Average Practice Speeds: Talladega 2 – Good Sam Roadside Assistance 500 (2012 Chase Race #4)

If there’s one place that you can skip practice at, it’s Talladega–and that’s what many teams did on Friday. There were many teams that ran a few laps early in the day to make sure nothing was wrong with the car and then parked and will wait for qualifying on Saturday. As a fantasy racer, I don’t see a reason to take practice speeds to seriously at the restrictor plate tracks. The only time I look at them is when I need a tiebreaker between drivers, but you can use them however you want.

Important Practice Notes: 1st practice notes (click here). Happy Hour notes (click here).

You can save 10% on your membership this week by using the discount code “gofantasyracing“.

 Average Practice Speeds:

Average practice speeds are calculated by taking the average speed of each driver in each practice and multiplying it by the number of laps ran. When you do this for each practice and add the  totals together, and then divide by the total number of laps ran, you get an average of their practice speed, instead of just the one lap statistic you see when you look at practice sheets. I have found over the years that this is much more accurate as to whether or not someone has a car that is good for one lap or one that can consistently be fast. These numbers, however, can be skewed if a team puts new tires on frequently or rarely changes the tires. Those marked in red did not participate in Happy Hour.

In the first practice session, the five fastest drivers were:
1. Travis Kvapil – 200.452 mph
2. Casey Mears – 200.322 mph
3. Jeff Gordon – 199.633 mph
4. Brad Keselowski – 199.562 mph
5. David Ragan – 199.554 mph
Click here for the complete results from this practice.

In terms of ten-lap average, the top five for the first practice were:
1. Casey Mears – 196.345 mph
2. David Ragan – 196.203 mph
3. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. – 195.999 mph
4. Brad Keselowski – 195.907 mph
5. Sam Hornish, Jr. – 195.814 mph
Click here for the complete ten-lap average chart for the first practice.

In “Happy Hour”, the fast five were:
1. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. – 197.598 mph
2. Kurt Busch – 197.521 mph
3. Carl Edwards – 196.053 mph
4. Matt Kenseth – 195.948 mph
5. Marcos Ambrose – 195.688 mph
Click here for the complete results from this practice.

When it came to ten-lap average, the best for Happy Hour were:
1. Kurt Busch – 193.795 mph
2. Martin Truex, Jr. – 193.753 mph
3. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. – 193.647 mph
4. Juan Montoya – 186.430 mph
5. Carl Edwards – 185.734 mph
Click here for the complete ten-lap average chart for Happy Hour.