With NASCAR's Busch Light Clash this weekend, here's a look at how the field is set

Monica Holland, Fayetteville Observer

The NASCAR Cup Series third-annual Busch Light Clash at the Los Angeles Coliseum is set for Sunday, Feb. 4. No points are on the line for the exhibition event before the tour moves to NASCAR’s most prestigious race, the Daytona 500, scheduled for Feb. 18 at Daytona International Speedway.

A driver set to enter the special event is Martin Truex Jr., driver of the No. 19 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota, entering his sixth season with JGR, and he has become quite the short-track racer.

Prior to his time with JGR, Truex had never won on a short track. Since joining JGR, he has scored six of his 12 total victories on short tracks, which includes three wins each at Richmond Raceway and Martinsville Speedway. Nine of Truex’s wins since joining JGR at the start of 2019 have been on tracks 1.33 miles in length or shorter.

REMEMBERING CALE: 'He could drive the fool out of a race car': Remembering NASCAR legend Cale Yarborough

JJ AND THE OG CREW: NASCAR's Jimmie Johnson reuniting with crew chief Jason Burdett for select races in 2024

TRAGIC LOSS: Sherry Pollex, philanthropist and former longtime partner of NASCAR's Martin Truex Jr., dies

True was the victor in last year’s Clash event, first by winning his heat race, then leading the final 25 laps of the feature. Truex went on to win three regular-season races and brought home the regular-season Cup Series championship after 26 races.

The Mayetta, New Jersey, native will participate in the Clash for the 13th time in his career this weekend. His next-best Clash finish of second came in the 2015 edition at Daytona International Speedway, the traditional home for the non-points event before the inaugural race at the Coliseum in 2022. Truex started 23rd and brought home a 15th-place finish during the inaugural Coliseum race before bringing home the winner’s trophy in 2023.

Racing history at LA Coliseum

It wasn’t the first auto racing venture to come to the L.A. Coliseum when NASCAR entered the gates in 2022. At the end of World War II, open-wheel Midget cars began competing there in 1945 under the United Racing Association (URA) banner on a quarter-mile paved athletic track and continued through 1948 under the Automobile Association of America (AAA) sanction. Racing was prominent in the area at bigger tracks around Southern California, causing racing there to end.

That is until 1979, when Mickey Thompson began his off-road racing stadium series, with the Coliseum serving as his first event of many with future seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion and recent NASCAR Hall of Fame inductee Jimmie Johnson competing there early in his career before coming to NASCAR.

The race will have an interesting qualifying format.

How the Clash field is set

Four 25-lap heat races will eventually make up the starting field of 10 cars each. The field will be split into three practice groups, with each group receiving three sessions. The fastest lap time from each competitor’s final practice session will determine the starting lineup for the four heat races. The top four overall lap times in final practice will earn the pole for each heat race, while the fifth- through eighth-fastest lap times will make up the other half of the front row for each heat.

The complete field for each heat race will be filled using this methodology: Heat One will be made up of cars listed in overall positions one, five, nine, 13, 17, 21, 25, 29, 33, 37 on the final practice timesheet.

The top five finishers (20 total cars) from each heat race automatically advance to the Clash, with the winner of heat one winning the pole and the winner of heat two earning the outside pole.

The winners of heats three and four will fill out the second row, with the remaining order being determined in the same manner.

The remaining finishing positions from each heat that did not advance will continue to Sunday’s 75-lap Last Chance Qualifying (LCQ) race. Below is a breakdown on how the LCQ will be filled out:

The starting order will be determined based on finishing positions in the heat races.

The sixth-place finisher from Heat One will be on the pole for the LCQ race. The sixth-place finisher from Heat Two will be on the outside pole. This pattern will continue to fill out the remaining LCQ field.

The top two finishers from the LCQ race will advance to the Clash, filling out positions 21 and 22.

The 23rd and final spot in the Clash will be reserved for the driver who finished the highest in the 2023 championship standings who does not transfer on finishing position in their heat race or in their LCQ race.

All other drivers will be eliminated from competition for the remainder of the event weekend.

Truex feels winning last year’s Clash is very important for sending his team in a positive direction for 2024.

“I think it was definitely a huge part. It builds confidence and particularly in the decision-making process,” Truex said. “We went to the Clash in 2022 and we were absolutely awful. It was like, ‘OK, we need to change everything around.’ To have the guys come with a new setup and be as good as we were all weekend long; it was a huge boost to start the year. You always want to start the season strong, exhibition race or not. You want to go out there and win and get your confidence going. That just kicked things off for us and we knew we were back.

NASCAR Clash TV schedule

SATURDAY

  • 6 p.m. — Practice (FS1)

  • 8:30 p.m. — Heat Race No. 1 (FS1)

  • 8:45 p.m. — Heat Race No. 2 (FS1)

  • 9 p.m. — Heat Race No. 3 (FS1)

  • 9:15 p.m. — Heat Race No. 4 (FS1)

SUNDAY

  • 6:30 p.m. — Last Chance Qualifying Race (Fox)

  • 8 p.m. — Busch Light Clash at The Coliseum (Fox)

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: NASCAR Busch Light Clash how field is set

Advertisement