NASCAR 101

By Ron Lemasters Jr., Official NASCAR Members Club

03/08

Tailgating is a way of life for millions of people, right? If you're reading this magazine, you're probably one of those millions, and you know more about tailgating than anyone on your block.

While football season may be prime tailgating season, no sport fits tailgating as perfectly as NASCAR stock car racing.

The NASCAR season lasts from February to November, and the races are held in places like Talladega, Alabama; Bristol, Tennessee; and Darlington, South Carolina, where they know a thing or two when it comes to good food, good times and good racing.

But in case you're not as up on NASCAR as you are on tailgating, we're giving you a quick and dirty introduction to the sport, with a short glossary of racing terms thrown in for good measure.

The Car
We'll start with the car itself. This season, NASCAR drivers will compete in all 36 races (38 if you count the Budweiser Shootout and the NASCAR Sprint All-Star Race) in what is known as the Car of Tomorrow.

The new car, which NASCAR built to improve driver safety after a rash of fatalities in the early part of the decade, replaces the older model that had been in use for the past 15 years.

The car is taller and wider than its predecessor, and it has a wing on the back instead of the blade-like spoiler the old car carried. The wing, combined with a front-mounted "splitter," controls the air flow over and around the car, which in turns provides downforce.

Downforce is the pressure of the passing air pushing down on the surfaces of the car as it races, and that helps the car stay in contact with the track surface. This pressure, combined with springs, shock absorbers, tire pressure and a thousand other things, allows stock cars to reach speeds of more than 200 miles per hour.

The engine is a standard 358 cubic-inch V-8, just like the ones in the bigger production cars available today. The major difference from a street-legal engine, besides the fact that it can generate over 800 horsepower, is that it uses a carburetor to mix air and gasoline instead of direct fuel injection. If you were born after 1982, chances are you've never driven a car with a carbureted engine.

A carburetor is ancient technology in today's auto marketplace - production cars of today use electronically-controlled fuel injection in place of carburetors - but NASCAR would rather police a mechanical piece than have to police electronic engine management units, so the carburetor is the delivery system of choice.

The engines are purpose-built for the tasks at hand: generate as much horsepower as possible and run 500 miles without a glitch. They also get about 4.8 miles per gallon of Sunoco racing fuel, so that means frequent visits to pit road to get more.

The tires are Goodyear Racing Eagles, and they are slicks, which means they last about 40 laps (approximately 40 miles) instead of the 20,000 miles average tires will last. Each tire is made specifically for the track it's competing on, so you can't really run Bristol tires at Talladega, or vice versa. A single set of four costs the race teams around $1,800, and they typically run through 10-20 sets per race weekend.

The inside of the NASCAR stock car is a maze of steel tubing designed to protect the driver. Energy-absorbing foam lines the driver-s side door panels, and some cars even have an escape hatch through the roof. There is no stereo, but there is a two-way radio so that driver and crew can talk to each other. There's no air conditioning, either, so most drivers run cold air or recirculated ice water systems through their helmet and fireproof driver-s suit as well...

The Race
That's a quick overview of the car. Now, let's move to the racing. Each 43-car field is made up of the top 35 cars according to the car owner point standings. Driver points, which determine the driver champion, are not used, because NASCAR is rewarding the car owner.

Each driver runs two laps, and the fastest is the qualifying time for that driver. The top 35 are merely jockeying for starting position, because they are locked into the field. The fastest seven cars outside the top 35 also make the race. One spot is reserved for the most recent NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion not already in the race, and if there is no past champion entered, then the next-fastest car among the non-qualified cars gets in.

The cars line up in 21 rows of two cars plus the 43rd starter in a row of his own, and the first one to the checkered flag wins. But of course, it's never that simple.

During the race, drivers make pit stops to get fuel and tires and also to make adjustments to the car's handling. A typical four-tire pit stop takes less than 15 seconds, and as the race goes on, stops get quicker and quicker, down into the sub-13-second range.

Handling is the most important variable in a NASCAR race. The races are typically 300 to 500 miles in length. Drivers face handling problems almost from the start of the race, because track conditions change from minute to minute in some cases, and so does the weather. If qualifying is held in hot, sunny weather and race day dawns cool and overcast, the handling characteristics will change, sometimes abruptly.

The most common handling problems NASCAR drivers and teams face are understeer and oversteer. NASCAR fans rarely use those terms: they call it pushing (understeer) or loose (oversteer). Pushing means that when a driver goes into the corner, the front end of the car wants to climb up the outside retaining wall. Loose is when the back end steps out and flings itself at the outside wall.

The aerodynamic effect of 43 cars on the same track is always a factor the drivers need to be aware of. The swirling, roiled air affects the way cars handle, because there is no consistent flow of clean air over the nose or rear wing, which lessens grip on the front or the rear tires.

Air pressure in the tires, chassis adjustments such as wedge (alternating weight on the rear springs, also called cross-weight) and the track bar (which centers the rear wheels within the body of the car) are common in fixing handling issues. Each stock car comes with weight jack bolts (which adjust the weight on each of the rear wheels). Adjusting these affects the way the car corners, when all the weight is transferred to the right side of the car by centrifugal force.

The track bar moves the rear wheels to allow the car to follow the curve better. It changes the angle at which the rear wheels follow the front wheels.

So now you have a primer on NASCAR racing from a technical point of view. As you're grilling, chilling or otherwise cooking up a great time in the RV lot, feel free to refer to these lists of NASCAR terms.

Oh, and save some ribs for me!