As if racing inches apart from some of the fiercest competitors in motorsports at about 190 mph wasn't enough of a challenge, drivers in this weekend's UAW-Ford 500 at Talladega Superspeedway can expect a lot of uncertainty about the Car of Tomorrow configuration they'll race for the first time at the 2.66-mile speedway.

The car's performance, primarily in and around the draft, is one of the great unknowns facing the 51 entered drivers who hope to be in the 43-car field on Sunday afternoon. But a greater concern to a lot of them is how well they'll be able to see, not only looking behind them, but also ahead.

Bracing for unknown

As the COT debuts at Talladega, the Chase drivers are trying to win a championship while figuring out how the car will react on the superspeedway.

• Complete story, click here

The COT has an expanded, bulbous "greenhouse" or driver's canopy; and on the back of the rear deck, a sizeable wing with a wicker bill atop it, to aid in providing downforce.

While the height of that lip, along with the size of the holes in the carburetor restrictor plate that sits between the carburetor and the intake manifold atop each car's engine may not be determined until some practice runs are made, many drivers are sure of their concerns about visibility.

Roush Fenway Racing driver Carl Edwards, who won the second Chase for the Nextel Cup event, at Dover, said no one will be exempt.

"You can't see very well, so that's going to be a big deal," Edwards said. "That's going to make a difference because it's just going to make it harder to see if something's happening in front of the guys that you're right on [in the draft].

"If you're bump-drafting with somebody and you can't see what's in front of them. That could cause a big problem for the guy in the middle."

Gillett Evernham Motorsports Dodge pilot Kasey Kahne said he had found a potential solution to some of his vision problems coming into the weekend, but as he began practicing Friday he found he could see further behind his car, but not right behind it -- and on account, his team was forced to experiment with different mirrors Friday.

"It's tough to see out of -- especially over that rear wing," Kahne said. "You just have to try to get your mirrors to where you can see -- but it's definitely tougher than with the spoiler, though. It's hard to see out of that car.

"We did some work with our mirrors and I think I've found a better one that some of the other guys are using -- it's inside the car and it's a different shape, so I can see over the top of the wing, where with my other mirror I had to look under it, so I could only see about an inch.

"That should help us, but you definitely have to mess with it, or you can't see."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. and his crew chief, Tony Eury Jr., have had a lot of success at restrictor-plate races, winning seven times between Daytona and Talladega.

But the chief mechanic, who's in his last race with Earnhardt Jr. before going to Hendrick Motorsports, said vision would be a challenge, and he's not sure a different mirror position is the answer.

"You can try to mount the mirror up as high as you can toward the roof of the car, and that makes it better, because the way the wing is, it's right in the middle of the [rear] glass," Eury Jr. said. "You can mount the mirror up, but you've got to look at that as your driver has to look further away from where he's at.

"If he's looking ahead of his car, his vision has to go higher; which is why a lot of the guys run their mirrors kind of midway or at head height, so you can kind of use peripheral vision [to see the mirror] without moving your head -- you're not having to look away to see it.

"It'll be interesting, but I'm sure everyone will get through it."

But with most of the field wadded together in drafting formations, how well their competitors can see is a concern for both Earnhardt and Eury Jr.

"The only thing [Earnhardt Jr.'s] said is that with the rear wing, it's hard to see what's going on behind him, the cars lining up [in the draft] and stuff like that," Eury Jr. said. "And out of the front windshield, you can't see through the guy's car in front of you, because the wing is so high, and they're so big and bulky."

Eury Jr. said that with the vision issues, signaling between drivers might be a problem, and he and Earnhardt aren't the only ones concerned.

"With their hand signals I think there might be a big problem, because like [Earnhardt Jr.] says, usually when someone is bump-drafting you, you can put your hand up to let the guy [behind you] know that you're getting close to the guy in front of you.

"He says you're losing that, and that's going to be one bad thing, and that will probably cause a couple accidents, but there ain't a whole lot we can do about that -- with that wing and the way the windshield angle is in the back, it's tough."

Joe Gibbs Racing driver J.J. Yeley said he saw plusses and minuses at the two-day COT test at Talladega last month.

"The new cars give you a different perspective on the racetrack because, sitting inside the car, the windshield is vertical and you see a lot more out of the front of the car," Yeley said. "It's just a bit difficult to see the hand signals. I think you can run into the back of a guy harder without upsetting them versus the conventional cars, where you get into the back of the guy in the draft and it gets him sideways."

Yates driver David Gilliland has spent some time out front at Talladega, after winning the Bud Pole for this event last season and the outside front row spot in the spring, but he's concerned about being back in the draft.

"Before, for example, you'd be going down the backstraight and if you were bump-drafting somebody, or something like that, you could see through the window of the guy in front of you and actually see the car in front of him," Gilliland said. "Now, with the wing on the back, you can't see -- and you can hardly see the guy in front of you, the way their cars travel and the pitches they're doing, the car's attitudes, the way they are.

"Especially at Talladega, everybody runs the front down as far as you can, and what that does is it brings the wing up, and now you're trying to look through the wing, that's solid, and you can't see. And that's a lot of concern.

"You can see behind you a little bit -- not as good as the other [standard] cars, but close. It's more in front. When you're nose-to-tail you can't see anything but the car in front of you. Before, you used to look through the windshield of the guy in front of you to see what was in front of him."

The bottom line, according to Edwards' teammate Matt Kenseth, is expect more of the same from Talladega.

"I think you'll expect to see a pretty typical superspeedway race -- I think there's going to be a lot of action, I think it's going to be real exciting," Kenseth said. "It is difficult to see, and I see some potential problems of maybe having some accidents there, because we do run so close to each other, bump-drafting and all that.

"It is hard to see around another car, but everybody's kind of dealing with the same thing there, and hopefully it'll turn out OK. The cars, the way they draft and everything, have a lot of potential for a great race.

"It just would be nice if you could see a little bit around them somehow, and I know that's something that NASCAR is working on."

That may not come soon enough for Chase contender Tony Stewart.

"I dislike anything where you have to rely on somebody else -- to me, what you and your team do should be what it's all about," Stewart said. "I don't like having to have a guy behind you or in front of you dictate what you do and where you go. That's really the one reason why I dislike [plate racing]."

The vision issues may only exacerbate Stewart's concerns.

"It's very nerve-wracking," Stewart said. "When you can't plan your moves unless you know what the guy behind you or in front of you is going to do."

According to what a lot of drivers are saying, that possibility doesn't easily exist with the Car of Tomorrow.