Fixing It

[71Fan]

With all the recent talk of boring, changing race dates, and reviving fan interest etc etc etc...it got me to wondering what I would do to fix it. And I'm wondering what you would do also. So, here's my list.

1. Inverted Starts.

Totally invert the field. Make the fast cars actually have to race their way to the front.

2. Heat Races.

In a heat race format, every lap counts. There's no hanging out waiting for a pit stop to adjust the car. Mash the gas and go....or go home.

3. Remove The Spoilers

Find a way to make the cars near impossible to drive. This would make every turn an adventure. Think of Dirt Cars. Nobody knows going in to a turn if a car is going to come out of that turn.

4. Bias Ply Tires.

Get rid of the radials. Again, this would make every turn an adventure.

5. Lower Gears.

This would make powering off the turns the name of the game. Combined with bias-ply tires, no spoiler, and go or go home heat racing, a driver would have no choice but to mash the gas for all he/she was worth while hoping the car sticks.

6. Free Tires.

Typical of the Start N Parks is that they simply cannot afford the tire bill. So, include an adequate number of free tires for every car that makes the race and/or advances to the next heat race..

7. No More Green Flag Pit Stops

Stop the race every 20 or 30 minutes for a 5 minute pit stop with all cars lining back up according to their position prior to the stop. This would allow even the lowest budget teams the chance to adjust their cars on a level field with the super teams.

8. Remove The Last Two Cars.

After every mandatory pit stop, remove the last two cars. This would ensure that nobody got to cruise while waiting for the cars in front of them to break/crash.

9. Forget The Pay Window.

Give every car except for the winner that finishes the race on the lead lap the same amount of money, and pay nothing to any car that does not finish lead lap.

10. Run What Ya Brung.

Except as noted about lower gears, bias-ply tires, and no spoiler, as long as a car passes a safety inspection allow it to race. One of the things that plagues NASCAR racing is the homogeneousness of the cars. Let's get back to what auto racing is really all about, and allow folks to actually be innovative when it comes to building fast cars.

Well, if that didn't make ya laugh or at least ponder what you would do, at the very least it has eased the boredom of my day

[harvick#1]

sorry, this is a professional series, not an amateur local dirt track series.

there is always alot of money and business at stake in Nascar, and I dont agree with anything you have said.

there needs to be tweaks in the system now, but they are more subtle

[71Fan]

Like what? At least I'm not complaining while not offering ideas. And the way I figure it, a person has no right to complain about anything if they are not willing to at least suggest specific changes.

So you don't like any of my ideas at all? Well why not? What's wrong with them?

And as I wrote to Lee Roy in another thread. Please don't talk down to me like I just turned on the TV last week. And, just a bit of unasked for advice....you might want to take the word "humble" out of your self-description at your webpage. From my view, you are anything but.

[Jonesi]

What's wrong with these? well...

1. Inverted Starts.

It would just cause sandbagging. Just look at all the games they played at The Winston over the years with inverting cars.

2. Heat Races.

I've never understood the mentality of this, but I'm from the endurance end of motorsports, Rallyes, LeMans, 24hDatona, etc and going back further Mille Miglia, Liege, Peking to Paris. The longer &b harder the better.


3. Remove The Spoilers

Nascar doesn't do anything the insurance company doesn't approve, and they'd probably veto this.

4. Bias Ply Tires.

Why would a tire company pay to promote obsolete tires?

5. Lower Gears.

I think gears should be left to the team. Pocono had great races until Nascar mandated the gears.

6. Free Tires.

It's not that the Start N Parks can't afford another $1200 for a 2nd or 3rd set. It's the extra $30-50k in wear & tear they can't afford when they're only getting about $60k


7. No More Green Flag Pit Stops

The low buck teams still would not compete, because the top teams would use the time to change whole suspension packages, etc.

8. Remove The Last Two Cars.

Nascar, track owners, networks etc would like to see as full a racetrack as possible

9. Forget The Pay Window.

Good way to lose teams.

10. Run What Ya Brung.

Good way to end up with 3 or 4 super teams spending +$100mil just like F1.

[Lee Roy]

sorry, this is a professional series, not an amateur local dirt track series.


I agree.

[Lee Roy]

Like what? At least I'm not complaining while not offering ideas. And the way I figure it, a person has no right to complain about anything if they are not willing to at least suggest specific changes.



You have no skin in the game unless you have money invested in a team, so don't take yourself so seriously. It's just an internet posting.

[Mark in Oshawa]

71 fan...What you would do is ruin NASCAR. I am sure You think those are all logical ideas, but they just are not.

NASCAR is pretty close to what it should be. We can argue about the Chase and points and some minor details, but in the end, the racing is about as good as it has been for some time. You want to fix NASCAR? Get rid of half the dates on 1.5 mile race tracks. Supplant them with short track's built for this modern era, places like Richmond or another Bristol (not the same layout, but the stands all the way around....)

THAT is how fans want to see NASCAR Sprint Cup racing, with contact, traffic and action....

[71Fan]

Lee Roy.....I have time and energy invested. Something that I consider quite valuable.

Jonesi.....

Inverted Starts would cause sandbagging? Maybe in qualifying but if I do I lose pit selection. And, taking the initial green flag from outside the top ten can be a huge disadvantage. Take the green flag from outside the top 25 and I would have to hustle immediately at some tracks just to keep from getting lapped. It's all about mashing the gas.

Heat Races......The mentality is simple....go or go home. Another incentive to mash the gas to get to the front. If out of 10 cars, 2 go to the Main and the next to go to a last chance qualifying, that means 6 cars are going home and the 2 that get in to last chance don't have a really big chance of making the main either. Heat Racing imo is one of the most exciting ways there is to determine a final field and eventual winner. You might want to try getting to a WoO or IMCA event for a taste of just how electric it is.

Can't remove the spoilers due to insurance????? Huh? If anything it would generally lower the speeds, and it would help to keep the cars on the ground when they get turned around. Spoilers did not used to be mandatory. Shucks, Ol' Wingtips had Harry take the spoiler off the car for qualifying at Dega one year and he set a new track record. But then, nascar drivers back then actually had to have more talent than Jocko Flock to reach Victory Lane.

Tires....They would pay NOT for the public promotional aspect of it, but rather for the money they could make selling tires to the series (and other series also). But that's beside the point as to why I think bias play would be a good idea. See Jocko Flock reference above.

Gears....Yuppers on Pocono. But what they also did there was mandate transmission gearing which keeps most cars from going to 3rd coming out of One. Meanwhile, by limiting straightaway speed more emphasis would be placed on cornering. Something that I gather from your post that you are quite fond of. Cornering wouldn't be that easy without spoilers or radial tires. Again, it's the Jocko Flock thing.

FreeTires....nascar tears down the motor of the last place car not involved in a wreck. And they don't put it back together. And the owner doesn't get it back for a while either. While I agree that many of the backmarkers use a motor more than once to save money, from what I understand the typical tire bill for a Cup weekend is $30,000. There was a time when NASCAR paid tow-money to get folks to show up for races. Tire money is essentially the same thing.

Pit Stops.....Yup, the big teams could take major swings but take a big swing and you increase your chance of missing completely.

Car Removal.....Would they? Are ya sure they wouldn't rather broadcast competitive racing? While there might be a full-field clause in nascar's tv contracts, I've never understood the reasoning for it. But yea, that may be true. I was just looking for ways to promote mashing the gas.

Pay Window.....Lose what teams? Yea. Suppose that would happen. But it sure would light a fire under folks to stay on the lead lap. And it would take cars off the track that sometimes do little more than get in the way.

Run What Ya Brung.....There all already 3 or 4 super teams that dominate Cup. As for a hundred mill a year.....well dang, that's only about 3 times as much as the top dogs are getting per car now. And, I will give credit to F-1 where it is due. The cars are state of the art racing machines. And unless nascar goes back to actually racing stock cars, all they are putting on track are imitations by comparison.

Anyways.....thanks for joining in Jonesi. As I said in the original post, really just meanderings of an uneventful afternoon. Enjoy

[Lee Roy]

Lee Roy.....I have time and energy invested. Something that I consider quite valuable.


Okay. You made it sound like you would be sitting down and discussing this with Rick Hendrick, Jack Rousch, JD Gibbs, Brian France and Mike Helton.

[Shifter]

This list sounds an awful lot like this one:

http://www.caranddriver.com/features/10q1/john_phillips_twenty_new_rules_to_boost_nascar_s_r atings_-column

[Rodster]

Nascar got itself into this mess for one reason only, money, money, money. They were doing just fine before they felt the need to go mainstream and try and compete with the NFL for fans.

Once they signed their huge TV contracts they no longer were able to call their own shots because now they had to answer to NBC, FOX, ESPN and whoever they took TV revenue from.

As a result we have the made for TV..."Chase for the Cup" which led to the COT. Nascar has gotten way too expensive to watch for the average fan. I remember talking to a guy who had money in Jacksonville, FL and back in 2004 he was already paying several thousand to watch both events at Daytona. He couldn't buy just tickets for the 500 he had to buy tickets for all the races and so many seats.

If I were to fix Nascar i'd dump the COT (stupid idea), return the old points system and dump The Chase and bring the sport back to it's roots. The other problem with Nascar is that it has way too many series it sanctions doing exactly the same thing and people get bored watching a Nascar version of trucks and everything else go round and round. Again this has more to do with trying to satisfy the TV networks.

I would also offer that if they they dropped the COT, the could start a new healthy war between mfgs. I remember when Dale Sr. would be pissed because his Monte Carlo wasn't as fast as the Thunderbirds etc. They need to involve the fans because the cars look the same sans decals, it's turned into a spec series.

[71Fan]

sorry, this is a professional series, not an amateur local dirt track series.



I'm sure that guys like Donny Schatz, Steve Kinser, Danny Lasoski, and Sammy Swindell would be very interested in finding out that they are not professional racecar drivers.

And, I guess Tony Stewart doesn't put on professional races at Eldora???

[71Fan]

This list sounds an awful lot like this one:

http://www.caranddriver.com/features/10q1/john_phillips_twenty_new_rules_to_boost_nascar_s_r atings_-column

Not bad....I had never seen that....thanks....especially liked #16

Twenty (20) minutes of each TV broadcast will be allotted to a segment videotaped in the grandstands. This segment will officially be known as “Is She Wearing a Bra?”

Reminds me of one year at Phoenix when I saw a chick flash Dale Jr in Victory Lane

[71Fan]

Rodster....

Ticket prices are downright stupid. As an example I can recall when a Start/Finish ticket at Riverside was 7 or 8 times the minimum wage. A Start/Finish ticket today at most tracks is probably 25 to 40 times the minimum wage.

And no kidding about too many fingers in the pie so to speak. They actually turned the Daytona 24 in to a spec car race.....sigh....

[Rodster]

I've always felt if Dale Sr. were still alive, Nascar and the France family would not have taken Nascar to where they are today. I started watching Nascar back in the mid to late 80's when it was a fringe motorsport with a bad attitude and a chip on it's shoulder. Today's Nascar has NO resemblance to that sport.

I stopped watching Nascar in 2003 because even back then I felt Nascar had begun to lose it's soul. No wonder the car mfg have begun to complain to Nascar. All the cars are basically the same with the exception of the headlight decals and Mfg logo.

If Nascar continues on their current path they risk alienating their core base even further and the fanbase they want is too fickle to worry about.

[71Fan]

Yup, can't really blame ya for that at all Rodster. Recently I've been getting pretty fed up with it myself. I guess that's becoming rather self-evident though.