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In a recent article on Yahoo!Sports, the Rocketman Ryan Newman decided to play NASCAR Commish for a day and offer up some thoughts on changes he would make.

So of course I thought it was time to have some fun with that.

First of all, Newman wants to realign the stars and get rid of the 3 ½ day race weekends. He says “We leave on a Thursday afternoon, have to be at the track Friday, Saturday and Sunday. We don’t get home at midnight, 10 o’clock at the earliest on Sunday. It makes for a way longer week than it needs to be.” Oh wah, wah. While the crews work nearly around the clock but the drivers do not. And the crews work round the clock all week long. When you have teams practicing to beat the band prior to the race and you have to squeeze in qualifying as well as time for the sister races that may be running, just how do you shorten the weekend? Many tracks run the sister races and are dependent on that income for the weekend. And while I hate the practice, many tracks force you to buy the Nationwide race AND the Cup race.

He also wants to swap the spring Atlanta and Phoenix races. Why, cause it might be cold in Atlanta in early March? Cry me a river.

He also wants to drop one Cali race in favor of Darlington or somewhere like Kentucky or Nashville. What fan doesn’t agree with that? Kentucky is 1.5 miles, 14 degrees turn banking, and accomodates approximately 69,600. Nashville is 1.33 miles, 14 degree turns and accomodates 50,000+. Cali is 2 miles, 14 degree turns and accommodates 92,000+….wait a minute. 92,000 vs less than 70,000 at the other two tracks…hmmmm. But then, not all 92,000 seats are full but who cares? Greed is good and Roger Penske own Cali. Does he know Newman has said this???

He wants points awarded for qualifying. Of course he does. Just how would you do that Rocket Man? Top 1? 2? 3? 4? Where do you cut that off?

He does not like having to force the go or go home teams (outside the Top 35) to qualify last. He feels that they should be able to qualify based on their draw like the rest of the guys. But what he is missing is that qualifying altogether levels the playing field for those guys as they are competing against each other for the final spots. He might have a different opinion once Hornish falls out of the top 35. Or he is there himself someday.

He thinks the points leader going into the Chase should get bonus points based on being the leader. Yeah!!! I have been saying that since Day One. Let’s get it done!! Outside of that, he lies the Chase. I am numb to it. It is what it is even though I dislike it.

Tech inspection is too long. Oh really? And it needs simplifying. I am sure NASCAR would agree but when you have Chad Knaus and others trying to cheat their way into a victory, a long drawn out tech inspection is the reasonable outcome of that. Ryan – note the 3 ½ day weekend comment from before. It takes time to put 43 cheating SOBs through the paces. You think the officials like it any better?

SAFER barriers all around the track. Absolutely. See past article I have written, especially after Gordon’s nasty crash. He also wants a traveling safety team. I agree with him there too. NASCAR has more money than it knows what to do with. Get this done as well.

I also have to agree with him that not having had Hendrick win a single race so far compared to winning most of them last year is a major rush of fresh air.

I wish we could get more drivers playing Commish for a day. I had fun, hope you did too.

Let me know your thoughts on all this.

Drive fast, turn left and keep the shiny side up.

Feel free to send Chuck your thoughts on this and other race topics at chucka@turnleftracing.com. The blog at www.turnleftracing.com is down now due to spammers. We will have that back up as soon as we can.