Bristol's my favorite track: You've got to be kidding
Darrell Waltrip / AllWaltrip.com
Posted: 23 minutes ago

Well, folks, I'm sitting in the motorhome, just looking out and watching it snow and rain awhile up here in the mountains of East Tennessee.

The weather is so unpredictable, and you know what? This whole Tri-Cities area is unpredictable because that's the way this race certainly always is. It's very unpredictable. You never know what's going to happen next at this little bullring. It's like the Bermuda Triangle. You fly in here, all kinds of weird things happen, and there's no explanation for it. Ask Dale Jarrett, Jamie McMurray and some of the more even-tempered guys who have certainly lost their cool, but drivers won't lose their cool this weekend because it's about 38 degrees with snow flurries.

Winning at Bristol is so gratifying for a driver because you know you've accomplished something special. Sure, there are other races on bigger racetracks that may have more prestige. But in a driver's eyes, the short tracks are the hardest races to win because you have to have it all together. You don't necessarily have to have the fastest car. You don't necessarily have to have the most horsepower. It's not about aerodynamics. It's about finesse, good car control and good vision. Driving a racecar is about vision, being able to see and anticipate things. The smaller the circle, the quicker you have to react.

A short track is absolutely the most fun place to race because the driver can make such a huge difference. When you win at Bristol, you defy the odds. There are 43 cars on a half-mile track for 500 laps. More than likely, you're going to encounter every possible situation that you can imagine — and some you can't — in one race.

During the last couple Bristol spring races, there have been some long green runs, and we've actually had some green-flag pit stops. I hope that trend continues because it's interesting to watch drivers change from pitting under green to pitting under a yellow flag. Under the green, you can come in off of Turn 4 or off of Turn 2, depending on which side of the track you're pitting on. During a caution period, all cars enter pit road at the Turn 2 entrance. You have to go all the way around both pit roads to get to your pit stall. It's been very confusing to drivers. Even veterans like Mark Martin and Jeff Gordon have made a mental mistake and come in the wrong entrance.


Friday, 3/24 on SPEED
7 p.m. ET: Trackside on SPEED

Saturday, 3/25 on SPEED/FX
Noon ET: Busch qualifying on SPEED
1:30 p.m. ET: NASCAR Live on SPEED
2 p.m. ET: Nextel Cup Happy Hour on FX
3 p.m. ET: Bristol Busch race on FX
7:30 p.m. ET: SPEED News
11 p.m. ET: Tradin' Paint on SPEED
11:30 p.m. ET: NASCAR Performance on SPEED

Sunday, 3/26 on SPEED/FOX
11 a.m. ET: NASCAR RaceDay on SPEED
1:30 p.m. ET: Bristol Nextel Cup race on FOX
7 p.m. ET: SPEED News
8 p.m. ET: NASCAR Victory Lane on SPEED
# 2006 NASCAR on FOX schedule

Your brain gets scrambled and you feel fatigued from going around in circles on the track's high banks. You're going to race a little, but you're going to wreck a lot. Even if you're not the one that's in a wreck, you're going to be around wrecks all day long. It twists drivers to the limit. If you're not in a wreck, you still have to avoid it, and it will take you out of your rhythm.

Bristol is physical. It's a 36-degree banked racetrack at high speed. You run around the track at 130 mph with a lot of downforce and sideforce. And then there's the mental fatigue of the traffic and dealing with all the things you've got to deal with in a matter of milliseconds. Things happen quicker at Bristol than they do at Daytona and Talladega. You're physically and mentally stretched all the time.

And the wrecking is emotional. If it's happening to you, then you're going to lose your cool. You're going to get upset, and you're going to react and retaliate, which will make it worse. Maybe the wrecks are not of your own doing, but when somebody wrecks in front of you, you can't avoid it. Last year, Kurt Busch slid back up in the track in front of Jeff Burton and just rammed into him. It's a product of having nowhere to go. It's a very small circle, and there aren't a lot of places to hide. When something happens, it happens so quickly that it's almost unavoidable.

It takes a special driver to be able to deal with everything: the racing, the physical part, the mental part, getting tired, being physically fatigued and being emotionally drained. You can't let close racing, with all the bumping and bouncing off each other, affect you. You can't let it get the best of you. You have to put it behind you

In the movie Forrest Gump, there's a line, "Stupid is as stupid does." That's what happens to you. You're in control of everything that's going on around you, and everything is going your way. But then somebody does something that's really dumb, and you get caught up in it. You'll just see guys make mistakes and use bad judgement, but you've just got to keep your dog out of all those fights. There's no payoff for an angry payback. All you're going to end up with are angry people. You're going to end up in the Oval Office with fines and probation. We've seen emotional and physical reactions happen on the track during the race and in the pits after the race.

If a driver could just take a chill pill before this race starts and not let all these things affect him to the point that it hurts him, then he can be successful. To win at Bristol, it takes a really smart guy who is in complete control of not just his car but himself. Each race provides the perfect example of guys that have control over themselves and their actions and guys that don't.

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Other factors go into winning at Bristol. You've got to be lucky, which goes back to skill and all of those things. You've got to have a great pit crew because getting out in front of people and not having to pass them on the track makes a driver's job a lot easier. And I don't even like to use the word "patience" because race drivers really don't have patience. They have intelligence. You have to be intelligent enough to sit behind somebody, wait for them to mess up and not force them into something that sucks you into it as well. I don't like to say that drivers are patient because we're not, but some drivers use more intelligence than others, which shows in the results.

I get tired of people saying, "Aww, it's just Bristol." But, you know what, it is just Bristol. I don't know how one little racetrack can cause so many headache, but it does. And it's fun to watch. If you don't believe me, tune in Saturday and Sunday on big FOX, get yourself a box of chocolates, sit back and watch.

Oh, by the way...
If I were a Dodge team, I would run my Intrepid at Bristol, and I'll tell you why. The Dodge Charger is known to have overheating issues. It's going to be chilly this weekend, which will help everybody's overheating problems. But with a little damage and debris on the nose, I'd want to have the best possible cooling system that I could have. The Intrepid is a little easier to manage than the Charger so I would run my Intrepid here this weekend.