NASCAR Cup Series drivers have a mix of excitement and trepidation as they prepare for a pivotal race two hours southeast of the Charlotte area.

Sure, Darlington Raceway is a known quantity having hosted 129 Cup races since 1950. The unknown stems from the move to a 750-horsepower, low downforce package. Now, they have no idea what to expect before starting the weekend with a Saturday afternoon practice session.

“It’s going to be crazy there, honestly,” Daniel Suarez told SiriusXM NASCAR Radio. “I’m actually looking forward to it. I’m super excited for the challenge, but Darlington is a very difficult race track with less power and more downforce. Now we have less downforce and more power, so it’s going to be tricky.

“Yesterday I was in the simulator doing some post-Las Vegas work, and we did only for one hour, we did Darlington and it was very difficult to drive. I spent more time backward than going in the right direction.”

Darlington Raceway uncertainty did not become a big topic of conversation until the 750-horsepower package caused a wee bit of chaos at Phoenix Raceway. Drivers wore through tires faster than expected, and they fully felt the extra power while completing laps at the 1-mile track.

Ross Chastain told media members earlier in the week that he expects to be slow and frustrated. Though he indicated that racing should be frustrating at times instead of all the drivers just having the same stuff.

Denny Hamlin, who won last season’s spring race at Darlington Raceway, proclaimed on his podcast that this would be a wild card race. Other drivers have since joined in while expressing a mix of excitement and nervousness.

“You want to see some cars out of control? Here in a few weeks, these cars with essentially little to no underbody — because we’re now going to the short track aerodynamic package for Darlington — these cars are out of control,” Hamlin said after going to Phoenix.

“We are going to be…I’m predicting four seconds of falloff. It might be more. It’s just the cars with the underbody taken off and that simple diffuser, even on new tires, just absolutely out of control. It’s going to be a wild card race.”

This is not the first time the drivers have headed to a track not knowing what to expect. This has been the case the last two seasons at Bristol Motor Speedway.

Inconsistent levels of tire wear made the short track race a complete unknown. One race featured a stunning level of wear, numerous blown tires, and Hamlin winning. The next trip to the short track featured tires that barely wore as Kyle Larson led 462 of 500 laps.

Larson then led 411 of the 500 laps during the 2025 spring race before winning again. Once again, tire wear was not an issue. The playoff race then featured far more wear, as well as 14 cautions. Christopher Bell won the rather chaotic race.

The big difference between the Bristol unknowns and the Darlington unknowns is the level of difficulty. Darlington, an egg-shaped oval, is a truly difficult track on a normal day. Drivers frequently hit the wall, and they burn through tires on the rough surface.

Adding in more horsepower and a low-downforce package just exponentially increases the difficulty level.

“My eyes are wide open,” Brad Keselowski said. “The biggest thing I’m thinking about at Darlington is to go 50 laps on a set of tires was almost impossible with the Next Gen car in the last two or three seasons, and now that we have more horsepower and less aero, I don’t know if we’re gonna be able to go 35 laps.

“So, keeping up with the tires is going to be a big challenge. The drivers managing it, the teams putting our setups to where it can do it. Darlington is going to be a heavy lift. It’s always a heavy lift, but it’s a heavier lift now, I think, with these circumstances and a lot of unknowns entering the race at Darlington.”