Plot

From left to right: Chick Hicks, Lightning McQueen, and The King.

The last race of the Piston Cup stock car racing season ends in a three-way dead heat between retiring veteran Strip "The King" Weathers, perennial runner-up and dirty fighter Chick Hicks, and the self-centered rookie Lightning McQueen. A tiebreaker race is scheduled for one week later at the Los Angeles International Speedway. McQueen, eager to start practice in California as soon as possible in order to become Piston Cup champion and take The King's place as the sponsored car of the lucrative Dinoco team, pushes his driver Mack to travel all night long. Mack tries to avoid falling asleep, but becomes a victim of a gang of reckless street racers, subsequently causing the sleeping McQueen to roll out of the back of the truck unnoticed. Waking up in traffic, McQueen speeds off to find Mack, but becomes lost and ends up in the run-down town of Radiator Springs. A mishap with the local sheriff causes McQueen to inadvertently tear up the town's main road. McQueen is arrested then tried the next day by the town's judge and doctor, Doc Hudson, who at first wants him to leave immediately; at the insistence of local lawyer Sally Carrera, Doc instead sentences him to repave the road as community service.