The 2024 Clash at ‘The Coliseum’ had gotten boring for fans, and NASCAR decided to make a change. And what could have been better than the return of the Bowman Gray Stadium first time to the Cup Series since 1971? And it was a huge success; grandstands were houseful, viewership doubled (1.51 M to 3.o1 M) and drivers seemed satisfied too. Ryan Blaney after finishing in P2 behind Chase Elliott, said, “I’m looking forward to hopefully coming back next year. I don’t see why you wouldn’t come back. ” But should it? Would it suffer Coliseum’s fate? Or should it be moved around?
Well, there are mixed reactions coming from veterans in the NASCAR community. On one hand, Kevin Harvick has often been a fan of moving around races. He’s at least suggested a hundred times to move around the Phoenix race to Homestead or Vegas. He’s for moving “The Clash’ around too, provided it stays in the country. However, Denny Hamlin’s ex-crew chief has different ideas.
What is Chris Gabehart’s suggestion for ‘The Clash’
The BGS race had everything. Sheer dominance: Chase Elliott started from the pole, led 171 laps, and took the win. It also had overtakes: Ryan Blaney started from 23rd and finished in the runner-up position. And, of course, the Madhouse drama: Kyle Larson and Chase Briscoe spun in perfect synchronization. But while we are getting over all that happened in the two days at BGS, Kevin Harvick is already making suggestions for the 2026 Clash.
Kevin Harvick, on the ‘Happy Hour’ podcast, agreed that BGS was amazing but it could achieve more if it’s moved around. He said, “Think about the places we can take it though, especially if you move it into the summer. And let’s just say it’s the All-Star race and instead of the All-Star race, you have these. And the clash you have these three races that go along with it. You could move that around too. You could go to Bowman Gray, Hickory, and Berlin.” By Berlin, Harvick means Berlin Raceway in Marne, Michigan. He thinks ‘The Clash’ should be kept local amid NASCAR’s current push to go global. Like the newly added Mexico race.
But Chris Gabehart thinks that it should get more exposure and can be at a global venue. He took it to X, to reply to Harvick’s video, and wrote, “Let it…grow…..” However, Harvick feels that the grassroots community will be upset if the race is taken out of the country, “But I don’t think you want to rip it out of the country. I think you’ll offend our grassroots fans of fans like Bowman Gray and the places that you could affect your own house here in our country. Instead of trying to make it global let’s fix the structure of our system that we have here from the grassroots up and use our biggest stars to do it,” he added.
Let it… grow….
https://t.co/uNNjCip95Y
— Chris Gabehart (@CG1751) February 5, 2025
And Harvick’s suggestions could work. If ‘The Clash’ was taken to another grassroots track like BGS, maybe Hickory. And like they made upgrades in BGS the same is done there surely the grandstands would be packed and it would be something new for Cup fans.
NASCAR needs to embrace the history of the sport through such events. And in NASCAR, fans can’t have enough short-track races. So it’s very unlikely that this plan could fail. Maybe Coliseum was a good design (unique) but had no history, no connection. That’s why Daytona still worked, no matter if the race got boring. And like Harvick, there is another veteran who thinks it could be moved around and why it did not work out at the Coliseum.
Dale Earnhardt Jr opens up about BGS
Harvick and Junior seem to agree that the Coliseum race was exciting the first year (only). It was something new, but the hype died because, according to Jr it was not practical to race there. On the Dale Jr podcast episode, he said, “The track was forced, the radius of the corners was bad. It didn’t race good at all. As you saw at Bowman Gray, the radius of the corners matter. Just that little more of a wider radius allows the cars to race and go about the turn. That race track at the Coliseum and I drove it in the next-gen car. It’s not a race track. It’s not. It’ not a proper race track at all. No one would ever take that and build that to replicate it anywhere else. Some body gives you money and tells you build a short track in your hometown. That’s not the fuc—- layout you are gonna build right?”
And on the other hand, Jr thinks the possibilities with BGS are endless too. He said, “I hope they go back the next year. I don’t know if they need to do it three years in a row. I don’t know if they needs to be ‘The Clash’ for the next decade. I’d go back next year and I would even consider moving the all-star race to the Bowman Gray Stadium beyond the clash.”
Junior let his imagination go wild as he pictured how great it would be, “Think about how good it raced, think about how cool it was, imagine that track with some temp in it. Those tires wearing the way they are and a million dollars on the line. Maybe that would get Denny to get a little more aggressive. Denny might not say it out loud but I think everyone would be a little bit more aggressive which is exactly what you would have to expect when you got to Bowman Gray,” he added.
And Jr has raced in the next-gen at BGS in 2021, while he was testing the car before the launch. So he knows how exciting it can be there! What do you think? Should ‘The Clash’ be moved? And if yes, then where? Tyler Reddick had said Europe, what are your suggestions? Share your thoughts with us in the comments below.
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