The NASCAR All-Star Race is supposed to feel chaotic, unpredictable, and impossible to ignore. But for Bubba Wallace, the buildup to this year’s edition on Sunday has felt flat. The exhibition race shifted from North Wilkesboro to Dover Motor Speedway, and Wallace feels the atmosphere surrounding the All-Star no longer carries the same energy that fans and drivers once associated with it.

It’s not like Wallace hates Dover. It’s one of his favorite tracks to ‘drive on’, as he admitted in the build-up to the weekend. But when it comes to racing, the vibe changes.

The only thing that could spice the All-Star Race up, in Wallace’s opinion, is the revamped format, which now features all 36 cars starting together before the field gets cut down ahead of the final segment. NASCAR is also applying traction resin at Dover in hopes of creating more grip and opening up extra racing lanes.

“I know we’re bringing a whole new package this weekend, and doing the resin deal, and I’ll stay on the fence about how Sunday will go. But we’ll see, but it just doesn’t feel like All-Star weekend. It doesn’t feel like, to me, it just feels like another race weekend, all right?” he said.

“And so I’m having to tell myself that this weekend doesn’t really matter,” the No.23 driver added. “Let’s just go out and try new things, different things, I don’t know. It’s just like, blah, and I hate that. I hate that for the sport, I hate that for the fans. We need to have some fun interaction, like All-Star-type vibes. We just don’t get that here, unfortunately.”

NASCAR has been trying its best to hype the event up. The sanctioning body has publicly declared its openness to experimenting with the weekend in an effort to add more drama, and even the Dover Speedway president, Mike Tatoian, has promised excitement. “The mid-May dates historically offer great weather in our region, and we are already hard at work on plans to make the entire weekend a special one for our fans,” he said.

But to the community, this feels forced. North Wilkesboro quickly became one of NASCAR’s biggest feel-good stories after the All-Star Race returned there in 2023 for the first time since 1996.

Massive crowds showed up, with the 2023 edition drawing around 35,000 fans and sold-out grandstands. Kyle Larson won in ’23, with Joey Logano and Christopher Bell emerging victorious in the following two years.

The concerts, throwback festivities, and grassroots racing events across the week gave the venue a festival-like feel, and many fans and drivers have openly praised it. “The energy the last couple of years here has been really fun. Just a really intimate environment for a Cup race,” Chase Elliott said about the track in an older interview. That feeling is missing ahead of Dover.

This year, the NASCAR All-Star race will have two 75-lap stages before a final 200-lap segment involving 26 drivers. NASCAR also introduced an inversion after the opening lap stage, only with elimination rounds leading into the final stretch of the race.

Wallace has already secured his place on the main event through his 2025 Cup Series victory at the Brickyard 400, giving the 23XI Racing driver an automatic entry into the showcase race.

Form, however, will not be on his side. In fact, emotions were already running high for Wallace entering Dover after a frustrating finish at Watkins Glen last weekend left him visibly furious on pit road.

Bubba Wallace clears the air on Watkins Glen incident

Wallace spent much of the race at Watkins Glen fighting for a top-10 finish before his day unraveled with eight laps to go. John Hunter Nemechek clipped him entering Turn 1, spinning him. The frustration carried over to pit road after the race, where Wallace got into a heated exchange with Christopher Bell while venting about how his race had fallen apart.

Wallace’s emotional reaction quickly became a major talking point after he was seen in a tense post-race interaction with Bell. However, Wallace insisted at Dover that his anger was misdirected.

“I got wiped out by the 42 [Hunter Nemechek],” Wallace said. “I don’t know if TV caught that. We were in a position for a top-10, top-12 day. I got wiped out following 45 [Tyler Reddick]. And when I put so much freaking effort into becoming a better road course racer …

“I joke with you guys that I suck, and I don’t give a damn about road courses; I really do. It’s a competitive nature, and I push hard every time we get into the car, and at that point in the race, man, everything was clicking,” he added.

In another interview, he insisted that all was well between him and Bell. “If I wouldn’t have confronted him, I don’t think he would have known that I was upset. We’re all great,” Wallace insisted.

It was a disappointing weekend, which is why the All-Star break comes at a good time for Wallace. He could use an exhibition race to shake things off before the season resumes in full swing. Currently, he sits 10th in the Cup Series standings with one top-five finish and six top-10 finishes.