“It’s very much going to be a survival race. Really challenging for the drivers.”
That’s how Brad Keselowski summed up his expectations for the NASCAR Cup Series race next weekend at Naval Base Coronado. While no one else put it so bluntly, the consensus over the weekend at Michigan International Speedway is that the second-ever street course event should be an eventful one.
On one hand, the three races in Downtown Chicago took place at a circuit best described as Martinsville but with right turns as it was a more condensed layout around Grant Park. On the other hand, while Coronado is larger (3.4 miles versus 2.1 miles) the faster speeds into heavy braking areas will invite a different kind excitement.
That doesn’t even factor in the bumps, which includes railroad tracks, which no one really knows what to predict.
“They’re literally still paving sections of the track,” said Ross Chastain.
Ryan Preece said ‘ride quality is going to be a big thing’ in reference to keeping the car stable on the long straights because not doing so will cost a car speed over the course of an entire lap.
And oh, by the way, part of the circuit runs parallel to San Diego Bay, and while the catch fence and walls are not remotely expected to be a concern, how can a driver not think about what it would be like to end up sinking to the surface in a race car?
“I hope not,” said Erik Jones. “If I end up in the Bay, I may just have to call it quits. I don’t think I would race again after that.”
Chris Buescher heard that exchange and was quick to echo that sentiment too.
“That is not my plan either,” Buescher said. “I heard you ask Erik earlier, so I’ll have a swimming buddy if we do, I guess, but that’s not our game plan whatsoever. I feel like it’s a bad plan going into it and we’re going to avoid it at all costs.”
Chase Briscoe has seen Sprint Cars end up in a pond but he certainly doesn’t want, nor does he expect, to live that scenario in San Diego.
“I mean, I’ve been to dirt races where there’s a lake or pond outside of the race track, and you think about that,” Briscoe said. “I guess, if I’m going to go into the Bay, thank God we have the Navy there with their Scuba divers because that’s going to be the best place to do it.”
Again: Disclaimer, and Briscoe says ‘knock on wood’ but this is not expected to be anything more than a lighthearted joke about racing next to San Diego Bay.
What is not a joke is how challenging Ryan Blaney expects the racing to be.
“I’ve done sim a couple times now and I think (the layout) is pretty set, and we have a good idea what it’s going to be but it’s going to be rough,” Blaney said. “Turn 1 is a pretty high commitment of speed, and then Turn 2 is very downhill, and it gets really rough through 3 and 4.
“The exit to 5 is super rough and they’ve worked on a couple of patches over the railroad tracks and stuff like that. They said they paved some of that to help us out but it’s still going to be bumpy. It’s going to be tight. I mean, Chicago was narrow and bumpy so we have some experience.
“We have one more sim session, but I’m looking forward to it and seeing it put together. It’s a big racetrack. Challenging. It’s like three and a half miles so we have a lot of corners to prepare for and probably mess up and some point.”
And that’s really the anticipated challenge of the race. Whereas Chicago was challenging because drivers expected to be crashed in a 90 degree turn, San Diego will force drivers to risk crashing all by themselves after a long straightaway into a tight corner.
“I’d say there’s more flowy sections of the racetrack than Chicago,” Blaney said. “Chicago is a lot of 90 degree corners. There’s one flowing S-type of situation and we still have a handful of 90 degree turns. I think it’s good.
“It’s going to be different from Chicago because it’s not just 90 degrees after 90 degrees. There should be more of a rhythm to our racing that weekend.”
Ty Gibbs agrees that Turn 1 is going to be the hot spot but also thinks the field will spread out since it’s a larger track. Joey Logano said ‘railroad tracks are a new one’ and said it’s going to be like racing a Fast and Furious movie that weekend.
Gibbs added that Chicago is ‘point and shoot’ where San Diego is more like a traditional road course.
Tyler Reddick agreed with that to a point.
“It has its spots,” Reddick said of areas that are similar to Chicago. “It does get a bit tight into Turn 6 and Turn 12. I think they’re calling it 12 A and B over there is the tightest corner from a mile per hour standpoint.
“But a lot of the areas do have more room than I think we had in Chicago. But honestly, Chicago may seem narrow looking at it but I do felt like we had room there. I do think this place should be fairly racy from a width standpoint too.
“But it’s just so hard to know until we get there. Everyone kind of has an idea where the passing zones might be and where it’s going to be important to be fast, but we won’t really know until we’re there.”
Extra spotters and track workers?
NASCAR had a regularly scheduled safety and competition meeting on Saturday at Michigan and one of the things all parties agreed on was adding more track workers around the layout.
Remember, at Watkins Glen, NASCAR caught some criticism for being slow to react to Cody Ware severely impacting a steel barrier. Drivers said at the time NASCAR needed to employ more corner workers.
Because Naval Base Coranado is so expansive, and the sightlines not optimal, NASCAR will do just that next weekend, which Denny Hamlin appreciated.
“Which is good because, I mean, this track is massive in size, right,” Hamlin said. “It’s got so many different corners and twists, and certainly, you’re going to think that this thing’s going to have walls on both sides because things can get hidden pretty easily. Corners can get disguised and you end up missing a car sitting there. It’s good that they’re putting more resources to that because we certainly need it on the road courses.”
Michael McDowell says NASCAR told them that they expect to have 36 corner workers that weekend.
“They just need to give us plenty of notice when something happens, right,” McDowell said. “I don’t think the racing will be much different than Chicago and we also have some responsibility to get slowed down and keep our heads up.
“But it’s also hard to get these cars whoa’d up in time, even if we have spotters right there, and if you have corner workers right there. That’s just part of street course racing to a certain degree. But, I also don’t think there anything more treacherous in that regard than Chicago was.”
Ricky Stenhouse Jr. says some teams have asked NASCAR to use up to seven or eight spotters for the race.
“Yeah, we brought that up,” Stenhouse said of the request for more corner workers. “There were guys that have been there, like Chase Briscoe, who has brought it up and said the tightest area are like Turns 6, 7 and 8, where it gets really narrow and he was concerned about where the spotters are.
“Our spotters, I think they’re in Turn 8, but Chase felt with the building and things like that, that our spotters couldn’t see so I think everyone is planning on having five spotters but I think there were a lot of raised hands that said ‘hey, we could maybe use seven or eight spotters, depending on a lot of factors.
“You don’t want to not have somebody to be able to see an area where Chicago happened and the racetrack was blocked and everybody just piles in. So, I think we on the Cup side, are trying to get ahead of that so Trucks and O’Reilly can put on a really good show as well. They’ll have it figured out by Sunday for our race, but I think we’re just trying to get ahead of it for everyone.”
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