NASCAR's Ben Kennedy looks ahead to 2025 Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium

The 2025 NASCAR season will start next month, and the first event will be an exhibition race, the Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium. When NASCAR announced the Clash would take place at the historic track and football stadium, Ben Kennedy appeared on Kevin Harvick’s Happy Hour to reveal what fans can expect with the race.

“It’s going to be new, it’s going to be different, it’s going to be exciting for sure,” Kennedy, NASCAR’s executive vice president and chief venue racing innovations officer, said. “To be on big Fox on Feb. 2 and promoting our season and the [Daytona] 500, it’s going to be massive. I’m really excited about it. I was there when we announced it a couple weeks ago. The energy in that place every Saturday night it doesn’t matter if you show up in the middle of May or the middle of August or whatever it might be, the energy in that place is palatable. It’s incredible, and the fans bring it every single week.

“People talk about what makes Bowman Gray so special, and it is on track product, it is the infrastructure and the history just that you feel inside that stadium. But it’s also the people, it’s the fans that come every single week.

More on NASCAR’s Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium

Bowman Gray Stadium is no stranger to NASCAR as it hosted Cup Series points events from 1958-71. Some of the NASCAR legends who have won at the track are Richard and Lee Petty, David Pearson, Junior Johnson, Bobby Allison, Glen Wood, and Rex White. Current drivers — including Kyle Larson and Bubba Wallace — competed at the track in what is now called the ARCA Menards Series East.

“We’re going back to The Madhouse in Bowman Gray Stadium,” Kennedy said in a press release. “Bringing our Cup Series back there for the first time since the 1970s, it’s going to be another historic event. I’d say in a lot of ways, this is going to be an opportunity to celebrate our roots, our history and celebrate our NASCAR regional series.”

Kennedy added: “This is the next evolution of The Clash for us. One of the areas where we feel like there’s an opportunity for us to continue to switch it up and go to new markets and new venues is an exhibition race like The Clash.”