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Coca-Cola 600 to be stopped briefly for moment of remembrance

Coca-Cola 600

CONCORD, NC - MAY 25: Crew members stand on pit road during a red flag for the national moment of remembrance during the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Coca-Cola 600 on May 25, 2009 at Lowe’s Motor Speedway in Concord, North Carolina. (Photo by John Harrelson/Getty Images)

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CHARLOTTE, N.C. - Charlotte Motor Speedway officials announced Wednesday that they will stop the Coca-Cola 600 after the second stage for a 30-second moment of remembrance.

Track officials did this for the 2009 Coca-Cola 600 when it was run on Memorial Day because of rain the previous day. The National Moment of Remembrance takes place at 3 p.m. ET on Memorial Day and people are asked to pause for a minute at that time.

Although the Coca-Cola 600 runs May 26, the day before Memorial Day, track officials asked NASCAR to bring back the moment of remembrance for this year’s race, Greg Walter, executive vice president and general manager of Charlotte Motor Speedway, told NBC Sports.

“People kept talking about that that was so impactful,” Walter said. “So we asked can we do that again? Our sport is so prone to supporting the military and so prone to understanding what the Memorial Day is all about. (We) worked with NASCAR, trying to figure out where we could do this, where (it) would be meaningful and not impact the competition greatly. The end of stage two was where we arrived.”

Walter said after the second stage ends, the pace car will collect the field and lead all the cars down pit road. They’ll stop there. Crew members will walk onto pit road and there will be a 30-second remembrance before the race resumes.

When this was done in the 2009 race, the field was stopped on the fronstretch and pit crews came out on to pit road.