Kyle Busch, Execs Give Inside Look At NASCAR’s Historic First Race On Daytona’s Road Course

Everything is historic when it comes to Daytona International Speedway, but when NASCAR runs the Go Bowling 235 this Sunday (NBC, 2:30 p.m. ET; Radio: MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio) it will mark the first time America’s most popular racing series takes to the challenges of the road course.

The race highlights how leagues have had scheduling flexibility due to the pandemic. It presents challenges for not only the drivers who will race without practice or qualifying, but also for NBC as a broadcast partner. I spoke with execs at NASCAR, NBC, and driver Kyle Busch, who has experience on the road course, to get an inside look at how the race will play out.

Racing on the road course has long been in the fabric of Daytona for 61 years. With superbikes and the IMSA Rolex 24 for endurance racing, the track is unique in all the world. The road course – originally called “the International Horseshoe bend” – is comprised of 14 turns, which includes a large section on the superspeedway. “Due to the predicted high speeds and loads on the braking system, NASCAR will add a chicane off oval Turn 4 at Daytona and move to a high downforce 750 hp aero/engine package for the NASCAR Cup Series race,” said John Probst, senior vice president of racing innovation for NASCAR.

As to why NASCAR decided to go to the road course this year, it became a matter of practicality due to the COVID-19 pandemic. With New York state having announced in late June that anyone that visits from out-of-state must be in a 14-day self-quarantine, the road course race at Watkins Glen had to be canceled. Daytona’s facility is near where most of the teams have headquarters provided a road course option while reducing travel.

According to Ben Kennedy, the former racer now turned NASCAR’s managing director of racing operations and international development, different portions of the schedule were mapped out as part of the return to racing under the pandemic to offer the ability to get the most races in on the schedule but also looking at options too, as he said, “pull levers” to do so.

“The road course race at Daytona ultimately came from discussions around the 2020 schedule,” Kennedy said. “Given that we announced earlier in the year that Busch Clash would be moving to the Daytona road course for 2021 ahead of the Daytona 500, moving to the road course this year after Watkins Glen had to be canceled seemed like a really good opportunity.”

For the drivers, when the green flag drops it will be the first time that any of them have taken on the road course in a NASCAR event. Many of the drivers have been prepping for the race virtually. Kurt Busch, Ricky Stenhouse Jr., and more have been involved in iRacing, while others will run their own simulators such as Austin Dillon using Chevy’s, or a combination like Martin Truex, Jr. who has done iRacing along with TRD’s simulator. But that only goes so far.

“Nothing beats seat time at the track,” said Kyle Busch, who ran a Lexus RC F GT3 car in the Rolex 24 this past January and starts 4th from Row 2 on Sunday. “I picked a good year to race the Rolex 24, and specifically run in the GTD class which is a little bit closer to a Cup car in they’re heavier. They don’t have as much horsepower as a Cup car but it gave me a chance and a sense of speed and how fast it is to go around the road course for the cars we’re going to be running this weekend.”

As to car setup, downforce is traded for additional speed that comes with the superspeedway section of the course given the tight cornering through the infield. The setup of the cars is unique given the flat turns in the infield and exiting onto the steep banks of the superspeedway section.

Busch said the setup of the cars start with how you would approach a traditional road course, and adjust from there.

“You setup the rest of the track to deal with the suspension travel to keep the car from hitting the surface with the front bump-stops and since we can’t use bump-stops on the rear – not coil-binders on the springs – but bump-rubbers in the rear springs in order to stop travel. That’s about all you can really do. It’s all an unknown for us with this race. Knowing how much camber you need for the infield road course verses the superspeedway is all unknown. The only thing we have close is the Roval at Charlotte. But even the Roval is a different tire than we’re running on at the Daytona road course.”

For the broadcast by NBC, there’s some prior experience and yet will be wholly new. NBC Sports was the broadcast partner for the Rolex 24 in January, but that was before the pandemic hit. Now, with COVID-19 protocols the entire production is spread across multiple locations miles apart. The broadcast booth is at Charlotte Motor Speedway where two booths – one for Rick Allen and Steve Letarte and one for Dale Earnhardt, Jr. and Jeff Burton – are where the race is called. Around seven trucks that comprise the replay and main control room, special effects, etc. are the core hub at Charlotte. Another truck called “The Mule” that travels from track to track, carries the cameras, audio, and any other technology needed to get the feed of the races on the schedule back to NBC’s main broadcast hub in Charlotte. That environment has caused the entire production staff to adapt, said Jeff Behnke, NBC Sports VP of production for NASCAR. “For the broadcast team, it’s a completely different feel given the social distancing. You can’t tap your partner on the shoulder and say, ‘Did you see that?!?’ but everyone from top to bottom has done an outstanding job this season under the circumstances.”

As to the race itself, how does Behnke view it? “It should be exciting racing for fans,” he said. “We’ll use around 18 cameras for the road course at Daytona. Expect the unexpected.”  

As to how the race ultimately plays out, it will be dicey in the early going as drivers feel the cars and the course out and largely look to avoid contact. Initially, Busch said he’d look to stay out of trouble as the field stretched in the early laps. After that, Kyle Busch is going to be Kyle Busch, who is known for aggressive racing. While key passing zones for IMSA racing come with entering and exiting the infield, Busch said it will happen anywhere there are opportunities.

“Any turn is a passing turn,” he tells me. “I had a run-in with a driver one year at Watkins Glen about the final corner before the main straight. And he said, ‘That’s not a corner you pass in.’ And I said, ‘Excuse me? What are you talking about? There’s no such thing as a corner you don’t pass in.’”