Official 2010 Nascar Thread

For some reason, potholegate got my attention and I ended up watching the race. I am on an open wheel site and man, they were really kicking NASCAR for the track.

I think they should take the pavement off and put them on dirt. Would make things more interesting. Would favor a few drivers (Stewart, Gordon, and other former Sprint car drivers).
 
For some reason, potholegate got my attention and I ended up watching the race. I am on an open wheel site and man, they were really kicking NASCAR for the track.

I think they should take the pavement off and put them on dirt. Would make things more interesting. Would favor a few drivers (Stewart, Gordon, and other former Sprint car drivers).
That would make Stewart or Kenny Schraeder the next champion. I like this idea.:thumb:
 
Damn Kasey did well in qualifying and early in the race but once his car got beat up he couldn't keep up with the leaders.
 
I was very happy to McMurray win that race. Besides potholegate, the race was very good. I liked having the bump drafting back, and really liked the multiple tries at a clean finish.
 
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Besides potholegate, the race was very good. I liked having the bump drafting back, and really liked the multiple tries at a clean finish.
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Yes very nice to let the drivers drive again. Nice to have some rubbin' and racin' going on without Nascar poo pooing all over it.
 
Jr knows how to drive that track.
By far the best Hendrick car.

Right before DW said "He looked just like his daddy" on that last lap I said the same thing to Ben.

Shannon cried, Kyle Busch lost :(

OH
NASCAR
FIX DAYTONA, that was deplorable

FUNNY commercial though ROFL

I hope now with a new crew in place that Jr has a good year. By a good year I mean get in the chase then have a solid run in the chase. He doesn't need to win the whole thing.
 
So its obvious now after yesterday's race, NASCAR needs to get rid of one of the races at Fontana. Its embarrassing to see half the seats empty. Southern California just doesn't care about the sport, which is fine, just stop force feeding them the races when other parts of the country would love to have a race at one of their tracks. And who cares about Fontana, its just another cookie cutter track thats boring as hell.

and it seems every single year at the spring race they have a problem with rain. February is the rainy season is LA, whats so hard to understand about that?
 
Apparently I am not alone on that thought.

Attendance woes continue at Auto Club Speedway

http://www.nascar.com/2010/news/opinion/02/22/one.menz.jmenzer.fontana.gzucker/index.html

FONTANA, Calif. -- It's time to get off Gillian's Island.

The ruse is up. Gillian Zucker seems to be a very nice and sharp lady who works extremely hard at running Auto Club Speedway and trying to convince all of Southern California what the rest of America already knows: that NASCAR is pretty darn cool, and one of the best sports in the world to experience seeing in person.

But it's not working. It's nothing, really, to be ashamed about. The almighty National Football League couldn't even make it work in fickle Southern California.

Zucker, the track president at the facility where Sunday's Auto Club 500 was run, has been very creative with her marketing program. Not as creative as she is with fudging attendance numbers and convincing herself that her track really does deserve the two Sprint Cup dates it currently owns on the 38-race schedule (counting two non-points events), but creative nonetheless.

Sunday's official guesstimate on attendance was 72,000.

Seriously? The grandstands, which seat 92,000, might have been half full. Maybe. But that might even be a stretch. Let's say they were and give 'em 46,000 for that -- which would mean there were another 26,000 in the infield, where there couldn't have been half that.

A most generous but much closer to accurate estimate on the attendance would have been, say, 56,000. And that's not enough to justify continuing to come this far west two times a year. It's that simple.

Gillian's logic

We all know Kansas Speedway, a place that seats 81,687 and generally sells all of them plus puts another 10,000 in the infield, is about to get a second date. It's likely to happen as soon as next season, when the $680 million Hollywood Casino at Kansas Speedway is set to open overlooking Turn 2. If Kansas gets a second NASCAR weekend, the date has to come from somewhere.

Even Zucker knows it.

"I think every track has to be concerned that it would come from them," Zucker said Sunday while driver Jimmie Johnson, from the nearby San Diego area, was in the process of winning a highly entertaining race at the facility she runs. "And I will be out there kicking and screaming, fighting and scratching, to keep our two dates. I know what we bring to the economy of California. It's something that we're proud of, and it's something that this state needs.

"And I also believe there is a big opportunity for NASCAR here. There are a lot of fans out there. We just need to keep delivering a great product out on that race track."

Well, unfortunately, it is not as simple as that. Auto Club Speedway has been holding two events per year since 2004 -- but the crowds have been falling off at both events, or so it appears to the naked eye, for at least the past three years. ("Official" attendance guesstimates by Captain Gillian and her ill-fated, lost-on-a-NASCAR-island crew may not support this assumption that nonetheless is widely held by everyone who actually has gone to a race there during that time span).

Wouldn't it be better for everyone involved to take one date away from Auto Club Speedway and gamble on getting better results in Kansas? For that matter, there are other venues that probably deserve the Sprint Cup date just as much as Kansas and infinitely more than ACS -- such as Las Vegas Motor Speedway, which has been begging for a second race weekend; or even Kentucky Motor Speedway, which is salivating for the chance at just one.

But Zucker isn't buying into the theory that one great race would be better than two seemingly mediocre ones (at least in terms of attendance) at her place.

"I personally think that a lot of emphasis is put on sellouts," Zucker said. "But you have to remember that these facilities are not all equal. If you have a facility that has 50,000 seats and it sells out, is that better than having a facility with 92,000 seats and might not? So I really don't know that selling out one race is better than having two that are almost there and on their way."

Poor Ms. Zucker. You are in denial.

Business time

Zucker also claimed Sunday that the economy is largely to blame for all the empty seats in her grandstands, and there is no doubt that is true. But the crowds began falling off even before the economy went in the tank.

The fact is that NASCAR probably was premature in the first place in awarding a second date to Southern California. You can't blame it for trying. Times were good back in '04. Nationwide interest in the sport was at an all-time high; television ratings and attendance virtually at every track were peaking. Plus it's a huge, relatively untapped market that seemed ripe for the picking. Los Angeles is 50 miles to the west of Auto Club Speedway, and San Diego is 108 miles to the south.

Zucker has relentlessly and tirelessly attempted to engage this vast and varied fan base. For that, she should be applauded. And there are no problems with the facility itself, which is fine. But these folks just don't care that much about racing, or at least not enough of them do.

A reporter asked Zucker on Sunday how she keeps from getting discouraged. She admitted the crowd was not as large as she would have liked.

"It's not as big as I want it to be. But you know what? I love NASCAR. I love it," she said. "And for me, when I was first introduced to this sport and I saw it for the first time, I felt like I had been missing something because I hadn't been experiencing it from the time when I was a small child. I want other people to have that opportunity.

"So I continue to be excited about the idea of introducing a community to this sport. And we continue to have a lot of people who haven't been exposed to it getting exposed to it. That charges me up. That's why I don't get discouraged."

Her enthusiasm and determination are admirable, even if her mathematical skills when figuring attendance figures are not.

But enough is enough. This West Coast Experiment has run its course, and it's not like the venue will be deprived of NASCAR altogether, as it still will have one date to sell. That makes so much more sense.

It's time for NASCAR to get down to business -- elsewhere on this spring date, beginning next season.
 
They need to get rid of one of the races at Pocono, as well.

1. Boring ass fricken race
2. Both fricken 500s. Seriously???
3. IT NEVER SELLS OUT


Take one away from Pocono, or Fontana and give one back to Darlington or Bristol, or give another one to Infineon or Watkins Glen.
 
The Brickyard 400 err Allstate 400 at the Brickyard or whatever it is. I been to two of them. One when they had the original time (first week of August or something). I then went to one a couple years ago when they moved it to July. Talk about misarable. So freaking hot, I took 4 bottles of water and drank every last one of them in 2 hours. I ended up seeking shade and skipped half the race. AFter that, I said I would never go to a NASCAR race at Indy ever again. The only two races I want to see in Indy is the Indy 500 and the Red Bull Grand Prix. I keep trying to have Mari Hulman George get me tickets for the motorcycle one. But she keeps forgetting I asked (she said she could one time when I loaded her car with her groceries).
 
The Brickyard 400 err Allstate 400 at the Brickyard or whatever it is. I been to two of them. One when they had the original time (first week of August or something). I then went to one a couple years ago when they moved it to July. Talk about misarable. So freaking hot, I took 4 bottles of water and drank every last one of them in 2 hours. I ended up seeking shade and skipped half the race. AFter that, I said I would never go to a NASCAR race at Indy ever again. The only two races I want to see in Indy is the Indy 500 and the Red Bull Grand Prix. I keep trying to have Mari Hulman George get me tickets for the motorcycle one. But she keeps forgetting I asked (she said she could one time when I loaded her car with her groceries).



Yeah, we used to have those issues at the Busch race in Milwaukee, which is the last weekend in June and the Cup race at Chicagoland Speedway, the second week in July. Both have been moved to night races due to the heat issues.

The first year we went up to the Busch race in Milwaukee, I actually thought it was awesome, while the hubby and the other couple we were with complained about the heat the entire time. I mean, I got to work on my tan, drank beer all afternoon, and I didn't once have to get up to go to the bathroom even once, I just sweated it all out. Perfect race conditions to me. :)
 
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And who cares about Fontana, its just another cookie cutter track thats boring as hell.
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It was a bit of a boring race, I had it on for quite awhile until Kasey's car got beat up and he was totally out of it.

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The Brickyard 400
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I don't think that track is great for Nascar anyway. Year before last or was it last year they had the big problem with tires there getting chewed up very quickly. Should stick to Indy cars there.
 
So its obvious now after yesterday's race, NASCAR needs to get rid of one of the races at Fontana. Its embarrassing to see half the seats empty. Southern California just doesn't care about the sport, which is fine, just stop force feeding them the races when other parts of the country would love to have a race at one of their tracks. And who cares about Fontana, its just another cookie cutter track thats boring as hell.

and it seems every single year at the spring race they have a problem with rain. February is the rainy season is LA, whats so hard to understand about that?

I couldnt agree more. i cant stand cookie cutter tracks. Fontana, Las Vegas, Ft. Worth Tx, Pocono, Charlotte, Michigan even Indy are just simply snoozze fests:zzz:. I miss Darligton in a bad way, that was a great race back in the day.
 
They need to get rid of one of the races at Pocono, as well.

1. Boring ass fricken race
2. Both fricken 500s. Seriously???
3. IT NEVER SELLS OUT


Take one away from Pocono, or Fontana and give one back to Darlington or Bristol, or give another one to Infineon or Watkins Glen.

Bristol already has two, thats plenty. I agree with giving one to Darlington, or maybe even go back to Rockingham. Or maybe try another part of the country.
 
I couldnt agree more. i cant stand cookie cutter tracks. Fontana, Las Vegas, Ft. Worth Tx, Pocono, Charlotte, Michigan even Indy are just simply snoozze fests:zzz:. I miss Darligton in a bad way, that was a great race back in the day.
OPPS i ment Rockingham. I know they race onece in Darlington some time in May. i`m a :bozo:
 
OPPS i ment Rockingham. I know they race onece in Darlington some time in May. i`m a :bozo:

I miss The Rock as as well. What a great track. i mean its like no other track on the circuit. Both ends of the track are completely different in shape, length, and banking. The reason for the odd shape is that there is some swampland that was protected so they had to alter the shape of the track. It always gave great racing and unreal finishes. Its such a shame they don't go there anymore.

l.php
 
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The Brickyard 400
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I don't think that track is great for Nascar anyway. Year before last or was it last year they had the big problem with tires there getting chewed up very quickly. Should stick to Indy cars there.


Goodyear fvcked that up by bringing the wrong tires

There have been some great races at Indy in NASCAR
 
Bristol already has two, thats plenty. I agree with giving one to Darlington, or maybe even go back to Rockingham. Or maybe try another part of the country.



Sorry, my bad... I didn't mean Bristol, I meant Rockingham. I was pissed when NASCAR dumped the track completely.
 
Wow Edwards just hosed Koslowski bigtime ! Nice that he was able to walk away from that crash. No need for that.

Go Kasey !
 
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