I have not been too kind to NASCAR lately, and today will be no different.

Before I go entirely off the rails, I am referring to the top 3 levels of NASCAR-Cup/Xfinity/Truck. As a competitor in NASCAR, Pinty’s series is fantastic and generally fair racing.

I don’t care what series or style of racing you prefer: Oval, Road, or Street. They all require the element of racing I enjoy most-when a driver can drive a little bit deeper, go quicker or maintain a little more control than the car they’re racing, resulting in a successful pass or defense. I fucking love that!

Showcasing driving skills and excellent racing should be the pinnacle of any racing series. This idea of control is becoming foreign in NASCAR, where driving into the car in front of you is expected and acceptable. Even if you make a clean pass, nothing stops the driver from passing, releasing their brake, making contact, upsetting the car they’re chasing, and moving on to victory lane.

“I was going for the win” is something that virtually every driver has said after wrecking, dumping, or making contact with someone in the closing laps of a race.

A better quote would be: “I wasn’t going to be able to pass them, so I just took them out.”

I’ve gone back and forth with NASCAR from Love to Hate and back again. Right now, I won’t say hate, but I will say that there’s very little with NASCAR that appeals to me as a race fan. I’ve attended many NASCAR races from Phoenix to Daytona and have worked as a competitor in the Truck and Xfinity series. I am not the world’s foremost authority on NASCAR, but I’m also not limited to what I see on TV.

This is not a new position for me. If you’ve listened to the CanTorque Race Report Thursday afternoons, we’ve all but stopped talking about NASCAR, or when we do, it’s because of something so outrageous that we can’t overlook it. As a racing lover, this bothers me, but I feel like the series doesn’t give me much choice.

While the product on track has been dismal, NASCAR has some of the most significant drivers in the series’ history.

Kyle Busch – NASCAR’s all-time winningest driver.
Kyle Larson can race and win in any car he’s in.
Denny Hamlin.
Kevin Harvick.

Because this is racing, everyone will have an opinion, and when a fan doesn’t like a driver, they will invariably say, “they suck.” Let me assure you that the four drivers above are incredibly talented, as is most of the NASCAR world. It is such a shame that they rarely get to show their skills.

Dale Earnhardt was killed in 2001 in a relatively benign accident. NASCAR responded, and the series completely changed. Seat belts were strictly regulated, HANS/Hutchens devices were mandatory, the driver’s compartment was moved away from the outside rails, and every oval track implemented SAFER (Steel and Foam Energy Reduction). The point is that when NASCAR decides to do something, they do it enthusiastically.

I’m hopeful that NASCAR will eventually take a look in the mirror to address the points below and move back towards a proper racing series.

I think that NASCAR moved away from being a racing series long ago and is now focused on Vehicular Entertainment. The closest example I can come up with is that NASCAR is an automotive version of WWE. I’m not implying that the outcomes are predetermined, but I am saying that NASCAR is far more focused on “the show” than great racing. If NASCAR were a person, I’d call them superficial, far more worried with their looks than their actions or personality.

More examples of where NASCAR is going wrong:

• The penalty system generally doesn’t make sense: a loose wheel is more severe than when a driver deliberately takes out another driver. The open wheel is a two-lap penalty during the race, and two crew members are suspended for two races which usually comes with a financial penalty. Intentional contact is rarely, if ever, penalized.
  • Hendrick Motorsports is in the middle of having their four teams heavily penalized for parts the required supplier supplied them.
  • Denny Hamlin was penalized for speaking the truth about an on-track incident….the incident was never penalized during the event, only after DH said it on his podcast.
• We know with 100% certainty that Daytona and Talladega that 1/2 of the field, will be involved in an accident at some point in the race. That is a shocking statistic that most governing bodies would address and remedy….not NASCAR. Teams spend more money and weeks building these cars for Daytona than other races. Their most expensive cars get turned into tens of millions of dollars of scrap when 30 cars run within 2 seconds of each other.
  • The series knows this and doesn’t change anything because they enjoy the spectacle of the crashes and “close racing.”
  • While drivers generally walk away from their accidents, Ryan Newman was almost killed a couple of years ago; he missed nearly a month before somehow returning to the car.
  • Asking drivers to participate in an event with a 50%+ percent chance of an incident is deplorable.
  • NASCAR ignores the costs to teams and the risk to the drivers for the sake of the show
  • 
    To NASCAR, this is racing.

• Green/White/Checker/Overtime and Stage Racing is a useless gimmick, and about racing is total bullshit. Keeping the field artificially close is dangerous and doesn’t allow great drivers or teams to showcase their skills. Triple “overtime” in COTA this past weekend…..how fun and exciting!!!
• Playoffs DO NOT BELONG IN RACING!!!!
  • There isn’t another sport in the world that allows teams that have been eliminated from competing with those vying for a championship, but the ludicrous nature of NASCAR’s playoff system would show when only four cars are on track for the final race….vanity at its finest
  • This, again, is supposed to create “excitement,” but how exciting is it when you know that the championship race is so predictable that it will come down to a late race caution and be decided in the last few laps?
  • If things are exciting all of the time, then it’s no longer exciting

The exception to this rule is drag racing, where they already run in a ladder system, but we’re not talking about other forms of racing, damnit…stick to the topic.

• NASCAR has spent millions of dollars turning LA County Coliseum into a short track of 1/4 mile. That construction only lasts for one weekend and then has to be removed. It takes weeks to prep and build up the surface; then, it has to be paved. It is a colossal waste of time and money for an exhibition race that doesn’t replicate any other track or race on the calendar.
• The most sought-after tickets in NASCAR were always the two races at Bristol Motor Speedway; it has excellent banking in the corners and even 5-9 degrees on the straights, which allows for side-by-side racing. It was a perfect track and a perfect race. NASCAR chose to turn one of its races into a dirt race
  • To date, no one can explain how taking cars built for asphalt driven by a field that doesn’t regularly run on dirt will put on a show or endear NASCAR to dirt racing fans.
  • If you ever get to see winged sprint cars on dirt, do it! And when you do, you’ll know very quickly that proper dirt cars being run by dirt drivers is an infinitely greater show than watching flying bricks tip-toe around.
  • The square peg is firmly forced into a round hole.
• Broadcasts used to consist of, you know, broadcasters. I’m a big fan of inside-the-ropes access and behind-the-scenes commentary. NASCAR went way too far when Fox broke the mold years ago by stacking the booth with former driver Darrell Waltrip, former crew chief Larry McReynolds (who is referred to as Larry Mac, even though his name is mc……anyway) and another former crew chief Jeff Hammond all of whom worked together on track at various points in their career spent as much of their broadcasts talking about themselves as they did about the action on the track
  • Today, most of the broadcast team on any NASCAR broadcast are former drivers, and the broadcasts aren’t nearly as engaging, except for Mike Joy, a broadcasting legend.
• More than anything else, there isn’t a definable driving standard. NASCAR does not punish their drivers for lousy driving; they usually encourage it. “Have at it, boys” was a theme presented by NASCAR management years ago, essentially leaving the policing of on-track action to the drivers. There isn’t a sport on the planet that allows the competitors to police themselves.

Last weekend’s race at COTA should have been the ultimate showcase of how far NASCAR drivers’ skills have come, where they can share the track with two former F1 champions and one of the world’s best sportscar drivers. Just imagine Kyle Larson going wheel to wheel with Jensen Button into a corner, driving side by side until one got the edge, and seeing them do it again a few corners later…..that would have been amazing, but it never happened.

Instead, we got to see another smash-up derby and drivers who seemingly forget where the brake pedal is and what it’s used for.

Don’t take my word for it:

Ryan Preece said that there’s no respect in the series and that a few drivers need to have their asses kicked
Alex Bowman noted, “the way that we race is embarrassing.”
Jordan Taylor was filling in for Chase Elliott, said that Sunday’s race gave him more contact than the entirety of his career combined, following up with if people drove like that in sportscars, they’d be ejected from the event.
Jensen Button said, “I think that I hit or was hit on every lap of the race” “these guys race for 30th place mid-race like they’re going for the win on the last lap.”
Denny Hamlin commented on the massive volume of contact “A lot of the reason drivers do it is that they don’t get called on it.”
During an interview, Kyle Busch specifically called out Ross Chastain as a dirty driver as Chastain walked by.

There’s much more, but that’s a pretty good cross-section and virtually unanimously suggests that things must change.

Drivers are obviously and repeatedly frustrated, but the series is oblivious. Remember that these are just public comments, I promise their private opinions are far more pointed, but we’ll never hear them for their fear of being penalized.

NASCAR’s Sr. Vice President of Competition Elton Sawyer said after COTA: “We didn’t see anything that crossed the line; our DNA for 74+ years has been aggressive racing” He then followed up with the fact that so many drivers made such hard contact so many times and that the cars survived much of the connection.

The same car that NASCAR is praising is the same one that ended the career of Kurt Busch because it is too stiff.

Rant over. I’m looking forward to being able to watch F1 from Melbourne as well as Indycar from Texas.

Agree? Disagree? Let’s chat about it: [email protected] or jump in during the Talkin’ Torque Show on Thursday evenings from 5-6 PM MST/7-8 PM EST.

CL