Qualifying format, setting the lineup and practice groups for Cook Out Clash explained

Editor’s note: Saturday’s practices and heat races air on FS1. Sunday’s Last Chance Qualifier and Cook Out Clash air on FOX.

The season-opening Cook Out Clash exhibition race will star 23 drivers in a 200-lap feature event on Sunday, Feb. 2 at 8 p.m. ET (FOX, MRN Radio, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) — and, like previous iterations, will have a unique qualifying method to make the field.

The tight confines of the 0.25-mile Bowman Gray oval set up for an event similar to that hosted by the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum from 2022 through 2024.

MORE: Full 2025 Cup schedule | Behind the scenes at Bowman Gray

The weekend‘s on-track action begins Feb. 1 with live practice sessions on FS1 (6:10 p.m. ET). The entrants will be split into three practice groups, with each group getting three practice sessions. Each competitor‘s fastest lap from their final practice session will determine the starting lineup for all of four 25-lap heat races. The practice groups are assigned based on 2024 owner points, starting with Joey Logano in Group 3 and moving across to William Byron in Group 1, then Tyler Reddick, Christopher Bell and so on.

PRACTICE GROUPS

FINAL PRACTICE/QUALIFYING GROUPS

The final practice sessions will be a bit different, acting as a qualifying session that will determine the grid for each heat race. Each group will stage in the pit area and then split into two smaller groups of 6-7 cars. From there, the A and B groups will each get 4 minutes to set a fast time.

The fastest driver in final practice will start from pole position in Heat 1; the second-fastest driver will start from the pole in Heat 2; the third-fastest driver will start from the pole in Heat 3, and so on. Only green-flag laps will count in each heat with no overtime in play. The top five finishers in each heat will advance to Sunday night‘s feature event.

Those who do not advance will have one more chance to advance courtesy of a 75-lap Last Chance Qualifier, or LCQ, on Sunday afternoon. Like the heat races, only green-flag laps will count toward the lap total with no overtime in play. The top two finishers in the LCQ will advance to the feature race, where they will start 21st and 22nd, respectively. The 23rd and final starting position in the Clash will be awarded to the driver who finished highest in the 2024 driver points standings who did not already transfer into the main event.

Sunday night‘s 200-lap feature starting lineup will be set by the results of the heat races. Heat 1‘s winner will start on pole for the main event while Heat 2‘s victor will start second in the feature. A timed break will be observed at the race‘s halfway point at Lap 100. Like the preliminary events, only green-flag laps will count and the event must finish under the green flag.

The 2025 Cook Out Clash marks the Cup Series‘ first return to the historic Bowman Gray Stadium since 1971, when Bobby Allison scored the victory in the last of 29 points-paying races at the quarter-mile venue in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.