NASCAR will shorten the lengths of its final two stages in the April 26 race at Talladega Superspeedway to address fuel-saving concerns on superspeedways.
Next January will also bring the return of a “Preseason Thunder” test session at Daytona International Speedway, assessing potential technical changes to the cars that could lessen the impact of conservation strategies at superspeedways.
The sanctioning body also revealed that YouTube personality Cleetus McFarland has yet to be approved for Talladega. (More on that below.)
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But back to the superspeedways, where the concept of drivers running at less than full throttle at the longest tracks on the circuit has drawn negative reactions.
“Listen, we talk to our fans every week,” John Probst, NASCAR’s executive vice president and chief racing development officer, said on the latest episode of the “Hauler Talk” podcast. “So we hear what they’re saying. There’s certainly a lot of feedback from the fans that don’t always like to see some of the three-wide fuel saving that happens mostly at Talladega and Daytona.
“And I think that coming out of Daytona, we have been working hand-in-hand with a lot of our race teams, trying to largely break into two categories of things that we could do. One being the sporting-related things, like rules around pit stops or stage lengths or things of that nature. The other being in a technical bucket, which would mean car changes, spoiler, power levels and things of that nature.”
Though the precise lengths have yet to be announced, Probst said the final two stages at Talladega will be short enough to complete without a fuel stop.
“Generally, how a lot of our speedways were laid out, it was a short stage, a short stage and then a long stage to the end,” Probst said. “Going into Talladega, we’re going to flip that.”
Last year, Talladega’s segments broke down as 60 laps for the first stage, 60 for the second and 68 for the last.
This year, the first stage likely will be closer to 100 laps, with the last two stages under 50 laps apiece, when the Cup Series returns to the 2.66-mile oval in two weeks.
“It could be interesting in that first stage, if there’s some teams that try to do it on one stop versus some that try to do it on two,” Probst said. “We think that if there are some that do it on two, they may drag the group that would try to do it on one stop. So it’s got some potential for some pretty interesting strategies.”
The dates have yet to be set for the Daytona preseason test, but Probst said it would occur before the Rolex 24, which is slated for Jan. 30-31, 2027 (and will be preceded by an IMSA test at the track on Jan. 22-24).
NASCAR plans to test “some different power levels and spoilers and maybe some other car-type things,” Probst said, adding about fuel strategy that “it’s important to point out that this is a tool now that the teams know. And this is not something that I think is ever going to go away because these guys will look for every possible advantage that they can get. And that’s reasonable on their end. So I think that what we can do is just take steps to mitigate that.”
Other topics addressed by Probst during the podcast:
— After making his O’Reilly Auto Parts Series debut at Rockingham Speedway, McFarland has yet to be approved for Talladega.
“We’re all huge Cleetus fans,” Probst said. “We all watch his videos and are certainly very appreciative of everything he’s done in our sport and will continue to do in our sport.
“He is approved right now for O’Reilly Series short tracks, which means he’s good for all of ARCA, all of Truck and then O’Reilly up through the short tracks. We’d like to see more out of Cleetus in the short tracks. So we’re not saying no, but there is more that we would like to see out of Cleetus before we would approve him for Talladega.”
— NASCAR has finalized the track layout for its inaugural race weekend at Naval Base Coronado in San Diego, California, on June 19-21. Probst said paving will be required in some sections of the track that are used for loading aircraft carriers.
“The drivers will have to deal with some unique features that a course like that will throw at us, but it’s an honor for us to go out there and race in June,” he said. “There are parts of that base that we’ll be racing on tarmac, runway, streets that are concrete and asphalt. So that track will probably have more different aspects to it than any track we’ve ever raced on. There’ll be some curveballs that we have to hit. Once we get everybody at the track and we get kind of into the grind of our normal race weekend, the one thing that our industry has shown is that once we’re on site, we can adapt as well as anyone and put on a really good show.”
— With a Goodyear tire test slated April 21 for Chicagoland Speedway, Probst said there isn’t any major repaving needed for the 1.5-mile speedway in Joliet, Illinois.
“The track surface actually weathered pretty well,” Probst said of Chicagoland, which was mostly dormant since the most recent Cup race in July 2019. “There’ll be some track bond to patch up some minor issues and obviously some painting and cleaning up the garage and some retrofitting of the suites. But we’re pretty pleased how the track weathered over time; this current package has had some pretty good racing at Kansas. Chicago is a bit of a sister track to Kansas, so we’re pretty pumped up. We think that’ll be a really good show.”
Other topics covered by Forde and senior director of racing communications Amanda Ellis during the 48th episode of “Hauler Talk,” which explores competition issues in NASCAR:
— Why rain tires were unavailable for use at Rockingham;
— A new rule that resulted in more than a dozen Craftsman Truck Series teams missing 10 minutes of practice at Rockingham Speedway because of inspection failures.
Nate Ryan has written about NASCAR since 1996 while working at the San Bernardino Sun, Richmond Times-Dispatch, USA TODAY and for the past 10 years at NBC Sports Digital. He is a contributor to the “Hauler Talk” show on the NASCAR Podcast Network. He also has covered various other motorsports, including the IndyCar and IMSA series.