NASCAR Daytona Preseason Thunder Fans Perspective
NASCAR Preseason Thunder is three days of testing for the NASCAR Season opening Daytona 500. In the old days it was very important to the NASCAR teams in order to have a chance to be fast and win. In the past teams would work on the bodies of the race car, check the stop watch, work on them again and again until they could get the most speed out of the car. They would also work on the position of the car body on the car itself. Over the years this lead to cars that really looked funny when you were standing in front of them. If you had been partying in the infield the night before you would get a strange sense of vertigo while looking at the car. With the new car teams can’t do much if anything to the body and the position of the body on the car. That is what the car templates that we all hear about at every race are for. NASCAR also dictates the gearing, shocks and springs. This has made Daytona testing a little less hectic and not as important.
NASCAR race teams can’t win the Daytona 500 due to testing this week but they most certainly can lose it. First and foremost an amazing thing happens to cars when they are going 200 MPH. Parts and pieces that look good and are on tight can loosen up and fall off. After all of the wind tunnel work and pull down rig work the car may still travel more such that wheels rub tire wells, splitters hit the track or suspension parts drag. These things can make a car a 190 MPH boat anchor. These are the first items that must be corrected. Since corrections might render a car useless teams may have multiple cars to test in order to pick the best one. The Teams will probably get these items figured out during the first practice.
The rest of the three days will be spent as follows in no particular order and most likely simultaneously. This will be the first NASCAR race where the cars utilize fuel injection. It would be expected that the engines will perform much like they do in the shop but there might be some tweaking. The driver might also have a different feel in the throttle to get used too. The Fuel injection will be monitored during all of the practices.
The second thing being tested is for the driver to get used to the new smaller spoiler which should make the car looser in the corners and possibly the tri oval.
The most talked about part of the test will be the performance of the new smaller radiator and location of the opening of air to the radiator. How this will impact cooling during qualifying, pack runs and more importantly how long a two car tandem can be run. This will probably be the focus during the last two days of testing.
For the Fans will testing be boring? Probably, except for the fans that keep track of how cars are performing on day one and throughout the other two days of the test. No one change will make a car fast on the track. It will be a combination multiple changes. Some of the changes teams try will be interesting but the only way they will be interesting is to know what was being done prior to the change. The only certainty is if you need your NASCAR fix prior to Daytona, this is it. If you really get into it, you are truly a NASCAR fanatic.
If you want to watch Preseason Thunder at Daytona tune into the Speed Channel Thursday Jan. 12, through Saturday, Jan 14th., 1 PM ET to 5 PM ET. You can also watch the morning sessions live at Speed.com 9 AM ET to 12 PM ET.
Follow me during the offseason on Twitter @brian_jr1 for more news and Commentary.
