NA&#36CAR needs to do some homework

Kansas Kid · August 7, 2001

I'm not sure if many people have noticed this, but I believe NA$CAR Winston Cup racing has some major problems with the abilities of there drivers to put on a good race. It is pretty obvious that the driver who is in the lead, no matter how he got there or if the car is any good, is able to pull away from the pack and make the race boring. Now if a car is dominate and they should have a bad pit stop and end up in the pack, they can not possible make it to the front by on the track passing.

This was vividly illustrated the past two weeks in Pocono and Indy. At Pocono the 24 car was simply dominate for the first part of the race, and then they came in for a pit stop and ended up in the middle of the pack. As dominate as that car was, he should have been able to pass a majority of the cars in front of him, yet he struggled to to pass half of them. Now this week at Pocono, Steve Park had a dominate car towards the end of the race. They come in for a pitstop, come out 8th and end up 7th after 30 some laps. Why were these guys not able to come to the front? Its because these cars are, way to sensitive to aerodynamics.

These cars are simply not able to pass when in traffic because all the air is taken of the nose, allowing the leader to just run away from traffic. This makes for very poor racing IMHO, and NA$CAR needs to fix this situation, and fix it soon. I remember in the 80's how a guy could pass cars and not have to worry about an aero push. Heck, even CART engineered a fix for there cars when they began experiencing this problem. NA$CAR needs to get there head out of the sand, and get to work. Either that or be destined to have races by the guy who comes out off the pits in front, not the best driver and team.

Bill89 · August 7, 2001

I think that NASCAR is doing a good job at making the cars pretty close to being equal. But it's all in the setup. Some cars don't run good in traffic. The aero push, clean air, loose when someone is on your bumper. You have to realize that the weather also haves something to do with it. These cars are so sensitive that the slighest thing can ruin the car.

August 7, 2001

I think you're comparing apples and oranges. The WC cars of the 80's are about as close to today's WC cars as CART or IRL.

Today, most of the teams are pretty even. To get stuck behind a car that is 0.1 seconds slower than you is a lot different from being behind one that is 0.5 seconds slower. It is harder to pass a good car. Although if you can get by him, that 0.1 second will show.

I think NASCAR is doing an excellent job of having the closest racing competition in the world.

What I think they need to do is move away from tracks that end up as a one groove track.

NHIS, Martinsville are the worst, I like to see a little banking and have cars searching for the right groove. Vegas, Atlanta, Charlotte, and Richmond are the best IMO for multi-groove racing.