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Hot take here but racing is for the fans not the drivers.

This is like the old King of The Hill episode where Bobby goes to clown school. While his clowning is technically perfect, the audience absolutely hates it. No one is watching TV to see drivers hit their setup and take perfect lines around the track. They want chaos.

I don't think anyone disagrees that racing is for the fans. If there is no fans (either it be butts in seats, or watching/listening from home), then there is no sport as a whole.

The key in point is the type of fan that NASCAR and their business partners are trying to chase, and honestly this mythical casual fan base (that apparently wants Daytona/Talladega pack racing at every track & that the ratings would equal NFL playoff games weekly if they got them) that they are chasing simply doesn't exist. If it was solely down to that style of racing, then the IRL would still exist in it's 2005 form of insane pack racing & photo finishes.

NASCAR is simply in a identity crisis, and no matter what they will do going forward - it will be a acid trip of curiosity, anger & confusion among all.

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hopefully SMI has learned from the mistakes of past repaves (Charlotte, Michigan, Texas, Kentucky) in regards to using genetically modified polymers in the asphalt mixes, as that is what is keeping those tracks locked down to a single groove with very little surface wear - although they might go with it for this because if the goal is Daytona/Talladega type racing, then why would they want to repave sooner?

I never really respected the entertainment-first approach to racing or any other sport because it always makes the competition more contrived and less meaningful. Racing doesn't exist to entertain us. It exists because people like to compete, and when it's done well and competently, it naturally draws in the attention of fans who are interested in it. Yeah there's a balance to be pursued when something is popular enough to draw lots of eyeballs (in person or on TV/internet), but the further you get away from letting a competition play out on its own terms (the terms of the competitors), the more it always ends up sucking shit. You're losing more and more of what drew people to the sport in the first place.

I guess I should have wrote NASCAR racing is for the fans.

They’ve nerfed the difficulty years ago and turned it into whatever it is now.

not the first time I've heard rumors about the NextGen car being a literal deathtrap for drivers so I'd take Steve's word for it

NASCAR markets itself with pack racing and wrecks

How many NASCAR promotional videos usually feature a big wreck at one of the superspeedway races.

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better add fatalz to the mix if they don't redesign this PoS. This thing is flunking crash tests at 113 MPH

also hope Supercars fixes it with Gen3 because it's the same front clip design

That's bizarre if true, why would NASCAR engineers want to push car stiffness beyond safety? What's the goal there?

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There are a few people in that Twitter thread that seem to be suggesting William Bryon’s crash in his March 2020 Next Gen test was a warning that the car might not be as safe as it should. I remember reading about it at the time and I just did another search for more details but all I’m really finding is that he did crash. Those articles are all short on detail but none of them seem to indicate anything alarming, especially since Byron has quotes about the wreck and makes no mention of anything major.

Looking at the Twitter thread and associated reddit thread seems like there's a lot of conjecture and loose information behind this. Steve Hmiel's twitter account looks like a shared account with his wife and may actually be his wife posting this. Byron's test accident occurred 16 months ago, who knows what changes have been made since. Generally there's a lot of "a friend of a friend got a corporate memo saying it was bad" and anecdotal evidence that could be concerning or par for the course based on context that hasn't been provided. Only way to know the reality is for NASCAR to get out in front of it, which we know they won't.

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I hope it's fake news and not a cover up. This next gen is literally designed to generate as many wrecks as possible.

Rather fitting that its first race is scheduled to be at a repaved superspeedway. Hold your breath folks.

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Kyle Jeffries (former engineer at Stewart Haas) has a great thread about the issues pertaining to the NextGen car

does anyone know if any large group testing has actually been done where they are actually trying, not lifting for fake packs

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only 2 or 3 cars on track (as there isn't many built), and from what I've heard - one of the biggest flaws of the car is how bad it handles dirty air (despite chucking off tons of side force)

given NASCAR's historical record on dealing with safety (plus the fact that race control & safety crews has been very lacking this year), not sure if I wanna believe it

Jesus CHRIST this was their one chance to fix this

So, it's gonna kill people on the few instances where it's NOT being boring?

TBH, nascar is obviously shit scared about anyone dying in one of their cars, it's about the only reason I think they keep them running around with so little power and so much DF these days, so no-one spins out
So if there is a genuine problem with the safety of these cars, I can see the next gen being delayed rather than pushed through onto track where it could be a huge liability.

The dirty air stuff though, I honestly don't think they have anyone techincally minded looking at this car, just designing something that suits the manufacturers in the sport and to hell with the consequences of the body shape

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RIP Birmingham Wheels: here's some of the crash videos I recorded when it was there:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIaKIE ... 5t9d5PvoHA

Twitter:

http://www.twitter.com/paulhadsley

1 problem with that, and it always wins out over everything else

The terrible racing and dirty air problem is the main reason I stopped watching NASCAR (Stage racing didn't help). There was a brief period a few years ago when I thought they tested out some lower downforce packages that improved the racing a little bit? Why do they insist on limiting power and increasing downforce further when it makes the racing awful? Maybe it will reach a point where Michigan, Atlanta, Charlotte, and Texas can be run as full throttle pack races (it might be interesting to see a race like this but I'm pretty sure the novelty will wear off with the endless crashes and stupidity). Every other intermediate track will be garbage to watch.

More power. Less downforce. No splitter. Surely there is a better chance of side by side racing and overtaking when cornering speeds are 50 - 60mph less than straightaway speeds, and cars are sliding around more?

That is their ultimate intention & hope from the start with all of this - for all tracks over 1.5 miles especially

There's no coincidence that you will start to see drivers "retiring" or going to other forms of motorsport like what Jimmie Johnson is doing. Same thing happened with IndyCar (especially the IRL side) in the mid to late 2000's