By Ramsey Poston, NASCAR Managing Director of Corporate Communications

Where to begin? There seems to be more angst and hand-wringing over Talladega today than in a long time.

Here's what I saw - Dale Earnhardt Jr., Kurt Busch, Denny Hamlin, Kevin Harvick, Kasey Kahne, Jamie McMurray, Jeff Gordon, Juan Pablo Montoya and others raced hard all day long. There were packs of three- and four-wide racing at various times around the 2.66-mile track. There were 58 lead changes among 25 drivers. According to the Loop Data, which electronically registers every car around the track, there was 13,438 passes among the 43 drivers.

Were there periods of single-file racing? Yes, and that's often the case at 'Dega. Love it or hate it, Talladega is about strategy; it's a chess match on wheels and sometimes takes time to develop and play out.

The ABC broadcasters certainly weren't happy with the race and they felt compelled to remind viewers of that virtually every lap. They seemed to blame NASCAR's enforcement of the rule prohibiting bump-drafting in the corners for every moment they didn't like. Along the way ABC missed a lot of very good racing. That's not to say that every lap was a barn-burner, but there was some seriously intense racing as well. Interestingly, a caller on Sirius NASCAR Satellite Radio this morning said that he first watched the race on ABC then listened to the MRN rebroadcast and said, "It was like two different races," referring to the excitement and action portrayed on the radio broadcast.

A number of myths quickly sprouted out of this race; so let's address them:

Was there a conspiracy among the drivers not to race as suggested by Dale Jarrett on ABC?

• No. As Jeff Burton said on Sirius today, "I think that's complete nonsense..."

Did NASCAR force the no bump-drafting rule on the drivers?

• The drivers asked NASCAR to enforce the rule. From the time we pulled into Talladega on Thursday, several well-respected veteran drivers came to the hauler and said "we need to address the bump-drafting in the corners." So that's what we did.
• Tony Stewart during the pre-race said, "I think NASCAR made the right decision. Like NASCAR said, we can police it best by not doing it but it's still hard to convince yourself that you're not doing the right thing. NASCAR told us not to push in the corners, so I'm all in favor of it."
• And Burton weighed in here too: "Think about how much conversation we had about bump-drafting: 'We got to take bump-drafting out', I mean how many people said that? Tons of people were saying bump-drafting is the problem. So NASCAR takes bump-drafting out - and now they say not bump-drafting in the corners is the problem. You can't win."

Does NASCAR care about safety?

• Burton took to task Ryan Newman's comments that NASCAR doesn't care about the drivers. To this, Burton was indignant: "To say NASCAR doesn't care about us is ridiculous I mean that is a ridiculous statement. Why do we have soft walls (SAFER Barriers)? Why do we have foam in side of race cars? Why did we design a car around safety? Why do we have dedicated rescue personnel? Why do we have catch-fences?"
• We all know that racing is a dangerous sport and nothing is more important than keeping the drivers as safe as possible. Rest assured we are reviewing each accident and learning more about what happened and why. We want to keep the cars from going airborne and will continue to address this issue.

That's the wrap up on 'Dega. Jimmie Johnson leads the field into Texas with his sights on making history. Will he be NASCAR's first driver to win four consecutive championships? We'll find out in the coming weeks.