The year was 1978. The race was the Volunteer 500 at Bristol Motor Speedway. The winner was Cale Yarborough.
So what was the big deal about the ’78 race? It was the very first race run under the lights at Bristol. That race laid the foundation for what now is widely known as simply “The Night Race,” and led to it earning the prestigious honor of NASCAR’s most popular race.
The Sharpie 500, set for Saturday, Aug. 25, will mark the 30th race at the World’s Fastest Half-Mile to be contested under the lights.
The atmosphere for the Night Race is unique. Nearly 160,000 fans in attendance under the moonlight, packed around a bowl-shaped stadium with grandstands towering 21 stories high. Forty-three cars on a. 533-mile oval, each aggressively fighting for running room on a 43-foot wide, steeply banked concrete surface.
The Bristol Night Race – dubbed by ESPN.com last year as one of the Top 10 Hottest Tickets in American Sports, along with the World Series and The Masters – has been a tough one for drivers to consistently master. Fourteen drivers have won at night at BMS but only six are active.
The all-time leading winner at night is Darrell Waltrip. Seven of Waltrip’s record 12 wins at BMS came at night and he’s the only driver to win three straight—- 1981 through 1983. Second on the list is Dale Earnhardt who had nine wins at Bristol with four of them coming in the August event. Earnhardt won three in a four-race stretch, including 1987 and ‘88.
Only one other driver has back-to-back night race wins at BMS and that’s Matt Kenseth who will be going for his third straight Sharpie 500 on Aug. 25.
Other drivers with night race wins at Bristol are Rusty Wallace (three), Terry Labonte, Mark Martin and Yarborough (two each) and Alan Kulwicki, Ernie Irvan, Dale Jarrett, Tony Stewart, Kurt Busch, Jeff Gordon and Dale Earnhardt Jr. (one each).
The closest finish under the lights? That honor goes to the infamous 1995 event, won by Terry Labonte. Labonte, who tangled with Dale Earnhardt in the waning moments of the race, eventually nipped him by. 10 second. A close second is the 1997 duel that saw Dale Jarrett edge Mark Martin by. 102 second
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