Viewer's Guide: M'ville

The Chase for the Nextel Cup continues Sunday when the series visits Martinsville Speedway, the smallest track in NASCAR's top series, for the Subway 500. ESPN on ABC will have live coverage from Martinsville beginning at 1 p.m. ET with NASCAR Countdown. The green flag is scheduled for 1:43 p.m. ET.

Martinsville Speedway, at just more than a half-mile in length, is shaped like a paperclip with long straights and tight, mildly banked turns. The track places a premium on brakes as well as driving skill as the action is usually rough-and-tumble short-track racing.

Q&A: Rusty Wallace

Jimmie Johnson has won the past two races at Martinsville. The last driver to win three in a row is current ESPN analyst Rusty Wallace (April 1994 - April '95). Wallace won seven times at Martinsville, his second-most at any one track (Bristol, nine wins).

Q: Aside from the expected beating and banging how hard is Martinsville Speedway on the car itself?

Wallace: At Martinsville Speedway you'll see a lot of brake problems, and next is the rear-end gear. You turn so many RPMs that the rear-end gear ratio heats up real fast. It's such a short track and you have to get up to speed real fast.

Tempers, brakes and rear-end gears, those are the three things that can fail at Martinsville. On top of that, the fenders get beat in, the sides of the doors get beat up and tire marks end up all over the car.

Q: How hard is the 500-lap race at Martinsville on a driver?

Wallace: The 500-lap race at Martinsville Speedway is very hard on a driver. It seems like the race is never going to end. The drivers get very fatigued, the cars get hot; the engine and brakes produce a lot of heat and all of that radiates up into the car and causes the drivers to be pretty worn out when the race is over.

Q: What should ESPN on ABC viewers watch for that is unique to Martinsville?

Wallace: Viewers will see a lot of physical contact between cars this weekend at Martinsville. It is one of the oldest and prettiest racetracks on the circuit. You will literally see fire coming out of the brakes and expect a lot of wrecks. One thing unique to Martinsville is a curb, like what you find on a regular street, running along the inside of the track. When a driver hits that curb, he will typically shoot up the racetrack. It is one of the oldest, all-American short tracks, and neither drivers nor race fans will get bored there at all.

Truck Series on SPEED

SPEED continues its season-long coverage of the Craftsman Truck Series with the Kroger 200 from Martinsville, beginning with Bud Pole Qualifying at 11 a.m. ET. Saturday. At 2:30 p.m. ET, NCTS Setup gets you ready for the race and takes you up to the green flag, set for 3:16 p.m. ET.

Toyota All-Star Showdown

The NASCAR All-Star Showdown also can be seen on SPEED. Qualifying for the lower-tier all-star race is at 8 p.m. ET Friday. The top teams in NASCAR's Grand National and Elite divisions compete for recognition and more than 500,000 in awards at 10 p.m. ET Saturday.