Race Weekend Central

NASCAR 101: Joe Gibbs Racing’s Short-Track Dominance

2022 Cup Richmond Denny Hamlin car celebration

(Photo: Nigel Kinrade Photography)

With NASCAR in the midst of its short-track swing and on the heels of Joe Gibbs Racing’s sweep at Richmond Raceway, Denny Hamlin‘s win continued the trend of the Toyota stable’s dominance at tracks less than a mile in length. Saturday (April 3) afternoon’s NASCAR Xfinity Series ToyotaCare 250 was all JGR through and through, …

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NASCAR 101: A Menagerie of Unknowns, Potential Surprises at Daytona

Martin Truex Jr., driver of the #19 Bass Pro Shops Toyota, Christopher Bell, driver of the #20 DeWalt Toyota, Bubba Wallace, driver of the #23 McDonald's Toyota, Kurt Busch, driver of the #45 Monster Energy Toyota, and Denny Hamlin, driver of the #11 FedEx Express Toyota, drive during practice for the NASCAR Cup Series 64th Annual Daytona 500 at Daytona International Speedway on February 15, 2022 in Daytona Beach, Florida. (Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)

(Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images)

Things couldn’t be more nebulous to begin the 2022 NASCAR Cup Series season.

NASCAR 101: Who Didn’t Return to NASCAR in 2021?

Jimmie Johnson at Detroit 2021 IndyCar

(Photo: Chris Owens/INDYCAR Media)

A smaller crop of drivers who raced on the national NASCAR stage in 2020, largely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, equals an altogether more diminutive list of racers who didn’t return to a NASCAR national series in 2021. And of those who didn’t return, some were, as always, expected. Jimmie Johnson, Clint Bowyer, Matt Kenseth …

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NASCAR 101: Chip Ganassi Racing in NASCAR Through the Years

Ross Chastain at COTA

Ross Chastain on track at COTA (Photo: Nigel Kinrade Photography)

As of the checkered flag at Phoenix Raceway in November, the NASCAR operation at Chip Ganassi Racing will cease to exist. On June 30, Trackhouse Racing Team, which joined the sport this season with Daniel Suarez behind the wheel, announced it had purchased the entirety of CGR’s NASCAR assets, effective the end of the 2021 …

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NASCAR 101: Doubleheader Weekends, Past & Present

2020 Pocono Cup II Kurt Busch Austin Dillon pack racing around a turn NKP

(Photo: Nigel Kinrade Photography)

Doubleheader weekends are not a new idea when it comes to motorsports. It’s not even a new idea when it comes to NASCAR. However, regarding the nation’s most popular motorsport, the idea of running two races in one weekend at the same track is something NASCAR has only recently decided to undertake. This weekend at …

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