Trick or treat? Talladega could provide both with new Chase date
Talladega Superspeedway was moved to a later date in the Chase this year, and that apparently makes it even more of a bogeyman.
Even before the Chase began – heck, even before the season began – people were pointing to the Nov. 1 Amp Energy 500 at Talladega as the race of all races, as an event that might bring on Armageddon (or at least DEFCON 2), as something to be feared more than 24 hours of repeats of The View.
Could it be all that? Holy moly. Get your tickets now for the race of the century (but it is a young century).
Talladega has gotten more exposure this year as a potentially pivotal race in the Chase primarily because its new date is three weeks later in the process. A bundle of date-swapping that involved Talladega, Atlanta and California resulted in Talladega basically taking Atlanta’s No. 7 spot in the Chase.
The reasoning behind all the talk of calamity and catastrophe at NASCAR’s longest track is that it now is situated close to the final week of the Chase, and that’s too close for some people. They predict racing will be even more frantic over the track’s 2.66 miles of breathe-when-you-can drafting, and they also predict – in part because of that – the championship race will be negatively impacted because there will be little time to make up lost territory before the season ends.
And it also should be mentioned that the race will be run on Halloween weekend, as if the context and Chase schedule positioning of the event didn’t already give it a ghoulish glow. Those who survive Halloween Saturday night in the Talladega infield might see a witch’s brew of a race the next afternoon.
Is Talladega the Chase scrambler that so many fear? Has it taken previous Chases and tossed them in a jumble of crazy-quilt directions? Can Alabama contain it?
The answer is maybe yes, maybe no.
The past five Chase races at Talladega have produced a mixed bag for Chase competitors. Chase drivers won three of those events – Dale Earnhardt Jr. in 2004, Jeff Gordon in 2007 and Tony Stewart last year. But the madness often surrounding Talladega can throw black shadows across Chase hopefuls, too. Drivers in the championship hunt combined for average finishes of 17.3, 16.0, 16.2, 17.8 and a thoroughly miserable 19.8 (last year) in Talladega’s Chase races.
Of course, the thing about Talladega is that you never know what you’re going to get – or, in some fans’ cases, which car part is going to land in your lap. The Talladega draft is predictable only in its unpredictability. You can be fairly certain there will be at least one big crash, but its timing and its participants can’t be forecast with any degree of certainty, and that is what makes a Talladega Chase race an invitation to anarchy.
In last October’s race (and it wasn’t even close to Halloween), half of the dozen Chasers were struck down by accidents in the second half of the event – four in the final 15 laps as the packed lead draft worked itself into a frenzy.
That’s the big worry. Drivers who are in the top five on one lap can be sitting in mangled heaps in the garage the next. And through no fault of their own.
Mark Martin knows the ways of Talladega. In 43 appearances there, he has won only twice. In 49 Sprint Cup races at Daytona, Talladega’s wicked sister, he has seen victory lane only from the outside of the fence.
That is why Martin, still seeking that elusive championship, approaches Talladega not so much in dread as in resignation. His thinking is that it’s not worth the worry.
Whatever happens happens, and he has little control over most of it.
Talladega trick or treat. None of us will know for sure until the final lap.
Wear your scariest costumes and join us.
