120 Fun Facts About NASCAR

In what year was NASCAR founded?

The organizing meetings ran through December 1947 and the paperwork was signed on February 21, 1948, a week after the first sanctioned race on the Daytona beach course.

The December 1947 meetings that formed NASCAR were held in the Ebony Bar of which Daytona Beach hotel?

The talks took place in the Ebony Bar on the hotel's rooftop, and the Streamline still operates on Atlantic Avenue today.

Who founded NASCAR?

"Big Bill" was a Washington, D.C. mechanic who moved his family to Daytona in the 1930s and went on to build both Daytona International Speedway and Talladega.

Who won the very first race of NASCAR's top division on June 19, 1949?

Glenn Dunaway crossed the line first but was disqualified for illegal rear springs, handing the win to Roper, who had driven his Lincoln to the race from Kansas.

What was NASCAR's top division called in its first season, 1949?

The name meant exactly that: showroom cars with almost no modifications allowed, which is why the first winner was disqualified over his springs.

From 1971 to 2003, NASCAR's top series carried the name of which cigarette brand?

The R. J. Reynolds deal came just as tobacco advertising was banned from American television, so sponsoring a series was a way to keep the brand on screen.

Which drinks brand was the Cup Series title sponsor from 2017 to 2019?

It was the last title sponsor of the top series; since 2020 it has simply been the NASCAR Cup Series with a group of 'premier partners' instead.

Beginning in 2026, NASCAR's second-tier national series took the name of which sponsor?

The series had been the Busch Series, the Nationwide Series and, from 2015 to 2025, the Xfinity Series.

Who won the inaugural championship of NASCAR's pickup-truck series in 1995?

The trucks were called the SuperTruck Series for that first season only, and their first race was run at Phoenix on February 5, 1995.

Where is the NASCAR Hall of Fame, opened in 2010?

It sits in uptown Charlotte, a short drive from the race shops of most Cup teams, and its inaugural class was inducted the day after the 2010 All-Star Race.

Which NASCAR pioneer, credited with discovering drafting at the 1960 Daytona 500, got a Reagan pardon for moonshining?

He had spent a year in an Ohio federal prison for running a still; the pardon came in December 1986, two decades after he retired from driving.

Who became the first Black driver to win at NASCAR's top level, at Jacksonville in December 1963?

Officials initially flagged another driver as winner and only awarded him the victory hours later; he was inducted into the NASCAR Hall of Fame in 2015.

Greased Lightning, the biopic of NASCAR's first Black race winner, starred which comedian?

The film played loose with the facts, but its subject was a Danville, Virginia, mechanic who ran his own team on a shoestring for more than a decade.

Who was named winner of the inaugural 1959 Daytona 500, three days after the photo finish?

Beauchamp was sent to victory lane as the unofficial winner, and the reversal came only after photographs and newsreel footage were studied.

How many laps does it take to complete the Daytona 500?

The 2.5-mile tri-oval makes the math simple, and since 1982 the race has opened the Cup season rather than sitting mid-schedule.

The Daytona 500 winner receives a trophy named after which General Motors design chief?

The trophy has been handed out since 1997 and depicts the Firebird I concept car, an Earl design that also served as the 1959 race's pace car.

The 1979 Daytona 500 was the first 500-mile race broadcast live flag-to-flag. On which network?

A huge snowstorm had trapped much of the East Coast indoors that Sunday, so millions of first-time viewers watched the brawl unfold live.

The 1988 Daytona 500 produced the race's first father-son one-two finish. Which family?

It was also the first Daytona 500 run with restrictor plates, and the father beat his son by about a car length.

Which driver got his first Cup win, in his 463rd start, at the 2001 Daytona 500?

It remains the longest wait for a first win in series history, and the celebration was cut short by the news that his car owner had been killed on the final lap.

Who won the 2011 Daytona 500 the day after his 20th birthday, becoming the race's youngest winner?

It was his only Cup win in 187 career starts, and it gave the Wood Brothers their first victory in a decade.

Who won the 2022 Daytona 500, the first points race for the Next Gen car?

The win came in just his eighth Cup start, driving the No. 2 Ford for Team Penske, whose owner Roger Penske was celebrating his 85th birthday that weekend.

How many Cup Series races did 'the King', Richard Petty, win in his career?

Nobody else has reached 110; the total includes seven Daytona 500s and seven championships, and his final start was the 1992 season finale at Atlanta.

In 1967, Richard Petty set a record by winning how many consecutive races?

He won 27 of the 48 races he entered that season, both still records for a single year.

In Pixar's Cars, Richard Petty voices Strip 'The King' Weathers. What model of car is the character?

It is the winged Plymouth Petty actually raced in 1970, painted in his signature Petty Blue.

Dale Earnhardt's black Chevrolet for Richard Childress Racing carried which number?

The number and the GM Goodwrench black paint became so linked to him that fans still hold up three fingers on lap three of the Daytona 500.

Dale Earnhardt finally won the Daytona 500 in 1998. On which attempt?

Crew members from every team lined pit road to shake his hand on the way to victory lane; he had lost the race in every way imaginable, including a flat tire on the last lap in 1990.

Which safety gear, which Dale Earnhardt had refused to wear, did NASCAR mandate in October 2001?

The head-and-neck restraint had been available for years, but most drivers found it uncomfortable until Earnhardt's death made it non-negotiable.

Dale Earnhardt was born in which North Carolina town?

The mill town's minor-league ballpark later became home to the Kannapolis Intimidators, named in his honor.

Who took over Dale Earnhardt's seat and won at Atlanta three weeks later by 0.006 seconds?

The car was renumbered from 3 to 29 and repainted white; he went on to win the 2014 championship and retire with 60 Cup wins.

Jeff Gordon's rainbow-liveried DuPont Chevrolet carried which number?

Gordon was born in California, raised in Indiana and signed by Hendrick in 1992; his 93 wins are third all-time.

Jeff Gordon won the Brickyard 400 at Indianapolis a record how many times?

The first came in the inaugural 1994 race, a hometown win for a driver raised in Pittsboro, Indiana.

Which home-improvement chain sponsored Jimmie Johnson's No. 48 throughout his championship run?

Home Depot backed a rival Joe Gibbs car in the same era, giving the sport a decade-long hardware-store feud on the track.

Jimmie Johnson's record run of five straight championships ended in which year?

The streak began in 2006, and no other driver has won more than three in a row.

Who was the first driver to win three consecutive Cup championships, in 1976, 1977 and 1978?

All three came in Junior Johnson's cars, and he later added back-to-back Daytona 500 wins in 1983 and 1984.

Nicknamed 'the Silver Fox', which driver sits second on the all-time wins list with 105?

He rarely ran full seasons, so his 105 wins came from just 574 starts, and his 1976 Daytona 500 win came after he and Petty crashed within sight of the line.

Which 1992 champion celebrated wins with a clockwise 'Polish victory lap'?

He drove the wrong way round so fans could see the driver's side, and he took the title as an owner-driver by 10 points before dying in a plane crash the next April.

Whose 1987 airborne crash into the Talladega catch fence prompted the introduction of restrictor plates?

The car cut a tire at more than 200 mph and tore out a section of fencing near spectators; plates stayed on the cars at Daytona and Talladega until 2019.

Bill Elliott won NASCAR's Most Popular Driver award a record how many times?

'Awesome Bill from Dawsonville' won it every year from 1984 to 1988 and again through most of the 1990s; his son Chase later inherited the streak.

Which three-time champion opened Fox race broadcasts with 'Boogity, boogity, boogity'?

Nicknamed 'Jaws' in his driving days for his mouth as much as his aggression, he won titles in 1981, 1982 and 1985 and voices Darrell Cartrip in Cars.

Who is the only driver to have won championships in both IndyCar and the NASCAR Cup Series?

'Smoke' took the 1997 Indy Racing League title and Cup crowns in 2002, 2005 and 2011, the last as an owner-driver on a tiebreaker.

Who holds the record for most wins across NASCAR's three national series combined?

More than a hundred of those wins came in the second-tier series alone, a total no one else is close to.

Kyle Larson was suspended in 2020 after using a racial slur during what kind of event?

The comment went out on a live stream during the pandemic shutdown; Chip Ganassi Racing fired him, and he returned with Hendrick in 2021 and won the title.

Which driver, nicknamed 'Sliced Bread', became the youngest Cup race winner at 19 in 2009?

The nickname, as in 'greatest thing since', was hung on him as a teenager; he has since won three championships with Team Penske.

Which driver, raised on a watermelon farm, smashes a watermelon after NASCAR wins?

He worked the family farm until he was thirteen, and in 2025 he won the Coca-Cola 600 for Trackhouse Racing from last on the grid.

The 2022 Martinsville "Hail Melon" wall-ride was inspired by a game the driver played on which console as a kid?

He rode the wall through turns 3 and 4 flat out, passed five cars, and made the Championship 4; NASCAR banned the move the following season.

23XI Racing combines Michael Jordan's 23 with the car number of which co-owner?

Hamlin has driven the No. 11 for Joe Gibbs Racing his entire Cup career, so the name reads 23 and XI, the Roman numeral for eleven.

In 2013, who became the first woman to win the pole position for the Daytona 500?

She finished eighth in the race, still the best result by a woman in the event, five years after becoming the first woman to win an IndyCar race in Japan.

Which manufacturer joined the Cup Series in 2007, the first new brand since 1971?

Chevrolet, Ford and Toyota are now the only three makes on the grid; Dodge left after winning the 2012 championship with Brad Keselowski.

The playoff format originally called 'the Chase' debuted in which season?

It reset the points for the top ten with ten races left; eliminations arrived in 2014 and the word 'playoffs' in 2017.

From 2002 to 2019 the Cup Series season finale was held at which track?

The 2020 schedule shake-up moved the Florida race to March and handed the championship weekend to Phoenix.

The Next Gen car introduced in 2022 replaced five lug nuts per wheel with how many?

The 18-inch aluminum wheels use a single center-locking nut, which cut pit stops down and put an end to the loose-lug-nut penalties of the previous era.

After the 2019 Daytona 500, restrictor plates were retired in favor of what device?

The spacer does the same job of choking airflow to the engine but was already in use at every other track, so it simplified the rulebook.

How many crew members may go over the wall to service a car during a Cup pit stop?

Two tire changers, two tire carriers and a jackman is the usual mix, with the fueler counted among the five since the Next Gen era began.

In NASCAR, a solid black flag shown to a driver means what?

Ignore it long enough and the black flag with a white cross follows, meaning the car is no longer being scored.

Which race is the longest on the NASCAR Cup schedule?

It starts in daylight on Memorial Day weekend and finishes under the lights, and it began life in 1960 as the World 600.

Which track is the longest oval on the Cup schedule at 2.66 miles?

Its turns are banked at 33 degrees, steeper even than Daytona, which is why it produced the fastest lap in NASCAR history.

What average speed did Bill Elliott's all-time record qualifying lap at Talladega in 1987 reach?

The record is effectively frozen: restrictor plates arrived the very next season and top speeds have been capped ever since.

The inaugural 1969 race at Talladega saw most of the star drivers do what?

Tires were shredding at the new track's speeds, so the drivers' association walked out and NASCAR filled the field with Grand American cars and unknowns.

Which track markets itself as 'The Last Great Colosseum'?

The concrete half-mile in Tennessee is ringed by grandstands that once held 162,000 people, and it hosted a college football game with a record crowd in 2016.

Winners at Martinsville Speedway have received what unusual trophy since 1964?

Fred Lorenzen took home the first one, made by a local clock company; Richard Petty has won 15 of them, the most of anyone.

Darlington Raceway's egg shape is said to be the result of preserving what?

The landowner did not want to lose his fishing hole, so builder Harold Brasington tightened turns 1 and 2, giving 'The Lady in Black' its lopsided layout.

Who won the first Southern 500 at Darlington in 1950?

He won NASCAR's first 500-mile race by nursing hard truck tires while faster cars shredded theirs, in a Plymouth part-owned by NASCAR's founder.

Which New York road course returned to the NASCAR Cup Series schedule in 1986?

'The Glen' hosted the United States Grand Prix for twenty straight years before losing it over an unpaid $800,000 debt to the teams; Cup cars came back in 1986.

Which team, the oldest still active in NASCAR, ran Jim Clark's pit stops at the 1965 Indianapolis 500?

Ford flew the Virginia crew to Indianapolis for their pit-stop speed; the family team has fielded the No. 21 since 1950 and gave David Pearson most of his wins.

Hendrick Motorsports' first Cup win, at Martinsville in 1984, came with which driver?

The team was still called All-Star Racing that year; it now holds the record for Cup wins with more than 300 and 15 championships.

Tom Cruise's Cole Trickle in Days of Thunder was patterned after which real driver?

The surname was a nod to journeyman Dick Trickle, while Robert Duvall's crew chief was modeled on Harry Hyde, who had run Richmond's cars.

In Talladega Nights, Sacha Baron Cohen's Jean Girard is a rival from which racing series?

Sebastian Vettel later quoted the film's 'Shake and Bake' line over the radio at the real United States Grand Prix.

The first NASCAR race held outside the United States, in July 1952, took place in which Canadian province?

Buddy Shuman won the 200-lap race on a half-mile dirt track at Stamford Park.

In which year did Bill France Sr. first establish races at Daytona Beach?

He hoped racers would race for him because other organizers tended to fleece winners of their payouts.

How many points-paying races make up a NASCAR Cup Series season?

The pre-season Clash and the mid-season All-Star race are run in addition to the points events.

Which Miami rapper became a co-owner of NASCAR's Trackhouse Racing ahead of its 2021 debut season?

Pitbull bought into the brand-new team alongside founder Justin Marks, and stayed on as a partner until February 2025.

Which nickname did Dale Earnhardt earn in the 1987 season for his aggressive driving style?

The Intimidator stuck after that year's all-star race, and fans also knew him as the Man in Black and Ironhead.

The Daytona 500, the February opener of the NASCAR Cup season, is promoted under which nickname?

The Great American Race is also billed as the Super Bowl of Stock Car Racing, and unusually for a sport's biggest event, it comes at the start of the season rather than the end.

Which Super Bowl-winning NFL head coach started his own NASCAR Cup team in 1992?

Joe Gibbs founded the team with his sons a year before he first retired from football, and its first Cup championship followed in 2000.

Which car, the model for Paul Newman's Doc in Pixar's Cars, dominated NASCAR in the early 1950s?

Hudson Hornet drivers won 27 of the 34 top-division races in 1952. Its low 'step-down' floor gave it a lower center of gravity, so it out-cornered more powerful rivals.

Which former child actor became a full-time NASCAR Truck Series driver in 2025?

Frankie Muniz, the star of Malcolm in the Middle, first stepped away from acting to race open-wheel cars in the 2000s, then landed a full-season truck ride with Reaume Brothers Racing.

What did Juan Pablo Montoya hit under caution in the 2012 Daytona 500, starting a huge fuel fire?

A jet dryer, a trailer-mounted jet engine used to blow the track dry, was carrying 200 gallons of kerosene, and the blaze stopped the race for more than two hours.

In 2023 the NASCAR Cup Series held its first street race on a lakefront course in which city?

Chicago laid out a 2.2-mile circuit through Grant Park, and a Supercars champion making his very first Cup start won the race.

In NASCAR and IndyCar, a white flag waved at the starter's stand signals the start of what?

The final lap is the white flag's meaning in most American racing; under international FIA rules the same flag warns of a slow-moving vehicle on the track ahead.

In Talladega Nights, Ricky Bobby lives by his father's advice, 'If you ain't first,' and which two words?

"If you ain't first, you're last" is the creed of Reese Bobby, Ricky's father, played by Gary Cole, and Will Ferrell's Ricky builds his whole racing career on it.

Which Akron, Ohio company has supplied tires for NASCAR's stock car series since 1954?

Goodyear has been based in Akron since its first factory opened there in 1898, and it also supplies tires for NHRA drag racing and sports car racing.

Which beer brand sponsored Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s red No. 8 Chevrolet at his family's team, Dale Earnhardt, Inc.?

Budweiser stayed on the red No. 8 until he switched teams for 2008, a move that also cost him his familiar car number.

Which delivery company sponsored Dale Jarrett's No. 88 Ford and built ads around him racing its truck?

UPS signed on as his primary sponsor, then spent years of commercials trying to talk him into racing its trademark Big Brown Truck.

Which Missouri driver, once a substitute teacher, celebrated his NASCAR wins with a backflip off his car?

Carl Edwards borrowed the backflip from sprint car driver Tyler Walker, and once left it out after winning a race that had been cut short by rain.

Which Ford model, first sold in 1964, replaced the Fusion in the NASCAR Cup Series in 2019?

Mustang bodies took over as Ford phased out the Fusion sedan, bringing its pony car to NASCAR's top series more than half a century after its launch.

Shane van Gisbergen, who won on his NASCAR Cup debut in 2023, became the first Cup race winner from which country?

New Zealand got its first Cup winner in a three-time Supercars champion, the first driver to win on his debut in the series since Johnny Rutherford in 1963.

In 2022, which two-time Olympic stadium in Los Angeles hosted NASCAR's preseason Clash exhibition race?

Memorial Coliseum, home of the 1932 and 1984 Summer Games, swapped football for stock cars, and Jeff Gordon lit its Olympic cauldron for the occasion.

At Daytona and Talladega, where cars run in tight packs, fans call a crash that collects many cars what?

The Big One usually means a wreck of five or more cars, and the phrase is used in IndyCar and other series as well as stock cars.

In the name NASCAR, which was proposed by mechanic Red Vogt, the first 'A' stands for which word?

Association moved to the middle because the founders' first choice, National Stock Car Racing Association, already belonged to a rival body, giving National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing.

Which driver gave 23XI Racing its first Cup win in a rain-shortened race at Talladega in October 2021?

Bubba Wallace was out front when the rain came, so the first victory of his own Cup career doubled as the first for the year-old team's celebrity owners.

Which Arizona-born country star competed in 35 races in NASCAR's top series, with six top-10 finishes?

Marty Robbins, the voice of the gunfighter ballad 'El Paso', scored one of those top-10 finishes in the 1973 Firecracker 400 at Daytona.

In 2023, a modified NASCAR Cup car driven by Jimmie Johnson and Jenson Button entered which endurance race?

24 Hours of Le Mans organisers gave the stock car their 'Garage 56' slot for experimental entries, marking NASCAR's 75th anniversary in the race's own centenary year.

Which Pennsylvania track has only three turns, each modelled on a turn at a different racetrack?

Pocono Raceway's designer, Indianapolis 500 winner Rodger Ward, copied one turn each from Trenton, Indianapolis and the Milwaukee Mile, which is why it is called the Tricky Triangle.

Which one-mile desert oval, known for the 'dogleg' kink in its frontstretch, became NASCAR's championship venue in 2020?

Phoenix Raceway got its dogleg because the original layout had to make room for a road course that shared parts of the oval.

Glenn Roberts, the 1962 Daytona 500 winner, got which nickname from his fastball as an American Legion pitcher?

Fireball had nothing to do with speed on the track: it came from his days pitching for the Zellwood Mud Hens, and it followed him to 33 wins in NASCAR's top division.

Which former aerospace engineer was the first woman to race in both the Indianapolis 500 and the Daytona 500?

Janet Guthrie made both starts in 1977, and she was also the first woman to lead a lap in NASCAR's top series.

Jeff Gordon's family moved to Pittsboro, Indiana, to help his racing, but in which state was he born?

California is where he was born, in the Bay Area city of Vallejo, and the family moved east because Indiana offered more opportunities for younger racers.

Which oil-treatment brand began a 28-year sponsorship of Richard Petty's cars in 1972, ending his all-blue paint job?

STP wanted the cars entirely in its own orange-red and Petty refused to give up his blue, so after an all-night negotiation they settled on the famous two-tone scheme.

Which driver won 40 Cup races and finished second in the standings five times without ever taking the championship?

Mark Martin came agonisingly close across two decades: his last runner-up finish, in 2009, came at the age of 50, some 19 years after his first.

Tim Flock won a 1953 NASCAR race with which unusual co-driver, named Jocko Flocko, riding along in the car?

A monkey named Jocko Flocko rode to victory that day, then was retired two weeks later after a pebble hit him mid-race and the pit stop to remove him cost a likely win.

Which cereal maker sponsored the No. 5 Chevrolet that Terry Labonte drove to the 1996 Cup championship?

Kellogg's had already backed him at a smaller team in 1993 and followed him to his new ride, where he took his second title a record twelve years after his first.

Which Wisconsin driver won the 2003 Cup championship with only one race victory all season?

Matt Kenseth took the points lead at the season's fourth race, right after his lone win at Las Vegas, and built the title on eleven top-five finishes.

Which carmaker left the NASCAR Cup Series after 2012, the year Brad Keselowski won the title in one of its cars?

Dodge had come back in 2001 after a 15-year absence, and it bowed out with the drivers' title in hand, leaving only three manufacturers in the series.

Which open-wheel star won the 1967 Daytona 500, two years before his only Indianapolis 500 victory?

Mario Andretti won it for the Holman-Moody team, and after adding a Grand Prix world title in 1978 he became the only driver to have taken all three prizes.

Which NASCAR Cup team owner bought the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and IndyCar from the Hulman family in 2019?

Roger Penske, a former racer nicknamed 'the Captain', has also won NASCAR Cup championships as an owner, including three in a row from 2022 to 2024.

Which tool brand, the original 1995 title sponsor of NASCAR's Truck Series, returned to the series name in 2023?

Craftsman came back after Stanley Black & Decker, which had bought the brand from Sears in 2017, signed a multi-year deal with NASCAR.

Which nickname, coined on air by Benny Parsons in 2003, goes to the lapped car that gets a lap back under caution?

The lucky dog rule, officially the free pass, was brought in to stop drivers racing each other back to the start-finish line when a caution came out.

In 2012 the NASCAR Cup Series dropped carburetors from its V8 engines in favor of which technology?

Fuel injection was first meant to arrive midway through the 2011 season, but NASCAR decided before that year began to put the change off until the next one.

The Car of Tomorrow, introduced to the NASCAR Cup Series in 2007, first replaced the trunk-lid spoiler with what?

A rear wing had not been seen on NASCAR's top cars since 1970, and it lasted only three years before officials went back to the spoiler amid fears the wing helped cars get airborne.

Which telecom brand replaced a cigarette maker as title sponsor of NASCAR's top series in 2004?

Nextel had its name on the Cup for four seasons, and once the takeover by Sprint was complete the series was rebranded again.

Which Monterrey native, the 2016 Xfinity Series champion, became the first Mexican-born winner of a NASCAR Cup race?

Daniel Suárez got the landmark win on the road course at Sonoma, having already been the first foreign-born champion of a major NASCAR national series.

Ryan Newman, nicknamed 'Rocket Man' for his many poles, earned an engineering degree from which Indiana university?

Purdue awarded the degree in 2001, when he was already combining his studies with a part-time schedule of NASCAR and ARCA races.

Which devices, required on NASCAR cars since 1994, pop open during a backward spin to keep the car on the ground?

Roof flaps stay stowed in normal running, then spring up when the car turns backwards to disrupt the airflow over the roof and cut the lift that would send it airborne.

Which 'soft wall' designed by University of Nebraska engineers was first installed at Indianapolis in 2002?

SAFER barrier sections put steel tubes in front of bundles of foam, and nearly every oval on the NASCAR and IndyCar circuits had installed them by 2005.

Which crew chief guided Jimmie Johnson to 81 Cup wins and became the only one to win five consecutive championships?

Chad Knaus started early: by the age of 14 he was serving as crew chief during his father's championship season at Rockford Speedway.

NASCAR ran a separate division from 1956 until 1959, with its own Daytona 500 qualifying race, for which cars?

Convertibles made up 20 of the 59 starters in the 1959 Daytona 500, and their separate qualifier grew into the twin Duel races that set the field.

Which historic short track began hosting NASCAR's All-Star Race in 2023, with a moonshine-still trophy?

North Wilkesboro Speedway landed the race in NASCAR's 75th anniversary season, and the replica still on the trophy honoured the sport's bootlegging roots.

Which driver, racing with a leg brace after a war injury, won the first title in NASCAR's top division in 1949?

Red Byron fitted two stirrup pins to his clutch pedal so that, together with the brace, his injured left leg could work it.

Which 1980 Daytona 500 winner had earlier become the first driver to exceed 200 mph on a closed course?

Buddy Baker broke the barrier at Talladega on March 24, 1970, in a winged Dodge Charger Daytona that Chrysler's engineers ran as a test car.

In which Georgia town does a pool-room siren sound whenever hometown heroes Bill or Chase Elliott win a race?

Dawsonville gave the elder Elliott his nickname, 'Awesome Bill from Dawsonville', and the siren sits on the Dawsonville Pool Room near the city square.