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Sprint Cup
CUP: Witching Hour At Talladega
It likely will be another wild weekend at Talladega...
NASCAR Sprint Cup drivers race in a big pack at Talladega Superspeedway. (Photo: LAT Photographic)
The NASCAR Sprint Cup Series heads to Talladega Superspeedway this weekend for the Halloween afternoon running of the Amp Energy 500 at the 2.66-mile Alabama track.
And it’s safe to say, all bets are off.
For the drivers, being three-, four- and even five-wide for three-and-a-half hours is every bit as harrowing as some of the sights you’ll see among the Talladega infield revelers at the witching hour.
Four-time defending series champion Jimmie Johnson comes into Talladega with a narrow six-point lead over Denny Hamlin and a 62-point margin over Kevin Harvick. But all it takes is getting caught in the middle of one multi-car crash for those point totals to be completely reset.
Chances are, for at least one of the top three in points, Talladega will be a house of horrors on Sunday. They’ve all been in the big one here before and likely will be again at some point.
And that begs the question, is it better to be lucky or good at Talladega?
“I think both,” said Greg Biffle of Roush Fenway Racing.
Biffle then offered up two pieces of advice on how to finish well at Talladega: “Stay out of the wreck and stay out of the wreck,” Biffle said. “That’s gotten us top-10 finishes. We’ve got good cars. We almost won the Daytona 500. We’ve been right there restrictor-plate racing. It’s just a matter of some (wrecks) you get through and some you don’t. I like restrictor-plate racing, but I don’t like being in the wreck.”
How nerve-wracking is racing at Talladega?
Jeff Gordon, a six-time Talladega winner, said getting to victory lane here is no longer the objective — surviving is.
“It gets to a point at Talladega nowadays where you're just happy to finish in the top five,” said Gordon, who swept both Talladega races in 2007. “It's not just about the win. A top-five is like a win at a place like Talladega because you survived.”
To that end, Gordon said finding drafting partners is critically important at Talladega.
“If you find a guy you're working well with that you think you can get up there and worst-case scenario finish second or third because you're pushing him, you're going to try to win the race but you're not going to risk too much and you're going to do what you can to finish the race,” he said. “If you can work with a guy and have a pretty good shot at finishing second, then that's a good guy. That's a good guy to be working with.”
Kyle Busch, who won at Talladega in 2008, knows where the ideal spot is at the end of the race: Out in front.
“You just want to be leading and protect what you’ve got and try to keep the rest of the guys behind you,” said Busch. “You know it’s going to be tough, you know it’s going to be crazy and guys are going to be trying to go three-wide, four-wide and everywhere trying to get a push draft going and everything. If you were leading and you had a teammate behind you or something like that, obviously that would make it pretty good.”
Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.
And it’s safe to say, all bets are off.
For the drivers, being three-, four- and even five-wide for three-and-a-half hours is every bit as harrowing as some of the sights you’ll see among the Talladega infield revelers at the witching hour.
Four-time defending series champion Jimmie Johnson comes into Talladega with a narrow six-point lead over Denny Hamlin and a 62-point margin over Kevin Harvick. But all it takes is getting caught in the middle of one multi-car crash for those point totals to be completely reset.
Chances are, for at least one of the top three in points, Talladega will be a house of horrors on Sunday. They’ve all been in the big one here before and likely will be again at some point.
And that begs the question, is it better to be lucky or good at Talladega?
“I think both,” said Greg Biffle of Roush Fenway Racing.
Biffle then offered up two pieces of advice on how to finish well at Talladega: “Stay out of the wreck and stay out of the wreck,” Biffle said. “That’s gotten us top-10 finishes. We’ve got good cars. We almost won the Daytona 500. We’ve been right there restrictor-plate racing. It’s just a matter of some (wrecks) you get through and some you don’t. I like restrictor-plate racing, but I don’t like being in the wreck.”
How nerve-wracking is racing at Talladega?
Jeff Gordon, a six-time Talladega winner, said getting to victory lane here is no longer the objective — surviving is.
“It gets to a point at Talladega nowadays where you're just happy to finish in the top five,” said Gordon, who swept both Talladega races in 2007. “It's not just about the win. A top-five is like a win at a place like Talladega because you survived.”
To that end, Gordon said finding drafting partners is critically important at Talladega.
“If you find a guy you're working well with that you think you can get up there and worst-case scenario finish second or third because you're pushing him, you're going to try to win the race but you're not going to risk too much and you're going to do what you can to finish the race,” he said. “If you can work with a guy and have a pretty good shot at finishing second, then that's a good guy. That's a good guy to be working with.”
Kyle Busch, who won at Talladega in 2008, knows where the ideal spot is at the end of the race: Out in front.
“You just want to be leading and protect what you’ve got and try to keep the rest of the guys behind you,” said Busch. “You know it’s going to be tough, you know it’s going to be crazy and guys are going to be trying to go three-wide, four-wide and everywhere trying to get a push draft going and everything. If you were leading and you had a teammate behind you or something like that, obviously that would make it pretty good.”
Tom Jensen is the Editor in Chief of SPEED.com, Senior NASCAR Editor at RACER and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. You can follow him online at twitter.com/tomjensen100 and e-mail him at Jensen is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of Speed,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows. Jensen is the past President of the National Motorsports Press Association and an NMPA Writer of the Year.
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