Daytona Beach is a city in central Florida, midway between Orlando and Jacksonville. With a 23-mile coastline facing the Atlantic ocean, full of hard-packed sand beaches and open spaces, Daytona is a top destination for outdoor activities. But for any motorsports enthusiast, the city is all about the Daytona International Speedway, home to the NASCAR Daytona 500 race every February since 1959. The Road Course at Daytona International Speedway has a 12-turn layout where cars can develop lightning speeds, with a 101 mph average velocity that doubles in the fastest sections of the track. Most of it goes through the 31-degrees banked tri-oval NASCAR racetrack, except turns 1 to 6 and 8 to 11, enclosed infields of the main oval track.
The first turn in the road course layout brings an abrupt decrease of speed, approximately from 200 mph to 70 mph, immediately followed by a slight direction change with little room for passing at turn two. Then comes the first hairpin at turn three and a high-acceleration segment only interrupted by the kink in turn 4. In this high-speed left-hander, lots of accidents happen when drivers underestimate the difficulty of the sector. The second hairpin at turn five leads to turn number six, which is a transition back into the tri-oval area. Once on the NASCAR track, the wind plays a huge factor, as also does the heavy 31-degree banking of the raceway, forcing drivers on the top to cover longer distances than those going at the bottom. Last but not least, the other infield segment from turns 8 to 11, called the Bus Stop, is a narrow left-right-right-left turn combo, hard to get through, where even the tiniest mistakes can prove to be very costly.
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