Hauler Talk: NASCAR will hold Cook Out Clash at first available opportunity
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Editor's note: This story and podcast were published Friday before it was known that Sunday's on-track activity would be postponed as well.
NASCAR will hold the Cook Out Clash at the first available opportunity and will renew track preparations early Saturday morning in hopes of racing Sunday at Bowman Gray Stadium.
Senior Director of Marketing Services Justin Swilling, who is spearheading operations for The Clash, explained on the latest episode of the “Hauler Talk” podcast that NASCAR essentially will treat the weekend’s winter forecast the same as a rain-delayed event -- meaning that the green flag will drop as soon as the track is ready.
“Come hell or high snow, we're going to be racing,” Swilling said. “We're going to race as soon as that place is ready to roll.”
NASCAR already adjusted the Clash schedule once but had to do so again when winter weather persisted. Now, on-track activity will begin Monday at 11 a.m. ET with practice and qualifying ahead of the Last Chance Qualifier at 4:30 p.m. and the Cook Out Clash main event at 6 p.m.
“We felt the timing we came out with on Sunday was a best-case scenario and what we're certainly hoping for that,” Swilling said. “And then if Mother Nature's meaner to us, we'll adjust accordingly. And as soon as we can drop the hammer, we're going to do it.”
The original forecast called for 1 to 3 inches of snow Saturday in the Winston-Salem area with precipitation starting overnight and tapering off by early evening.
“The beautiful thing about this forecast, if there is such a thing, is that this is going to be fluffy snow that's probably going to be fairly easy to move,” Swilling said. “We feel more confident that we can work in this than in last week's storm. So we're actually not going to wait for this storm to leave. We're going to be working during the storm on the track surface, the football field, the garage area and the surrounding parking lots that we've already cleared off from last week's storm.
“The plan right now is literally at 5 a.m. Saturday morning, we're going to get started on moving what's been left in the four or five hours that snow may have been falling from midnight, Friday, into Saturday morning, and we're going to keep working all the way through Sunday. We've got a lot of work to do, and we'll stay at it until we got the place clear and we can host an event.”
NASCAR also will be collaborating with city officials from Winston-Salem, which owns Bowman Gray Stadium, to monitor how conditions have impacted the region and its roads.
“In terms of allowing fans, they're mission critical in that because they have to make sure their resources aren't tapped or oversaturated to have this event,” Swilling said. “So every step of the way to this point, they've been in lockstep with us, and they'll have to continue to be. We want to make sure that whatever scenario we come up with, the city's on board, too.”
During the podcast, NASCAR Managing Director of Communications Mike Forde also explained how practice and qualifying will work in setting the starting lineup after Saturday’s heat races were canceled.
Over a two-hour period, there will be two eight-minute practice sessions followed by a qualifying session that will be split into groups. Each car will have four minutes to record a qualifying time over as many laps as desired within the time window.
“We want to have fewer cars on the race track so that they can have a clean lap for qualifying,” Forde said.
The top 20 cars from qualifying will lock into the main event. The top two cars will advance from the Last Chance Qualifier, and the 23rd position will be claimed by the highest-ranked driver in the 2025 points standings who has yet to qualify.
There are 38 cars expected to participate, and all passed on the first or second inspection attempt Thursday.
There will be no change to the tire allotment for the event. The tires that had been tagged for the heat races will be put into the allotment for practice and qualifying.
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Other topics covered during the 41st episode of “Hauler Talk,” which explores competition issues in NASCAR:
-- How moving The Clash to Daytona International Speedway was ruled out as an option;
-- The logistical difficulties if The Clash were delayed to next weekend at Bowman Gray Stadium;
-- The help that NASCAR got from Charlotte Motor Speedway and elsewhere with securing equipment to help clear the snow and ice from last weekend’s storm.
Click on the embed below to listen or search for “Hauler Talk” wherever you download podcasts to hear it on your phone, tablet or mobile device.