Since 1997, Elliott Sadler had always circled the races at Talladega Superspeedway on his calendar as ones he desperately wanted to win. He finally made his mark at NASCAR’s Most Competitive track a year ago, holding off an array of challengers to claim his first Talladega triumph. What’s next on his list? How about a repeat trip to Gatorade Victory Lane in the May 2, Winn-Dixie 300!
“Do you know how hard it is to win at a place like Talladega Superspeedway?” asked Sadler, who prior to the victory, went winless in 28 NASCAR races – Sprint Cup and XFINITY Series – at the mammoth 2.66-mile venue. “We had been trying for so long and been close so many times. I flipped at Talladega too many times to count trying to make it to Victory Lane, but last year guess where we were? We were there. Now that place is going be special going back to try to defend our title.”
A back-to- back visit to Talladega’s Gatorade Victory Lane in the NASCAR XFINITY Series has yet to happen since Martin Truex Jr. did so three consecutive times from 2004-2006. Sadler, who drives the No. 1 Ford for Roush-Fenway Racing in 2015, will face some fierce competition to achieve this goal, including a huge crop of youngsters as well as seasoned veterans like the 2013 Winn-Dixie 300 winner Regan Smith.
Smith, driver of the No. 7 Chevrolet Camaro for JR Motorsports, came close to catching Sadler last spring, crossing the start/finish line in third place just behind Chris Buescher, Sadler’s new teammate this season.
“When we won at ‘Dega a couple of years ago, it was a tough race mentally,” said Smith, who edged Joey Logano, Kasey Kahne and Kurt Busch in a nail-biter in the final laps. “We had weather issues that day but we got in. The weather played mind games with us, and then at the end, it was a lot of tense moments. We feel good about coming back to Talladega, and expect there to be many drivers to contend up front.”
Smith has 18 races under his belt at Talladega to give him and Sadler a total of 47 starts. The top five in the NASCAR Sprint Cup Series standings currently – Chris Buescher, Ty Dillon, Chase Elliott, Darrell Wallace, Jr., and Ryan Reed have 14 career starts between them in various series at NASCAR’s biggest and baddest track. All five are seeking their first victory at NASCAR’s Most Competitive track.
Dillon is the grandson of Talladega Superspeedway all-time winning team owner Richard Childress. Elliott is the son of two-time Talladega winner Bill Elliott, who also set the official NASCAR qualifying mark of 212.809 mph in 1987. Reed captured the season-opening XFINITY Series race in Daytona while Wallace, Jr., a Mobile, AL native, was ninth in last fall’s NASCAR Camping World Truck Series race. Buescher is just hoping to improve one spot from his runner-up finish a year ago.
Talladega’s weekend kicks off on Friday (May 1) with practice sessions for the GEICO 500 (NASCAR Sprint Cup Series) and Winn-Dixie 300 (NASCAR XFINITY Series), as well as practice, qualifying and green flag for the International Motorsports Hall of Fame 200 ARCA Racing Series Presented by Menards event, set to start at 5 pm (CST). The evening concludes with “The “Big One on the Blvd” Mardi Gras-style parade, which will feature NASCAR drivers and fan competitions on the track’s infield Talladega Blvd.
Saturday’s slate includes qualifying for the GEICO 500 and Winn-Dixie 300, followed by the start of the Winn-Dixie 300 at 2 p.m. (CST). The day concludes in the evening with the Talladega Superspeedway traditional Infield Concert featuring country music maverick and Columbia Nashville recording artist Chase Rice. The concert is free with the purchase of a Sunday GEICO 500 (12 noon CST start) admission ticket. For ticket information, call 1-877-Go2-DEGA or visit www.talladegasuperspeedway.com.
All seating along the fronstretch grandstands and towers are equipped with roomy and comfortable 21- and 22-inch wide chair back seats. Large High Definition Sprint Vision video boards that were implemented in 2014 will be back – three are permanent – and placed along the frontstretch to provide views of the whole track to every seat in the house. The video boards, three of which that are now permanent, are an initiative that is planned to be implemented at all International Speedway Corporation (ISC) tracks in the coming years.
TSS PR
