out of the drivers control. The 3 wide, 10 rows deep pack is unbelievable even if it is the restrictor plate holding the cars that way. When you are in the grandstands you can not help but get caught up in it.
As everyone knows by now, during the prerace drivers' meeting NASCAR president Mike Helton warned that aggressiveness, particularly bump drafting and pushing in the corners with a two-car breakaway, wouldn't be tolerated. So a few years ago the took away the area below the yellow line. Let me tell you what, if you think 3 wide is something you should've seen when the cars would fan out 6 or 7 wide down the back stretch. Then they issued the no bump drafting. I don't think I read or heard one driver singing the praises of those calls.
The purpose of the small plate and the no bump drafting in the turns was SUPPOSED to stop the cars from getting airborne like Carl Edwards car did in the spring and stop "the big one". Well let see, that didn't work out too good now did it? Ryan Newman and Mark Martin both got airborne and there was still a very big one.
Denny Hamlin predicted the rule would force drivers to bump each other harder in the straighaways and cause a "big one" at the end. And boy did it.
Newman had this to say "The more rules, the more NASCAR is telling us how to drive the race cars, the less we can race and the less we can put on a show for the fans," Newman, who finished 36th, said. "They [NASCAR] have created a lot of boredom because we couldn’t race. It is survival." No-bump rule frustrates fans, drivers
THIS IS NOT RACING! Jimmy Johnson got a top ten finish not because he raced hard all day or because his pit crew did a stellar job or because Chad Knaus made a gutsy call. IT WAS BECAUSE HE "RACED" ALL DAY FOR 38TH PLACE!
No insult meant towards Jamie McMurray but he won only because he was lucky enough to be in front of the carnage that erupted behind him.
As to the "show", well there wasn't much of one for the first 3/4's the race. For one of the few times in my race fan career when the cup guys were at a decent race track, I flipped the TV to football. I just could not justify devoting 3 hours to that parade. I told Jimmy, I'll flip back with 30 to go. By the way I do that for California, Michigan, Chicagoland and Kansas too. How sad I have to add Talladega to that list.
The drivers seemed to agree with me.
Denny Hamlin: "I'm as bored as [the fans] are.''
Kevin Harvick joked about needing a spot to put his iPod, and Tony Stewart asked his crew for some No-Doz.' "It was probably the most yawning that I've done in a superspeedway race," Brian Vickers said. "Maybe that's what they want, I'm not sure." Drivers tee off on the boring Talladega parade rules
Denny Hamlin said he's never been so bored behind the wheel. Tony Stewart, who laid back with Jimmie Johnson much of the afternoon, radioed, "Someone tell me something interesting so I don't fall asleep out here."No-bump rule frustrates fans, drivers
Now on to what I found amusing. The drivers finally reached in their pants and found their cajones. They have finally realized that they do indeed hold power. I have said many times that the drivers need to form a union and in a way that is what they did on Sunday. In 1969 when the drivers tried to boycott the first race at Talladega they did not hold the power to hold NASCAR's feet to the fire. In 2009 the drivers do hold thast much power. They are bigger and hold more power as a group
than NASCAR does. Could you see what would happen at Talladega in the spring of 2010 if Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Tony Stewart and the rest of these guys stand together and DO NOT RACE? The fans would demand a refund AFTER they tear down the grandstands.
"It's just a product of this racing and what NASCAR's put us in, in this box with these types of cars, with the yellow line, with no bump-drafting, no passing," Newman said. "Drivers used to be able to respect each other and race around each other -- Richard Petty, David Pearson, Bobby Allison, all those guys have always done that. I guess they don't think much of us anymore." Newman flips, then fumes over NASCAR's restrictions
NASCAR quit caring about the fans years ago thinking there would always be new fans to take the long time fan's places whom had grown unhappy and disillusioned with the sport. I agree with Newman that NASCAR doesn't think much of them and that my friends is as serious a mistake as them not caring about the fans and their opinions.
Kyle Busch smugly said this is what's called a drivers' union. He also said it was B.S. and suggested that if this is what NASCAR wants, then the race should be shortened to 75 laps. No-bump rule frustrates fans, drivers
Amen Kyle, I hear you loud and clear and
as a racefan I am glad to see it happen.
Now if we can get then to stand up to
NASCAR on other important issues, I think
it could only help matters. The time is
now for drivers to insist that a committee
of drivers, crew chiefs, team owners AND
FANS be formed to talk to NASACR on a
weekly basis about the state of the sport
and what can be done to improve it.
"Obviously, there is something else that
needs to be thought about," NASCAR's
most popular driver Earnhardt Jr. said. "I
am sure NASCAR will figure it out. They
are pretty hard-headed over there. Don't like to admit they're wrong sometimes."
To say that NASACR doesn't like to admit they are wrong is as big an understatement as I have every heard. I’m not smart enough to know what needs to be done to fix what is wrong at Dega, but it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see something needs to be done.
Go visit our home page, called appropriately The Pits & check out our photos & pages.
Our most popular page; Race Recon is where you get all the info you need to go to the
races including local camping, hotels, bars, restaurants, tracks, golf & other important
& recipes, stories, trivia, quotes & more! While you are surfing see if you are a
adventures with the tailgating race fan at NASCAR tracks.
