As long as we have a couple of other NASCAR fans in here, I’ll ask y’all a question:
What do you think of the Car of Tomorrow? Good idea that will improve racing, or expensive mistake that will make things worse?
And will Toyota be able to qualify a single car for the 500 next February?
[QUOTE=brianjedi]
As long as we have a couple of other NASCAR fans in here, I’ll ask y’all a question:
What do you think of the Car of Tomorrow? Good idea that will improve racing, or expensive mistake that will make things worse?
And will Toyota be able to qualify a single car for the 500 next February?
[/QUOTE]
Sounds like The COT is liked by the drivers. I think it will improve the compettitiveness of the sport but I hope it doesn’t bring too much parity to the gang.
I like that on some tracks Fords/Chevys/Dodges do better. I think it’s good that you have competely different manufacturer structure and support in place.
I hope that continues, in some form, although I don’t really see how it will. I think you’ll still have the bowtie and the blue oval on the fronts of the cars depicting which manufacturer is supporting which car, but the fan attachment will be gone because the direct visible link between maker and car will not be there. That’s just one aspect of the sport that individuals could embrace. Hopefully it won’t snowball past that.
Haven’t given much thought to the Toyota thing yet. I suspect they will have compettitive teams at every track in the real near future. They are going after drivers pretty aggressively though.
[QUOTE=brianjedi]
As long as we have a couple of other NASCAR fans in here, I’ll ask y’all a question:
What do you think of the Car of Tomorrow? Good idea that will improve racing, or expensive mistake that will make things worse?
And will Toyota be able to qualify a single car for the 500 next February?
[/QUOTE]
I didn’t mind Toyota geting into the NASCAR thing since a modified Camry could pass for the “look” of a stock car, and even Honda could get into the mix with an Accord.
While I don’t mind the COT and think the changes are great they almost look too much like Rally cars or the Fast & The Furious type car. You almost expect them to buzzz intstead of roaar. Doesn’t bother me much but I can see die-hard old fans complaining about the look not being “tough” or “American” enough.
[QUOTE=Uncommon Sense]
Haven’t given much thought to the Toyota thing yet. I suspect they will have compettitive teams at every track in the real near future. They are going after drivers pretty aggressively though.
[/QUOTE]
Here’s the problem Toyota has: MWR won’t have a single car in the top 35 in owner points, and neither will Team Red Bull. Bill Davis will have the #22 PROBABLY in the top 35, but it’s gonna be a stretch to see more than 2 Camrys locked in the field (Blaney and Jarrett.)
Honda has said they’re not interested in NASCAR right now, and I think that’s probably true. They’re stuck in the IRL until '09, and they’re banking on an open-wheel merger bringing Cosworth to the dance for them to battle with. I think you’re more likely to see Nissan before Honda.
What is your opinion of cheering Jeff Gordon’s crashes?
This has been eating at me for years. Let me be clear: I find this behavior abhorrent. I don’t give a damn if it’s happened to a lot of drivers (and I’ve found no evidence of this). I don’t give a damn about Gordon’s background dues or whatever silly issue this booing is supposedly about. This Is. Not. Tolerated. in a civilized society. Remember the time the Philadelphia Eagles fans cheered that Cowbowy who got injured, and just about every sports news outlet in the country raked them over the coals? No excuses. No hemming and hawing. It was wrong, period.
What’s even more bewildering is how nobody at ESPN (which has a pretty big stake in NASCAR) has even taken a stance on this. It’s always “oh, that’s not too unsportsmanlike” or “gee, Gordon isn’t too popular, huh?” Every single time.
I cannot watch this sport again unless I get an opinion on this. Someone, anyone.
On a completely unrelated note…one of my first memories of this sport was watching Bill Elliot winning seemingly every superspeedway race by about fifteen lengths. I swear, he was more dominant than Wayne Gretzky and Arnold Palmer put together. Any idea how this one Ford driver got so much success, and why he plummeted back to the pack seemingly overnight?
What is NASCAR? I know it’s some kind of car races and the cars look sort’a stock, but that’s about it.
(I’m a foreigner, lived in the States for 5 years, the only response I was able to obtain when I asked this question was blank looks)
[QUOTE=DKW]
What is your opinion of cheering Jeff Gordon’s crashes?
This has been eating at me for years. Let me be clear: I find this behavior abhorrent.
[/quote]
Relax. It’s about the same as cheering when the opposing quarterback gets sacked at the end of the game quelching the last minute winning drive. He’s shaken up but not hurt. Do you abhore that?
Nobody wants Jeff to get hurt, we’d just like to see him spin his car into the infield and lightly touch the wall. 
When folks cheer when a driver crashes (not hard) it’s because he likely won’t finish the race and very likely won’t win it. They now feel that their driver has a better chance of winning without Jeff on the track. It isn’t because they want him hurt, they just want him out of the race.
And, drivers rarely get hurt these days. It takes quite a wreck to get a driver visibly injured and I can quarantee that NOBODY in the stands is cheering if Jeff hits the wall at a bad angle at 180 MPH like Earnhardt. Or gets in a BIG pile up.
Trust me on this, they only cheer when he spins out or gets in a mild bender - just enough to take the car out but not send him to the infield care center.
Better now?
Nava, NASCAR
[QUOTE=DKW]
On a completely unrelated note…one of my first memories of this sport was watching Bill Elliot winning seemingly every superspeedway race by about fifteen lengths. I swear, he was more dominant than Wayne Gretzky and Arnold Palmer put together. Any idea how this one Ford driver got so much success, and why he plummeted back to the pack seemingly overnight?
[/QUOTE]
Not sure. I’ve wondered this myself, with Terry Labonte too.
These guys used to dominate (Terry won the championship in '96 and Elliot in '88) and now they have a hard time making the cut. I suspect their drive for greatness has been fulfilled and they seem to be partialy retired, so that may have something to do with it. Plus, with all the up and coming younger guys you have the chance to build a dominating team for years to come so the older guys on the way out get overlooked. It seems that all the money is going to the younger teams.
[QUOTE=Nava]
What is NASCAR? I know it’s some kind of car races and the cars look sort’a stock, but that’s about it.
(I’m a foreigner, lived in the States for 5 years, the only response I was able to obtain when I asked this question was blank looks)
[/QUOTE]
This is probably one case where Wikipedia can do a better job: NASCAR - Wikipedia
If you have specific questions after that, ask away.
[QUOTE=Hey you!]
How are the ever-climbing oil prices affecting the sport? Is anyone looking as to how this is going to affect the sport’s future?
[/QUOTE]
Actually, I’d look at this in a different light than Uncommon Sense did. It isn’t effecting the teams as they have enough money to do what they need to do.
It is, however, effecting attendance, or is at least a contributing factor. One of the big races recently (I think it was the Brickyard at Indy) had less than full attendence for the first time in a very long time.
Some folks just don’t have the money to hop in the car and go to a race anymore when they live pretty far from the track. Now the gas for the trip alone can run in the hundreds. When you add that to the ticket price, food prices, etc., some fans can no longer affort the in-person trip.
So I’d say it is effecting the fans, but not necessarily the teams.
[QUOTE=DKW]
What is your opinion of cheering Jeff Gordon’s crashes?
This has been eating at me for years. Let me be clear: I find this behavior abhorrent. I don’t give a damn if it’s happened to a lot of drivers (and I’ve found no evidence of this). I don’t give a damn about Gordon’s background dues or whatever silly issue this booing is supposedly about. This Is. Not. Tolerated. in a civilized society. Remember the time the Philadelphia Eagles fans cheered that Cowbowy who got injured, and just about every sports news outlet in the country raked them over the coals? No excuses. No hemming and hawing. It was wrong, period.
What’s even more bewildering is how nobody at ESPN (which has a pretty big stake in NASCAR) has even taken a stance on this. It’s always “oh, that’s not too unsportsmanlike” or “gee, Gordon isn’t too popular, huh?” Every single time.
I cannot watch this sport again unless I get an opinion on this. Someone, anyone.
On a completely unrelated note…one of my first memories of this sport was watching Bill Elliot winning seemingly every superspeedway race by about fifteen lengths. I swear, he was more dominant than Wayne Gretzky and Arnold Palmer put together. Any idea how this one Ford driver got so much success, and why he plummeted back to the pack seemingly overnight?
[/QUOTE]
It’s a combination of things: Gordon’s a Californian open-wheeler who wins a lot. That’s the Triple Crown of dislike for a lot of old-school NASCAR fans. As the line in “Days of Thunder” goes, “If you’re Californian, you’re not much of anything.”
That’s one bad thing about a portion of the NASCAR fanbase: they don’t want a lot of “Yankees” in the field, as though there are 30 undiscovered drivers in Georgia and Alabama that can’t get a ride because of Gordon and Jimmie Johnson.
I, personally, am excited when drivers like Paul Tracy, Max Papis, Juan Pablo Montoya and Patrick Carpentier want to come run stock cars.
As for Bill Elliott, back in the pre-restrictor plate days, he was unstoppable at Daytona and Talladega. Still holds the track record at Talladega (and probably always will) with a 212.809. His 1985 is probably the best single season of the modern era. 11 wins, 11 poles and the first man to win the Winston Million.
[QUOTE=DKW]
What is your opinion of cheering Jeff Gordon’s crashes?
…
On a completely unrelated note…one of my first memories of this sport was watching Bill Elliot winning seemingly every superspeedway race by about fifteen lengths. I swear, he was more dominant than Wayne Gretzky and Arnold Palmer put together. Any idea how this one Ford driver got so much success, and why he plummeted back to the pack seemingly overnight?
[/QUOTE]
On Gordon, I agree that it’s disrespectful. But what bothers me more than the booing is the throwing of beer cans, bottles, and other crap onto the car and the track. This has happened to more than Gordon, but I specifically remember one time when Gordon won under caution and the crowd lost their heads. Like the NY Giants and the snowball incidents, they should have no place in sports. Fans should learn control!
As for Elliott, when he ran that 212.809 mph lap in 1987, NASCAR decided that he was going too fast and that it was too dangerous, so they started stuff (note: I’d prefer to use the term “crap”) like restrictor plates that limit the speed the cars can go. Bill was a “balls to the wall” type driver and speed was his thing. They took that speed ability away. Dang shame, that. He was amazing to watch. Now he helps Evernham sports and is an asset to their organization.