Jumping towards the twenty first century at Nascar

stafford1500 said:

In reply to slowbird :

That would be a good show.

Another way to make the racing better is shoter races, so there is no time to wait and strategize, just run flat out to get to the front. Take chances at passing and dont be afraid to use the bumper.

Wasn't that some of the intention of adding stage racing?  Put points out there to encourage the drivers to go hammer down from the drop of the green flag? 

I'm looking forward to seeing what NASCAR will look like in 2021.  From what I understand, there will be a ton of changes.  New car.  New contracts with tracks (i.e. maybe all new tracks).  New sponsorship model or something like that (isn't Monster just a temporary hold over deal?).  Maybe changes to help control the cost of racing, allowing more teams to spring up.  I still love the sport now, but definitely am ready to see it get fresh blood.

Having more road courses like Sonoma would help immensely

On the "shorter races" thing, I think shorter races are better for TV but longer races are better in person. If I'm going to dedicate a weekend of my life to camping and hanging out I don't want to watch a 45 minute sprint, but if I'm at home, there are better things to do than watch a race for four freaking hours. I feel the same way about road races. In general spectating ovals is way better than spectating road courses, the shorter the better, but road courses make for a better TV package if the camera work is done well. 

Re: stage racing

IMO, NASCAR dropped the ball in stage racing when they force the caution after the stage. It should stay green until the damn end.

How about just running a timed race and most laps wins? It sure works with most of the other race series out there....

I sure miss when the cars roughly looked like the cars they were based off of and not just the same brick with different stickers. Although I would like to see one complete has to run every track chassis vs the super speedway vs short track vs mid length vs etc....

Klayfish:

Yes that was the intent of the stages, but the stages are long enough to start playing strategy and the slow guys still get lapped.

Mazdeuce:

I agree that short races work better for TV, but that is the primary market being "sold". The at track experience is a 2nd to TV. A lot (most maybe) of the fans that go to a race do not go for the entire weekend, they show up for race day, which includes the 4 hours of racing, 2-3 hours to park/get into the track, and another 1-2 hours to get out of the track and head home. That is a long day.

Perhaps several short races with breaks in between and some sort of reshuffle of the cars for each start.

Ranger 50:

I agree the end of each stage should be a continued green condition (barring some sort of actual incident). That would make some of the calculations for the points much different, and result in different strategies. The stages are still long enough that they allow everyone to settle into a spot and ride around.

Smaller fuel tanks could help that situation, but then you get into the issue of trying to figure out ways to take advantage of the system and the tire changers start to become even more important in the results. The mandated air guns for the pit crews has reduced some of the expense, but it has only migrated elsewhere.

Dootz said:

Having more road courses like Sonoma would help immensely

I did hear that the "Roval" was a HUGE success and that they are looking to diversify the track layouts in the future.

A few tracks have sports car or track day courses already in place.  Pocono has umpteen configurations.

  At New Hampshire, a small portion goes outside the oval but still in view.

On TV I have seen others have similar set ups.

There are ways of handicapping the race starting line up.   AMEC ice racing has one.  

As a former nascar viewer, I like these ideas. Shorter races, more road courses. Make the road courses the long race, make the ovals shorter. Make the chassis not tube frame, and actually based off the car it represents. Stock transmission and running gear. Engine must be off the shelf. 

_ said:

As a former nascar viewer, I like these ideas. Shorter races, more road courses. Make the road courses the long race, make the ovals shorter. Make the chassis not tube frame, and actually based off the car it represents. Stock transmission and running gear. Engine must be off the shelf. 

Great suggestion, but I think I'm not in the minority for thinking about how unlikely it is to that we're going to see a V8, RWD, manual transmission Camry. Or much of anything else.

I'd love to have one, though.

In reply to _ : No more $80,000 engines or whatever they’re up to now.  Off the shelf motors.  If the Ford cammer engine is too much for Toyota let Toyota come up with their turbo charged 4 cylinder or whatever. 

Let a Chevy look like a Chevy.  And if Audi wants to play let them play.  

If someone is too fast for the field handicap them until the racing is back to even. OK BMW, you need to have this 300 pound muffler with the 3/4 inch exhaust port. I don’t care if the Mercedes Benz is a big barge and the Honda a little  economy sized car.  Or whatever.  

I want to see things that look like whats’s on the road.  Hey, maybe SUV’s?  It would be fun to watch a Porsche dice it out with an Explorer. While the Land Rover tries to find a way past them both.  

Knurled. said:

In reply to STM317 :

Doesn't F1 basically use throttle body injection too?  They spray the fuel really, really far away from the port.  Maximizes atomization and charge density effects.

I think they have upstream and downstream injectors.

Spraying fuel at the top changes the weight of the air and effectively changes the tuned length of the runner.

Floating Doc said:

_ said:

As a former nascar viewer, I like these ideas. Shorter races, more road courses. Make the road courses the long race, make the ovals shorter. Make the chassis not tube frame, and actually based off the car it represents. Stock transmission and running gear. Engine must be off the shelf. 

Great suggestion, but I think I'm not in the minority for thinking about how unlikely it is to that we're going to see a V8, RWD, manual transmission Camry. Or much of anything else.

I'd love to have one, though.

If they want to remain competitive in nascar they would. (Or would they? perhaps a fwd monster would be good on the ovals?)

Klayfish said:

 

 

Maybe changes to help control the cost of racing,

Changes to "Control the cost of racing" always make it more expensive, the teams spend more money to work around the rules.

Often these changes are political or economically motivated for the promoters and not the racers.

The same car for all the drivers deal has been tried and failed miserably.

In reply to bentwrench :

Is the opposite the answer?

Never change the rules?  

Keeping pushrod V8 engines in sedans when V6 SUV’s are massively outselling the remaining cars in America? 

How can they be called Stock cars when there is absolutely nothing about them that is stock?  

Is it Memories of a by gone era, car racing? 

Back when everybody ran their own stuff it was hard to police.  It was how much each manufacturer was willing to spend. There were some interesting cars and engines though.

So Nascar said, lets make everything equal and leave it up to the drivers.

There are lots of race series using cars with stock tubs running on road courses.  Nobody watches them.

Also, by the time you add enough tube to make a Talladega style crash something everyone just walks away from, we are well past a stock car.  And Talledega is going to be part of Nascar until Alabama slides into the Gulf of Mexico.

iceracer said:

So Nascar said, lets make everything equal and leave it up to the drivers.

Spec series can be ok - at least indycar in its current incarnation can be interesting, if a kind of sad shadow of its former self.

NASCAR has three problems: the cars, the rules and the dying fanbase. This might help the cars, but are they still super-heavy, under-braked, under-tired and low downforce? Are they still applying modern engineering to perfect archaic technology?

Are the scoring rules still incomprehensible?

Are the drivers still allowed to basically run each other off the road without penalty?

No idea how to fix the dying fanbase.

frenchyd said:

In reply to bentwrench :

Is the opposite the answer?

Never change the rules?  

Keeping pushrod V8 engines in sedans when V6 SUV’s are massively outselling the remaining cars in America? 

How can they be called Stock cars when there is absolutely nothing about them that is stock?  

Is it Memories of a by gone era, car racing? 

That could be construed as one reason why the fanbase is dying out. Those with happy memories of that bygone era are aging!

Dave M said:

frenchyd said:

In reply to bentwrench :

Is the opposite the answer?

Never change the rules?  

Keeping pushrod V8 engines in sedans when V6 SUV’s are massively outselling the remaining cars in America? 

How can they be called Stock cars when there is absolutely nothing about them that is stock?  

Is it Memories of a by gone era, car racing? 

That could be construed as one reason why the fanbase is dying out. Those with happy memories of that bygone era are aging!

That plus our hero’s are retired or dead. People like Jr Johnson, Dale Earnhardt, Mario Andretti,  AJFoyt  etc . Those  were real hero’s men we admired. Not the corporate spokesman driving today.  

In reply to Dave M :

Scoring rules are pretty straightforward, compared to cricket.

Drivers are self policing.  They are quite aware that berkeleying a guy will get you a berkeley back at the least helpful time.  Works for me.

The fanbase took a pretty good dive when the economy cwent sideways.  It looks bad on TV sometimes, but the stands were built for Earnhardt/Gordon era, and a whole bunch of empty seats still means a pretty good crowd.  Nascar also alienated some of the old time fans with their playoff bullE36 M3, but we are getting used to it...

Lotsa talk about stage racing.  I dare you to watch a Michigan race from before stages, then watch any of the races there since, and tell me which one doesn't send you for a nap from lap ten to lap one ninety.  Sure it's a gimmick, but it's a gimmick that provides entertainment.

In reply to Dave M :

Chase Elliot, Martin Truex, Kyle Busch, Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, and half a dozen more.  Half a dozen in the Xfinity series. Watermelon dude in the trucks.  

There are tons of compelling guys.

Streetwiseguy said:

In reply to Dave M :

Chase Elliot, Martin Truex, Kyle Busch, Kyle Larson, Ryan Blaney, and half a dozen more.  Half a dozen in the Xfinity series. Watermelon dude in the trucks.  

There are tons of compelling guys.

See, I agree with that. There's no shortage of great drivers in NASCAR! But put them in compelling hardware and in a compelling format.

But what do I know? I like sports car and motorcycle racing, after all!

Streetwiseguy said:

There are lots of race series using cars with stock tubs running on road courses.  Nobody watches them.

Also, by the time you add enough tube to make a Talladega style crash something everyone just walks away from, we are well past a stock car.  And Talledega is going to be part of Nascar until Alabama slides into the Gulf of Mexico.

Everyone overlooks this.  The only cars any number of people pay to watch race in the US are tube framed with sedan looking bodies, not just in the top NASCAR series but at short tracks all over the country. I can go to five tracks within a two hour drive of me tonight find full stands of paying fans.  Clearly the car's construction and track configuration aren't really the problem.  There's plenty of personality among current drivers as well. The people that don't watch now will continue to find reasons not to.  The biggest problem now is the same one every form of entertainment is facing. There are too many choices. Baseball, football, movies all have trouble drawing audiences now.  Hopefully the new cars will reduce costs enough that the smaller fan base can support it. 

In reply to Wally :

I think the rapid drop in NASCAR viewership as compared to, say, F1 suggests that the problems are NASCAR specific. Yes, car racing in general is less popular but NASCAR is way less popular than at its peak.

Other forms of racing had much lower viewership at their peak and didn't have very far to drop.  A lot of the fans that jumped on the bandwagon in the 90s were very casual fans that NASCAR won't get back no matter what they change.