Amp Energy 500 Race Preview

Talladega Superspeedway -- 10/31/2010

Author: Jed Henson

Published: Wednesday Oct 27 2010 6:59am

The series returns this week to the king-size track in Talladega, Ala., the track that provides the most unpredictability on the circuit (Daytona is a close second). NASCAR forces the teams to run a restrictor plate on the carburetor on this 2.66 mile, high-banked track because without it, drivers would reach speeds well over 200 mph, posing an unacceptable risk to everyone near the track.

The problem with capping horsepower, of course, is that it tends to bunch the cars up in packs, and packs increase unpredictability in two ways. First, they produce an intense form of drafting tactics in which the cars form lines two- and three-wide. To get up front, drivers must draft in line and shuffle between the lines to move forward. This means drivers with average skills and equipment have a greater chance running well than they do at non plate tracks.

Second, the packs tend to produce big, demolition-derby style crashes. If one driver in a pack bobbles, surrounding cars have little chance of avoiding him, and carnage results.

Couple those factors with double-file restarts, multiple green-white-checkers attempts and the inherent weaknesses in the post-qualifying practice data (in post-qualifying practice, the drivers mostly practice drafting, rendering the speed-chart data mostly useless), and you have a recipe for extreme unpredictability.

All that said, you can still get a feel for who will run well Sunday—you just have to alter your evaluation process a little.

Handicapping Talladega II
I've looked at the qualifying and race-result data from 2010 races at Talladega and Daytona to compile initial rankings. Then I tweaked them after I reviewed the drivers' laps-led and times-led statistics for those races, my race-recap notes from those races and the opinions of other online experts.

I came up with the following:

1. Clint Bowyer
2. Greg Biffle
3. Jeff Burton
4. Kyle Busch
5. Matt Kenseth
6. Jimmie Johnson
7. Dale Earnhardt Jr.
8. Kevin Harvick
9. Carl Edwards
10. Jeff Gordon
11. Joey Logano
12. Kurt Busch
13. David Reutimann

Bowyer hasn't been spectacular on the plate tracks, but he's been consistently solid. He seems to have figured out how to avoid trouble throughout the race, and then get up near the front at the end.

Biffle, Burton and Kyle Busch have had good cars at the plate tracks this year, and they too seem to know how to avoid trouble and finish up front.

Finally, will Dale Jr. reclaim his Pied Piper role at Talladega? He's been solid on the plates this year, and perhaps leading the race for awhile last week at Martinsville gave him a taste of his old mojo.

Stay tuned for my update following qualifying and practice.

Comment on this article.

(255 chars max)

Username:
(No HTML)

Captcha: