday. His Arrow McLaren team repaired the No. 17 Chevy enough to qualify 19th the next day. He practiced as high as 11th on Monday leading into today’s Double attempt.
At the All-Star Race, the qualifying procedures included a pit stop element that required teams to fill the car with fuel and make a four-tire pit stop before the driver exited pit road and completed their qualifying session. In the end, Michael McDowell’s No. 71 Spire Motorsports crew walked away with the $100,000 check.
On Tuesday, May 20, the NASCAR Hall of Fame inducted four new members: Kurt Busch, Harry Gant, Ray Hendrick, and Humpy Wheeler.
Many of you reading this remember the rise, the fall, and the rise again of Kurt Busch. The 2004 Cup Series champion won 37 races at the sport’s highest level, including the 2010 Coca-Cola 600 and the 2017 Daytona 500 where he made a last-lap pass on Kyle Larson when he ran out of fuel in turn 1.
“Handsome” Harry Gant spent much of his career driving some version of the Skoal Bandit, whether it be with Mach 1 Racing or with Leo Jackson Motorsports. Of his 18 career wins, four of them came in September 1991 where the then-51-year-old racer started the month winning his second Southern 500 before reeling off a string of wins at Richmond, Dover, and Martinsville.
Though Ray Hendrick started just 17 races at the Cup Series level, the Virginia native established himself as one of the pioneering figures in modified racing, so much so that he was granted the moniker “Mr. Modified”. Voted as one of NASCAR’s 50 Greatest Drivers in 1998, Hendrick dominated the modified scene to the tune of 700 career victories.
Howard Augustine “Humpy” Wheeler Jr. rose to prominence in NASCAR as the promoter for Charlotte Motor Speedway. Taking the job from the illustrious Richard Howard in 1975, Wheeler’s 33-year run at the track saw it become one of the biggest venues in all of North America. When stock cars weren’t ripping around the oval, IMSA tackled the Roval, and Legends Cars rolled around the quarter-mile.
Any race was just a prelude to whatever Humpy had prepared for the event, such as putting a dead chicken in a shark’s mouth and putting them on a car.to get a rise out of rival drivers Darrell Waltrip and Cale Yarborough. Wheeler’s numerous promotional exploits garnered him the nickname “The P.T. Barnum of NASCAR”.
The very next day, shock news came out of the Joe Gibbs Racing camp as Christopher Bell’s spotter Stevie Reeves abruptly quit the 20 team. JGR announced Matt Philpott as Reeves’ replacement.
Australian Supercars — the series that raised such talents as NASCAR’s Shane van Gisbergen and IndyCar’s Scott McLaughlin — will see another one of their own making their debut stateside as Supercars winner Jack Perkins looks to make his Xfinity Series debut with Joe Gibbs Racing in August at Portland in the 19 car.
I know this is a lot to catch up on, so if you need a break, enjoy this video of IndyCar driver Pato O’Ward milking a cow prior to today’s Indy 500.
As for content from our website, Jey and I ran down the entire Cup Series order for our latest power rankings, ordering all 36 drivers based on statistical prowess and our own personal takeaways from the first 12 races.
Not only that, Jey and I took advantage of the exhibition weekend to craft Stock Car Spotlight where we talk up some of the younger drivers in the NASCAR ladder system.
Our first edition about Connor Zilisch and Brent Crews dropped last week while our Corey Heim and Isabella Robusto piece came out early this week, followed by our write-up about Jesse Love and Kaden Honeycutt.
Friday night saw the Craftsman Truck Series return to action for a 200-miler at Charlotte with rookie Gio Ruggiero on pole. It didn’t take long for Corey Heim to sneak by his Tricon Garage teammate, taking the lead away before the end of third lap.
In the short run, the Niece Motorsports Chevys of Ross Chastain and Kaden Honeycutt kept pace with Heim, but the No. 11 Safelite Foster Love Toyota Tundra cleaned house, leading a race-high 98 of 133 laps and sweeping the stages en route to his fourth win of the season.
On Saturday afternoon, Taylor Gray took the pole for the BetMGM 300 at Charlotte where he held the top spot for the first 23 laps before Cup Series star William Byron blew by him and cruised to a stage 1 victory that he matched with a victory in stage 2.
A speeding penalty prior to the final stage forced Byron to the back of the field, allowing Justin Allgaier to take hold of the lead. A caution for a flat tire on Gray’s car during green-flag pit stops put Allgaier back at the front and pushed Byron further down the running order for the ensuing restart with 46 laps to go.
When Carson Kvapil brought out the seventh caution with 20 laps to go, the race changed dramatically as much of the lead-lap runners ducked into the pits for fresh tires. Allgaier stayed out on the track, and after a few restarts, that looked to be the right decision.
Unfortunately for the defending series champion, it was not to be as Byron kept moving up the order as the field crashed around him, taking a strong run into turn 3 on the final restart to get by Allgaier for good and score the victory in team owner Rick Hendrick’s backyard.
As for today’s Crown Jewel event at Charlotte Motor Speedway, today’s Coca-Cola 600 sees a familiar car on pole with the No. 19 Bass Pro Shops Toyota piloted by Chase Briscoe setting the fastest lap alongside Kyle Larson on the front row. For full qualifying results, click here.
Right before qualifying kicked off for the Cup Series yesterday, Richard Childress Racing announced that they’d picked up their team option on Kyle Busch’s contract, extending their relationship into 2026.
The Race
Today’s Coca-Cola 600 will be the first of a five-race stretch where the NASCAR Cup Series will air on Amazon Prime Video with Adam Alexander, Steve Letarte, and Dale Earnhardt Jr. in the booth.
Read this very carefully: Amazon Prime Video comes with your Amazon Prime subscription, so if you already enjoy free two-day delivery from Amazon through their Prime subscription, you have complimentary access to Amazon Prime Video. Log in with your Amazon credentials, and you’ll be good to go!
If you don’t currently have an Amazon Prime subscription, you can click this link where you can sign-up for a 30-day free trial of Amazon Prime, which coincidentally expires right after the last Amazon Prime race at Pocono Raceway.
If you live outside the US, I don’t have any further guidance for your viewing, so sorry for that.
As for the race itself, the Coca-Cola 600 remains the only race on the calendar that includes four stages as the 400-lap race distance gets split into quarters, ending at the following laps: 100-200-300-400.
If we’re talking about the average Coca-Cola 600, it looks something like this: 10 cautions for 52 caution laps, 22 lead changes, and only two instances of overtime in the last decade, 2020 and 2022. Look for the final caution to fly around lap 355, or 46 laps remaining.
Writer’s Pick
Last week’s writer’s pick was Ryan Blaney, and had the AdventHealth 400 ended one lap later, he might’ve found himself in victory lane but was forced to settle for third.
This week, I’m going with Tyler Reddick.
The 23XI Racing driver has never finished worse than ninth in this event since entering the series in 2020. If you look at the last three years, Reddick has ended the night sixth, fifth, and fourth.
Going by that logic, I’ll have selected a third-place finisher as winner for the second race in a row, but I suspect that the 45 car, one of last year’s Championship Four contenders, will find himself collecting his first of many Crown Jewel victories.
(Top Photo Credit: Jim Dedmon/USA TODAY Sports)
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