CONCORD, N.C. – NASCAR All-Star Race weekend has arrived and the Hendrick Motorsports drivers will descend upon Texas Motor Speedway for the event. This is not a points-paying race but there is a cool $1 million on the line.
Kyle Larson, Chase Elliott, William Byron and Alex Bowman are all locked into the All-Star Race thanks to points-paying wins in 2021 or 2022. Larson and Elliott also meet the eligibility of having won this race in the past and as previous NASCAR Cup Series champions.
Hendrick Motorsports has won the last two all-star main events with Elliott winning at Bristol Motor Speedway in 2020 and Larson winning at Texas last year. In both instances, the drivers went on to win the championship in the same year as their All-Star Race win.
For All-Star weekend, everything is a little different with a unique qualifying format on tap. The race will consist of four stages with a pit stop competition in between the second and third stage.
Here is what you need to know to catch the action in the Lone Star State this weekend.
WHAT TIME IS PRACTICE AND QUALIFYING?
There will be group practice sessions that start at 7 p.m. ET on Saturday, May 21, for the All-Star Open entries followed by the All-Star Race entries. All four Hendrick Motorsports cars will be in the All-Star Race practice session.
Qualifying for the main event will take place at 7:55 p.m. ET on Saturday, May 22. Both practice and qualifying will be televised on FOX Sports 1. The opening round will be a traditional single-car, one-lap format that goes in reverse order of the 2022 owner points entering the weekend. The fastest eight will transfer on to a three-round, head-to-head elimination bracket. This head-to-head format will take place to get the bracket down from eight to four to two, with the final pairing competing for the pole position in Sunday’s race.
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WHAT TIME IS THE RACE?
The main event is scheduled for 8 p.m. ET on Sunday, May 22, and will be broadcast on FOX Sports 1. The race will be broken up into four stages of 25 laps, 25 laps, 25 laps and 50 laps. Between the second and third stage, there will be a pit stop competition where each team must pit and perform a four-tire stop. The team with the shortest time on pit road, that includes pit in and pit out times (without a penalty), wins the pit crew award.
CAN I LISTEN ON THE RADIO?
You can tune in on MRN Radio and SiriusXM NASCAR Radio (channel 90).
CAN I STREAM ONLINE?
Yes. Download the FOX Sports GO app for online coverage. Fans can also keep up with the action on Twitter by following @TeamHendrick.
WHAT CHANNEL IS FS1 AND FS2?
It varies by location, but this link allows viewers to find the channels by entering their zip code and selecting their television provider.
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FIVE FAST FACTS HEADING INTO TEXAS ALL-STAR WEEKEND
Data courtesy of Racing Insights
3: Consecutive top-10 finishes for Bowman in the All-Star Race. Those finishes have come at three different tracks to host the event (Charlotte Motor Speedway, Bristol and Texas).
7: There have been this number of instances where the Hendrick Motorsports driver that won the All-Star Race went on to win the Cup Series championship in the same year. This happened for Jeff Gordon (1995, 1997, 2001), Jimmie Johnson (2006, 2013), Elliott (2020) and Larson (2021). Overall, there have been 12 occurrences of this in Cup history.
10: The number of wins for Hendrick Motorsports in the All-Star Race. Five drivers have won this event for the organization: Johnson (four wins), Gordon (three wins), Terry Labonte, Elliott and Larson (one win each). This total is the most among all organizations.
68: Laps led by Hendrick Motorsports in last year’s event that went for 100 laps. William Byron led 30 laps, Larson led 17 laps, Elliott led 12 laps and Bowman led nine laps.
119: All-star starts that Hendrick Motorsports has made in its history. This is also the most among all organizations.