Over 20,000 fans attend NASCAR All-Star Race

Over 20,000 fans were in attendance at Wednesday night's NASCAR All-Star Race at Bristol Motor Speedway to watch fan-favorite Chase Elliott pull off another win. The event is believed to have the highest attendance of any sporting event in America since the pandemic began.

The event was set to allow up to 30,000 spectators, and while there was no official count, it's estimated that there were at least 20,000 fans who were socially distanced throughout the venue. NASCAR has been slowly ramping up attendance, as 10,000 fans were at Road America in Wisconsin last week.

The All-Star Race is typically held at the Charlotte Motor Speedway, but it was moved to Bristol Motor Speedway because Tennessee allowed Speedway Motorsports to sell a percentage of the seats. Bristol can hold up to 140,000 people, so the event was set to max out at around 21% of total capacity. While fans were required to wear masks while entering the venue and moving around, they were allowed to remove their masks once they were seated.

Bubba Wallace participated in the event but Michael McDowell crashed into him and kept him from finishing during the qualifying race. Wallace was openly angry about McDowell's driving, and placed the bumper of his wrecked car on McDowell's team truck.

“Just disrespect. When you get hooked into the wall, I don’t even need to see a replay," Wallace said. "What a joke he is."