Track history
Talladega Superspeedway was built in 1969 in an old soybean field near Anniston, Alabama. Track builders Bill France, Sr. and Bill Ward wanted it to be the biggest and fastest superspeedway on the Cup circuit. It is, without a doubt, the fastest racetrack in the world. Bill Elliott qualified at over 212 mph in 1987 at the 2.66-mile facility, which led to NASCAR's decision to slow down the cars here and at Daytona because speeds were getting unsafe. Both tracks use restrictor plates to limit the horsepower of the cars. Speeds on the straights (4,000 foot backstretch and 4,300 foot frontstretch) still exceed 200 mph.
The track is a high-banked trioval that is four lanes wide, with 33 degree banking at the ends and 18-degree banking in the trioval. For this reason, Talladega has a lot of 3-wide racing and it's not unusual to see the whole field running together at top speed the same as they did when the green flag dropped at the beginning of the race. The drivers run wide open all the way around the track, never lifting except to avoid getting caught up in the big wrecks, which are common in restrictor plate racing.
First Cup race
On September 14, 1969, after driving the No. 71 K & K Insurance '69 Dodge to a 196.386 mph qualifying lap, Bobby Isaac started on the pole for the first NASCAR Cup race, the Talladega 500. After leading 13 laps, Isaac finished 4th. Richard Brickhouse, in the No. 99 Nichols Engineering '69 Dodge, started 9th and won the race. The average race speed for that event was 153.778 mph.
As fantasy players, your team budget won't allow you to pick all track favorites so Mid-pack Attack is here to help. A mid-packer may not win the race but has as good a shot at a top 15 finish as track favorites Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon, Denny Hamlin, Jimmie Johnson and Tony Stewart. There were 46 cars on the preliminary entry list for this weekend's Cup race. Boris Said's No. 08 was withdrawn leaving 45 entries. The 43 drivers who qualify will be competing in front of 143,000 fans in the grandstands. Here are our picks for Sunday's AMP Energy Drink 500 in Anniston, Alabama.
Mid-pack picks
Kurt Busch has the best average finish (10.6) of all drivers in the last seven Cup races at Talladega. He's scored the most championship points in those races as well. Busch manages to avoid the big wrecks since he runs up front most of the time. In fact, he's ranked number 1 in the NASCAR loop "Running in Top 15" category (68.7% of the time) for the last seven Dega races. Kurt is also first in their "Quality Passes" (passing while running in the top 15) category.
If David Gilliland was not your choice in most races this season, now is the time to put him on your roster. In his first trip to Talladega in 2006, Gilliland sat on the pole and finished 15th. In his second race, he came close to another pole (started 2nd along side track favorite Jeff Gordon) and finished 4th. In his first Daytona race in February 2007, he sat on the pole and finished 8th. He came back to DIS in July, started 32nd and marched his way forward to an 11th place. In this race last season, Gilliland got caught up in a wreck about 1/4 of the way into the event and limped to a 27th place finish (21 laps down). This past April, he started 40th and finished a respectable 15th. Gilliland likes restrictor plate racing.
NASCAR Media rates Brian Vickers 5th overall at Talladega amongst the drivers entered in Sunday's race. According to their loop data, he's 2nd among "Closers" (improving positions in the last 10 percent of the race) and 3rd in "Quality Passes" (passing cars under green while running in the top 15). In eight Cup starts at this track, Vickers has scored three top 5 finishes including his one Cup career win in 2006 and a 5th here in April. Vickers had finishes of 12th and 11th in the two other restrictor plate races (Daytona) this season. He's an excellent choice for a fourth or fifth driver this weekend.
Elliott Sadler will be the first to tell you Talladega and Daytona are not his favorite tracks. Sadler said he's had "the most terrifying experiences of my racing career at Talladega." Besides some horrific wrecks in those restrictor plate races he otherwise runs well at both tracks. At Daytona, he had top sixes in four of the last six starts. Sadler finished 15th at Talladega in April 2007 but wrecked in the last two trips to the Alabama superspeedway. It's hard to tell where he would have finished in April since he was caught up in the "big one" on the last lap and was credited with a 29th place. If he can avoid contact on Sunday, look for a top 15 from the McDonald's MONOPOLY Dodge.
