Breaking It Down: Newly-configured Atlanta ready to surprise drivers, fans

Higher banking, tighter turns and a new racing surface provide a combination of the best of both the superspeedway and intermediate worlds

This weekend, NASCAR’s top 3 series head to a freshly repaved Atlanta Motor Speedway for the first time since its reconfiguration. News of the track’s reconfiguration created quite a buzz within the NASCAR community last July when track officials announced that the 1.5-mile track would make unprecedented alterations to its traditional cookie-cutter layout that reigned since 1997.

The track’s new design incorporates unique dimensions such as 28-degree banking and 40-foot wide corners, which sets the speedway apart from any other intermediate track currently on the schedule. Between the fresh racing surface, unconventional dimensions, and the Cup Series’ new Gen 7 car, fans and teams alike head into this weekend full of curiosity and excitement as they eagerly await to see what kind of action the new configuration produces.

While the former racing surface desperately needed a repave, the four-degree increase in banking and narrowing of the racing surface came as a surprise to many. At 28 degrees, the track is now the highest banked intermediate oval on the circuit and the 40-foot corners resemble the width of Daytona, a track famous for its three-wide racing.

The track emulates the high banks and relatively narrow width of a superspeedway, yet its shorter length could potentially create its own distinctive style of racing. Drivers will carry high speed due to the characteristics of the track, yet unlike superspeedways, they will have to experiment with racing lines and the throttle in order to search for the perfect balance between speed and control.

To make things more interesting, NASCAR is bringing its superspeedway package and an apron line rule, similar to the double-yellow line rule, to Atlanta this weekend. Coupled with the hard tire compound that Goodyear traditionally brings to new racing surfaces, the action this weekend may have the best of both the superspeedway and intermediate worlds.

The Superspeedway package and track design are perfect to promote drafting and pack racing. However, when placed in the setting of an intermediate track, factors such as setup, tire wear, preferred lines, and throttle control will play much larger factors than they do at Daytona and Talledega. With this combination of factors at play, along with the fact that every driver is tasked with learning the new track, the racing we see this weekend may be the first of its kind.

Drivers will have an incentive to draft with each other down the straightaways to build up speed, while the corners will play a pivotal role in providing drivers an opportunity to pass. With the contrast between the drafting on straightaways and each driver’s individual approach to the corners, there is a good chance that there is a lot of two-wide racing that forces drivers to spend multiple laps setting up each pass.

"The track is totally different than anything we’ve ever had," last week's Cup winner, Chase Briscoe, said. "It’s supposedly going to be like a mini-Daytona or Talladega, with pack racing and drafting, but what really happens when we get there?

"It’s going to be intense, it’s going to be wild, it’s going to be a narrow track with a lot of speed and a lot of excitement. It’ll be interesting to see where we stack up when we get there. I don’t know what to expect."

Briscoe is one of the many drivers in the field who are completely unsure of what to expect. Briscoe and the entire field is essentially going in blind this weekend and many of his fellow drivers have voiced a similar combination of curiosity and excitement in their approach to this weekend’s race.

Fans will find out this weekend what the newly reconfigured AMS will race like. Until then, the speculation surrounding the possible outcomes runs rampantly through the garage area and social media in anticipation of the track’s debut.

Only time will tell if these changes turn out to be the right ones.

That being said, If successful, the ambitious defiance of tradition by Marcus Smith and SMI could very well pioneer the modern reimagination of the standard cookie-cutter intermediates that NASCAR fans know so well.