NASCAR at Talladega 2016: Preview, Prediction for the GEICO 500
April showers bring May (horse)powers.
Talladega Superspeedway puts the super speed in superspeedway. Velocity vectors will hit 200-plus mph as the restrictor plates bolt on for the GEICO 500.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. will be the favorite to win this race riding his beloved No. 88 Amelia. We said the same thing heading into Daytona Beach, but Amelia failed to touch down in Victory Lane.
Now with a new makeover, he and she attempt to regain control of this plate track.
Rick Hendrick, owner of the No. 88 car (and three others), needs to see one hit VL because he canโtโone presumesโtake Joe Gibbs Racing any longer. Hendrick canโt even.
Or maybe, better yet, heโs thinking: You can have the sprint. Iโll take the fall.
Read on for this weeks preview and prediction, Alabama style.
By the Numbers: Talladega Superspeedway
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GEICO.com 500
Place:ย Talladega Superspeedway
Date:ย Sunday, May 1, 2016
Pre-race Coverage:ย 10:30.m.ย (ET), NASCAR RaceDay, FS1
Green Flag:ย 1:19 p.m. (ET), Fox
Distance:ย 188 laps, 500 miles
Defending winner:ย Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Current Driver Standings
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1. Carl Edwards, 331
2. Kevin Harvick, 324
3. Jimmie Johnson, 310
4. Kyle Busch, 302
5. Joey Logano, 299
6. Kurt Busch, 279
7. Dale Earnhardt Jr., 278
8. Denny Hamlin, 258
9. Brad Keselowski, 255
10. Martin Truex Jr., 246
11. Chase Elliott, 234
12. Austin Dillon, 234
13. Jamie McMurray, 224
14. Kasey Kahne, 222
15. Matt Kenseth, 212
16. Ryan Newman, 205
Bold denotes race winner.
The Still-Too-Early-to-Watch Chase Bubble
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The Two Above the Line
Matt Kenseth
Nothing exciting to report here for Kenseth.
Heโs been on this bubble all season, sometimes below, but this time above.
He overcame a potentially terrible situation this past weekend at Richmond when he needed to change two batteries partway through the race.
โI feel incredibly good,โ Kenseth said two weeks ago at Bristol, per Ray Slover ofย Sporting News.com. โIโm driving I think for arguably the best team in the sport, love the guys Iโm working with and weโre still really competitive.โ
Having won five races a year ago, and being on the hottest team, will keep wind in the sails of the No. 20 boat.
Ryan Newman
No news is good news for Newman.
He made zero headway after Richmondโs race. All he does is log laps, but it is fairly impressive that even though he cut a tire after one of Richmondโs restart, he still managed to finish 18th.
Newman doesnโt spike or bottom out. Heโll do this the rest of the season: a low simmer until he finally dials it up to 212 degrees.
The Two Below the Line
AJ Allmendinger
After that miraculous finish at Martinsville where AJ Allmendinger finished second place behind only Kyle Busch, Allmendinger has returned to form, so to speak, with finishes of 22nd, 19th and 25th.
He slips three spots this week, out of the Chase Grid and into the marshes.
Trevor Bayne
Well, well, well, whoโs this in the still-too-early-to-watch Chase bubble?
Trevor Bayne, the 2011 Daytona 500 winner*, finished fifth at Bristol and 17th at Richmond, creeping up two spots in the driver standings.
After Bristolโs top fiveโhis first since 2011โBayne said, per Tom Jensen ofย FoxSports.com, โYou can't come back if you don't have good race cars and we've got that now. I need to minimize my mistakes going forward.โ
Weโve seen many fresh faces pop in and out of the Chase bubble. This is a good sign that newer challengers are rising to put pressure on the tenured stars of this sport.
*: His only win, but if you plan on winning one, well, might as well haul Moby Dick into the boat.
Biggest Movers
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Biggest Climb, Up Four
Matt Kenseth
Kenseth moved up three spots after finishing seventh at Richmond.
There isnโt much to add about Kenseth except that he must be feeling the pressure.
His other teammatesโmost notably Busch and Edwardsโhave asserted themselves as title contenders.
The season is 25 percent finished and, most alarming, over 33 percent through the regular season.
Kenseth isnโt one to show the pressure heโs under, but with his teammates wasting so little time winning, the No. 20 team has got to be pressing.
A little.
Biggest Fall, Down Three
AJ Allmendinger
That second-place effort the Dinger threw down four races ago at Martinsville seems like an apparition.
Since that possibly galvanizing effort, the No. 47 car has an average finish of 22nd.
Not good after taking seventh at Fontana and a runner-up in the STP 500.
He needs a big rebound effort to prove those two top 10s werenโt flukes.
Biggest Storylines
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Amelia Returns
Earnhardt and everyone around him sung the praises of Amelia, his plate car that drove him to a four-race average finish of 1.5 in 2015.
He finished third in the Daytona 500 and won the summer race. He won the spring Talladega race and finished second in the fall race.
This year at Daytona? A crash and a 34th-place finish. But Amelia getโs a new set of wings for another crack at a superspeedway.
โWe're going to have Amelia...Iโm excited about that," Earnhardt said in this week's The Dale Jr. Download on Dirty Mo Radio (h/t NASCAR.com). "We know how she ran last year. We've just got to run Talladega like we have to win it, just like we did the last time we were there. We did a good job.ย If we run it like that, we'll be up front at the end."
Thereโs a little bit of redemption pumping through Juniorโs veins this time. He wants to get back to that 2015 form and what better way than to crush it at the track the Earnhardts own?
Eighty Percent of Lugs Ainโt Cuttinโ It
Tony Stewart took a lot of flak for chastising NASCAR for allowing four out of five lug nuts per wheel. Loose wheels neared pandemic levels so far.
For his candor, NASCAR served him a $35,000 fine. Then, after that, NASCAR essentially admitted he was correct by saying teams must tighten all five lugs.
LugGate.
"I just felt like this is one thing they dropped the ball on,โ Stewart told Fox Sports during the pre-race show (h/t NASCAR.com). โSo, they're doing a good job. They're looking at it. They're going to address it and make it right, and down the road we won't have to worry about this again, hopefully."
Tactful, yes, and Stewart must be rolling his retiring eyes that the governing body would have the audacity to fine him for his criticism, then make the rule change based on that maligned critique.
Expect those Joe Gibbs pit stops to be a little bit slower now.
Is There Friction at Joe Gibbs Racing?
One wonders what the JGR team meeting was like this week.
Was it โGood job, Carl!โ? Was it โGood job, Carl, butโฆโ?
Hmmโฆ
Listen:
The only teammates who matter are the ones wearing the same number as you. NASCAR is the only sport where teammates are a matter of context.
To loosely quote Herm Edwards, an NFL analyst famous for saying, โYou play to win the game,โ โYou drive to win the race.โ
There are sponsors to represent. (Banfield Animal Hospitals and Xfinity got a ton of air time at the end of that race.) You race for trophies. You race for dough!
As for the No. 18 driver, Busch deflected the questions, which meant he must have been royally P.O.โd.
There are no handouts in NASCAR, especially early in the season with both teams already locked into the Chase.
If nothing else, Edwardsโ bump and run came as a surprise. That move also served as a notice that they all may be teammatesโbut only teammates until the final lap.
Dark-Horse Pick: Ricky Stenhouse Jr.
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Why not Ricky Stenhouse Jr.?
Take a look at the numbers. Talladega is undeniably one of Stenhouseโs better tracks.
In five trips around the 2.66-mile track, he has racked up three top 10s and one top five.
Stenhouse said, per Zack Albert ofย NASCAR.com:
"There were a lot of times last year where I was worried about race strategy and how we were going to do things throughout the race and I would catch myself not staying as focused as I needed to in the car about driving the car and I'd make a mistake. There were just so many things that added up at the beginning of the year last year that came from trying to do too much from inside the car. I think it's really helped me a lot and him to have more confidence in the calls that he makes, the changes that he makes on the race car as well.
"
This could be a career year for the No. 17 car. He already has one top five and three top 10s, and now he heads to a track where anything can happen.
And the Winner Is...Joey Logano
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Joey Logano, a forgotten driver of this slideshow, no mention at all, is the pick to win at Talladega?
Yeah, because Logano won the fall Talladega race over Earnhardt in 2015, and Logano won the Daytona 500 too.
And another thing: Logano is fifth in the driver standings, a quiet fifth.
He has overcome a lot of issues in races this year and still managed an average finish of 8.2, including three top fives and six top 10s from nine races.
Logano has been overshadowed this year despite his consistent week-to-week efforts.
That changes this week when Team Penske gets its second ticket to the Chase.
Stats come courtesy of Racing-Reference.
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