NASCAR teams were informed Friday morning that all sanctioned racetrack testing in 2009 has been banned. (Photo: Todd Warshaw, Getty images) » More Photos

Hamlin thinks open testing might just be the way to go. “In the end, maybe we wouldn’t do as much testing,” he said. “We’d be doing more that actually means something. We’d be going to tracks we’re racing at now instead of going to places that we don’t race and try to figure out things that don’t mean anything. We’ve been going to all these places to do this testing anyway, now you might settle down and do possibly less. There’s only so much you can do with these cars, and you can’t get over inventive with them. You’re not going to go to all the tracks — some are cookie-cutters — so if you got it figured out at one track you can make it work for the others.”

FRONT-ROW AGAIN? Joe Nemechek has always been good at superspeedway qualifying, as witnessed by his pole run at Talladega Superspeedway in April and this year’s Daytona 500, where he was the third-fastest qualifier on pole day. Nemechek returns to Daytona International Superspeedway this weekend for the Coke Zero 400, but he does so without the Furniture Row Chevrolet that was so good earlier in the year. That car was wrecked in a last-lap crash at Talladega.

So how will its replacement be? “Let's just say we're cautiously optimistic,” said Nemechek, who needs to qualify on time for Saturday night's race as one of the go-or-go-home drivers. “We should have another great superspeedway Chevy, but as hard as you try to make it identical, it's never 100 percent the same. Hopefully our new superspeedway car will be as good or better. I really enjoy running at these big tracks.”

Tom Jensen is the Senior NASCAR Editor for SPEEDtv.com, the former Executive Editor of NASCAR Scene and a contributing Editor for TruckSeries.com. He is the author of “Cheating: The Bad Things Good NASCAR Nextel Cup Racers Do In Pursuit of SPEED,” and has appeared on numerous television and radio shows to discuss NASCAR racing. Jensen is the President of the National Motorsports Press Association. The Answer Man is back at SPEEDtv.com. Tom Jensen answers your questions during every race week and looks forward to hearing from you - please e-mail it to