Wednesday, February 17, 2021

2021 NASCAR Cup Series Season embraces road racing


For the first time in a NASCAR Cup Series season (1949-2021) the schedule calls for the series to visit seven different road course tracks – Daytona International Speedway Road Course, Circuit of The Americas (COTA), Watkins Glen International, Sonoma Raceway, Indianapolis Motor Speedway Road Course, Charlotte Motor Speedway Road Course (ROVAL) and Road America. The previous most the NASCAR Cup Series competed on in one season was four back in 1964 and 1957.

 

Series

Track

Track Type

Winner

Date

Season

Cup

Augusta (RC)

Road Course

Fireball Roberts

11/17/1963

1964

Cup

Bridgehampton

Road Course

Billy Wade

7/12/1964

1964

Cup

Riverside

Road Course

Dan Gurney

1/19/1964

1964

Cup

Watkins Glen

Road Course

Billy Wade

7/19/1964

1964

Cup

Kitsap

Road Course

Parnelli Jones

8/4/1957

1957

Cup

Lancaster

Road Course

Marvin Panch

11/11/1956

1957

Cup

Titusville-Cocoa

Road Course

Fireball Roberts

12/30/1956

1957

Cup

Watkins Glen

Road Course

Buck Baker

8/4/1957

1957

 

The first of the seven road courses on the 2021 schedule is this weekend’s Daytona International Speedway Road Course. The series made its debut at the Daytona Road Course last season with the 2020 NASCAR Cup Series champion taking the checkered flag. This weekend’s race, the O’Reilly Auto Parts 253 At DAYTONA is scheduled for 70 laps or 252.7 miles (3 p.m. ET on FOX, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

The starting lineups for this weekend’s race was determined by Metric Qualifying and as a result Hendrick Motorsports’ Chase Elliott will start from the pole and 2021 Daytona 500 champion Michael McDowell will start on the outside front row (second).

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