NASCAR had a wondrous year in many respects but also saw a lot of problems arise.
With the car of Tomorrow (COT) coming on the NASCAR Sprint Cup circuit full-time in 2008, just what changes will we see to the car to make the racing more competitive?
The COT was designed to be safer, level the playing field, be more cost-effective and make the racing better by relieving the aero dependency and putting the racing back into the hands of the drivers.
Well, it is safer so far, we’ll see how cost-effective it is and it certainly has not made the racing better. The car is dreadful in dirty air and doesn’t seem to want to turn in the corners. While there were some very close finishes, most of the race was boring until the closing laps when two or three cars were able to fight for the win. And a more level playing field? Hardly. It was painfully obvious that only a few select teams were ahead of the COT technology curve. NASCAR needs to tweak the package and Goodyear needs to bring some new tires to make this new car better. Keeping the status quo will not help the 2008 season.
The points system had another bad year. Jeff Gordon was way in front after 26 races and had that all disappear when the Chase started. He then lost to Jimmie Johnson who won a series high ten races for the season and four in the Chase. I still have an issue with the “regular season” points leader losing the lead the team fought so hard for after 26 races. But as fans across the country made their feelings known to me, more needs to be done. First of all, everyone that leads a lap gets 5 points right now no matter if it is 1 lap or 100 laps. The total lap leader also earns 5 points, which many fans do not realize. Personally, I would do away with the single lap point award. Guys are getting points for leading a lap under caution while the leaders are in the pits. That makes no sense to me.
The added bonus for wins really did not come into play this year and did not really affect the Chase. Perhaps the lap leader bonus should be more than 5 points and the winner should get more.
Of course, all this means that a driver having a Jimmie Johnson-like year will rack up a bundle of points. And while fans get sick of seeing the same guy win again and again, that is the way it is in any sport.
The top 35 rule has outgrown its use. Get rid of it. I know why it was enacted and it served its purpose for a short time. Perhaps it was a bad rule from the get go. But in any case, let it go. The 43 fastest cars should race on any given day. And get rid of the past champions provisional while you are at it. Bill Elliott is not competing at a decent level and he is there to help his team stay in the top 35 and that is all. If Bill wants to race, let him qualify on speed and let the owner get his equipment into shape to get him there.
But with that said, I do realize that smaller operations depend on such a rule and getting themselves safe for the first 6 races of 2008 means a huge breath of life for the season, But then those same owners usually fall back into the provisional game for the rest of the year to try and stay in the top 35. Let them race for qualifying. If you are fast enough to get in, you deserve to be in.
What do we as fans want to see? Be aware that the top 35 rule has eliminated the field fillers who can’t afford to keep a year-round team. Those guys would show up quite often to simply finish last and collect a decent paycheck to keep their dreams alive until the next race they could prepare for. Do we want that in Cup racing again? Or has the landscape changed and field fillers are a thing of the past?
The Chase. Love it, hate it, but it here to stay. It has produced some close finishes. Look at history: in 2000, Bobby Labonte beat Dale Earnhardt by 265 points. In 2001, Jeff Gordon out a whalloping on the field beating Stewart by 349 points. But in 2002, Stewart edged Mark Martin by just 38 and in 2003 Matt Kenseth beat Johnson by 90 with only 1 win all year but 25 Top 10 finishes. The next closest driver was Dale Jr. 207 back. Then the Chase started. Kurt Busch beat Johnson by 8 in the first Chase in 2004, Stewart beat Biffle and Edwards by 35 in 2005 and Johnson beat Kenseth by 56 in 2006. There were also 4 drivers within 78 points at the end of the year. This year, Johnson beat Gordon by 77 but the next closest driver was Bowyer at 346 points back. That’s an old school margin of defeat. You have to go back to 1997 when Gordon beat Jarrett and Martin by less than 30 points to find a pre-Chase finish as close. But between 1990 and 1999, half of the season finishes were well within 100 points.
So in the years just prior to the Chase, we had two close finishes and two that were not. Since then all have been close, meaning they were within 100 points at the end of the year. So you could claim that NASCAR has achieved its goal of closing the field back up and generating a close finish for the fans.
But how have the fans responded is the bigger question.
Looking at TV ratings and track attendance, fans are not watching. And not only during the Chase, but during the whole year. Losing Dale Earnhardt in 2001 had a huge impact on the sport and there hasn’t been a personality in NASCAR to replace his presence and his draw. Additionally, the changes that NASCAR has made to the sport have not brought in a sustained audience. While NASCAR has lost many old-school fans it has attracted many new fans. But those new fans have either moved on or are not as dedicated compared to old fans.
The broadcast of Cup racing has moved all over the dial, many fans do not have cable TV and others have simply refused to keep up with the ever-changing schedule. If they have followed, they have found the quality of the broadcast team and coverage has gone downhill playing to the lowest common denominator – the uneducated viewer.
After 20 races of that kind of patronizing drivel, many long-term fans simply tune out.
Lastly, the races are simply too long in my opinion. Since moving to the 36-race schedule in 2001, NASCAR has moved important dates out of the traditional strongholds and some tracks have lost all dates. Whether the tracks in the new markets can sustain long-term attendance remains to be seen, although the race at Texas this fall seemed to say “no”.
2008 will bring the 60th anniversary of NASCAR and the 50th anniversary of the Daytona 500. NASCAR will be raking in the dough in collectibles and everyone will be looking forward to the new season as we always do. But once the shine wears off, what NASCAR does in the next few months will have more to do with how the sport rebounds and sustains interest until November.
Let me know your thoughts.
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.
I like your column and the way you think. The chase doesn’t pick the winner. This season proved that. Adding two cars to the chase last year still didn’t get Jr. into the field. Move it back to ten and leave it alone and yes, let the 43 fastest race. I admit racing is a business but in NASCAR even the driver is managed by the crew chief in a pit box. The driver needs to be a bigger part of the game. Let his decisions determine more of the outcome, not a management team. This isn’t an F1 high tech display – or it shouln’t be. Maybe every team needs a Chad Knaus to level the field.
Regarding long boring races; shorten them instead of turning them into endurance contests where teams hold off the real racing until near the end.
I agree with almost everything you stated in your article. I have said for years that if you are fast enough to qualify then you go home and I don’t care which driver you are. It’s not fair to those who beat say Jeff Gordon or Dale Jr and they go home because of them being in the top 35. It’s just plain wrong. If they send the top driver’s in points home want to bet that they will get it together at the next race. Why are the fan’s not watching the race on television? It’s because the announcers are just awful this year last part of the year and the fan’s are sick of seeing and hearing nothing but Jr. Who cares if he’s riding around in 36th place and have them show us for five minutes or longer inside his car. That’s just nuts…plus I could care less about the break away car leave it on the track where the action is at. I also don’t believe that Dale Sr is the reason why viewing has gone down. It’s because we never know which channel it’s going to be on. Plus ABC/ESPN as been the pits…we don’t get have of what we get when FOX is showing the races.
The point system just plain stinks from my point of view. Why should a driver that has lead the points for the first 26 weeks have it all taken away from him. It’s a shame that when the Chase starts that the driver doesn’t get some kind of bonus for it. Not put behind another driver because they had a couple more wins. In my book it’s how you do all year and not what you do the last 10 races. Give more points to the winner of a race, bonus for a pole, bonus if you lead the points for 10 weeks in a row…then start the Chase where the driver’s are at the time the Chase starts. Don’t give a bonus for wins then…also they need to bring some different track and type races in the last 10 for the Chase. A road corse race needs to be in the Chase…Nascar needs to wake up and start listening to the fan’s or Nascar won’t have any fan’s left. Thanks for a great article.
I like your colum, I like the chase format, it think even more should be put on winning,more points and more money, Bruton Smith made a commit that more of the purse money should go to the winner, i agree, there should be a big gap between 1st & 2nd,and finishing 40th,41st,42nd&43rd should pay little to nothing,i like your view of getting rid of the top 35 and the 5 points for leading a lap. As far as races being boring, they are, because racing has become a business and business is boring. I want to see door to door, fender rubbing, bumper tapping racing every lap not drivers scared to do anything for the fear of losing points or being suspended,im not saying you have to destoy a bunch of cars, because i dont like watching a caution filled race either, when i first started watching racing the yellow goodyear on the tire would not last 10 laps, now they never go away,i want to hear the commentators call the race, not show me how something works every week, week after week after week,if every week you are catering to the new people to the sport and waht point do let them become loyal fans, its the same people talking about the same thing every week, i love nascar, have for the last 12 years, now its become……………. a business………… boring ol’ business
first of all the format wasnt changed when dale jr missed the chase and secondly jeff gordon dale jr didnt have a problem with qualifing and never have. how much did michael waltrip pay you anyway
NASCAR jumped the shark when they started trying to make all of the cars the same. It started innocently enough, when they outlawed ground effects and mandated roof flaps in the wake of the increasingly higher speeds in the name of safety. Restrictor plates came next and kept the speeds down at the super speedways. After successfully implementing these important safety rules, NASCAR went crazy with more and more rules. Instead of requiring the car body to use panels from and match the dimensions of the manufactures production car, they changed the rules to dictate the body dimensions. They started dictating rear spoiler height followed by angle. You no longer saw the pit crew adjusting the spoiler for more straightaway speed or more downforce. Instead of each team choosing their tire supplier, they pushed Hoosier out and mandated Goodyear (I don’t disagree with this tire decision as tire safety had been declining in the effort to maximize performance). More and more rules were implemented to the point of almost every component of the car being dictated by NASCAR. DEI had a great super speedway program due to their engine builders making their engines reliable at RPMs higher than anyone else. New rule: NASCAR will now dictate the transmission and rear end gearing to be the same for every car. So much for all of this engine development effort. Dale Jr. no longer dominates the super speedways.
NASCAR should make and enforce rules that pertain to safety and other key car specifications only. Rules on the type of engine, displacement, weight, and tire size are all OK. I would like to see OEM body panels as well. Let the teams be creative in improving performance.
I still like to watch the Cup races. However, while I used to plan my weekend around them, I now turn on the TV if I happen to be home and remember that there is a race. And then it is usually in the background as I concentrate on something else.
I’m in the demographic that NA$CAR doesn’t want any more. I’m almost 70 with a lot of discretionary funds. I’ve been a strong fan for many, many years. I stopped watching the races and supporting the sponsors primarily because of the top-35 rule. My driver drove for a new team and never had a chance to get into the top 35. He very frequently qualified faster than many of the top-35 drivers, but seldom raced. Why should I watch?
I also cancelled my Nextel contract because of the exclusive sponsor rule and all the lawyer BS that followed…I now use Verizon. I wouldn’t think of using Nationwide insurance because they (and NA$CAR) are chasing out all other insurance companies. Sponsors used to be as competitive as the drivers, now they just buy their way into the sport and lock out competition.
NA$CAR has changed so that money rules and the fans are totally ignored. If you ignore your fans long enough, there will not be any fans left to provide the dollars to the sponsors…what happens then? G’bye.
Cheers,
Larry
DW summed up Nascar in a recent interview, sayin,” Nascar has sucked the life out of racing and emasculated the drivers.” Current broadcasters are boring; the races are too long (a result of boredom); there is product differentialtion (COT) and the race cars are “spec” racers. The game has changed. I will probably stay a fan because I like race cars with fenders.