Tag Archive for ‘NASCAR’ at Buried Planet

Tag Archive for 'NASCAR'

Richmond experience on Sprint’s dime

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on September 13, 2008

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I had the opportunity to go to my first NASCAR Sprint Cup series race since 2003, when it was still the Winston Cup Series, and my sixth overall, on the dime of Sprint on Sunday, September 7, 2008, at Richmond International Raceway. The race was supposed to be Saturday night, and since my mother had won the two tickets, she was going to take my father. With the advance postponement due to Tropical Storm Hanna, my mother was unable to make it herself, so I took my father to his first race.

Centerpiece at Sprint Hospitality area

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The long drought is over

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Relantel

on June 18, 2008

in NASCAR

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Sunday’s Cup race at Michigan International Speedway (MIS), the Life-Lock 400, saw Dale Earnhardt Jr’s then-76 race winless streak finally come to an end.

It looked like it would end five races ago at Richmond, when Jr. was spun out while leading by Kyle Busch with less than 3 laps to go in the scheduled distance. It looked like it could have ended in the season-opening Daytona 500, after he won his 150 mile qualifier and the Bud Shootout (pole-sitter’s race), until a late call to stay out when others pitted may have cost him a shot at the win. As it was, he finished 9th, and would follow that up with a 2nd place finish at Las Vegas, and left Vegas with the most points after race-winner Carl Edwards failed post-race inspection, and was docked 100 points plus the 10 bonus points for the win when the Chase begins.

The streak might have been 13 races less had Brian Vickers not taken Jimmie Johnson and Jr. out on the backstretch on the last lap at Talladega in October 2006. Or it might have ended at Pocono last August, when Jr. sat on the pole and finished 2nd to Kurt Busch. Such is the nature in the Sprint Cup series, where wins are tough to secure.

NASCAR mismanages rain at California Speedway

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Relantel

on February 25, 2008

in NASCAR

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The weekened was a lesson in the havoc that mother nature can make. Rain, rain and more rain followed NASCAR’s top three series to the newly rechristened “Auto Club Speedway of Southern California” - freshly renamed from California Speedway on Friday.

Rain forced cancellation of qualifying for all three series, and left each series with little or no practice time on the track. The Truck race was the only one to go off as scheduled, on Saturday afternoon, but Sprint Cup final practice was curtailed after 17 laps, and the Nationwide series race was postponed before it started.

NASCAR’s first move was to put the Nationwide race 1 hour following the Sunday Sprint Cup race. They didn’t count on the rain forcing the Sprint race to start more than two hours late, then suffer an hour and twenty minute red-flag due to an accident and water seepage issues, only to again be red-flagged for rain at 9:12PM eastern. At some point early in the 2nd red flag, it was decided the Nationwide race would be at 1pm EST on Monday (today). That was when they still thought they could get the Sprint race in late Sunday night. The FOX crew kept up with updates, first at 11pm, saying check back at midnight, then at midnight, it was the track should be ready at 1am. At 1am, they announced they would go back racing at 2am. And, you guessed it, at 2am they decided to postpone it until 1pm Monday. This postponement meant the Nationwide race had to be postponed yet again, since both races cannot run simultaneously. This time, it was to the indefinite time of 1 hour following the conclusion of the Sprint Cup series race.

All of this wreaks havoc on the Tivo, since most NASCAR fans will be at work during the Cup race, and would not get home until the Nationwide race has started. Hindsight certainly echoes several drivers thoughts at the Lap 21 red flag - NASCAR should have postponed the Cup race to Monday at the outset. As it stands now, they will restart on Lap 87, with five cars out of contention due to water-caused accidents.

ADDENDUM: I noticed this David Poole column after posting. Poole follows the NASCAR beat for The Charlotte Observer, but does opinion pieces on Thatsracin.com as well. He goes so far to suggest that the Speedway ought not be on the schedule. (California inherited its second date from Darlington’s Southern 500 - the Labor Day Race - in 2004, much to the chagrin of the traditionalists)

Dale Jr starts with a bang - wins in first race for Hendrick Motorsports

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Relantel

on February 10, 2008

in NASCAR

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For Dale Earnhardt, Jr., the opening of 2008 speedweeks at Daytona International Speedway was his chance to get back on the racetrack. He hadn’t won since May 2006 at Richmond, and had spent the last half of 2007 knowing he was leaving his father’s company. In June, he announced where he was going - the hated arch-rival Hendrick (to his fans anyway - more so from Hendrick also being Jeff Gordon’s owner). September saw the sponsorship announcement. But at last, this was finally the chance to be in the now, instead of the looking forward to.

And he took advantage of the prime-time stage, leading 47 of 70 laps (a race-record), taking the lead for good coming to the white flag, and holding off Tony Stewart and new teammates Jimmie Johnson and Jeff Gordon for the checkered. There were six shootout wins between the three of them - to Jr’s one coming in.

The questions running around the garage were numerous, and they included two big ones: Could Jr win with Hendrick?, and How long would it take? YES, and right away were the answers. One could see the emotion on Jr’s face in Victory Lane - after all, it had been 21 months since his last Cup win of any kind. There was also relief - relief of not having to answer the question “so when will you win?”

The race itself was the first test of the “Car of Tomorrow” in race conditions at Daytona, now in full time use for the entire 2008 season after having been used for selected races in 2007. Coming in, it was an unknown. This, combined with a large incident in practice Friday, likely contributed to careful driving by the field, avoiding “the big one” so often common in restrictor plate racing. By in large, things were possible with these new cars that had not been in recent times.

Three-time winner Tony Stewart made a pass for the lead without help, overtaking Jr (who had help from Johnson) with 10 laps left. Unfortunately for Stewart, driving his first race in a Toyota for Joe Gibbs racing after they left Chevrolet, Kurt Busch spun with 7 to go, bringing out a caution and a double-file restart unique to the Shootout. Jr and Johnson were in the outside lane on the restart, and Stewart down low followed by Jeff Gordon. Johnson had just enough to shove Jr in front coming out of Turn 4 to the white flag.

It seemed even Stewart was happy to see Jr win if he couldn’t - although Stewart finished 2nd to Jr in the 2004 Daytona 500, Stewart was a three-time winner of the Shootout.

With the “when will he win” question dispensed with, it now becomes “how many will he win? For that answer, we’ll have to wait for the season to develop. There will be some feeling out of the Car of Tomorrow at those tracks where it was not used last year, such as Las Vegas and California. Will he win the 10 that Jimmie Johnson won last year? Unrealistic, seeing as Johnson ought to be able to manage a 6-win performance. Hendrick Motorsports won 18 of the 36 races last season. Jr’s best season was a 6-win campaign in 2004 for DEI, but that was his only season with more than three wins.

For posterity’s sake - I will predict 5: Daytona (500), Darlington, Sonoma, Indianapolis and Talladega (fall). Based on his history, I could see a Martinsville or Bristol in the picture as well.

Title fight all but over with Johnson’s 4th win in a row

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Relantel

on November 12, 2007

in NASCAR and Sports

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Hendrick driver Jimmie Johnson won his fourth race in a row, and tenth on the season, extending his point lead to 86 points over teammate Jeff Gordon with one race to go. All Johnson has to do to clinch his 2nd title in a row is finish 18th or better in Homestead. The race at Phoenix saw him take the lead for the final time from Martin Truex Jr, after Truex had stayed out on the last yellow flag while most every other driver, including Johnson, pitted. Truex could not hold off Johnson, and several others, falling to the lower half of the top-10 by race’s end.

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Did he or didn’t he? Biffle slows at Kansas

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Relantel

on October 1, 2007

in NASCAR and Sports

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In the end, NASCAR stepped in it big-time in Kansas yesterday. From the two rain delays, the 2 hour 2nd one coming after the official mark, to restarting it knowing they could not get the full distance in, and cutting back the length twice (first from 267 to 225, and then to only 210), and then finally ending under four laps of caution after debris on lap 207, failing to heed the green-white-checker rule. Many of these choices led to Biffle winning - where he ran out of feul, and could not maintain pace-car speed, coming to the end of lap 210. A green-flag finish to 210 would have seen him run out of gas, and a green white checker would have done the same thing.

The debris at 207 was not phantom - Montoya left clear debris on the track - but the way NASCAR called the rest of the race, it would have seemed fitting for the race to have gone green even with the debris. That would have made more sense than the excuses that NASCAR’s Jim Hunter gave after the race, that Biffle “maintained a reasonable pace” and that the “field was frozen at the moment of caution” - by that standard, the October 2006 Talladega race would have been an 8-48-25 finish.

2nd place not good enough

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Relantel

on August 7, 2007

in NASCAR and Sports

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Dale Jr claimed his first pole in 5 years at Pocono last weekend, fell back from the start, managed to lead 8 laps mid-race, and rallied to finish 2nd behind winner Kurt Busch. Busch led 175 laps of 200, so between the extra 5 bonus points, and the 15 point difference between 1st and 2nd, Busch turned a 13 point deficit into a 7 point lead for the 12th and final chase spot.

Robby Gordon Robbed in Montreal

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Relantel

on August 7, 2007

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When is the Winner not the Winner? When NASCAR chooses to enforce its rules differently for one driver than every other. And when Robby Gordon is involved.

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NASCAR hits hard at Hendrick - but not that hard

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Relantel

on June 27, 2007

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NASCAR came down hard against the 24 and 48 teams today, giving them identical penalties that befell the 8 team after Darlington: 100 points (owner & driver) lost, $100,000 fine, and a 6 week suspension for the Crew Chief. This was on top of both teams being unable to practice on Friday, and unable to qualify as well, forcing them to settle for the 41st and 42nd starting spots, respectively. Gordon finished 7th, while Johnson finished 17th in Sunday’s race at Sears Point.

While the COT penalties were identical to that of the 8 team, their effect is not. Gordon had led the points by 271, now it’s only 171. He is still up on 13th place by 700+ points, and still has the same amount of wins bonus at the Chase cutoff as he did before. Johnson falls from 3rd to 5th in points, but remains 366 points behind Gordon, and is up on 13th place by about 350 points. Like Gordon, Johnson also still has the same amount of wins bonus as he had before.

With 10 races until the Chase, barring a major injury keeping either from several races, they will make the Chase. The 8 car is on the bubble - they were in Chase territory when the penalty was applied, and had to climb back into place. The 8 is 96 points ahead of 13th - but would have been 196 and in 10th place.

A good read on TNT rushing to Van Helsing

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Relantel

on June 18, 2007

in NASCAR and Sports

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John Daly of the Daly Planet expresses well what had bothered me yesterday but I did not take the time to write about, where TNT started the Van Helsing movie with near 15 minutes left on their NASCAR time slot.

He writes:

Basically, TNT did the mandatory interview with the winner, interviewed both DEI drivers, and then sprinted for the airplane. There was not a moment after the race where anyone except Larry McReynolds was “fired up” about what just went on during the race. If this had been an event that ran long on time, fans might understand. After a long rain delay like Pocono, leaving quickly is understood.

But, for a network like TNT who has only six NEXTEL Cup races in their entire schedule for the year, this was strange. When you add-in the fact that fifteen minutes remained in the scheduled time slot for this event, it becomes even stranger.

NBC was guilty of this last year, and some of the team are the same (Bill Weber and Wally Dallenbach, Jr., for example), of rushing off into the sunset, sometimes with barely more than the winner’s interview. In most cases, the race went past the scheduled allotment of time, and it was hurry up to get back to whatever other programming was on. As Mr. Daly notes, last week’s Pocono coverage makes one wonder who runs the operation over there, as TNT stayed with the rain delays much longer than expected, even though it was well past the original time slot.

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