Coronavirus restrictions have begun to loosen, but race officials have opted for one-day events that minimize travel and at-track exposure for essential personnel. The last time the raceway held a springtime event was April , when Kevin Harvick dominated by leading of laps in his lone Darlington win.
Matt Kenseth, who returns to competition Sunday for the first time since , kicked off that string of success in Newman missed the last three races during his recovery time. The Stewart-Haas Racing veteran has a similarly steady streak at Darlington, where he has placed among the top 10 in seven consecutive races. ET , FS1 Wednesday, p. Johnny Mantz.
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In recent years the track has been reconfigured; what was the front stretch is now the backstretch, and the turns have been renumbered accordingly. Seating has been increased to approximately 60,; it has been limited by the proximity of a railroad track to the facility, a highway behind the backstretch, and the still-present pond. Darlington has something of a legendary quality among drivers and older fans; this is probably due to its status as the first NASCAR superspeedway and hence the first venue where many of them became cognizant of the truly high speeds that stock cars could achieve on a long track.
It is often referred to as The Lady in Black , allegedly because the walls around the track are always painted white prior to a race but are always largely black by the end of it due to a profusion of tire contacts. Darlington is also known as "The Track Too Tough to Tame", and rookie racers hitting the wall are considered to have received their "Darlington stripe".
For many years Darlington has been the site of two annual Winston Cup races; one was held in the spring and the other, the Southern its name has varied in recent years due to sale of naming rights but this is what fans generally continued to call it , was always held on Labor Day weekend.
In , the Labor Day event was given to California Speedway , effective and replaced by a race run in November; recently NASCAR announced that in there will be only one Nextel Cup race run at Darlington, which offended many traditionalists. Originally, he envisaged a standard oval, but there was a problem; the farmer who sold Brassington the land operated an adjacent pond where he farmed minnows.
Part of the deal was that any track should not disturb his fish, so Brasington was forced to modify his design to create one corner tighter and narrower than the other, taking up less space and moving it further away from Sherman Ramsey's pond. By such a quirk of fate came the circuit layout which would go on to torment drivers and engineers in equal measures down the years, as they sought an ideal setup which probably never existed.
Darlington has always been about compromises. Beginning in , Brasington and his workers toiled to complete the facility, Harold himself taking the controls of the diggers on occasion, often to the chagrin of the workers!
After nearly a year, 'Harold's Folly' was complete and the 1. A two-week qualifying format, similar to Indianapolis, was planned to accommodate the 75 entrants who took part. The crowds were there in numbers too — 25, showed up on race day, more than double the expected number, overwhelming the grandstands and crowding onto the interior of the oval, instantly creating the infield culture which remains a feature to this day. The inaugural Southern proved to be a test for both drivers and machinery, for many being their first all-asphalt race.
Californian Johnny Mantz had an unusual strategic race, thanks to superior tyres; Mantz had correctly calculated that car tyres wouldn't last, so fitted much slower but more durable truck tyres, qualifying last. As the six hour race unfolded, despite driving slowly around the apron Mantz rose through the field to the lead as one by one his competitors pitted for new rubber. So bad were the tyre problems, crew chiefs were seen frantically buying tyres from spectators in the infield to keep their cars in the race.
Mantz didn't even require a tyre change and motored to victory, setting a record for most places gained en route to victory which is unlikely to ever be beaten. The pattern was thus set from the very first race that victory would always be hard-earned at Darlington.
The track soon became a favourite with the drivers, partly due to its difficulty, partly due to its long length compared to other ovals of the era and in no small part due to its ambience.
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