NASCAR world reacts to fuel-saving race pace during Geico 500 at Talladega

Toby Christie had a very interesting idea. What is stopping a group of drivers from joining each other and making their own pack to draft with in the Geico 500?

There were plenty of fans online wondering what was happening. The cars looked so slow. Yes, they were three-wide but it was at a pace that didn’t really excite fans. With crew chiefs and engineers finding out the most economical and efficient way to get around the tracks, fuel saving is going to be more common in these races.

At some point, a team, driver, whoever – has to decide they are going to run wide open. Someone will find a way to buck this trend and set a new meta for how to race Daytona and Talladega.

Things are only going to get quicker in this race. Drivers are going to start taking things seriously as the laps wind down.

Geico 500 frustrating, but different

Based off of today and what we saw at Daytona, there is only one comparison to make. This kind of racing is the equivalent to distance runners in Track & Field sitting back for a late race kick. Runners have to think about speed versus economy.

A lot of times, 5k and 10k runners don’t elect to go all-out. They pace out the race, let it come to them. You will see the positions shuffle around but no one really takes the lead and pushes the pace. That is until the last mile, half mile, or lap.

The point I’m making here, it’s a choice. These drivers and teams are choosing to race this way. Do they have to? No not at all. But they have found that the data tells them they should do things this way. Until a new strategy comes out or teams decide to just go for broke, this is what we will see.

Tune into the Geico 500 to catch the end of this race. The first two stages went caution-free, the first time that’s ever happened at Talladega, and now we are going to have a 68 lap dash to the finish line.