NASCAR classifies its racetracks into two categories, short tracks and super speedways. Short tracks are anything under a mile; while the super speedways are over a mile. There are two tracks in the super speedway category that exceed the two mile length - Dayton International Speedway is 2.5 miles long while Talladega Speedway is 2.66 miles in length. These tracks also have a banking at the turns in excess of 30 degrees.
Because of the speeds that can be achieved at these tracks - in excess of 200 miles an hour - the engines are restricted in the amount of horsepower they produce which slows the cars down around eight or 10 miles an hour. However, when the cars get into a single line causing a draft the speed of these cars increases and can again reach the 200 miles an hour mark. As a child I lived five miles from the track in Daytona. This was before the speeds reached today and the restricor plates and we could hear the cars going around the track even with the windows closed.
But because of the restrictor plate Daytona and Talladega are not the fastest of the tracks in NASCAR racing. That distinction belongs to Atlanta Motor Speedway where the cars can easily reach the 200 mile an hour mark without the help of drafting.
Unlike the open wheeled cars that routinely exceed two hundred miles per hour, NASCAR tries to keep the cars under that mark as a safety issue. Even so when there is a crash at the larger tracks it can trap a large number of cars in the field causing what is known as THE Big One. The cars are usually a mess after such an event but fortunately the drivers nearly always walk away from the fray.
