Today we took the half hour shuttle bus out to Darlington Raceway for the Darlington 500 NASCAR race. It was the final race of the season and was a sellout 47,000 spectators.

We had a look around some of the old NASCARs and sponsor displays.

The track is egg-shaped rather than oval because the neighbour had a pond they didn’t want to get rid of. The race is 500 miles (800kms) and took over 3 hrs to complete. The average speed around the 2.2km long track is around 270-280km/hr and doesn’t seem to change much at all around the corners.

It was a very white crowd. As the drivers were individually introduced, most got cheers but some got quite loudly booed. The guy next to us said it was mostly because they were the arrogant, mouthy ones but the last one was just because the driver was black. Racism is still entrenched in many parts of the world.

We had great seats about 50m from the finish line with a fantastic view of the pits. The pit stops are a bit crazy with a team running out to change tyres on one side then run around and do the other. Look for the flying tyres in the video below.

While there are some exciting parts of the race, mostly the re-starts and pit stops where there is close action, the majority of the time not much happens. It may be more interesting if you know the drivers, rivalries, background etc but once the racing starts, there is no conversation because it is soooo loud (even with ear plugs). It did come down to a close finish due to a crash not long before the finish resulting in another re-start so that was good.

The winner came from behind to win and his name was Chase! He did the obligatory victory burnout.

The trip back home wasn’t so successful as the shuttle bus driver gave everyone the wrong instructions of where to wait and it was over 2.5 hrs before we got out of the track. Got home about 1am.

This day in sporting history (1 September)

2016 NFL San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick kneels in protest during the US national anthem before pre-season game against the Chargers at San Diego’s Qualcomm Stadium, objecting to racial injustice and police brutality in the US