Skill, experience, teamwork and a little good luck are just some of the elements NASCAR drivers need to win at unpredictable race tracks like Talladega Superspeedway — the sport’s longest track at 2.66 miles.
Of course, those pieces are helpful in winning just about any race, but they’re especially true at NASCAR’s longer tracks, where chaos and becoming collateral damage are common. But some drivers seem to have mastered the superspeedways better than others, and their skillsets will be on display again Sunday in the Cup Series’ GEICO 500 (3 p.m. ET, FOX).
Bubba Wallace is among them, and for the No. 23 23XI Racing Toyota driver, getting good at NASCAR’s more treacherous tracks begins with one key factor: respect.
“The biggest thing is it starts with respect,” Wallace told For The Win. “So it’s hard for the rookies that come in to have the respect of the guys that have been around for a while just because we know how this race is gonna play out and we know one wrong move can take you out of it. For many superspeedway races just starting out in my Cup career, I was getting left hanging high and dry. And I thought I was making every right move, but apparently I wasn’t.
“But throughout time, you start getting those finishes and consistently finishing those races inside the top five, top 10. Then you see the respect level start to go up, and I think that’s probably the biggest thing. I’ve just been able to finish clean, have no damage or don’t cause any wrecks, and then your stock kind of rises after that.”
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Wallace’s first career Cup win was at Talladega in 2021. Although that’s his only superspeedway win so far, he’s also shown impressive results at Daytona International Speedway — the comparably chaotic 2.5-mile track — with four top-5 finishes since 2018, including three second-place finishes with two at the 2018 and 2022 Daytona 500s.
Going into Sunday at Talladega, Wallace is hoping for a clean race, which is a massive challenge when anyone’s tiny mistake has the potential to eliminate half the field. But after not finishing three of the first nine races this season, he said he personally, as well as his team, need to execute better.
“Our approach these [next] few races is you never try too hard at the wrong time, but you got to be there at the right time,” Wallace explained.
“And surviving is the key to these races and having the track position there at the end because we’ve obviously seen with this Next Gen car that you’ve kind of taken away the three-wide racing that we’ve had. There’s rarely a third lane now that gets more, and so you’re kind of boxed in with what you got. So you see a lot more aggressive moves of guys trying to shuck the other guy out of line. So I think you just have to play your cards right, and make sure you have a couple Toyotas lined up on your bumper and lead the field.”
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