The era of top drivers continuing to drive until age 50 and beyond appears to be coming to an end. Sunday's Kobalt Tools 500 at Atlanta Motor Speedway is expected to be the final AMS race for Bill Elliott and Dale Jarrett.

Elliott, 52, isn't scheduled to run the fall race at AMS and has said he won't run Cup any more after this year.

JOHNNY CRAWFORD/AJC (ENLARGE)

Dale Jarrett, 51, surrounded by autograph seekers, will stop driving after an event in May.

RELATED STORIES • Rain postpones Friday's events

Jarrett, 51, is retiring from full-time Cup racing after next week's race at Bristol and ending his driving for good after the All-Star race in May. Ricky Rudd retired last year at age 51. Ken Schrader, at 53, is running a partial Cup schedule.

In the past two decades, since Jeff Gordon started winning Cup races at age 22, NASCAR teams have tended to hire younger drivers and put them in top-flight cars. Even though many of the sport's top stars have been in the Cup series for several years, the average age of active Cup drivers, once Elliott and Jarrett step aside, will be 34.87.

Jarrett said he believes the average retirement age is in for a significant drop.

"You'll have a lot more of the guys getting out between 40 and 45 than what will stay on after that," he said. "It's a totally different world out there now, and the opportunities are there for them to do their business, make their money and not have to stay around that long."

Jarrett and Elliott both say it's not the driving that drains them, it's the rest of the job.

"It's not that they don't want to, but it's such a grueling schedule that you have to keep to balance the competitive side and keeping the sponsor relations going," Jarrett said. "It just wears you down, and I think there's enough money out there that they don't have to do it until they're 50 years old."

Elliott said his decision wasn't all about money. Although he plans to spend much of his retirement time going to races with his son Chase, he has decided that sometimes there are better uses for his time.

Recently, he had been spending time with Glenda Gooch, a young north Georgia woman who had undergone a heart transplant. Gooch died while Elliott was testing his Cup car in California.

"I couldn't get back for the funeral," he said. "I realized there's a lot of good I can do with my life. That's the way I need to go."

Tony Stewart, 36, agrees that the average retirement age in NASCAR is in for a drop, and he attributes some of that to drivers starting their careers at earlier ages.

"Kenny Schrader didn't start in this deal until he was 29 years old," Stewart said. "Now if you're in your late 20s, you could have been here 10 years already. The whole cycle is changing because everything is going younger, and drivers are getting to the top tier at an earlier age."

Stewart also points out that a driver's career can end at any moment.

"You know any time you go out there in practice you could get hurt and not be able to do my job for the rest of my life," he said. "That's what scares you."

Gordon, 36, said that even though he has no immediate plans to retire, it is something he and many of his peers are pondering.

"I'm seeing guys earlier in their careers thinking about it," he said. "They're seeing how much money is coming in. They're saying, 'I've got to invest. I've got to think long-term.' Before, if you didn't make a lot of money you didn't worry about it. ...

"Now you look at guys outside this sport, and it makes you think about where you want to be."

Gordon said all of his sponsor contracts run through 2010, a juncture that may weigh heavily in his future career decisions.

"Once I knew that number out there that could be close to when I want to step away from a full-time schedule, then it makes you think about it a little more," he said. "I don't have a full plan or anything in place, but I've certainly thought about it more."