NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C. -- In a nearly wire-to-wire performance, Joey Logano led all but one of 200 laps on the night to win the NASCAR All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro, claiming his second career All-Star Race win, his first since 2016, and his first at North Wilkesboro. Logano led 199 of 200 laps, setting a new record for the most laps ever led in a single All-Star Race in the process.
While Logano's win does not count toward the Cup Series championship, it does mark his first win in any NASCAR event since last March at Atlanta Motor Speedway. It is also the first win of the season for Team Penske and the second straight for Ford.
Logano's win, and the $1 million payoff that came with it, was in large part thanks to the amount of work his team had put in at a Goodyear tire test back in March. Logano shared that he had run approximately 800 laps during the test session, which paid off with the fastest car in the field.
"Great execution. It's been a while since we've won a race," Logano told Fox Sports. "I wish this one counted for points, but a million bucks will work as well."
Logano is now the ninth driver in the history of the All-Star Race to have won the event more than once, joining four others who have exactly two wins: Davey Allison (1991, 1992), Terry Labonte (1988, 1999), Mark Martin (1998, 2005) and Kevin Harvick (2007, 2018). Of that group, Logano is now the only one to have won the All-Star Race at two different tracks, having won at Charlotte in 2016 before his North Wilkesboro win.
While Logano's dominant win will define the 2024 All-Star Race in the record books, it's likely this race will be most remembered for what happened between Ricky Stenhouse Jr. and Kyle Busch. On the opening lap of the race, Stenhouse shot the middle of three-wide between Busch and Denny Hamlin, a move that ended in Kyle Busch running into the wall on the exit of Turn 2. Busch, thinking Stenhouse had run him into the wall, chased Stenhouse back down in Turns 1 and 2 the next lap, turning Stenhouse into the outside wall and ending his night after just two laps.
Stenhouse responded by parking his wrecked car in Busch's pit stall and then climbing up on Busch's pit box to exchange words with crew chief Randall Burnett and Richard Childress Racing vice president of competition Andy Petree. Due to the fact that North Wilkesboro does not have an infield tunnel or overpass -- a gate on the backstretch, which remains closed during on track activity, is the only way in or out of the track -- Stenhouse was forced to stick around in the infield for the rest of the night and wait for the opportunity to hash things out.
It was fairly obvious from Stenhouse's comments to Fox Sports that he was willing to take matters into his own hands, directly referencing the "Hold my watch" incident at Kansas in 2011 where car owner Richard Childress once punched Busch over an incident between him and an RCR truck in a Craftsman Truck Series race.
"Maybe Richard will hold my watch after the race," Stenhouse said.
Stenhouse waited at Busch's hauler after the race, and the two had an unpleasant conversation that ended in Stenhouse throwing a punch at Busch that connected, sparking a brawl between the two drivers and their crews.
"I felt like Kyle and I have always raced each other really hard back to the Nationwide Series when we were competing for wins week-in and week-out. Never had any issues, and then I wrecked him one time at Daytona and he's been kind of badmouthing me ever since then," Stenhouse said. "... I'm not sure why he was so mad that I shoved it three-wide, but I mean, he hit the fence and kind of came off the wall and ran into me. I don't know, when I was talking to him he kept saying that I wrecked him.
"Just definitely built-up frustration with how he runs his mouth all the time about myself. But I know he's frustrated because he doesn't run near as good as he used to."
Prior to the fight, Busch alluded to some frustration with the way he has been recently been raced by others. Busch has only two top fives and five top 10s in 13 races this season, and it has been almost a full year since his last win at Gateway last June.
"It's the first lap of the race, we don't even have water temp yet and we're wrecking each other off of 2," Busch said. "Tired of getting run over. By everybody."
After a Bristol race in March that featured extreme levels of tire falloff over the course of a run, the All-Star Race served as a major test for a new concept by Goodyear. In addition to a baseline tire that remained stable over the course of a run, teams also had sets of "option" tires available to them, giving them the opportunity to strategically use tires that had more grip but degraded further. Each car in the All-Star Race started the night on the option tires, and then alternated between prime and option tires as their teams saw fit.
Generally, the option tire seemed to have a positive effect on the racing, as the tires made enough of a difference in grip and wear for drivers to see their tires fall off and then slide around over the course of a run. However, setting up and completing a pass remained difficult -- as it has since the Next Gen car first began running on short tracks -- as perhaps best evidenced when Logano himself was given absolute fits trying to put Bubba Wallace a lap down.
There were some spurts of fairly spirited racing, including when Christopher Bell slid up and into Logano while racing for the lead, briefly opening the door for Denny Hamlin to go three-wide for the lead. However, track position and clean air remained paramount, signaling there is still work to be done as NASCAR tries to find an optimal configuration for short tracks.
"I needed more of an advantage to pass for sure ... I'd run to them and you just couldn't pass," Hamlin told Fox Sports after finishing second. "You would lose a little bit of aero there, and I'd give my car a break, I'd try to run to them again — you've got to be so much faster to get around.
"Hats off to the track and NASCAR and Goodyear for giving it a try, and certainly hopefully we learned something here for future short tracks."
Logano likewise recognized the continued importance of clean air, going as far as to say he likely would not have won had he lost the advantage he held with clean racetrack in front of him.
"I think that was kind of us trying to maintain that clear air. If I would have lost the clean air, we wouldn't have won the race," Logano said. "We maintained it all day."
The next steps following Goodyear's step towards variable compounds will likely come within the next month. The next short track race will be at Iowa Speedway on June 16, which will then be followed by a trip to the mile long New Hampshire Motor Speedway, which has short track characteristics, the next week.
The NASCAR Cup Series regular season resumes with the sport's longest race and one of its crown jewel events, the Coca-Cola 600 at Charlotte Motor Speedway, next Sunday at 6 p.m. ET on Fox.
In a dominant performance, Joey Logano will lead 199 of 200 laps and win the NASCAR All-Star Race at North Wilkesboro, earning his second career All-Star win.
1 - #22 - Joey Logano
2 - #11 - Denny Hamlin
3 - #17 - Chris Buescher
4 - #5 - Kyle Larson
5 - #12 - Ryan Blaney
6 - #23 - Bubba Wallace
7 - #1 - Ross Chastain
8 - #9 - Chase Elliott
9 - #34 - Michael McDowell
10 - #8 - Kyle Busch
FIGHT! Ricky Stenhouse Jr. took a swing at Kyle Busch and it was on from there. The RCR crew is now throwing Stenhouse's crew members off of their hauler.
White flag for Joey Logano.
Less than five to go now for Joey Logano.
Less than 10 to go now. Logano's lead is down to about six tenths on Hamlin, but almost no one has shown to have anything for the 22 car tonight.
Joey Logano has now led 180 laps and counting, setting a new record for the most laps led by any driver in a single All-Star Race. His lead is now up to one second on Hamlin.
Kyle Larson has burned his stuff up. He's fallen well back of the two leaders and is now under attack from Chris Buescher for third.
Joey Logano has opened up a six tenth of a second lead on Denny Hamlin. Kyle Larson's advance has cooled significantly, as he's faded to 1.4 seconds back of the lead and about seven tenths back of Hamlin. Coming up on 20 to go.
Denny Hamlin has been able to use momentum off the top of the track to hold Kyle Larson off. The burden right now is on Larson to complete this pass and then go to work on Logano before his tires equalize to the ones Logano and Hamlin have, even with the inherent advantage he should have on fresher ones.
30 laps to go.
Saw a big plume of smoke on the frontstretch. Looked like Bell and McDowell got into each other racing for 11th.
Larson is hauling on fresher tires. He's making up a bunch of time in the center of the corner on Hamlin and Logano.
Green flag is back out with 42 laps to go. Wallace, Larson, and Keselowski bounce off each other on the exit of Turn 2, and Denny Hamlin now puts the bumper to Joey Logano for the race lead!
But look at Kyle Larson in fifth! He's the first car on new tires and is coming in a hurry! He's taking Blaney and Buescher three-wide for third!
The top seven cars on track all stay out, including Logano, Blaney and Hamlin.
Larson, Bubba, Elliott, McDowell, Gragson, Chastain, Chastain, Busch, Truex and Suarez come to pit road, as does Ty Gibbs who got the free pass. Looks like the entire field is now on option tires.
Caution is out with 50 laps to go. Second and final All-Star caution of the night. Teams will have the option to pit under this caution
