Michigan International Speedway is a two-mile, D-shaped oval—it’s long, wide, and super fast. Remember that because of the shape, drivers are turning most of every lap—all the way from turn three, down the curving front stretch and through turns one and two. With all that turning, it goes without saying that downforce and handling will be important. That’s doubly true when you consider the turns are banked at only 18 degrees, which is pretty flat for as fast as the cars run.

But even though it’s fast, Michigan isn’t as taxing for the drivers because of all that room—you can race on the bottom, middle, or top, which makes it fun for the drivers and the fans. Michael Waltrip says: It's fun. It's just cool that you have options. That's all you want as a race car driver. You want to have somewhere to pass. At Michigan, if someone is running in your line, you just pick another one.��?

With that in mind, look for the drivers to search around during the race for the line that works best for their car. The track also tends to feature long green flag runs, making fuel mileage a possible factor—with cars able to run about 50 green flag laps on a tank of gas.

Wide and fast, Michigan is a great racetrack because it gives the drivers options. Go high, go low, or go anywhere in between. Wherever you need to go to make your car work, you can go there at MIS. Now with speeds pretty high, downforce is still critical, but the racing groove is so wide that you can get pretty far away from a guy you’re trying to get past, minimizing the effects of dirty air from his car. You see guys separate going into a corner and come back together coming out. Turn 3 can be tricky and MIS seems to favor Fords these days.