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I think was planning on running a limited schedule in 2014 when he sold the #51 team to Harry Scott Jr. This news is not surprising. I read on Jayski that he's asked Bobby Labonte to drive the car in the Daytona 500.

We're not talking about domination and all that, just the ability to race closer to each other that has diminished a lot compared to the further back you go. Even when you had two cars on the lead lap sometimes, they could race close to each other lap after lap without chaser's front tyres wearing out to overcome aero push now you've got 20+ cars on the lead lap thanks to spec cars and fake cautions but they can't race close to each other 2 laps after a restart onwards most of the time.

Not to mention the terrible tyre situation.

But the overall parity of the field is much higher now than it was back then as going fast has become more of a science than a guessing game, so you can't really do a fair head-to-head comparison. You can however see how much closer the cars could run through the corners back then than compared to today's cars when you look at old footage on Youtube.

In my opinion, here's what NASCAR needs to do for better racing:

*Less downforce with a higher ride height and restrictions on the suspension to avoid sealing the nose off through the corners
*More reliance on mechanical grip through softer tires that wear more, resulting in bigger speed differentials as the tires get worn.
*Current horsepower levels on lower grip levels would make the cars more difficult to drive and result in more small mistakes, which makes for more back-and-forth racing and more passing opportunities

I think the racing has been excellent... but people will continue to bitch because letting go of the past is impossible for some, even if the past sucked. But hey, 1994 was awesome, even though Geoff Bodine lapped the entire field at North Wilkesboro and Earnhardt won the Championship by 444.. yes 444! points. Or how about 1993? Rusty won 1/3 of the races and Wallace, Earnhardt and Martin won 21 of 30 races. 10 drivers won a race only 4 won more than 1.

I really don't think back then was better than now. I taped every race from 1993-1996 and would watch them over and over again. Shit was not as close as people think it was. In fact my Dad used to do what many complain about, he'd watch the start, mow the lawn, watch the finish. I feel the biggest reason for people getting pissed and saying it's boring is because society and definitely sports fans have a TERRIBLE attention span. We want everything right NOW. So them just logging laps is boring. We like the first 50 laps then ok, NOW show me an awesome finish!! Then when the end comes and there is no awesome finish like YouTube has shown me is possible, fuck this shit, this racing is garbage!!

In the end, I do believe they need to put the cars back in the drivers hands but I'm also not going to blame NASCAR for everything.

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What Chris said.

We wanted a safer sport, so we got safer cars. With that came shitty aero side-effects. It doesn't help that the car has changed a few times in the last several years; pre-COT -> Ugly-Winged COT -> Spoiler COT with Splitter -> Spoiler COT with no Splitter -> Gen6... the complaining hasn't ceased long enough for NASCAR to decide what the fans like and what the fans can't stand. That's what made Denny Hamlin's statements about the Gen6 after Phoenix 1 (its second race and its first at an intermediate track) so idiotic - this shit takes time, and if anyone should know that, it's a driver.

They're doing their best to make the end product better for us, but at the end of the day, "us" is the problem. They'll never make "us" happy.

NASCAR can and will hit a great package (because they have before), and when they do, *other* fans will complain. Rinse, repeat. Just STFU and watch. Or don't. The end.

Here's the real problem in three words: Rose Tinted Glasses.

There are a lot of problems that us older fans don't like, but at the end of the day, while I don't watch with the religeous devotion I used, come February my ass will watch all the Speedweeks coverage I can.

Here's something to think about since it's an argument that comes up a lot regarding comparrison's of different season's... The Chase fundamentally changed the way the teams go about conducting the season, and I propose that despite what NASCAR thought would happen, it's actually made going for the win less relavent in the early part of the year. Most of the top teams know they'll most likely win 2 or 3 races and that in it's own right will lock them in to the Chase, which is all that matters. Knowing this, and knowing the season points tally up to the break doesn't matter much, there is less incentive to run hard every week for points since it's not going to help you that much in the end.

That doesn't take into account the cars problems, but it does account for seemingly lazy racing for a large part of the year.

They can throw all the bandaids they want at it, but at some point something's going to have to give because year after year fewer butts are in the seats. Talladega REMOVING seats should be a wakeup call. Might be the first time in history that a NASCAR track has removed seats simply because they can't sell the damn things.

no thanks, i'll take that geoff bodine race over any nascar race in the last five years.

Yes the racing used to be sometimes good and sometimes awful, and yes the fields used to be spread out. But the real issue here is that there is the POTENTIAL for much better racing than we are seeing in NASCAR at the moment, but every time they change the rules it seems to be slipping further and further away. NASCAR's moving in the wrong direction with the Chase, harder tires, higher downforce, lower horsepower, and silky smooth repaving jobs that don't seem to wear out like older pavement formulations did and don't create tire wear (Darlington is hardly wearing in according to the drivers despite it being a few years since the repave, for example).

That's the real problem. We could be seeing GREAT racing as opposed to just good racing at times. Not to mention if the cars are slipping and sliding around rather than glued to the track with tons of grip, it just looks more entertaining in my opinion, even if the cars are a bit spread out. One of the reasons I enjoy "drivers" tracks like Darlington or road racing and seeing drivers hustle the car.

Hoosier Tires imo

This thread requires light entertainment before it all get's very serious and people start throwing around their donuts...

So, I present to you, a Las Vegas NA$CAR Showgirl that looks like she's having trouble passing (just like on the track then hehe)....

This is my biggest beef with the current racing. It just looks too easy. I don't need the drivers to crash every 10 laps, but seeing them slip n slide would be a good thing. It would create passing. The Gen 5 car was completely on rails. It sucked. The problem isn't as prevalent with the Gen 6 car, but it is still there. Needs more hustle.

The tracks that are bumpy as hell (and hard to race at) are fantastically fun to watch. Atlanta, Homestead, both road courses... Michigan, Daytona, Phoenix, Pocono and Kansas were all great before the re-paves, and now they're super-smooth and character-less. That just compounds the aero problem, really, because those tracks are all about sheer speed now.

Didn't it used to be that repaving a track didn't automatically mean the racing would suck compared to the old surface?

Not sure... rules packages were changing quite a bit in the first 10-11 years after Daytona's repave in '79, so it's hard to tell with that one. As for Pocono, Michigan, Atlanta and Darlington's mid-90's repaves, they seemed to have great races (more-or-less) right off the bat. Then they re-paved them all again recently (except Atlanta, of course), and they haven't really gotten "character" yet.

Chicagoland's surface is from 2000 or so, as was Kansas' before the repave last year. Homestead's '03 surface wasn't great for quite a while, but these last few years have produced pretty good racing.

Maybe it's just due to better paving technology or something... I dunno.

I asked because I watched the 1978 World 600 on YT last night. Evidently, CMS was repaved (At least the turns were, if the track surface was anything to go by) just before that race, and it ended up being very competitive throughout, capped by an epic back-and-forth 6-car battle for the lead in the last 150 miles or so.

Though that might've contributed more to the cars than the surface, iono.

From http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/110451:

Re-configured Kansas has actually produced fun races despite the wreckfests

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If it weren't for the track falling apart, I loved how bumpy Daytona was in it's final years before the repave. It was just incredibly fun to watch cars bounce and weave in the pack.

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"The track's wet, that's what I think about it. Fucking shit gets wet when it rains."
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James Buescher is going to the Nationwide Series but not with who you think.

http://teamrab.com/james-buescher-to-compete-full-time-in-the-nascar-nationwide-series-with-rab-racing-in-2014/

I thought for sure he was going to take over the #31 after Justin Allgaier move to the Cup series. No idea who is going to drive the #31 Nationwide Car now.