I had purposely removed myself from all thing racing.  Why you might ask?  A couple of reasons.  First and foremost, I was helping my lovely wife produce her podcast titled “Spooktalkular“.  But mostly because, I simply had grown disgusted with the state of racing today.  At the end of last season, I was so disappointed that I decided to just walk away.  I pretty much left the site untouched since right before Christmas.  Sure, this was supposed to be an exciting time for someone who loves the sport.  I just couldn’t bring myself to watch.  Well, that’s changed.  I sat down yesterday and succumbed to the urge.

I realized that it was Sunday.  And, Sunday equaled raceday in the past so I quickly cruised over to www.nascar.com to look for the TV schedule.  Damn, I missed Fox calling the race so I was stuck with NBC.  Damn, Damn, Damn.  I really dislike NBC’s coverage of NASCAR but, I decided to go ahead and watch it on TNT anyway.  Double Damn, it’s in New Hampshire, one of my least favorite tracks.  I wonder, could this be a sign from above to stay away?  Yep, probably but I’m not smart enough to pay attention so I decided to go ahead and watch anyway.

I felt awkward, like an ugly kid at a dance.  It had been so long since I had watched, I didn’t know who was driving what.  Tony Stewart’s leading the points?  Wow, I’ve got to go back and delete that article that I did last year about this being a huge mistake and how he was going to struggle.  I wonder if anyone noticed it….?  It felt weird, but good. 

It looks like Daytona is next weekend with it being July 4th and all so I think I’ll watch again.  Who knows, I may really be back for good.  And if so, God help us all…

jc

Back towards the end of October, I wrote of how I was shifting focus of the site because I was unhappy with the direction of NASCAR.  Well, who could have ever imagined what would happen over the past couple of months that have followed?  One of my biggest gripes is the multitude of big teams that were drowning out the smaller teams.  This was, of course, fueled by sponsorship dollars endlessly given by big business including the “Big Three” auto makers.

Well, that was yesterday’s NASCAR.  With the significant fall of the Stock Market and, the pending demise of the “Big Three”, sponsorship money has all but dried up.  Teams are starting to collapse and in the interest of surviving, are looking to merge with each other.  The saddest part of all of this is the massive lay-offs that have hit the racing industry.  Especially at this time of year.

Teams started by two of the biggest names in NASCAR/Winston Cup Racing are struggling for existence.  Dale Earnhardt, Inc. has already joined up with Chip Ganassi Racing to field a four car team.  Petty Enterprises is rumored to be looking to join up with Gillett-Evernham Racing in some type of a merger deal.  NASCAR, in an effort to save money, has even eliminated testing for 2009.

For these reasons, I will be remaining active in my NASCAR, Sprint Cup, Nationwide and Truck Series racing.  Not because of wanting to watch a train wreck but instead because this could be the be the beginning of a return to the roots by NASCAR and the teams competing in it.  Sure, it’s easy to be the best with unlimited money but what happens when you suddenly have a budget to contend with.  Whereas this is new for a lot of teams, there are some smaller teams that are no strangers to struggling to survive.  It’s in this environment where you may see some of these teams excel. 

I can’t help thinking of the Wood Brothers or even Petty Enterprises and how they are prepared to do better in this environment of having less.  This is indeed a new era in NASCAR racing.  Shoot, we may even start seeing hometown garages on the hoods of cars before it’s over.  Yes boys and girls, this may be what returns NASCAR back to the hands of the people who started it.  Without rockstar salaries, who’s going to want to be a driver except those who truly love the sport?

With that said, I am actually very excited to see what NASCAR looks like during Speedweeks and the months to follow.  I am looking forward to writing about this transformation as well here.

The RacingFaces podcast will be happening.  We are actually planning to produce an introductory episode this weekend with the first regular episode starting with the first week of 2009.  The podcast will be an extension of the blog with an opportunity for more news and interviews.  We’re going to do some prizes so be sure to listen as we’ve already got some really nice prizes lined up courtesy of Sprint and Toyota!

Well, the first chase race is now in the books and man what a race it was.  Even with ABC coverage (my local cable company doesn’t have our ABC affiliate in HD), it was a good watch.  Qualifying was rained out so the field was set by points which put Kyle Busch and Carl Edwards on the front row.  Kyle went into the chase first and from the start had problems.  He had mechanical problems and, after a spin, was involved in a crash with Jamie McMurray on lap 84.  His finish put him back in the 8th chase slot.

I was listening to Greg Biffle, Carl Edwards and Jack Roush’s post race press conference and one thing really struck me.  First I should set this up a little.  As I mentioned, Jamie McMurray and Kyle Busch got together, ending Jamie’s day.  Jamie wasn’t the only Roush-Fenway driver to have problems.  Matt Kenseth was taken out also in a crash in lap 220.  During the conference, Jack said that even though Carl and Greg had done so well, he would still have trouble sleeping because of what happened to Matt.  I swear, it’s almost like Jamie doesn’t exist at Roush-Fenway.  It seems that Jack often forgets that Jamie drives for him at least for the time being.  I can only imagine that the reason that Jack neglected to mention Jamie is because he isn’t in the Chase but that’s got to tear the hell out of a teams morale.  I don’t think I’ve heard yet if Jamie is going to be at Roush-Fenway next year. 

Carl and Jimmie are tied in the lead of the Chase with Carl shown in the first slot.  Greg Biffle’s win brought him up to the third slot and you can check out the entire field here.

(Photo Credit: Todd Warshaw/Getty Images for NASCAR)

Until the Richmond race today, it was pretty easy to dismiss David Reutiman.  He’s only run 53 races with an average finish of 26th.  Up until Fontana, he had only led a total of 6 laps in his three year career in Nextel/Sprint Cup racing.  He pretty much stays out of the way and runs his own race.  That is until Fontana, where he grabbed his first ever top-ten finish. 

I am a firm believer in the power of bounce.  We see it all the time in the sport.  Sometimes, all a team needs is a win or even a good run for a shot of confidence to spring them forward.  That’s why we see so many winning streaks or at least back to back wins.  The #44 UPS team may be just experiencing a bounce from their 9th place finish in Fontana but I don’t really think so.  For the second week in a row, they’re inside of the top-ten.

It’s relatively easy to grab a couple of lead laps.  Just stay out on a caution for a couple of laps and grab the bonus points.  When a driver is able to stay out front for 104 laps in a 400 lap race, that’s a different story.  That’s what Reutimann was able to do today at Richmond.  I was very impressed with the #44’s run today.  For a bit, I even thought he might just pull off his first Cup win.  Mark my words, this teams win is coming.  I’m not sure it will be this season but I’m betting that by this time next year, Reutimann will have a win or two under his belt.  That would be incredible for Michael Waltrip Racing.  Off the top of my head, I’m not sure if they’ve ever had a win.

I was so impressed with the #44’s run today that I even dedicated a forum to David Reutimann fans which, if he keeps running like this, should keep growing every week.  If you want to check it out, it’s our first real racingfaces.com forum.  Even better than checking it out, jump in and post.  During the off season this year, I plan on doing a lot of work with the forums to get them ready for next season.

I just returned from a pretty good weekend in the Mooresville/Lake Norman area of North Carolina.  I arrived on Saturday for a family visit and stayed through late Sunday night.  While I was there, I thought I’d take in some of the sights.  It is Race City USA after all.

My Daughter and I decided to go to the North Carolina Auto Racing Hall of Fame in Mooresville.  Without a doubt, she’s my favorite traveling buddy, even at 19 and she enjoys racing as well.  We found it pretty easy to locate off of exit 36 with signs posted to lead you in.  We pulled up to this fairly nondescript building, and I thought, this can’t be it can it?  I had checked out the website before I left and, it looked interesting but was in need of updating. 

Well, we went ahead and went in and on one word can come even close to describing the experience, WOW.  When you walk in, there was a very nice reception area with tourism info and a nice little gift shop area.  Beside the checkout, there’s a very simple entrance to the museum.  Five dollars each seemed to be a fair price even though, given the lack of flash and sparkle so far, I didn’t have high hopes.  Boy was I ever wrong. 

When we walked in, we were greeted by several rows of cars from all years of racing.  I found cars from so many drivers from the past.  Among them, Darrell Waltrip’s number 17, Harry Gant’s old 33 Skoal Bandit.  I almost had a tear come to my eye as I stood in silent remembrance when I noticed the #28 of Davey Allison.  There were a couple of Rusty Wallace cars along with an old Peak Antifreeze car the Kyle Petty drove.  I kind of chuckled to myself when I saw a standee there of Kyle with his 80’s rock band hair.  Shoot, there were even the cars of Ryan Newman, Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson and Dale Earnhardt Jr. for the newer fans that might not know or care about the older guys.  One thing that was noticeably missing was a black #3 or shoot, even a yellow and blue #3.  From what I understand Richard Childress keeps those pretty close.  I was surprised though because Dale Sr. was inducted into the HoF in 2005 if I remember correctly.

In addition to the cars, there were several displays of interest.  Using the cutaway wheel/tire, I was able to explain to my daughter the inner liner and how it worked.  One of my favorite displays was of an old garage scene from the 40’s showing the influence of moonshine running on the sport.  Beside it was a collection of Benny Parsons items.  Another sad pause there…

When we finished with the self tour, we stopped and asked the young lady at the gift shop if any of the car shops were open.  We didn’t have high hopes since it was Labor Day weekend but she said that JR Motorsports and DEI was open.  The incredibly friendly and helpful young lady gave us directions and a map to JR Motorsports but I opted out of DEI since I can’t get the PR folks over there to talk to me.

I can’t say enough about how this was a must-see attraction when in the Mooresville area.  It’s well worth the money and time.  I plan on heading back when I’m in the area again.

I took some pictures so when I get some time, I’ll link them in here for everyone to see. 

This just in from the “can’t leave well enough alone” file.  NASCAR announced today that they are changing the format of the “Bud Shootout”.  From it’s beginnings in 1979, in order to be eligible for the Shootout, you either had to be a previous winner of the Shootout or you had to win a pole for the last season.

In the 2009 Shootout to be held on February 7th, the field will be 24 cars consisting of the top six from each of the four manufacturers, GM, Ford, Dodge and Toyota.  This will be selected by the final 2008 car owner points standings.

If we’re going to race by manufacturer, I say, each manufacturer should have the same percentage of the 24 slots as the percentage of wins from the previous season.  Shoot, I just realized, that’ll never work because I don’t think we have that many Toyota teams.

Just my two cents…

If you look at the post right before this one, it is the NASCAR press release about the penalties handed down by NASCAR for the JGR cheating scandal.  That is, if you consider it cheating.

This all started out, sadly, because NASCAR decided to penalize Toyota for stomping the crap out of the competition.  No one could argue that NASCAR has been dominated by Toyota this season.  The accepted solution, don’t encourage Detroit auto makers to make a better motor, but instead, hold Toyota back because they figured it out.  NASCAR mandated what was the equivalent of a restrictor plate for the Toyota engines in an attempt to manage horsepower in those motors.

When Toyota first entered the scene in the Truck series, they dominated there.  I have to admit, my inner redneck came out and I hated Toyota.  I felt the same when they entered at the time, Nextel Cup racing and Busch.  After I thought about it, I realized that this was a positive injection of cash and R&D for the sport.

Now, fast forward a couple of years.  Toyota is doing great in NASCAR.  Our reward for them, restrictions…  Now, NASCAR did mandate the changes which JGR complied with.  Where JGR screwed up is by hiding the true power of the current engine package.  After being slapped down for doing a good job before, I can understand their reluctance to brag about the powerplant.

I say JGR did not cheat but instead, NASCAR tried to cheat them.  And, to that, NASCAR has succeeded.  JGR will be further throttled eliminating the edge that they earned fair and square.  The penalty is ridiculous by any measure and will on serve to stifle further progress on the engine package for all manufacturers.

I remind everyone, NASCAR does this because the fans allow it.  If ratings went down when stuff like this happened, I bet it would stop pretty fast.

I heard Buck and Bass from over at rowdy.com call what happened Sunday as the “Debacle 400″ and, they were right.  Well, It must be my getting old but I held back on commenting on the tire situation at the Brickyard 400 just to get all the information possible.  We all know that in the early hours of a story, info is sketchy at best and that often results in inaccurate stories.  Given what transpired last Sunday, I wanted to be as accurate as possible.

First of all, we should probably take a look at what Goodyear has to say.  Here’s their follow up to the Sunday test.  And I do say test because that’s all it could be called, because it damn sure wasn’t a race.

Follow-Up To Tire Performance At IMS

Heading into the race, it was clear to everyone – Goodyear, NASCAR officials, race teams and the media – that the highly abrasive track surface would lead to rapid tire wear, as it always has. Typically, that issue resolves itself as the race progresses. However, this year’s race had one significant change.

This was the first race at this track with the “new” Sprint Cup car (the Car of Tomorrow). The car is heavier and has a higher center of gravity than the previous car, leading to more stress on the tires, particularly those on the right side. The car also possesses a significant reduction in downforce from the previous car.

In April, Goodyear staged a tire test at the track with three drivers (Dale Earnhardt, Jr., Brian Vickers and Kurt Busch) that resulted in the tire brought to Sunday’s race. The focus of the tire test was to improve treadwear. A number of right-side compounds were evaluated to address the treadwear, but none of the drivers were comfortable with the reduced level of grip of those compounds. The decision was made to use the same right-side compound as was used in 2007 because its performance under race conditions was a known quantity. The compound was paired with a revised construction and a softer left-side compound.

The exact tire combination that Goodyear brought to Indianapolis this year was tested with those drivers on the track in April.

However, actual tire performance in a 43-driver field in real-world race conditions on a new car is always going to be different than in a test. Sunday’s race was held in essentially new conditions. Although this surface has always been very abrasive, it has always “rubbered in” on race day. In other words, as the race progresses, rubber from natural tire wear effectively sticks to the track, making the surface less abrasive and improving tire wear. That didn’t happen on Sunday.

Certainly, Sunday’s race results are not what Goodyear wanted nor what it expected and we are committed to working with NASCAR and Indianapolis Motor Speedway to correct it. As an industry, we will solve this problem and we’ve already started that process.

Well, after reading the follow-up, it certainly is different from a  lot of what I had heard and read over the past week.  I heard everything from “Goodyear didn’t bring the tire they tested with” to “It was a new surface”.  It looks like it was the tire tested and that Goodyear was attempting to address a problem they had already noticed with wear.  Where NASCAR and Goodyear “screwed the pooch” was when they didn’t do more aggressive testing leading up to the race.

Not to fault Dale Jr., Brian or Kurt, but three cars basically doing hot laps do not constitute a proper test.  Indy is the second most important venue in the series so calling that a proper test is ridiculous.  Given that this was the very first appearance of the CoT at Indy and, that Indy is such an important race, NASCAR should have provided for an open, full test in full race trim for any interested team.

I know NASCAR and Goodyear are both in the business of making money but, some type of compensation should be given to the fans who paid good money, saved up vacation days from work all year and paid upwards of four bucks a gallon for the gasoline to attend the glorified test session.  If nothing else, maybe a discount on next years event.  NASCAR ie. the Brian France has forgotten what it’s like for Joe Sixpack to make an annual pilgrimage to one of these events.  Sure we see the rock stars all the time on the pre-race but for lots of people, going to one of these races is a huge part of their lives.  So, “We’ll do better next time” doesn’t cut a whole lot with me.

NASCAR has been having problems with event attendance and TV ratings over the past few years.  I myself sometimes get incredibly disgusted with the sport and things like this are the root of why.

NASCAR and Goodyear, be on alert, either get it together or, another sanctioning body will become king.  Personally, I like ARCA, USAR and even the ASA series.  All of these smaller series remind me of the NASCAR from the 70’s or 80’s back before the growth hit.  All these series need is the attention that is deserved.  If you want to see real racing with the “fire in the belly”, that’s where you find it.  Racing is like loving, it’s much better when the heart’s in it than when it’s the wallet alone.

I thought I’d chime in here with my opinion, mainly because it annoys me that this is even being considered and also because I’ve been so quiet lately.  Several news sites, blogs and even Dale Jr. himself have made the comparison of Kyle Busch to the late great Dale Earnhardt.  This is because of his aggressive driving style of win or go home every lap.  After all, it was Dale who used to say that second place was the first looser.

As a huge fan of Dale’s, even back in the early days when he was fairly disliked by fans and fellow drivers alike, I think I take some offense to this.  Why do I just think that I take some offense, well, I’m not exactly sure.  As I set here, I do see a lot of the same characteristics in Kyle that pulled me to Earnhardt.  I guess it could be because I was about 11 years old when Dale entered the NASCAR scene back in 1979.  I’m a different person (although, the wife might not agree) than I was then.  Those same qualities that looked so cool back then may just not hold the same regard to me that they did.  Even the good book (Bible) tells us "When I was a child I spoke as a child I understood as a child I thought as a child; but when I became a man I put away childish things." I Cor. xiii. 11.

Kyle and Dale share a similar driving style, especially when considering Dale’s early days.  Dale would come up behind you and, if you didn’t get out of his way, he’d move you out.  If he wrecked you, he’d chalk it up to "That’s racin" or "Didn’t mean to spin him out, I just meant to rattle his cage"  In Dale’s early days, he would either win or wreck.  He just didn’t seem to like middle ground.  Kyle is similar but if not for the CoT, he’d have more DNFs this year than wins.  Kyle should write NASCAR thank you letters every week for the CoT.  I have lost track of how many saves he’s had that could have been attributed to the new car.  Heck, even last week, the way he was getting into the wall, he should have been out halfway through.  I personally don’t think that Kyle has gotten better as a driver, it’s just the car is so much more forgiving than the old design.

Now, personality is one place that they diverge.  Dale had that winning smile that, even if he had just caused the big one, you could look past that.  After all, he was Dale.  He embraced the nickname Intimidator and went on to basically invent motor sports souvenirs sales with that image.  During the driver introductions at Darlington last week, Kyle was harshly booed by the crowd.  He took his sunglasses off and pretended to wipe a tear from each eye.  Not quite the same.  Kyle is trying to live the "bad guy" image and not quite pulling it off.

In these days, I don’t think there will ever be another larger than life personality as big as Dale Earnhardt.  It seems like that every time some young gun comes along, he does good for a few years and then vanishes to the back of the pack.  I think the days of twenty year driving careers are over.  Once these guys loose their marketing appeal, they’re done.  Unless, of course, you’re Dale Earnhardt Jr.

Gosh, I miss Dale.  Although, I’m not sure he’d like what’s happened with his sport since he left us.

I usually check the website stats daily here at racingfaces.com and the last couple of days have been no exception.  After the Richmond race on Saturday night, I posted a couple of little pieces about the race.  Namely, I posted a piece about Jr and Kyle Busch getting together and, I posted one about Michael Waltrip losing his cool and pushing Casey Mears down the track.

I honestly figured that the Dale Jr. story would be the biggie but man, was I ever wrong.  The Michael Waltrip story has beat it in both search engine hits and story hit probably by about five to one.  I think I know why.  Every, and I mean every news highlight real that I saw after the race talked about the Kyle and Jr. incident.  I don’t think even one mentioned the Michael Waltrip incident.  I thought it was big news when a guy as easy going as Michael lost his cool so, as such, it was worth writing about and it appears that you the readers agree.  Be sure to use the comments to let me know if I’m on target or, off the deep end.

That lets me know that I’m on the right track here (no pun intended) so I’ll keep doing more of the underreported stories as they break.

In closing, thanks for reading and enjoy!