‘Great news’: NASCAR Cup Series drivers laud All-Star Race’s return to North Wilkesboro

Since Ross Chastain has lived in North Carolina, he’s thought about sneaking through the gate every time he drives by North Wilkesboro Speedway.

Eventually, he didn’t have to break into the historic track to check it out. Chastain got to race there in May — and will have another opportunity to do so next year.

NASCAR and North Wilkesboro Speedway announced Thursday that next year’s Cup Series All-Star Race will return to the revitalized track. The site of this past year’s All-Star Race, North Wilkesboro hadn’t hosted a race since 1996. The 40th running of the All-Star Race is scheduled for May 19, 2024, with the NASCAR Pit Crew Challenge on May 17 and the Craftsman Truck Series race on May 18.

“I realized why some of the old racers kind of laughed when we were going back,” Chastain said on a video call. “It’s frustrating. I realized that real quick. Man, everything about it, it’s just not ideal for our race cars. And that’s what I think will make good racing in the future.

“It frustrated me from a driving perspective. I didn’t totally walk out of there confident that I did many things right and I do want another shot at it. So, we get that now.”

North Wilkesboro, a 0.625-mile oval that first hosted NASCAR in 1949, was a regular track on the schedule until 1996, when Jeff Gordon won its final Cup Series race. The speedway was dormant until this past season, when NASCAR returned for the All-Star Race as part of its 75th anniversary celebration.

Kyle Larson swept both the All-Star and truck races at North Wilkesboro this past May. Larson, currently eighth in the Cup Series playoff standings, led the rest of the Cup field by about four seconds toward the end of his dominant victory.

While there weren’t any races there for that 27-year gap, the facility now has lights, safety barriers, grandstands and more. But the track itself? It hasn’t been repaved since 1981.

“We’re not gonna want to live in the good old days of that asphalt forever,” Chastain said. “Just racing on it, seeing the chunks flying around.”

It’s the fifth track to host the All-Star Race. After Charlotte Motor Speedway held the first in 1985 and every one from 1987-2019, the 2020 installment was run at Bristol Motor Speedway before Texas Motor Speedway hosted it in 2021 and 2022.

The announcement that this once-abandoned track would host its second All-Star Race in a row came outside the North Carolina Legislative Building in Raleigh, when state lawmakers touted the economic development opportunity for Wilkes County.

“Great news,” Dale Earnhardt Jr. wrote in a post on X, formerly Twitter. “This years event was the most fun Id had at a racetrack in many years. Fun concerts, parties, food, cold drinks, and @CARSTour racing mid week. I’ll be sure to take it all in again next year. All that AND a repaved surface to mix it up.”