by D.W. Collins

Created on: August 10, 2010   Last Updated: August 12, 2010

Should Daytona and Talladega be banned?: HELL NO! NASCAR is without doubt, the most challenging, and most competitive motor racing series in the world. As a spectacle it has no equal, no other form of motorsport, even Formula 1, can match the passion and excitement that NASCAR delivers, on a weekly basis.

Some of the most iconic, and historic names in the history of  motor racing, and indeed, in American sport in general, have made their names through the great sport of NASCAR: Dale Earnhardt, Richard Petty, and Jeff Gordon, to name but a few.

Thirty six “points paying” races, over ten months, of action packed, gruelling, passion filled sporting drama, a soap opera on wheels, if you will. Mostly racing on oval tracks, but no two tracks are exactly the same. They range from small half mile bull rings, to large, high speed, two mile plus super speedways, and two of those super speedways just happen to be Daytona and Talladega.

Central to what makes NASCAR so unique, is two of its most famous and revered tracks: Daytona and Talladega. These two high banked, fast paced, monstrous super speedways host a form of racing unlike anything seen anywhere else in the entire world of auto racing, that being “restrictor plate racing”

Restrictor plates are now standard practice in NASCAR, whenever they hold races at Daytona and Talladega, The main reason for this, is to try to contain the ever increasing speeds that stock cars can generate at big, high speed, high banked super speedways. Without the restrictor plates the cars are capable of speeds well in excess of 200mph, so in the interests of driver safety, NASCAR decided to put a cap on horsepower, just for these tracks (the “Cup Series” cars, the Premier Division of stock car racing, have hugely powerful 850bhp engines).

The trade off, though, for the decrease in engine power, is a racing spectacle unmatched in any form of motor racing anywhere in the world. Forty three raging, high speed stock cars bunched together in large, high speed packs, still touching 200mph, even with the restrictor plates attached. This spectacle is unique to NASCAR, no other major racing series can boast anything close to this, true motor racing utopia!

So an emphatic NO is the answer to the question: should Daytona and Talladega be banned? In fact NASCAR as a hole should be cherished for the sporting institution it has become, and make no mistake about it. Both Daytona and Talladega are amongst its crown jewels!

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