TRG # 004: Daytona, Drafting and Downforce

Daytona International Speedway (est. 1959), is the home of NASCAR's most prestigious race the Daytona 500 aka 'The Great American Race'. It hosts many other series and their events including the outgoing Grand-Am Rolex Sportscar series world renowned 24 Hours of Daytona and Brock Yates One Lap of America. Since 1987, the lap record was held by Bill Elliot in his Ford Thunderbird stock car; posting an average speed of 210.364 miles per hour (338.548 km/h) or a time of 42.783 seconds. Then, just recently this year of 2013, Colin Braun, driving a Michael Shank Racing USCC Ford/Riley DP smashed that record; posting a speed of 222.971 mph (358.837 km/h) or 40.364 s.

Drafting is an all important part of racing around this iconic speedway, not just for stock cars, but also for other types of racecars including sportscars. The basic concept is, by following a teammate or competitor closely, you can 'ride' the area of low air pressure immediately behind the lead car, thus allowing the chaser or 'pusher' to be able to save fuel and with their added momentum, potentially 'slingshot' around the leader to make a pass and gain that all-important position, which could mean the difference between winning and not. A good analogy for this concept is that of a boat cruising on a lake. At speed, a boat causes a significant amount of 'wake', which usually noticeably visible. The same goes for a racecar around large speedway, except that an air wake is not visible to the naked eye. Interestingly, it was said that Dale Earnhardt Sr. (the Intimidator), could 'see' the air and that is why he was so successful on the Superspeedways (2.5mi+).

Tandem drafting in NASCAR Cup racing

There are however, downsides to drafting. If you've ever watched stock car racing on television, you make have heard drivers on their team radios complaining about things such as 'Aero Loose' or 'Aero Tight'. The

reality is, sometimes drafting causes the lead car, while cornering, to become 'loose' (oversteer) and the chase car to become 'tight' (understeer), due to factors of 'drag'. This two different types of 'steer' are less than desirable handling conditions, and to this day, technology has not been able to negate these factors. This is all part of the challenge of racing on speedways and Superspeedways. Please bear in mind, this is only an introduction to these racing concepts and in order to pay them their full respect, I would probably have to write a textbook, that personally, I could probably not write.

Downforce, in introductory terms, is the the downward force of pressure created by the aerodynamic components of a racecar (eg. spoilers, splitters and dive planes). This helps the driver pilot the racecar more successfully around corners by the creation of 'Aero Grip', as opposed to (often in conjunction with) 'Mechanical Grip', which is created by the chassis (frame/suspension etc) of the car. To help one grasp this concept, look at a Formula Ford racecar; you will notice their are no 'aero' components, thus isolating the 'Mechanic Grip' factor and why Formula Ford is considered one of the best Driver Development categories in the world.

Look ma, no wings!