This weekend in Winston-Salem -- a little ways off from the tobacco farms and not far from the greater Charlotte area -- the Carolina winter will heat up and the earth will roar back to life with the beginning of a new year for NASCAR with its annual preseason exhibition race,

NASCAR returns to its roots Sunday with the Cook Out Clash at Bowman Gray Stadium, which last played host to a Cup Series event more than 50 years ago. After three years on a temporary short track at the Los Angeles Coliseum, NASCAR has moved The Clash to the 0.25-mile track in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, known as “The Madhouse.”