Expect the 2-car tandem at Talladega Superspeedway (AP)

Monday, April 11, 2011 3:01 PM By dwi

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Talladega Superspeedway has daylong been celebrated for its 500 miles of white-knuckle racing, the category of bumper-to-bumper action that keeps fans on their feet from alarum to flag.

Those in attending utilised to fret that even if they stepped absent for a moment they strength miss something monumental. Now the fretting seems to be on the call of racing fans will wager Sunday when NASCAR shifts to digit of its most revered vie tracks.

Two-car tandems took over the season-opening Daytona 500, where the Brobdingnagian arrange of cars broke apart as drivers realized that the fastest artefact around the superspeedway was with meet digit partner. There were very some slingshots finished the field, the artefact Dale Earnhardt Jr. did in 2010 when he charged from 10th to ordinal over the final digit laps.

There were, of course, a achievement 74 advance changes among 22 drivers, and NASCAR welcomed a fresh-faced new star in 20-year-old Trevor Bayne, the youngest succeeder in Daytona 500 history.

But the overwhelming communicating was most the new call of racing, which mimicked a game of leapfrog, in which digit drivers hooked up, took turns actuation apiece another to the front, then swapped the advance when their engines got likewise blistering from every that pushing.

Many fans fear a move of that racing at Talladega, and by every indication, that's meet what they'll see.

"We'll be doing the aforementioned thing we did at Daytona," said one-time Talladega succeeder Tony Stewart.

"I guarantee you right off the bat, that's meet what everybody is feat to do as presently as they impact the raceway — go right back into that mode."

It's not needs a intense thing. It's meet different.

For years, Daytona and Talladega were known as the digit tracks where fans could expect the large accidents created by arrange racing known as "The Big One." Daytona still had crashes — there were a achievement 16 cautions — but that didn't fulfill many fans who couldn't intend their heads around the two-car bike racing.

NASCAR officials felt the aforementioned at the move of Speedweeks, and issued a series of slight technical adjustments fashioned to preclude the cars from actuation apiece another for likewise long. Like everyone else, NASCAR was unsafe of how the Daytona 500 would endeavor out, but was ultimately pleased with what officials saw.

"We were curious, too. It was a phenomenon, we'd never seen anything same that," said NASCAR chairman Brian France. "But 74 advance changes, hammy racing every the artefact through, although it looked a little taste different, the rivalry take went up. It's different. But, mostly speaking, if rivalry goes up, the races are exciting, we're feat to same it."

So aside from a modify in the size of the horsepower-sapping restrictor plate, NASCAR has finished very little to force drivers to vie some differently this weekend at Talladega.

"We're feat to wager that aforementioned call draft," said Kurt Busch, who won digit aggregation races leading into the Daytona 500.

"The two-car plan is meet so potent. Anytime you crapper tell a vie automobile utility he crapper go quaternary seconds faster a travel and give him the instruction on how to do it, he's feat to go and locate it into play. That's that two-car draft."

There's an element of plot to it, too, that forces drivers to locate a Brobdingnagian turn of consortium in some of their large rivals.

The two-car plan forces the chase car, the "pusher," to vie blindfold because the utility can't wager what's ahead of the automobile he's pushing. Spotters are unnatural to be the eyes for drivers they've never worked for, and drivers are tapping into the broadcasting frequencies of guys they don't commonly intercommunicate to for in-race strategy sessions.

It prefabricated Daytona interesting, and not every the drivers enjoyed that intrigue.

"You can't wager where you're feat if you're the pusher," said Mark Martin. "If you're in front, sometimes you desire you couldn't wager where you were going. It's pretty thickened on you sometimes when you're running up reciprocation and you hit a man actuation you that doesn't rattling wager that.

"We hit to consortium apiece other. We hit to. Like them or not, you hit to."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. said he didn't same relying on others.

"I'd rather hit control of meet what I've got to do," he said. "Having to hit domain for someone added is a little taste more than I care to deal with."

There is digit warning that could modify the racing a little: Talladega is wider than Daytona, and many drivers believe the road has sufficiency expanse for the cars to go four-wide. It could advance to more shack for drivers to switch the lead, and more expanse for a fast-closing bike to intend past a slower two-car pack.

"Talladega is a much wider vie track, there's a aggregation more racing lines and grooves and shack to vie on," Jeff Gordon said. "We should be healthy to do the two-car drafts a aggregation easier than we did at Daytona. Hopefully, we're not hooking and spinning digit another same we were in Daytona."

It's for sure not feat to be the category of Talladega racing grouping are utilised to. That doesn't mean, however, that it won't be a exciting race.


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