The 2003 Carolina Dodge Dealers 400 was the fifth stock car race of the 2003 NASCAR Winston Cup Series. It was held on March 16, 2003, before a crowd of 55,000, in Darlington, South Carolina, at Darlington Raceway. The 293-lap race, the 100th NASCAR Cup Series event at Darlington Raceway, was won by PPI Motorsports driver Ricky Craven starting from the 31st position. Kurt Busch of the Roush Racing squad finished in second place and Dave Blaney third for the Jasper Motorsports team.
Elliott Sadler won the pole position by recording the fastest lap in qualifying. He and Ryan Newman traded the lead for the first two laps. Dale Earnhardt Jr. assumed the lead on lap 17 and went on to lead for 91 laps, more than any other driver. On lap 197, Jeff Gordon led at a rolling restart after a yellow caution flag, ahead of Sadler. Busch passed Gordon on the 269th lap but later had a power steering failure, allowing Craven to gradually lower his lead. By lap 291, Craven drew close enough to challenge Busch; after two attempts at a pass failed, he overtook Busch on the final lap, and won by two-thousandths of a second, tied for the closest finish in Cup Series history until the 2024 AdventHealth 400, where Kyle Larson beat Chris Buescher by 0.001 seconds.
It was Craven's second win of his career. The result advanced him from sixteenth to fifth in the Drivers' Championship, 143 points behind Matt Kenseth, whose eighth-place finished maintained his championship lead over Tony Stewart. Ford maintained its lead in the Manufacturers' Championship, five points ahead of Chevrolet in second. Pontiac (in what would be ultimately their last win in the Winston Cup Series, as the marque withdrew from NASCAR at the end of the season) overtook Dodge for third with 31 races remaining in the season.
Background
The 2003 Carolina Dodge Dealers 400 was the 5th of the 36 stock car races in the 2003 NASCAR Winston Cup Series. It was held on March 16, 2003, in Darlington, South Carolina, at Darlington Raceway, an intermediate oval track which began hosting NASCAR races in the 1950 Grand National Series; and was the 100th Cup Series race held at the track. The track is a four-turn egg-shaped superspeedway. Its first two turns are banked at 25 degrees, while the final two turns are banked at 23 degrees. The frontstretch (the location of the finish line) and the backstretch are banked at three and two degrees, respectively.
Before the race, Matt Kenseth led the Drivers' Championship with 618 points, and Tony Stewart followed with 569 points. Michael Waltrip and Jimmie Johnson were third and fourth with 543 and 519 points respectively, ahead of Bobby Labonte in fifth with 510 points. Johnny Benson Jr., Kevin Harvick, Jeff Gordon, Jeff Burton and Dale Earnhardt Jr. rounded out the top ten. In the Manufacturers' Championship, Ford led with a total of 30 points, three points ahead of Chevrolet in second position. Dodge, with 16 points, were one point ahead of Pontiac in third position. Sterling Marlin was the race's defending champion.
Darlington Raceway had a highly abrasive track surface, which was heavily used and altered the complex of racing there. Drivers were required to strenuously monitor their tire degradation, and track position was the most important aspect due to the difficulty of on-circuit overtaking. Gordon, who arrived as a favourite to win at Darlington Raceway due to his record six Winston Cup Series victories there, expressed a desire to continue his good form at the track: "We didn't win in Atlanta, but we led laps and battled hard for the win. That was our first good finish of the season – even though we've run well at each event – and I think that will give us some momentum this weekend."
Practice and qualifying Three practice sessions were held before the Sunday race—one on Friday morning and two on Saturday morning. The first session lasted 120 minutes, and the second and third sessions 45 minutes. In the first practice session, which was held in cool and overcast weather, Elliott Sadler was fastest with a lap of 29.125 seconds. He was followed by Labonte, Ryan Newman, Gordon, Kurt Busch, Kenny Wallace, Earnhardt, Rusty Wallace, Mark Martin and Dave Blaney.
A total of 43 drivers attempted to qualify on Friday afternoon; the maximum number allowed to race under NASCAR's qualifying procedure. Each driver ran two timed laps to determine pole position to 36th. The remainder of the field qualified through the use of provisionals; six were given to teams based on their 2002 Owners Championship placing and the seventh was reserved for a former champion who did not qualify for the event or the next squad in the Owners' standings. In his 146th race start, Sadler was the 16th driver on the track, and took the first pole position of his career with a lap of 28.902 seconds. He was joined on the grid's front row by Newman, who stated he could have bettered Sadler's lap had he not ran wide in turns one and two. Jerry Nadeau qualified third, Jimmy Spencer fourth, and Gordon fifth. Busch had the pole position until Sadler's lap, and subsequent improvements from other competitors later in the session demoted him to sixth. Ward Burton took seventh in the final minutes of qualifying. Marlin, eighth, altered the setup of his car to increase its handling stability. Waltrip and Todd Bodine were ninth and tenth. 37th to 43rd placed-qualifiers Jeff Burton, Joe Nemechek, Ricky Rudd, Kyle Petty, Tony Raines, Larry Foyt, and Brett Bodine used provisionals to enter the race. After qualifying Sadler said, "To get one this early and get it off our shoulders, you don't understand how big a relief this is and the weight that's been taken off my shoulders."
On Saturday morning Nadeau was quickest in the second practice session at 29.496 seconds, ahead of Johnson, Bill Elliott, Stewart, Kenseth, Greg Biffle, Nemechek, Martin, Harvick, and Gordon. During the session, Busch's engine failed on a slow lap; his team changed engines, which limited his on-track familiarisation. Kenseth's car emitted smoke due to an unsecured oil line, which his mechanics repaired. Later that day, Kenseth led the final practice session with a lap of 29.379 seconds; Johnson duplicated his second-practice result in second and Gordon improved from tenth to third. Nemechek, Jeff Green, Newman, Marlin, Kenny Wallace, Martin and Stewart made up positions four to ten. Towards the conclusion of the session, the right side of Waltrip's vehicle struck an outside barrier at turn two due to a cut tire, and he switched to a back-up car.
Qualifying results Grid Driver Team Manufacturer 138Robert Yates RacingFord28.902170.147 2 12Penske RacingDodge29.034169.374 3 01MB2 MotorsportsPontiac29.069169.170 4 7Ultra MotorsportsDodge29.083169.089 524Hendrick MotorsportsChevrolet29.086169.071 697Roush RacingFord29.101168.984 722Bill Davis RacingDodge29.111168.926 840Chip Ganassi Racing Dodge29.130168.816 9 15Dale Earnhardt, Inc. Chevrolet 29.138168.769 10 54BelCar MotorsportsFord 29.139168.764 1119Evernham Motorsports Dodge29.153168.682 12 17 Roush Racing Ford29.156168.665 132Penske Racing Dodge 29.178168.538 14 48Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet29.190168.469 1549BAM RacingDodge 29.226168.261 16 8Dale Earnhardt, Inc. Chevrolet 29.241168.175 1716Roush Racing Ford29.246168.146 18 77Jasper Motorsports Ford 29.255168.094 19 42Chip Ganassi RacingDodge29.260168.066 20 18Joe Gibbs RacingChevrolet29.264168.043 2123Bill Davis RacingDodge 29.267168.025 22 10MB2 MotorsportsPontiac29.275167.980 23 4Morgan–McClure MotorsportsPontiac29.280167.951 2441Chip Ganassi Racing Dodge 29.293167.876 259Evernham MotorsportsDodge29.309167.785 2643Petty EnterprisesDodge29.312167.768 276 Roush Racing Ford29.330167.665 2820Joe Gibbs Racing Chevrolet 29.338167.619 295 Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet 29.382167.368 30 31Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet29.423167.135 3132PPI Motorsports Pontiac29.425167.123 32 30Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet 29.462166.913 3329Richard Childress Racing Chevrolet 29.463166.908 34 0Haas CNC RacingPontiac29.484166.789 35 1Dale Earnhardt, Inc.Chevrolet29.498166.710 36 88Robert Yates Racing Ford 29.554166.394Provisional 3799Roush Racing Ford29.637165.928 3825Hendrick Motorsports Chevrolet29.758165.253 3921Wood Brothers Racing Ford29.592166.292 4045Petty Enterprises Ford 29.643165.894 4174BACE Motorsports Chevrolet 29.819164.915 4214A. J. Foyt RacingDodge 29.931164.298 4357 CLR Racing Ford 29.657165.816
Race Live television coverage of the 293-lap race in the United States on Fox began at 12:30 Eastern Time (UTC−05:00). Play-by-play commentary was provided by Mike Joy, with analysis from three-time Cup Series champion Darrell Waltrip and former crew chief Larry McReynolds. Around the start of the race, the weather was cool and overcast, with the air temperature , and a maximum wind speed of . Harold King, a board member of Darlington Raceway, began pre-race ceremonies with an invocation. Ann Benson, president of music at Columbia College in Columbia, South Carolina, performed the national anthem, and Mark Sanford, the Governor of South Carolina, commanded the drivers to start their engines. During the pace laps, Busch and Waltrip moved to the rear of the field because of their engine change and switch to a back-up car. Grip was difficult to locate and any advantage that drivers gained was minimal.
Newman passed Sadler for the lead in the first turn, which he held until Sadler retook it on the approach to the same corner at the beginning of lap two. On the third lap, Nadeau overtook Newman for second. Three laps later, Nadeau lost control of his car heading into the first corner, and spun 360 degrees. He avoided contact with a trackside wall and another car. Drivers behind him drove onto the apron to avoid a collision; Jamie McMurray made contact with Kenseth, causing the latter to spin, and bringing out the first yellow caution flag. Some drivers who had tight-handling cars elected to make pit stops for tires during the caution. Sadler maintained the lead at the lap 10 restart, followed by Gordon. Four laps later, Jack Sprague spun 360 degrees on the exit of turn four, prompting the second caution. Under caution, those drivers who remained on the track during the first caution, including Sadler, made pit stops.
Spencer did not make a pit stop and led at the restart on lap 17, followed by Earnhardt, Nadeau, John Andretti, and Green. On the following lap, Earnhardt's new tires helped him pass Spencer for the lead going into the third turn. Lap 23 saw the third caution: Johnson made contact with Marlin, cutting the latter's tire and disabling his steering. Marlin veered into an outside barrier on the backstretch. This caused a chain-reaction accident involving Labonte, Sprague, Todd Bodine, Harvick, Robby Gordon, and Raines. Harvick, Robby Gordon and Raines continued driving with aerodynamic deficiencies to their cars as Sprague, Todd Bodine, and Labonte sustained damage to their cars and were effectively eliminated from contention. Every driver, except for Jarrett and Jeff Gordon, made pit stops during the caution. Jarrett led the field at the lap 29 restart. On the 32nd lap, Earnhardt overtook Gordon and then Jarrett to return to the lead. The fourth caution was necessitated on lap 33 when Jeff Burton in ninth position had an engine failure, which obscured Stewart's vision and caused him to ram into Burton's car. Jarrett and Jeff Gordon made pit stops for tires under caution.