VOTE: Favorite Darlington scheme | MORE: Relive the ‘Tide Ride’ making history
BUY TICKETS: Darlington
The final piece of the Joe Gibbs Racing Darlington throwback paint schemes puzzle fell into place Tuesday afternoon at the NASCAR Hall of Fame.
The #TideRide Returns for @TooToughToTame! @JoeGibbsRacing @mattkenseth @AllWaltrip @RickyCravenESPN pic.twitter.com/UxBhCAzcFn
— NASCAR Hall of Fame (@NASCARHall)
August 16, 2016
Matt Kenseth pulled back the cover of his No. 20 Toyota Camry to reveal a Tide-influenced scheme that he’ll run on Sept. 4 in the Bojangles’ Southern 500 (6 p.m. ET, NBC, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).
Tide has a rich history in NASCAR, including being on Darrell Waltrip’s car for his 1989 Daytona 500 win, as well as a famous moment at Darlington — in 2003, Ricky Craven, in his orange Tide car, beat Kurt Busch to the stripe by .002 seconds in a classic slam-bang finish. Ricky Rudd also ran the paint scheme for several seasons.
In doing so, Kenseth will join Kyle Busch (No. 18, honoring Dale Jarrett), Denny Hamlin (No. 11, honoring Darrell Waltrip) and Carl Edwards (No. 19, honoring Tony Stewart) in the JGR fleet of drivers.
More than two dozen throwback paint schemes for this year’s race have been announced. The throwback program launched last year and is expected to continue for the next several seasons.
This year’s theme honors the era of 1975-84.