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Archive for February, 2010

California RacinDeals

Feb 22

Posted by Glen Harness in NASCAR, RacinDeals | Comments off

SERIES SPONSORS: I don’t get paid to mention the names of the sponsors of the top three NASCAR touring series (for any FTC types out there). So I’ll be referring to them as the “Cup” series, the “Grand National” series, and the “Truck” series. Now if those sponsors want to throw some money my way… Oh, that applies to speedways too.

WHERE’S DANICA?: I watched the whole Grand National race on Saturday,  and not once did the announcers update us on where Danica Patrick was running. Not once! No, not once, but about 30 times it seemed. I have to agree with Kyle Busch on this one: she hasn’t done  anything to garner that kind of attention, other than being female. And it’s really kind of sexist if you ask me. I thought it was very interesting that the ESPN announcers quickly tried to lower expectations for Danica by telling us how other Indy Car drivers did in their races at California Speedway. They didn’t give us any context, just finish positions (would have been nice to know if any of those drivers led or was taken out in a wreck not their fault).

START TIMES: I’ve seen ads on Speed touting the  consistent start times for Cup races. Apparently Fox doesn’t expect its viewers to know the difference between when a race starts and when coverage starts. The TV listings showed the race starting at 2:00 pm, when in fact it actually started at 3:00 pm (actual green flag was closer to 3:15 pm). Fox needs to separate their pre-race coverage from the actual race coverage. I nearly wasted a whole hour of DVR recording time because of their fake start time.

YAWN: Wake me when the race is over. If ever there was a race that indicated a need for competition cautions, that was it. And the Grand National race would have been the same except for the green/white/checker finish.

IS DIGGER WITH DANICA?: I noticed a lack of the stupid cartoon “Digger” during the first half of the race. And in the second half, they only showed the cartoon during caution laps. Maybe they finally got the message that people didn’t want a cartoon taking up half the screen when they were racing.

NO, LITTLE E IS WITH DANICA: Was last week a fluke for the 88 team? Are they back to their back-marker ways? Is he regretting leaving his dad’s team now?

THE PACE CAR: I wonder if NASCAR had to install one of those ignition cut-off switches in the pace car?

Daytona Week Racindeals

Feb 15

Posted by Glen Harness in NASCAR | Comments off

DANICA WHO?: Watched the Danica Patrick Nationwide Race on Saturday. I think some guy named Stewart won, but the race was dominated by Danica Patrick.

Look: I don’t have anything against Danica Patrick. I hope she’s successful in NASCAR. But you know and I know that she wouldn’t be getting 1/10th the attention she’s getting if she was ugly (or a guy). She’s an above average IndyCar driver who’s managed to get one victory in all her IndyCar starts. And with a field of only about 20 cars, it’s pretty easy to get top tens.  I’d be more impressed with her move to NASCAR if she’s won a championship or two. Heck, when Dario Franchitti moved to NASCAR in 2008, he’d already won an IndyCar championship and a few races. I daresay that he got nowhere near the publicity in his whole NASCAR career than Patrick has gotten in two stock car races.

IN THE BOOTH: ESPN has to have the worst announcers in the booth of any of the networks. Keep Dale Jarrett and replace Petree and the other guy. Bring back Bob Jenkins, please! Buddy Baker would be good to get back into the booth too.

WILL THE REAL START TIME PLEASE STAND UP: Speaking of ESPN, they had the start time of the Nationwide race at noon my time. I didn’t find that out until about 12:40. I ran downstairs thinking I’d missed the first 30 or so laps, only to find out that I’d only missed one green flag lap and they were under caution on lap four. So I didn’t really miss anything. Maybe ESPN didn’t get the memo to distinguish between the pre-race show and the race coverage. They should have said “pre-race show starts at noon, and race coverage begins at 12:30″.

And Fox wasn’t any better. I had the 500 set to record on my DVR, and the start time that Fox had was an hour earlier than the actual race. I know they want to get people to watch their pre-race shows, but I’m just not interested anymore. Ten years ago, yeah. But not today. And I don’t appreciate being tricked into watching it… and I just fast-forwarded past all that junk anyway.

MAKING THE RACE: I wish they would go back to the old method of selecting the starting field for the 500. With thirty-five guaranteed spots, it takes the drama out of the qualifying races. But I guess NASCAR got tired of some of their big names not making the race.

THE GREAT AMERICAN RACE: As far as the 500 itself goes, it was probably one of the better ones I’ve seen in a while. I’ll admit that I was wrong in predicting that NASCAR would chicken out on the larger restrictor plate, and I’m glad they stuck with the bigger one. Good to see another Roush refugee do good. And Little Earnhardt brought back memories of the fall 2000 Talladega race, his dad’s last win, with his move from 10th to 2nd.

LETTING THE DRIVERS DRIVE: I’m sure the NASCAR brass has broken their arms patting themselves on the back for “putting it back in the drivers’ hands”. But it never should have been taken out of their hands to begin with.

WAITER, THERE’S A HOLE IN MY TRACK: The Daytona track management should be embarrassed. Their “we’ll be racing in 10 minutes” turned into 100 minutes, and then they used the wrong patching material and had to stop the race again. There’s no excuse for that, at all. If I’d been at the race in person I’d have wanted some of my money back.

DANICA, PART DEUX: Next week is California Speedway, or whatever they’re calling it now. The Danica show will be on Saturday, and the Cup teams will run Sunday.

Daytona So Far

Feb 8

Posted by Glen Harness in General, NASCAR | Comments off

After the first weekend of stock car activity at Daytona, there were a few big news stories that came out.

The big news (as expected) is Danica Patrick. She ran in the 80-lap ARCA race and finished a respectable 6th. But she was nearly overshadowed by one of the other 5 women in the field, Alli Owens, who used some pit strategy and ran in third for most of the last half of the race, while Danica was recovering from a trip through the infield grass.

Now we hear that Patrick will be running in the Nationwide race Saturday. I personally think it’s a big mistake. The Nationwide Series is not ARCA. Where you might have only had two or three good drivers in the ARCA race, a lot of the Cup drivers will be in the Nationwide race, so the level of competition will be orders of magnitude higher.  I just hope that the reporters  give her the attention she deserves, and no more.

Is Junior back? He qualified on the outside pole for the 500 and only he and his teammate, Mark Martin, have guaranteed starting positions. The rest of the field will have to sort themselves out in one of the two qualifying races on Thursday. Obviously, it’s too early to tell if Little Earnhardt is back, but starting up front certainly helps.

Getting back to the ARCA race for a minute, I really liked the way Darrell Waltrip and Phil Parsons worked together in the booth. It was much less “frantic” than when Larry McReynolds is in there. Larry Mac is a good pit reporter; why doesn’t Fox hire Parsons and put McReynolds in the pits?

The Bud Shootout was Saturday night. I have to say, I don’t think it bodes well for the 500. It was another “get out front and no one can pass you” race. Of course, I could be wrong; the teams could have done stuff to those cars for that race that they’d never think about doing for the 500. I hope so.

I have to say that I’m surprised that NASCAR still hasn’t messed with the plates yet. I predicted that they’d go to a smaller plate before the race, and I’m sure they could still do that. I suspect that if too many cars get airborne on Thursday, they’ll change the plate then.

I’m DVR’ing the races on Thursday, so I’m going to have to decide whether to keep up with the race as best I can during the day, or avoid all racing news and be surprised as I watch them when I get home.

Not Your Father’s (or Grandfather’s) NASCAR

Feb 1

Posted by Glen Harness in NASCAR | Comments off

Brian France continues to put his own stamp on NASCAR.  He’s done away with (or doing away with) the wing on the Cup cars, replacing it with the spoiler that adorned the cars for decades.

But while giving a nod to the past with the spoiler, he wants to usher in the future by abandoning carburetors and going with fuel injection in 2011. That should be interesting to police.

So, in the spirit of the new NASCAR “populism”, I have some suggestions to improve the sport.

  • Since there are so many empty seats at Talladega and Daytona nowadays, why not just eliminate the first 10 rows and move all those folks back from the track. Then you could eliminate the restrictor plates altogether and not have to worry about a car getting into the fans.
  • Eliminate the stupid “chase” gimmick. Last year, Jimmy Johnson won most of his 7 races in the 10-race Chase. The year before, Kyle Busch won all of his 8 races leading up to the Chase, and had a commanding lead until they reshuffled the points. He ultimately finished in tenth place. The Chase format allows a driver to pretty much coast his way into a championship scenario, and then start really racing in the last ten races. That’s how Johnson has won his last two championships; he’s done enough to stay in the top five all year, and then once the Chase starts, they kick it up a notch. Or, a driver who dominated all season can have a couple of bad races and pretty much end his chances at a championship. If all 36 races had the same level of importance, then a driver wouldn’t be able to coast to a championship, or a couple of bad races wouldn’t hurt him so bad.
  • Stop competing against local tracks. The Saturday night races kill attendance at the local tracks. NASCAR seems to be doing its best to eat its seed corn. Sure, a few high profile drivers have come from the open-wheel ranks, but it generally takes those folks several years to get acclimated (if they ever do) to cars with fenders. You just don’t hear about drivers coming up from the local tracks like you used to. I think that’s because NASCAR has abandoned its roots. Sure, it might be interesting to watch Danica Patrick and see how many cautions she brings out, but I’d much rather see someone like Casey Atwood in that car.
  • Actually enforce the multi-car rule. You’re supposed to only be able to own four teams, but with all the weird deals going on, you have owners like Hendrick who have an interest in teams that are supposedly owned by others (e.g. Stewart/Hass). I’d be happier with a two-car rule per team, which would allow as many as 20 or so owners. Right now the four-car limit also limits the number of owners to around 10. That’s too few.
  • Eliminate the “diversity” program. It’s racist. NASCAR shouldn’t be basing diversity on skin color.

I’m sure I’ll be able to think up a few more changes that NASCAR should make as the season starts, but this’ll do for now.