Talladega Weekend Preview: All hail the return of Amelia and Dale Earnhardt Jr.

April 28, 2016 Greg Engle Main Page, NASCAR News Top Story, NASCAR Xfinity Series, Top Stories 0

Dale Earnhardt Jr. won in May last year behind the wheel of Amelia.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. won in May last year behind the wheel of Amelia.
Dale Earnhardt Jr. won in May last year behind the wheel of Amelia.

One quarter of the NASCAR Sprint Cup season is over.  Last Sunday at Richmond International Raceway, Carl Edwards bumped his Joe Gibbs Racing teammate Kyle Busch out of the way on the final corner of the final lap to secure the win. But that wasn’t the most exciting thing to happen in the series first nine races of the season.

The first quarter of the NASCAR Sprint Cup series featured two finishes, Daytona and Phoenix, that are tied for the seventh of all time (.010 seconds).  In fact seven of the first nine races ended in a margin of victory that was under one second, with one race (Atlanta) ending under caution. That’s the most since 2010 and is tied for the most through nine races since the inception of electronic scoring in 1993.

And there’s a full three quarters of a season to go.

The next stop on the circuit is at NASCAR’s largest track the mammoth 2.66 mile Talladega Superspeedway.  Saturday the NASCAR Xfinity Series will race 113 laps (300.58 miles) for the Sparks Energy 300 (3:00 p.m. ET on Fox) while Sunday the Sprint Cup series will take to the track for the GEICO 500, 188 laps (500.08 miles) (1:00 p.m. ET Fox, MRN, SiriusXM NASCAR Radio).

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About Greg Engle 7421 Articles
Greg is a published award winning sportswriter who spent 23 years combined active and active reserve military service, much of that in and around the Special Operations community. Greg is the author of "The Nuts and Bolts of NASCAR: The Definitive Viewers' Guide to Big-Time Stock Car Auto Racing" and has been published in major publications across the country including the Los Angeles Times, the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. He was also a contributor to Chicken Soup for the NASCAR Soul, published in 2010, and the Christmas edition in 2016. He wrote as the NASCAR, Formula 1, Auto Reviews and National Veterans Affairs Examiner for Examiner.com and has appeared on Fox News. He holds a BS degree in communications, a Masters degree in psychology and is currently a PhD candidate majoring in psychology. He is currently the weekend Motorsports Editor for Autoweek.