“Call 811,” “Buschy McBusch,” “Headache Relief Shot”: How Do NASCAR Races Get Their Names Ahead of Each Season

Every motor race always has a name attached to it. For races like Formula One, the race name starts with the country followed by the words “Grand Prix.” However, it is worth mentioning that nowadays, there is a different name attached to these races. This is primarily to satisfy sponsorship demands, so the sponsor’s name is tacked on for good measure. More or less, the same principle applies to NASCAR as well.

In the early days of the sport, the process of naming a NASCAR race used to be very simple. All that needed to be done was to schedule a NASCAR race and name it—usually, after the location where the event took place, like the Richmond 250 or the Southeastern 500. Grander names such as World 600 were also used. Similarly, a few races, such as the Gwyn Staley 400, came to be named in honor of a driver.

However, that all changed with the arrival of sponsor money. As a result, the NASCAR name game changed forever. This essentially meant that if the funding were large enough, the sponsors were allowed to have their name emblazoned.

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Some of the strangest NASCAR race names

Of course, having such liberty means that some sponsors will end up having strange names tacked on to different races. Some such names are based on food items, such as “Beef. It’s What’s for Dinner. 300” and “Heluva Good! Sour Cream Dips at the Glen.” A few have also been based on medicines, for example, “TreatMyClot.com 300,” “Goody’s Headache Relief Shot 500,” “MyAFibStory.com 400,” and “My Bariatric Solutions 300.”

The 2016 iterations of the Cup Series races at the Phoenix International Raceway and Pocono Raceway were, respectively, called “Axalta. Faster. Tougher. Brighter 200” and “Axalta ‘We Paint Winners’ 400.” Other odd names such as the “1000Bulbs.com 500,” “Call 811 Before You Dig 200,” and “GoBowling.com 400” have also come to pass.

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A particularly funny one was the “Buschy McBusch Race 400,” based on the Busch beer brand. One can only imagine the mouthful if the Busch brothers would have been leading the race! The sentence, “Busch has taken the lead from Busch in the Buschy McBusch!” does not exactly roll off the tongue easily.