2021 NASCAR thread

Not this week

 

18

 

Damn fagano trying to wreck his own teammate, blocking. I'd put that sumbitch in the wall every chance I got. He is just a total dick.

 

Let's go harvick. Since Chase can never have good luck at a fucking race. Anyone but fagano.

 

Pennzoil 400

2 Pennzoil sponsored cars, 1&2. Imagine that

 

Winner, winner, chicken dinner!

 

God I hate this package...

 

Motherfucker. Why don't the other drivers ever drive Fagano's ass like he drives everyone else. Unbelievable.

 

2nd is nice...

First would have been better.

And when did Stenhouse learn how to drive?!

 

Stenhouse had the race fall into his lap... literally

 

I was building a deck all day so I only saw the results...

But still... 3rd? Hes usually the first to hit something. That's an accomplishment.

 

Got lucky twice... stayed out and caught a caution, near the end. Then with like 5 to go stayed out at that caution and had enough cars that stayed out to cause a wreck behind him to keep people from being able to move up.

 

NASCAR really wanted the sponsor to have that one. They wreck in turn three and they don't throw the caution until after the leader takes the white. If I was Brad I would be pissed! Considering that is one of his cars. Chase's crew sucks as usual. Someone should just turn the 22 before the first turn every week. I expect Brad will be in the 48 next year. Pretty clear Penske has decided to put him in his place in the pecking order at that organization.

 

They have to go All-In with Hallie because they don't have a lot in Cup development after Cindric and Briscoe. I think Gilliland is a Ford dev driver? Roush carried the Ford development program in trucks and Xfinity for a long time and that channel is all dried up. That brought is J Burton, Edwards, the Busches, Kvapil, Biffle, Ragan. Keselowski brought us Reddick, Cindric, Hemric, Briscoe, but BKR bailed too. The current Ford truck guys (Crafton, Sauter, Rhodes, Enfinger, Gilliland, Grey) are staying put. Outside of Rhodes and Gilliland, I don't think they have aspirations to step up to Xfinity. And I don't see the skillset needed from those guys to succeed. Ford is very top-heavy on the Cup side. McDowell, Almirola, Newman and Bowyer are getting long in the tooth.

Deagan
Cindric
Briscoe
---
JH Nemechek
Lajoie
Custer
---
DiBenedetto
McDowell
Buescher
Almirola
Newman
Blaney
Bowyer
Logano
Keselowski
Harvick

 

The Xfinity series may as well be the Camaro series after watching yesterday... 2 Fords and like 4-5 Toyotas and the rest Camaros. Someone needs to seize the opportunity that is fixing to show itself as being the leading Ford pipeline... everyone is all crying begging for more manufacturers, but the ones we have dont spend as much in the lower tiers already, what makes people think a new one will?

 

I think a big turnoff for potential manufacturers (and a big damper on the current crop) is the OHV pushrod V8s. It made sense when the teams were sourcing engines (and sheet metal) from the manufacturers. It would be nice to see a return to factory sourced power plants built and tuned to a common spec. At that point, you could potentially boil the series back down to different engine platforms like it used to be (V8 in cup, V6 in Busch Series, etc).

Maybe:
Cup - Aluminum V8 or V6 with hybrid or forced induction
Xfinity & Trucks - NA V6

It pains the purist in me to even type that, but at the same time, screaming to "keep the stock in stock car" while ignoring technological innovations is disingenuous.

 

I dont care about "stock". It hasn't been stock in awhile... show me a new single cab tundra, or V8 Camry.... hell the supra uses a BMW powerplant in real life... V8s or bust... formula E is a kazoo sounding snooze fest and F1 has declined sharply since going hybrid. Need to keep the V8s.. now they should allow DOHC and SOHC to compete with OHV... think about it... 5.7 Iforce is DOHC, 5.0 Coyote SOHC and 6.2LT1 OHV... that's fit close to each manufacturer if it has to be relevant anymore...

 

I certainly agree with going back to manufacturer determined specs. They kind of leaned in that direction a little bit with given manufacturers the ability to create their own body panels but other than that it's still the same car.

I'm for technological improvements... but not to the point where it changes what the sport was designed to be... A driver focused Nanny free all out race.

The open-wheel driver nowadays are basically glorified steering wheel holders. All you have to do is keep it away from the walls or other drivers and the car does the rest for you. I don't like that. Stock car racing was supposed to be a simple Man and machine tight racing.

 

Yeah, I think they should open up the motor formula. Let V6s and V8s compete against each other. DOHC and SOHC engines, just keep it all under a certain displacement threshold. Let them run standard 4-speed or 6-speed transmissions. They've been painted into such a small box and I think they need to let teams run free for a while to shake things up.

NASCAR brass claims they make all these rules so there's equity in the garage. 71 years of rule after rule since that first sanctioning meeting and there's still not equity in the garage. They don't actually care about equity, they care about a good show. That's why they hit Ford with new rules every other week in the mid-late '80s. That's why they pulled apart Bill Elliott's car after every race in '85. That's why they told Jeff Gordon not to win by so much in the late '90s. That's why they tried to Matt-proof the points system and then Jimmie-proof the playoffs.

Open things up. Let's see which drivers are gutsy enough to hang it all out diving into T1 at the big super speedways. Let's see which engineer wants to study other racing series to develop a twin-turbo v6 that eats V8s on the long straits at Pocono. The most exciting era in Indycar was the speed wars where every year brought head-scratching innovations. The last time I recall experiencing that at a Cup race was back in the mid-90s when I was sitting on the infield of T4 at Daytona listening to Sterling Marlin running that wild new exhaust system. That was 26 years ago.

 

I must be an outlier for V8 only...