Darlington Raceway is the home of the Southern 500 and considered as one of the foundations of NASCAR, being the first ever superspeedway. Long before it became famous as the track that is “Too Tough To Tame” or the “Lady in Black”, the Darlington Raceway became popular to the locals in 1949 as “Harold’s Folly”. It was the brainchild of a businessman and racing enthusiast, Harold Brasington after watching the Indianapolis 500 in 1933. Many people, including his friends and family thought that Harold was crazy for building the 1.37 miles race track on a land that used to grow cotton and peanuts.

The egg-shaped speedway was finished in 1950 and the opening race was programmed on Labor Day. On that day, the Darlington Raceway made history when more than 25,000 people flooded the track to watch the race. Johnny Mantz from California was the first driver to win the Southern 500 on the challenging oval track which took him more than six hours to finish.