NASCAR has embarked on a season where it hopes to generate some enthusiasm from the roots of the sport.
Racing in the snow wasn’t included in that list.
NASCAR has postponed its preseason exhibition Clash, moving it from Sunday night to Monday afternoon because of snow in North Carolina. The 200-lap exhibition race at the quarter-mile Bowman Gray Stadium — a historic track owned by the city of Winston-Salem that also serves as the football home of Winston-Salem State University — is scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. ET on Monday, Feb. 2.
Practice and qualifying is set for 11 a.m. ET Monday on FS2, with the 75-lap last-chance qualifying race kicking off the coverage on FOX at 4:30 p.m. ET.
Forecasts predict that up to nine inches of snow will fall in the area on Saturday — a part of the country not accustomed to that type of snowfall. After more than an inch had fallen Saturday morning, the league made the decision. FOX Weather forecasts that the snow will end on Saturday night, with temperatures in the 30s on Monday and in the 40s on Tuesday.
There is no minimum temperature needed for NASCAR to conduct the race, but drivers could have concerns about their tires and brakes in the cold. Temperatures will be in the 20s by the time the main event starts Monday.
“We’re going slow enough at Bowman Gray, I don’t think that the cars themselves, the engines, will be too cold or anything like that,” said 23XI Racing driver Tyler Reddick in a media call Thursday. “If we were running a really big race track with that amount of [cold] air, perhaps. …. We’ll simply type of see what it does, if the [tires] lay rubber.”
NASCAR has stated it’s treating this occasion similar to every other race weekend with a climate problem by racing as soon as it feels it could actually maintain the occasion. The subsequent on-track exercise following the Conflict is observe and qualifying on Feb. 11 at Daytona.
“If we do get a bunch of snow and it is Monday, Tuesday and even goes out additional, I believe, we’ll be simply high quality so as to have the ability to get to Daytona,” stated Joe Gibbs Racing driver Christopher Bell in a media name Friday.
The monitor floor needs to be prepared by Monday. However can the infrastructure safely deal with followers? The stadium seats 17,000 and all of the personnel wanted to conduct the race may also want entry to the services. A storm per week earlier had nonetheless left lots of the metropolis streets — whereas satisfactory — with icy spots that are actually coated with snow.
Many of the groups are additionally primarily based about an hour away, so the flexibility of crews to get to the race additionally could be thought-about.
