Sorting out Pocono

By Richard Petty, Special to Turner Sports Interactive
July 23, 2001
1:08 PM EDT (1708 GMT)

Back about the mid-1970s, we started hearing about this brand-new track somebody was building in Pennsylvania. All we heard was that it was in the middle of a spinach field, that it was in the mountains of eastern Pennsylvania and that it had three turns.

I remember one of the boys who was working with us at the time said, "Three turns?"

"Yeah," I said, "Sounds different, huh?"

He stood there for a minute, a real puzzled look on his face.

"How do they get back to the finish line then?"

Well, there is a way back to the finish line and, like any other race, it's the first one there who wins. Pocono is a triangle. Actually, it's probably closer to a clothes hanger than anything else. You have a long, long, loooong front straightaway and two back straightways. Just to jazz it up a little, all three turns are different -- different length, different radius and a totally different way to approach them.

Pocono has something for everybody. You like drag racing? It's there -- that long front straightaway. You like superspeedway racing? It's there with that long two-and-a-half miles. You like short track racing? It's there with those short straightaways on the back. You like road course racing? Man, it's definitely there with three different turns. You like speedboat racing? Hey, we've even seen that in some of the downpours that come out of those thunderstorms in the summer.

And it's like any other track in that how well you get around the place determines how well you finish. Pretty simple, huh?

Start with a good motor -- a really good motor. You need a lot of horsepower there. The thing is, sometimes you can get too much horsepower because of that long front straightaway.

What was happening there a lot of times was cars would turn so many RPMs down the front straightaway that it was taking a toll on the engines. Now just about everybody shifts there into an "overdrive" to keep that really high RPM deal from happening.

But even after you figure out the engine, you still have to get through those turns. What you are looking for on the chassis is how to get the car through three completely different turns and get it through them really well. Getting down those three straightaways takes some doing, but it's a horsepower thing through them most of the time. A horsepower thing and a drafting thing.

The first turn is at the end of that long straightaway. You're coming in there pretty hard and it's a pretty good turn to the left. There isn't a ton of banking but there is some to help you through there. But it's a tough turn, and you have to get into it the right way -- not too much speed but not too little, not too much brake.

The second turn they call the "Tunnel Turn." Yeah, you guessed it. That's because the tunnel comes in right underneath it.

It's a short turn -- you are pretty much into it and out of it in a hurry. A lot of people consider it the toughest turn at the track, maybe one of the toughest turns in racing. You can go through side-by-side, no matter what anybody tells you.

Now, you might not want to go through there side-by-side but you can. The deal is -- be the car on the inside. If anybody is going to wish he wasn't side-by-side in that turn, it's going to be the guy on the outside.

The third turn is a long, sweeping turn that takes you back to that long front straightaway and the start-finish line. You want to get through it quickly like you do with any other turn, but it is a 'set-up' turn too. You want to go through it so you are in a good position to get down the frontstretch again. How you get through the third turn determines how well you do down the frontstretch until at least the start-finish line, if not all the way.

The place is a challenge, for sure, and you'll see guys trying all kinds of different tricks and setups all weekend long. The ones who hit it will be great and the ones who don't will be struggling. There's not a whole lot of middle ground at Pocono.

It's a busy weekend. You spend every minute you have on the track trying to figure the place out, and every minute you have off the track trying to figure the place out. Tell you what - once you figure the place out, it's a really, really good feeling.