NASCAR Talladega live stream: Start time, TV schedule, and how to watch Alabama 500 online

In what is often the most wild and unpredictable playoff race, the NASCAR Monster Energy Cup Series is at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday. NBC will broadcast the Alabama 500 beginning at 1:30 p.m. ET with the green flag scheduled to wave at 2:20 p.m.

Talladega had previously been the final race of three in Round 2, but was shifted to the middle of the bracket this season. Drivers prompted the change as they preferred not to have an elimination race at a track known for its volatility due to the use restrictor plates, which lumps the field in a big pack and prevents cars from stringing out.

Of the 12 championship-eligible drivers, only Martin Truex Jr. is guaranteed a spot in the eight-driver third round. Truex locked himself into the semifinals by winning last week at Charlotte Motor Speedway. A win by any playoff driver Sunday will automatically advance them to next round.

Jamie McMurray provisionally holds the final transfer spot. Matt Kenseth (-1 point), Brad Keselowski (-2), Ryan Blaney (-5), and Ricky Stenhouse Jr. (-10), who won at Talladega in May, are the four drivers below the cut line.

The second round concludes next weekend at Kansas Speedway.

Scary Talladega looms as ominous hurdle in NASCAR playoffs

It is the playoff race drivers and crew chiefs view with a mix of apprehension and foreboding. The one race they feel like their championship fate is not dictated by their own doing, but at the mercy of those around them and beyond circumstances they have no control over.

Every year since the Cup Series went to a knockout playoff format in 2014, Talladega Superspeedway has been the race that has surprisingly and with unmerciful cruelty dashed championship hopes of expected title contenders. From Dale Earnhardt Jr., Jimmie Johnson and Kyle Busch the first year under the new structure, to Earnhardt again the next year, to Martin Truex Jr. and Brad Keselowski last year, the restrictor-plate track doesn’t discriminate when it comes to inflicting heartbreak.

Dale Earnhardt Jr. isn’t lacking motivation to win in final Talladega start

“People want to see [this team] go to the front,” Earnhardt said. “Our fans want to see us take the lead as fast as we can possibly take it. They want to see us in the lead every lap. And I can see in the grandstands the reaction when we have taken the lead and come around Turn 4 on the front straightaway.

“I know that’s there, and that pushes me all day at these plate tracks to do as much as I can to get into the lead and stay there.”