Saturday night’s Budweiser Shootout was, by all accounts, some of the most off-the-wall racing we’ve seen in years. Cars shot through the field, two-by-two, leaving single-car stragglers behind. Some fans and drivers loved it, some loathed it. The only way anyone could make any headway was with one dance partner, and only one.
Immediately the cry went up: is this how Daytona is going to be? Is this how it’s going to be all year? And, most importantly, is this good racing?
In order: not forever, definitely not, and depends on your perspective.
Let’s dig a little deeper; to understand what happened last night, you need to keep in mind a couple things. First, despite what the non-NASCAR fan might think, racing isn’t just about mashing the gas and turning left. It’s high-speed chess, engineering and dealmaking at 200 mph. And second, believe it or not, NASCAR drivers are still learning about how to drive their cars under changing conditions, even now.
What changed about Daytona, the sport’s signature track? Several things. First, and most important, the resurfacing smoothed bumps and gave the cars phenomenal grip. Second, new tire compounds helped with that grip. Third, the Sprint Cup cars have a new nose with a smaller splitter and no braces, which has a small but measurable impact. Fourth, the bumpers and noses now align more closely than ever before. And fifth, this race was run in some of the coolest conditions of the year; we won’t see racing in 50-degree temperatures until fall, if at all.
So all of those factors set up the two-car dancefests we saw Saturday night? Settle in, it’s time for a little education.
First, we’ll let Ryan Newman explain: "The front car gets the clean air, the motor. The back car takes the air off the front car’s spoiler. Even though he gets the air taken out of his motor, he’s still pushing the car in front of him and he’s getting that help."
Get all that? In effect, it’s what your eighth-grade science class called a symbiotic relationship: each partner offers something to the other. The lead car cuts through the clean air, the rear car pushes while in the front car’s draft.
And this is where the new surface comes into play. Previously, cars had to let off the gas in the corners at Daytona because of the old surface. But now, "there’s plenty of grip and no bumps," says Dodge Motorsports engineer Howard Comstock. "Drivers can keep momentum and stay committed all the way through the corners."
But why just two cars? Why not three? Again, physics. If a third car gets in the mix, it disrupts the second car’s downforce, particularly headed into the corners. Three cars can’t hang together the way that two could. Neither, obviously, can four, five or more.
Here’s the thing, though: NASCAR isn’t as much concerned with two-car pairs as they are with 200-plus-mile speeds. Cars regularly topped 200 mph Saturday night, raising concerns that perhaps they’d hit that "magic number" where liftoff during wrecks becomes a real possibility.
There are many ways to regulate speed, from restrictor plates to water pressure relief valves to airflow alterations. NASCAR could implement one or more of those elements to cut the speeds to a safer level, or could leave everything as-is on the assumption that the track’s new grip mitigates the speed concerns. In other words, the drivers are going faster, yes, but they’re able to handle those speeds much better than they would otherwise.
"The cars handle so good, and there’s so much grip," Comstock said. "The drivers lose that sense of speed."
And for those fans concerned that this is the new way of business at Daytona, fear not: Saturday night was laboratory-level ideal conditions. Daytona will never have more grip than it does right now (at least until the next resurfacing in the 2040s), the upcoming races won’t be run in cool temperatures, and the track will "rubber in" over the course of the next few months. In short, Saturday night was a look at one ideal future for NASCAR; you’ll have to decide for yourself if that’s the scenario for you.
Follow Jay Busbee on Twitter at @jaybusbee and The Marbles on Facebook for constant updates from Daytona’s Speedweeks.
How exactly does this ‘nose-to-tail’ drafting work?
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