NASCAR truck race postponed until today

? An off-and-on rain Friday night forced postponement of the NASCAR truck series race, which was to be the first under the lights at Darlington Raceway.

The race was moved to 4:30 p.m. today after the scheduled NASCAR Busch series Bi-Lo 200. The Nextel Cup’s Southern 500 takes place Sunday.

The Craftsman series race, the second-to-last of the season, was Darlington’s first chance to showcase its multimillion dollar lighting system. And officials did all they could throughout the day — rain had earlier wiped out Nextel Cup and Busch qualifying — to drop the starting flag on time.

Twice in the two hours before the scheduled 7 p.m. start, jet-dryers had seemingly gotten the track dry enough to start. Driver introductions were complete and prerace awards were given out when the strongest rainfall of the day hit the area and quickly forced officials to postpone the event.

Carl Edwards starts on the pole with Shane Hmiel right behind. Series points leader Bobby Hamilton, who has won two of the three previous Darlington truck races, was fifth in the starting grid. Dennis Setzer, who trails Hamilton by seven points, is back in the field starting 17th.