Chris Polvoorde, Ethan Ebbert and Jason McNeil posted the fastest category qualifying times in Thursday’s Method Race Wheels qualifying session for Saturday’s 57th BFGoodrich Tires SCORE Baja 500. The session for SCORE Trophy Truck, SCORE Trophy Truck 2WD, SCORE Trophy Truck Spec and SCORE Trophy Truck Legends classes was held on a private ranch outside of Ensenada, Baja, Mexico and comes after a difficult week of pre-running the Baja 500 course due to muddy, rainy conditions.

From the onset, Polvoorde and navigator Mike Kim were focused on setting a heater lap in their No. 94 Optima Battery Toyo Tire all-wheel-drive Ford (pictured above). Polvoorde, 24, came to desert racing several years ago after a long and winning career in off-road short-course racing. That history was in full effect as he set the fastest halfway split time before duo stopping the timing clock at 3:55.407 – a full 6.5 seconds faster than second-place qualifier Luke McMillin (No. 83 Monster Energy BFGoodrich Ford). In third place was Tavo Vildosola, followed by 2024 Baja 500 winner Toby Price and then recent SCORE San Felipe 250 overall champion Alan Ampudia.

All the top five SCORE Trophy Truck qualifiers drove Mason Motorsports-built all-wheel-drive trucks.

Luke McMillin qualified second overall with his Monster Energy BFGoodrich Ford

Ebbert gave the factory Honda group something to cheer about as the 19-year-old piloted his No. 81T Honda Passport-bodied TSCO chassis to the fastest time in the SCORE Trophy Truck 2WD category. Facing a field of high-horsepower trucks with V8 powerplants, the twin turbo Honda V6 gave Ebbert enough pace to beat his nearest rival Mavrick Gaunt by 78 seconds.

In the hotly contested SCORE Trophy Truck Spec class, the speed of former category champion Jason McNeil, 47, took top honors once again. Driving the No. 234 TSCO-Chevy McNeil’s time of 4:14.952 was 2.9 seconds faster than second-place qualifier Michael Marshal and just over a second faster than the much higher horsepower entry of Ebbert.

Rick Johnson posted the fastest time of four entrants qualifying for the SCORE Trophy Truck Legends class (for drivers over 50 years old) piloting the No. 1L Mason Motorsports AWD Ford he shares with Gustavo Vildosola Sr.

Off-road racing’s third-oldest event returns to its traditional start and finish location in Ensenada, Baja, Mexico as the second round of the four-race 2025 SCORE International Desert World Championship series. In endurance sports car racing terms, if the Rolex 24 At Daytona is the linear equivalent of the Baja 1000, then the Baja 500 is a sister race to the 12 Hours of Sebring. For many seasoned competitors, race teams and fans, the annual pre-summer tradition is an ideal mix of mileage, time, and challenge.

First run in 1969, the SCORE Baja 500 was first founded by the National Off-Road Racing Association. Only the SCORE Baja 1000 (formerly the NORRA Mexican 1000) and the Mint 400 have longer event histories.

The 2025 Baja 500 course features a 463.01-mile loop course for Pro category bikes, trucks, buggies and UTV classes. A shorter but still demanding 416.3-mile route is on tap for Sportsman motorcycle and all other four-wheel competitors. The classes with the most entries for the race are the SCORE Trophy Truck with 41, followed by the Trophy Truck Spec class with 27. In third place is the Pro UTV Stock with 22, fourth is the Pro UTV Open class with 20, followed by Pro UTV FI with 19, and then Class 10 with 11.

201 participants have registered to date, coming from 27 states in the U.S., the U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, and 10 additional countries. The race starts in the pre-dawn hour of 3:30am local (Pacific) time on Saturday for motorcycle and quads, followed by a 9:15am green flag starts for the four-wheel racers. All entrants start via a timed split of the green flag and compete on corrected time. The fastest competitors are expected to complete the course in approximately nine hours, while all vehicles will have a maximum time limit of 18 hours from their start to be considered official finishers.

This year’s map, as well as complete race day coverage, is available at www.SCORE-International.com or SCORE’s YouTube channel.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) — A three-judge federal appellate panel ruled Thursday in favor of NASCAR in the antitrust lawsuit filed by two teams, one owned by Michael Jordan, and vacated an injunction that required 23XI and Front Row be recognized as chartered teams as their case snakes through the legal system.

Both race teams sued NASCAR late last year after refusing to sign new agreements on charter renewals. The charter system is similar to franchises in other sports, but the charters are revocable by NASCAR and have expiration dates. 23XI, which is owned by Jordan and three-time Daytona 500 winner Denny Hamlin, allied with Front Row in suing NASCAR after 13 other organizations signed the renewals last September and those two organization refused.

“We are disappointed by today’s ruling by the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals and are reviewing the decision to determine our next steps,” said Jeffery Kessler, attorney for 23XI and Front Row. “This ruling is based on a very narrow consideration of whether a release of claims in the charter agreements is anti-competitive and does not impact our chances of winning at trial scheduled for Dec. 1.

“We remain confident in our case and committed to racing for the entirety of this season as we continue our fight to create a fair and just economic system for stock car racing that is free of anticompetitive, monopolistic conduct.”

The two teams sued and asked for a temporary injunction that would recognize them as chartered teams for this season. The antitrust case isn’t scheduled to be heard until December.

The teams said they needed the injunction because the current charter agreement prohibits them from suing NASCAR. 23XI also argued it would be harmed because Tyler Reddick’s contract would have made him a free agent if the team could not guarantee him a charter-protected car.

The original judge ruled that NASCAR’s charter agreement likely violated antitrust law in granting the injunction. But when they heard arguments last month, the three judges at the the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit in Richmond, Virginia, indicated they were skeptical of that decision.

The judges said in Thursday’s ruling they were not aware of any case that supports the lower court’s theory of antitrust law, so they vacated the injunction.

“In short, because we have found no support for the proposition that a business entity or person violates the antitrust laws by requiring a prospective participant to give a release for past conduct as a condition for doing business, we cannot conclude that the plaintiffs made a clear showing that they were likely to succeed on the merits of that theory,” the court said. “And without satisfaction of the likelihood-of-success element, the plaintiffs were not entitled to a preliminary injunction.”

The teams have 14 days to appeal to the full court. The injunction also has no bearings on the merits of the case, and the earliest NASCAR can treat the teams as unchartered — a charter guarantees their organizations a starting spot each week and prize money — is one week after the deadline to appeal, provided there is no pending appeal.

NASCAR has not said what it would do with the six charters held by the two organizations if they are returned to the sanctioning body. There are only 36 chartered cars for a 40-car field. If the teams do not appeal, the six entries would have to compete as “open” cars — which means they’d have to qualify on speed each week to make the race and they would receive a fraction of the money.

It’s not clear what would happen to Reddick’s contract. He goes to Michigan this weekend ranked sixth in the Cup Series standings. Both organizations are still seeking a win this season — Hamlin’s three victories are with Joe Gibbs Racing, the team he drives for.

Reddick is last year’s regular-season champion and competed for the Cup title last November.

NASCAR driver Kyle Larson has pulled out of a planned Supercars race in Australia in November, with his Hendrick Motorsports teammate Chase Elliott potentially set to take his place

Chase Elliott’s long-standing relationship with NAPA Auto Parts, spanning 11 years since his NASCAR Xfinity Series days, has hit the headlines when it was revealed that NAPA was poised to partner with one of Elliott’s Hendrick Motorsports teammates and Cup Series competitors on a Supercars adventure.

Kyle Larson, who recently made his feelings clear on teammates Elliott and William Byron’s personalities , has faced challenges. His bid for ‘The Double’ ended abruptly as he crashed at the Indy 500 with Arrow McLaren, then suffered another crash at the Coca-Cola 600 in Charlotte, a race which left Elliott pointing the finger of blame.

Following these setbacks, news broke that Larson has withdrawn from a scheduled Supercars race in Australia this November, a venture that was to be supported by Elliott’s major sponsor, which boasts $12.6 billion in revenue. This development coincides with Hendrick Motorsports announcing a significant partnership with a $138 billion titan connected to Kyle Busch.

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Larson had already committed to racing for PremiAir Racing, with a deal from the South Australian Motorsport Board in place. He had also secured sponsorship from Elliott’s primary sponsor, NAPA, which shares a parent company with Repco, according to Speed Cafe.

While the financial details from NAPA remain undisclosed, the sponsorship was referred to as “major,” which seems fitting considering their substantial estimated yearly revenues.

In theory, this could pave the way for Elliott to step in for Larson in Australia. However, the 2020 Cup Series Champion might be hesitant to overextend himself, given that this season hasn’t exactly been smooth sailing in the No.9 Chevrolet.

With only three top-five finishes and none within the top three, Elliott has ended up 15th or lower seven times, including a 15th place finish at the most recent race in Nashville. This streak of lackluster performances has even sparked rumors among some fans that he might be replaced.

These rumors were only fueled further when rising star Carson Hocevar, known for his controversial style, was congratulated by Hendrick Motorsports vice president of competition, Chad Knaus, after his second-place finish in Nashville.

However, if Elliott or another NASCAR star does end up replacing Larson, he won’t have to look far for advice, as Supercar legend Shane van Gisbergen is currently immersed in his first full Cup Series season after relocating from Australia.

The 36-year-old three-time champion currently drives Trackhouse Racing’s No. 88 Chevrolet, and while he clinched a win in his series debut in 2023, he hasn’t made it back to the winner’s circle since.

Dozens of sportswriters knew Dale Earnhardt better than I did, or covered him longer. But watching Earnhardt, the four-part documentary now available on Amazon Prime Video, it’s immediately evident that while this program certainly centers around Earnhardt, there are so many ancillary satellites revolving around the main planet, and as part four concludes with an obligatory, sad Willie Nelson song, you click off the remote and think: Man, so much about that time I forgot.

So much about his life, and his death, his friends and his enemies, the way he treated the people he liked, which was different from how he treated his family. How one day Earnhardt started showing up wearing a suit, glamorous third wife Teresa on his arm, became a tycoon, built his Dale Earnhardt, Inc. offices and shop, promptly dubbed the “Garage Mahal,” in 1999. Inside, it was chilly and confusing. Mixed messages abounded. Granite, with gold drinking fountains, plus a stuffed deer that Dale shot, and the shotgun he used to kill it. So many shiny trophies that, lumped together, sort of lose meaning. It reminded me of Graceland.

Let’s face it: We all know how this movie ends, in a comparatively innocuous-looking crash on the last lap of the 2001 Daytona 500. So you’re signing up to watch a four-hour documentary because you are either interested in NASCAR in general, Dale Earnhardt in particular, or you just enjoy a well-told story.

The documentary, executive-produced by Ron Howard and his longtime business partner, Brian Grazer, will win awards, and it deserves to: I’ve worked on projects like this, and through all four parts I marveled at the precise footage and perfect soundbites the production team was able to unearth, because I know for every minute of aired footage, they must have had to plow through hours and hours of archives, beg friends and families and fans for home movies, refuse to take no for an answer when they knew what they needed exists, out there somewhere.

You don’t have to be a race fan to appreciate Earnhardt, though it helps, especially if you’ve been around for a while.

I met Dale Earnhardt on November 19, 1989, at what was then the Atlanta International Raceway. It was the Winston Cup season finale—and isn’t that the smartest marketing you ever saw, when you had to actually say the name of a cigarette company when you were referencing the series?—where the ’89 champion would be crowned. I was covering it for the Dallas Times Herald. It was my first NASCAR race. I wasn’t a Times Herald sportswriter; I was actually the paper’s television critic, and I had timed a visit to CNN studios to write a feature on the news network’s upcoming 10th anniversary for an airline magazine (remember those?). It was not a coincidence that there was an important NASCAR race there that weekend—I’d been writing about motorsports for a while, and it came time for me to check that NASCAR box.

So I joined 15 or 20 actual sportswriters in the Atlanta track’s small infield press room, accompanied by nobody I knew, but several I’d heard of. I was not accustomed to being in a room that had no view of the actual racetrack, but soon learned that wasn’t unusual.

It was not a particularly eventful race, until lap 202, when the orange number 22 car of journeyman driver Grant Adcox pancaked the outside wall and burst into flames as the car traveled down the embankment, into the infield. It seemed to take forever to get Adcox out of the car: They had to use the Jaws of Life to cut off the roof. He was taken to the infield care center, then helicoptered to an Atlanta hospital. There’s little question that Adcox was dead before his car stopped rolling, as the mounting for his seat came loose in the impact, and unrestrained, he suffered fatal head and chest trauma, but it is typical of all forms of motorsports to transport the driver to the hospital, where the family can gather and an appropriate member of the clergy breaks the news, and the carefully structured official announcement is made later, so fans can leave unaware that they’d just seen someone die. To a T, that script would be followed 12 years later for Earnhardt himself.

Adcox worked with his father at Herb Adcox Chevrolet in Chattanooga. He never had enough money to compete full-time in NASCAR, but raced regularly in the ARCA series, which used older Cup cars. Dale Earnhardt had said in an interview earlier in the season that he was impressed with Adcox’s talent, and with enough money, maybe he could be a success in the Cup series.

Some of the Cup races Adcox had managed to run seemed cursed. In 1974, Adcox qualified for a race at Talladega Superspeedway. Midway through the event, the caution flag flew, and the drivers dashed for pit road. As he started to pull into his pit stall, Adcox’s car began to slide, right into Gary Bettenhausen’s Roger Penske–owned AMC Matador, which was being serviced by the crew. Several of them were struck and injured, the worst being Don Miller, who lost a leg.

The following year, Adcox again qualified for the race at Talladega, but his crew chief dropped dead from a heart attack right there in the garage. The car was withdrawn, but Adcox found another ride, and then the race was delayed a week by rain. Adcox, a working man, had to cancel, and his spot in the field was given to fan favorite Tiny Lund, the affable 6-foot, 5-inch, 270-pound winner of the 1963 Daytona 500. In a multi-car crash on lap seven, Lund’s car was struck broadside, and he was killed. He was 45. Had Adcox been able to race, Lund would have been watching from the grandstands.

Earnhardt won that race at Atlanta, though he lost the 1989 championship to Rusty Wallace. Earnhardt was cheerful when he came into the press room to talk to us: One of his first comments was, “Boy, I hope Grant’s OK. That was a hard hit he took.” A sportswriter sitting next to me leaned over and whispered, “Did nobody tell him?”

Apparently not, and we sure didn’t. I spoke to Earnhardt briefly, then was soon back in my hotel room, about to type out the story on my wretched Radio Shack TRS 80 laptop. But what was my lede? That Earnhardt won? That Wallace was the champion? That Adcox was the first Cup driver to die in five years? I don’t recall what I typed into the Trash 80, but I typed away. And I had covered my first NASCAR race.

As I went to more and more races, Earnhardt was always a looming presence. He was hated and adored. I fell somewhere in between. Rubbing may be racing, but Earnhardt’s aggressiveness often rubbed me the wrong way, especially earlier in his career. He was polarizing—you either got him or you didn’t.

I apologize for the above autobiography, and I need to get back to Earnhardt. The praise is deserved, and the use of film and clips from TV broadcasts is Emmy-worthy. The TV critic in me was a little put off by the staging of some of the present-day interviews: It isn’t unusual for the interviewer, unseen and unheard in this case, to tell the subject to look at me, not at the camera, but several of the subjects appear to be speaking to someone in another room. The interviews with bass fishing legend Hank Parker, an Earnhardt confidant, are so dark and distant it’s almost like he was being filmed by a hidden camera. But that would be nitpicking director Joshua Altman’s style. Taken as a whole, Earnhardt is top-shelf. Part three drags a bit, but the rest seem right-sized.

As I watched, I took notes. Following are some expansions on those notes, in no particular order, which fans of the man and the documentary might find of interest.

Ralph Earnhardt

I wanted more from Earnhardt about Ralph Earnhardt than we were served. The importance he played in his son Dale’s life, perhaps not so much by action as inaction, was telling at every turn. Growing up at racetracks in the south, I’d seen dozens of Ralph Earnhardts: Lean, hard-bitten, tanned, wary and suspicious, usually with a pack of Lucky Strikes tucked in their shirt pocket. Ralph was a talented driver, perhaps an even more talented car- and engine-builder, as often as not working for the drivers he competed against on Saturday nights.

Ralph toiled for years in cotton gins, looking for a way out. That would be racing. With his typically German meticulous, practical personality, he wanted more, but didn’t crave it, didn’t demand superstardom, didn’t much want to travel, but he dominated racing for years at local tracks, where he made enough money and got to sleep in his own bed every night. He was sick most of 1973 with heart trouble, had to let his friend Stick Elliott race his car, but was back behind the wheel that summer, and won two races at Concord Speedway. “Veteran Ralph Earnhardt is back in high gear,” said the Charlotte News in July.

Two months later, Ralph Earnhardt died, at home, from a heart attack. He was 45. Years after, Dale spoke about his father in an interview. “That’s the last funeral I’ve ever gone to. It took me a year or so to get over being mad. I felt like I was robbed. I felt hurt,” Dale said. “It was too tough to take. The memories. All the things I wanted to tell him.”

Which, we learn from Earnhardt, isn’t at all dissimilar from the way Junior felt after losing his father, who was 49.

Teresa Earnhardt

Teresa Houston was pretty, and she knew it. She had grown up around racing—her uncle is Tommy Houston, who had 24 wins and 198 top-10 finishes in the NASCAR Busch series, and her cousin Andy Houston raced in all three of the major NASCAR series. She naturally met Earnhardt at the track, and they married on November 14, 1982.

She wanted to be a mother—her daughter Taylor Nicole was born on December 20, 1988—but she wasn’t crazy about being a stepmother. The relationship between her and Dale’s other kids, son Kerry, daughter Kelley, and Dale Earnhardt, Jr., was icy from the start. Kerry related on Dale Jr.’s podcast that when he was finally invited to his father’s house for the first time—at age 16—Teresa slammed the door in his face.

It may seem that Teresa, now 66, has been unfairly painted as the evil stepmother, but she certainly hasn’t helped her own cause. She virtually disappeared after Earnhardt was killed. She inherited everything: The Garage Mahal, the race teams, so much property, and the spectacularly profitable souvenir business.

Kelley, Kerry, and Dale Jr. got nothing, not even their own names. When Kerry and his wife Rene signed a deal with Schumacher Homes to help design and promote new houses, they called it the “Earnhardt Collection.” The ads were benign, in no way suggesting that Dale Earnhardt or his estate had anything to do with the project. Nonetheless, Teresa filed suit against her stepson in 2017, contending that Kerry, by using the name he was born with, was infringing on her copyright. Kelley and Junior were properly appalled, but not surprised. The case dragged on for years. It’s difficult to even conceive of a reason why Teresa would do this, aside from spite.

It’s worth noting, too, that Teresa had Senior buried on “her” land, and Junior revealed in a very recent Washington Post interview that he has only been able to visit his father’s grave once since he died, because Teresa has forbidden him and Kelley to access her property. Which may or may not be legal, given North Carolina’s confusing laws pertaining to whether or not a property owner can legally bar the next of kin from a gravesite.

With the possible exception of Brooke Sealey, Jeff Gordon’s first wife, no NASCAR ex has maintained a lower public profile than Teresa. Her name was most recently in the news last October, when she revealed plans for a portion of what the Charlotte Observer called her “vast landholdings.” The paper reported that she had asked the local planning board to rezone 399 acres in Mooresville so she could build an industrial park.

Earnhardt mentioned that Dale Jr. continued to race for the now-Teresa-owned Dale Earnhardt, Inc., until 2007, when the situation just became untenable. After his move to Hendrick Motorsports, sponsors fled DEI, and Teresa had to merge with Chip Ganassi Racing in 2008.

The extent to which Teresa is reviled by so many NASCAR fans wasn’t fully explored in Earnhardt, nor was her toxic relationship with her three stepchildren. It’s just so sad.

Dale Earnhardt, Jr.

No one is more surprised than I am that I’m describing Junior as a deeply complex man. In his younger years, that would have seemed absurd: What’s so complex about a kid who loves pickup trucks and beer and video games, and hanging out with his buddies, and who very possibly could have found happiness working forever at his father’s Chevrolet dealership?

One thing Earnhardt puts in laser focus was Junior’s need to earn his father’s respect, and he saw racing as being the road to that. Despite being a very wealthy man, Senior repeatedly balked at helping his children race, ostensibly because he wanted them to experience the same maturing desperation that he met and eventually conquered.

Hank Parker says in Earnhardt that he convinced Dale to spend some money helping them out, and Senior did buy them each a late-model car to run at local paved ovals, and a truck and trailer to haul them around in. It’s downright stunning when Junior says that he raced in 159 late-model races, and his father never came to a single one. Junior knew nothing about racecraft, and the man who possibly knew more about it than anyone declined to teach him.

Still, Junior battled through all that to win races—and a burgeoning fan base. When he moved to Hendrick, many of us thought he had it made, but Junior struggled. He had the same equipment Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon did, but they were winning championships and he wasn’t. After a colleague and I interviewed him during the now-defunct NASCAR media tour, we walked away disheartened by how sad Dale seemed. I asked him if he felt he had good chemistry with his current crew chief, and he said, “I’m not sure I’ve ever had good chemistry with a crew chief. I don’t even know what that is.” NASCAR drivers just don’t say things like that to reporters holding tape recorders. Afterward, my friend suggested, not entirely kidding, that Hendrick needed to put him on suicide watch.

When Dale Jr. retired at the end of the 2017 season, he had amassed a very respectable record: 26 wins, two of them the Daytona 500, with 260 top-10s in 631 races.

He and Kelley formed JR Motorsports, which in 2016 began fielding NASCAR Nationwide (now Xfinity) series cars, with the help of Rick Hendrick. The team began winning that first year and hasn’t stopped. Sponsors are delighted to bask in Junior’s company, and he and Kelley seem really happy in their respective roles.

Junior was one of NASCAR’s early adopters when it came to social media, founding the Dale Jr. Download in 2013, with Junior becoming the regular host in 2017. The podcast added video, and as Earnhardt honed his skill as a broadcaster, the Dale Jr. Download has become possibly the single most influential media source there is in the racing world—not just NASCAR, as Junior can and does have guests from all forms of racing. The way Howard Stern can get celebrities to emotionally expose themselves in a way they won’t anywhere else, racers will reveal parts of their lives to Junior that would typically be off limits elsewhere.

Never has Junior seemed so comfortable in his own skin. Years ago, I said this on a radio show that I hosted: If any racer had a license to be an asshole, it’s Dale Earnhardt, Jr. But he isn’t. In person, he’s polite, interested in what you have to say, patient with fans wanting autographs and selfies, and a genuinely nice guy.

I think that comes across in Earnhardt. Because the documentary is supposed to be about Senior, but Junior carries the day. Good for him, and Kelley, and Kerry.

It’s Week 15 of NASCAR’s Cup season.

Michigan International Speedway announced today that award-winning country singer and songwriter Ashley Cooke is stepping in to headline the Busch Light Summer Music Series performance prior to Sunday’s FireKeepers Casino 400 NASCAR Cup Series race.

Cooke replaces Nate Smith during pre-race festivities after he announced Wednesday afternoon that he’s going on strict vocal rest through the rest of June, thereby canceling his performances for the month.

“It means a lot that Ashley is stepping up to the plate to perform for our passionate fans before our NASCAR Cup Series stars hit the track,” said Joe Fowler, Michigan International Speedway President. “Ashley is one of the most exciting rising stars in country music and her show will have everyone singing along before the race on Sunday. We also wish Nate the best in his recovery and hope to see him out at the track soon.”

Since her debut album shot in the dark earned her critical acclaim, Cooke has been recognized as MusicRow’s Discovery Artist of the Year and Next Big Thing, Billboard’s Rookie of the Month and iHeartCountry’s On The Verge Artist. 

Cooke won her first CMT Award for Breakthrough Female Video of the Year at the 2024 CMT Awards before being nominated for ACM New Female Artist of the Year, and is currently up for Best New Country Artist at the 2025 iHeartRadio Music Awards.

In 2024, Cooke earned her first No.1 at Country radio with her single, “your place,” making her one of the only women to reach the top of the charts that year. With national TV appearances on NBC’s TODAY and ABC’s The Bachelorette, as well as tours with Luke Bryan, Cole Swindell and Jordan Davis under her belt, Cooke is ready to take 2025 by storm. Cooke started her year headlining her “your place Tour,” before hitting the road with Cody Johnson in Australia and Kane Brown throughout the US. She’ll be Performing at festivals all summer long, before heading out on the road with Parker McCollum and Lee Brice in the fall.” 

“We enjoyed collaborating with Ashley Cooke last year to surprise our fans in Nashville through the ‘Busch on Broadway’ pop-up series, right after her big CMT award win,” said Krystyn Stowe, Head of Marketing, Busch Family & Natural Family at Anheuser-Busch. “With the second show of our Summer Music Series coming up this weekend, we know she will give our fans in Michigan a pre-race experience they won’t forget.”

Earlier this year, Cooke released a highly-anticipated collaboration with Joe Jonas, “all I forgot,” followed by her song “the f word,” building to her sophomore album due later this year.

The inaugural Busch Light Summer Music Series consists of five full-length concerts at NASCAR races throughout the country. The series is an exciting new fan experience born from the renewed partnership with NASCAR’S Official Beer Sponsor.

Since the 1990s, the Anheuser-Busch family of brands has created countless opportunities for 21+ NASCAR fans to get closer to the sport they love. The first performance in the series took place earlier this spring, with ERNEST taking the stage at Texas Motor Speedway. After Michigan, the series moves to Chicago Street Race (Zac Brown Band – July 5), Iowa Speedway (Corey Kent – Aug. 3) and will conclude in Busch Light’s hometown of St. Louis at World Wide Technology Raceway (Sept. 7). Artists and details on the final concert will be announced at a later date.

The June race weekend at Michigan International Speedway begins with the ARCA Menards Series Henry Ford Health 200 on Friday, June 6, followed by the NASCAR CRAFTSMAN Truck Series DQS Solutions & Staffing 250 Powered by Precision Vehicle Logistics on Saturday, June 7. The NASCAR Cup Series will cap off the weekend’s action with the FireKeepers Casino 400 on Sunday, June 8.

Tickets are available for purchase via phone at 888-905-7223 or online at mispeedway.com.

Fans can view the full 2025 NASCAR Cup Series schedule and purchase tickets at nascar.com/tickets, and can stay connected to Michigan International Speedway on Facebook, Instagram and X. 

MIS PR