NORTH WILKESBORO, N.C. -- The 2023 NASCAR All-Star Race at the back-from-the-dead North Wilkesboro Speedway wasn't great. Kyle Larson led 145 of 200 laps and defeated runner-up Bubba Wallace by 4.5 seconds.
The traffic getting out of the little .625-mile moonshiners' bullring, located on farmland with only one road in and out -- Speedway Road -- wasn't nearly as bad as feared, but it wasn't exactly zooming, either. As Larson wrapped up his lengthy Victory Lane celebration on the roof of an infield building, carried there by hydraulic lift just as it last did his Hendrick Motorsports boss, Jeff Gordon, nearly 27 years ago, endless lines of red taillights still illuminated the Brushy Mountains under the sliver of a razor-thin crescent moon.