Jared Turner: Road courses have gained the attention of all drivers
By Jared Turner - SceneDaily Staff Writer
Friday, August 08, 2008
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COMMENTARY
There was a time not so long ago when the NASCAR Cup Series’ annual stops at the Watkins Glen International and Infineon Raceway road courses were treated as little more than an exercise in survival.
Except for a few road-racing specialists and Cup regulars with a penchant for turning both right and left, the goal was rather simple: get to the checkered flag, get the best finish possible and get out of town.
Times have changed. So have approaches.
Teams no longer gloss over the two road-course events, hoping to salvage a decent day before loading up the hauler and eagerly moving on to a more familiar and forgiving oval track.
That’s because there is more at stake.
And that’s particularly true for Sunday’s Centurion Boats at The Glen. Give up a ton of points and you might not get them back in time to make The Chase For The NASCAR Sprint Cup, which commences five races later at New Hampshire Motor Speedway on Sept. 14.
“A road course is definitely an opportunity to make up or lose a lot of ground,” says Richard Childress Racing’s Clint Bowyer, one of several drivers who could see their hopes of making the championship-determining field catapulted or crippled based on their run at Watkins Glen. “You have to make sure you’re on the taking side of things there.”
Before the Chase was introduced prior to the 2004 Cup season, there wasn’t nearly as much incentive for drivers to perform well at the two road-course events. Odds were that a bad run at Infineon or Watkins Glen wasn’t going to be the difference between winning and losing a championship.
But that all changed when the Chase format came into play. Now, the points gained or lost at a road course can be the difference between winning the title and being the first driver out of the Chase in 13th. Bear in mind that the road-course races award just as many points to win or lose as their oval counterparts.
Thus, we should not be surprised to see that 15 Cup drivers will attempt to qualify for Saturday’s Nationwide Series race at The Glen. Of those 15, note that 10 are Chase contenders. More laps around the 11-turn, 2.45-mile facility can only help a driver’s chances of a good finish on the Cup side.
Just ask Hendrick Motorsports’ Jimmie Johnson, who is making a rare Nationwide start in Saturday's event.
“The primary reason would be to get more seat time and be more competitive on Sunday in the Cup car,” he says.
Even teams not in Chase contention have started to place more emphasis on their road-course effort. Take the No. 01 team of Dale Earnhardt Inc. for example.
This weekend, veteran road racer Ron Fellows will pilot the car in place of its regular driver, Regan Smith. The No. 01 group sees Watkins Glen as a golden opportunity to pad its cushion over the teams it is battling to stay in the top 35 in Cup owner points. And Fellows, with his road-racing background, would appear to be more likely to help the team achieve that goal.
Teams increased emphasis on road-course performance is also evident in the testing done to prepare for non oval-track outings. Though neither Watkins Glen nor Infineon hosts one of this year’s seven designated tests at Cup tracks, more and more teams are seemingly visiting non-Cup facilities such as the Virginia International Raceway road course to get a leg up.
As teams put a greater emphasis on their road-course programs, that should in theory, at least, open the door for more drivers to have a legitimate shot of winning road-course events.
And that’s a far cry from the way it used to be.
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