Why Tiny Martinsville May Be Meanest Track on NASCAR Schedule

• Many drivers rank the.526-mile paperclip-shaped oval at Martinsville, Va., as among the toughest tracks on the NASCAR schedule.

• Richard Petty won at Martinsville 15 times, and Darrell Waltrip scored 11 victories to lead all drivers.

• Denny Hamlin, a five-time winner at Martinsville, called the track “a beast on its own."

Short and slow. Old and flat. All adjectives that describe NASCAR’s tiniest short track, Martinsville Speedway.

The general perception is that Martinsville, roughly similar to many of the half-miles drivers encountered on their routes to the Cup Series, should be relatively easy to negotiate. However, many drivers rank the.526-mile paperclip-shaped oval, the only track remaining on the Cup regular-season schedule from the inaugural 1949 season, as among the toughest.

Among the reasons:

1. Dozens of drivers seeking to place their cars in limited spaces.

2. The length of the workday in a 500-lap race (Sunday’s Cup race is set for 400 laps; the November 3 race is 500).

3. The droning, repetitive nature of a long race on a very short track. If you last to race’s end in a 500-lapper, you’ll make 1,000 turns.

4. Passing can be painfully hard. Often, it’s about gaining an inch or two lap after lap before finally getting inside the other driver’s left fender to create a side-by-side battle.

5. Pit road. One of the most claustrophobic in the series. The No. 1 pit box, with an easy exit, is coveted.

6. Anger. It’s easy for the too-close-for-comfort racing at Martinsville to create road rage, and fender exchanges between drivers can produce multi-car wrecks that often envelop the innocent.

“It’s different,” said defending Cup champion Ryan Blaney, who won last October’s three-hour, 30-minute race at Martinsville. “It’s so finicky how it works and what you need there to be good. Starting there in trucks and my first couple years in Cup, I couldn’t find my way at all. It takes a while to kind of get your feel.