This year marks the 60th running of the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway. At 600 miles, the former "World 600" is NASCAR's longest race, starting early in the evening and running well into nighttime. In 1960, the year that Charlotte Motor Speedway opened, the race was delayed by three weeks due to construction, but ever since, it has always run on the Sunday of Memorial Day weekend unless delayed by rain.
Five drivers- John Andretti, Davy Jones, Robby Gordon, Tony Stewart, and Kurt Busch- have done "double duty," competing in the Indy 500 and Coke 600 in the same day. Several drivers have claimed their first NASCAR Cup series win at the 600, including David Pearson, Jeff Gordon, Bobby Labonte, Casey Mears, David Reutimann, and Austin Dillon, and many more drivers have gone on to thrilling finishes.
But nothing in 600 history has ever comes close to being as exciting as the announcement made today by Charlotte Motor Speedway, as they announced that this year's race will be RUN ON DIRT!!!!!!!!!
And, by the way, in case you didn't watch all the way to the end, this was a HILARIOUS April Fool's Day joke on behalf of the track.
The Coke 600 will indeed run on the regularly scheduled pavement this year. If you want dirt track racing, go across the street to the Dirt Track...though you gotta admit that 600 on dirt at Charlotte would've been pretty cool!
Well done, Charlotte. Well done.