HOW TO SLOW NASCAR'S CONTINUING DOWNWARD SPIRAL? MORE ROAD RACES.

By Peter M. De Lorenzo

Detroit. If you weren't able to see the NASCAR XFINITY race from Mid-Ohio over the weekend, you missed one of the most entertaining NASCAR races in years. And what made it so? Take a natural-terrain road course (Mid-Ohio) and add heavy rain and ever-changing conditions to the proceedings, and you had an unpredictable - and fun - race to watch (read more about it and see a video in "The Line" -WG). After seeing the race and watching social media blow up about it, one obvious takeaway is that if everyone else out there can see the added value of having more road races on NASCAR's Sprint Cup and XFINITY schedules, why can't the powers that be down in Daytona Beach see it and make it happen?

And of course, as NASCAR's biggest and most consistent critic by far, I don't really want to regurgitate the litany of reasons as to why this is the case because I have done so many, many times since we started this website, but for perspective I am obligated to do so. Despite Brian France's self-induced picture of himself as a "visionary" when it comes to the future direction of NASCAR, the fact of the matter is that NASCAR is so rooted in the past that it can't get out of its own way.

The evidence? The NASCAR series has been on a downward spiral since 2007 in terms of in-person attendance and television ratings, yet the sanctioning body has done nothing about it. There are too many races, too many repeat visits to the same tracks, and the NASCAR death march of a schedule - which consumes 36 grinding weekends - is the most ridiculous schedule in all of sports this side of the NBA and the NHL. And the "Chase" is convoluted and tired, too, which doesn't help matters.

But why do the networks keep throwing money at NASCAR like drunken sailors, you might ask, when it's getting more and more difficult to conceal the sparsely populated grandstands, or in the XFINITY series' case on a typical oval track, no fans at all? That's because the networks have an insatiable need for content. And they don't really care where it comes from because at the end of the day they have hours and hours of time to fill on multiple sports channels. Unfortunately, the NASCAR brain trust misinterprets this attention from the networks as validation that they must be doing something right, when in fact the continuing degradation of the NASCAR product is there for all to see every weekend they run.

The root cause of NASCAR's problems is the sanctioning body's stunning resistance to change - and no, the "Chase" doesn't count as substantive change, it's just a gimmick - fueled by its chief enablers, the auto manufacturers. I've written about this before, and there is no indication that this situation is going to change anytime soon, especially with the auto manufacturers adopting a "go-along-to-get-along" posture when dealing with NASCAR.

How resistant to change is NASCAR, exactly? Besides the ball-busting schedule, which more and more drivers are speaking out against, NASCAR continues to do stupid things like refusing to use center-locking hubs (they're still using wheels with multiple lug nuts when every other major racing series in the world switched at least fifteen years ago), on-board jacking systems (again, other series switched to this years ago) and dry-break refueling (using hoses instead of gas cans). The NASCAR brain trust views these things as part of its quaint traditions, but to everyone else it's the clearest possible signal of their propensity to hold on to things for far too long. (And, I might add, NASCAR is courting disaster by refusing to make these changes in their pit procedures. It's a safety issue.)

Those are the high hard ones in the litany of NASCAR sins, but probably the most glaring example of NASCAR's resistance to change and head-in-sand approach to everything is the lack of road races on its schedule, when everyone - fans, teams, the television networks, sponsors, etc. - agree that the two road races on the Sprint Cup schedule provide the most compelling racing by far. And therein lies the problem. The Sprint Cup schedule includes two natural-terrain road courses at Sonoma and Watkins Glen, and that's it. And the groundswell of people begging NASCAR to add more road racing - especially adding a road race in The Chase - is becoming larger by the minute.

And what is NASCAR doing about it? N-O-T-H-I-N-G, as always, after all, why fix what ain't broke in their minds?

I have proposed many, many revised schedules for NASCAR over the years. I did a schedule with a modest four race reduction (32 race weekends), one with 30 race weekends and my personal favorite, a radical 25-race weekend schedule, which made the most sense for everyone involved in terms of time and money, while moving the NASCAR circus away from its perennial oversaturation mode. So, rather than doing a revamp of the entire schedule, let's take a look at this year's schedule, starting with a proposed, unprecedented two weekend mid-summer break, which eliminates the Brickyard event at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the second visit to Pocono, and go from there. You'll see two road races are added and other races are dropped to shorten the schedule.

July 24: OFF. (The wildly underperforming Brickyard event is dropped from the schedule.)

July 31: OFF. (The second visit to Pocono in six weeks is eliminated.)

August 7: Watkins Glen.

August 14: Mid-Ohio. (Sprint Cup is added to the Mid-Ohio weekend.)

August 20: Bristol (night race).

August 28: Michigan.

September 4: Darlington. (The Chase begins.)

September 11: Richmond.

September 18: Road America. (Chicagoland is dropped, a Sprint Cup road race is added in place of it at "America's National Park of Speed.")

September 25: Dover. (New Hampshire 2 is dropped.)

October 2: Charlotte.

October 8: Kansas.

October 16: Martinsville. (Talladega 2 - and the obligatory carnage - is dropped from the Chase.)

October 23: Texas.

October 30:  Phoenix.       .

November 6: Miami.

In short, four weekends are removed from the schedule by eliminating The Brickyard, Pocono 2, New Hampshire 2 and Talladega 2; the total length of the schedule is cut by two weeks with a two-week mid-summer break; the Chase begins in Darlington; Chicagoland is dropped and two more road races are added (Mid-Ohio and Road America) to the schedule.

NASCAR insists that "nothing can be done" with its schedule because of longstanding agreements with track promoters and the vitality of its existing schedule. Really? That's unmitigated bullshit. With dwindling in-person attendance, fading TV ratings and an overriding boredom with its existing schedule that's contributing to the downward spiral, how can NASCAR not make substantive, meaningful changes?

Even if just one change was made - dropping Chicagoland from the Chase in favor of Road America - it would at least signal that there's an acknowledgement of reality down in Daytona Beach.

And that's the High-Octane Truth for this week.


 

Editor's Note: Many of you have seen Peter's references over the years to the Hydrogen Electric Racing Federation (HERF), which he launched in 2007. For those of you who weren't following AE at the time, you can read two of HERF's press releases here and here. And for even more details (including a link to Peter's announcement speech), check out the HERF entry on Wikipedia here. -WG

Publisher's Note: As part of our continuing series celebrating the "Glory Days" of racing, we're proud to present another noteworthy image from the Ford Racing Archives. - PMD

(Photo by Dave Friedman courtesy of the Ford Archives)
Riverside, California, January 21, 1973. David Pearson (No. 21 Wood Brothers Purolator Mercury) leads the field from the pole for the start of the Winston Western 500 at Riverside International Raceway. Pearson would suffer clutch issues and finish in 22nd place. Mark Donohue (No. 16 Roger Penske AMC Matador) would win that day, followed by Bobby Allison (No. 12 Bobby Allison Coca-Cola Chevrolet) and Ray Elder (No. 96 Fred Elder Olympia Beer Dodge). Donohue won by a lap, leading 138 of the 191 laps. The race took 4:48:33 to run (racing-reference.info). 

Publisher's Note: Like these Ford racing photos? Check out www.fordimages.com. Be forewarned, however, because you won't be able to go there and not order something. - PMD