Contested over 90 laps on the 2.45-mile (3.94 km) road course, it was the 22nd race of the 2016 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series season.

The race had nine lead changes among eight different drivers, eight cautions for 20 laps and two red flags for 30 minutes and three seconds.

It was long known around the world as the home of the Formula One United States Grand Prix, which it hosted for twenty consecutive years (1961–1980), but the site has been home to road racing of nearly every class, including the World Sportscar Championship, Trans-Am, Can-Am, NASCAR Sprint Cup Series, the International Motor Sports Association and the IndyCar Series.

The circuit's current layout has more or less been the same since 1971, although a chicane was installed at the uphill Esses in 1975 to slow cars through these corners, where there was a fatality during practice at the 1973 United States Grand Prix.

The circuit is known as the Mecca of North American road racing and is a very popular venue among fans and drivers.

The preliminary entry list for the race included 40 cars and was released on August 1, 2016 at 9:55 a.m. Eastern time.

"[15] Under clear blue New York skies, Carl Edwards led the field to the green flag at 2:53 p.m.

Michael Annett overshot the inner loop, but continued on and was subsequently forced to serve a pass through penalty.

The second caution of the race flew on lap 47 for a rogue tire on pit road.

Chris Buescher and Paul Menard were tagged for their crews throwing equipment and restarted the race from the tail end of the field.

Exiting the outer loop, Ricky Stenhouse Jr. got loose and slid across the track into the guardrail.

[16] "The cars started checking up in front of me and they all moved out of the way and the 17 (Stenhouse) was sitting there, stopped," Johnson said.

It started when Ryan Newman got loose and turned David Ragan around, and also collected Clint Bowyer, Edwards and Alex Kennedy.

He lost the lead to Denny Hamlin as the seventh caution of the race flew for a two-car spin at the bottom of the esses involving DiBenedetto and Newman.

Exiting the inner loop, Buscher's car threw up a rooster tail of smoke and caused Menard to slow down.

Exiting turn 11 on the final lap, Keselowski got into the back of Truex and sent him spinning, at which point Rick Allen yelled out "Aggressive goes around!"

I felt like I maybe had (winner Denny Hamlin) squared up a little bit off turn 11 and maybe could've drag raced him to the line.

Pretty dumb move right there too, but I was the smarter one racing for points, lifted, could have wrecked him, but didn’t.

I just tried the best I could and overshot the corner and I didn’t want to do it this time and so I probably under drove and let those guys be a little closer than I should’ve.

It was pretty cool when I pulled over for the red flag in front of the grandstands and I could hear just fans screaming and yelling and loving it.

"[25] Following a fifth-place finish in his final road course race of his career, Tony Stewart said he was "just happy I’m not one of the guys who got tore up out there.

There were guys who had Top 5 going into the last lap who couldn’t finish so we’ll take it.’’[26] NBC Sports assigned the race to USA Network, as a result of Summer Olympic coverage on the primary channels used by the NBCUniversal group (during the time, USA also carried the Mid-Ohio Xfinity race and Premier League matches that typically air on NBC, NBCSN, or CNBC).

Rick Allen, Jeff Burton and Steve Letarte had the call in the booth for the race.

Dave Burns, Parker Kligerman, Mike Massaro and Marty Snider reported from pit lane during the race.

It was the first NASCAR race broadcast on USA since 1984, but the first under Comcast ownership and under the NBC Sports banner.

It is expected that USA will carry races in 2020 and 2024, as under the 2015 NASCAR television contract, the same conflict with the Olympics will happen.

When Martin Truex Jr spun on the last lap, lead commentator Rick Allen made the call “aggressive goes around!”.