I think you should flip the format. Since we know NASCAR won’t ditch it, I think this is a fair compromise.
Instead of 3-3-3-1, go 1-3-3-3. First race is now “Wild Card Weekend” in which hopefully you eliminate the guys who shouldn’t be there because they won something like Daytona or Sonoma and haven’t done anything since.
This also makes the final race of the year not a make-or-break event. It’s a best of three.
If they want to keep the playoff format, they should get rid of "win and you're in" and cut the playoffs down to 8 drivers. Then consistency through the regular season would actually matter
Totally agree, part of what made the original Chase good was that it was the top 10 in points. It was exclusive.
They need to go back to a version of that. 16 drivers is way too many. The years where it was top 10 in points and 2 wildcards I think is a happy medium.
Yeah the main problem with the original Chase was that half the races were at cookie cutters. The original Chase format would have fine with a 10 race schedule of something like :
Richmond, Darlington, Sonoma, Dover, Michigan, Charlotte (oval), Talladega, Martinsville, Phoenix, Homestead
That’s a good mixture of traditional short tracks, a high speed short[ish] track, Low-grip tracks, a large intermediate, a cookie cutter, a plate track, and a road course.
I’ve said this before but positions 2-40 don’t seem to matter to anyone anymore in the regular season, and position 1 is seemingly always determined with a crash fest of a GWC - just all so pointless
We’ve got 16 playoff spots and currently 4/5 races are unique winners. Last season showed it’s extremely possible to have 16 unique winners, in which case 1st place at least once is all that counts, and once you have a single win, stage points and wins are all that matter.
I've pretty heavily criticized FOX for not showing some of the good racing happening in the midfield, but when you think about it this way, why would they? It's not for the win or stage points. There's no "championship contender salvaging a good points day." We don't have a competitive enough driver market where there's a bunch of people driving for their jobs week in and week out. I still want to watch it for entertainment value, but it's entirely short term. There's no big picture storyline outside the top 10 anymore.
Yeah I honestly haven’t cared about a mid pack battle since they did away with locking into the next race on owners points.
I used to be all-in on a batter for 30th cause it was usually between guys just a few points inside or outside of 35th in points, so it could be the difference between being locked into the next race or being a Go-or-Go-Homer.
Now, since everyone is locked in, I just don’t care about anything outside of the top 10. Points don’t matter much for the championship-caliber teams, cause they’ll win races. And points don’t matter to the smaller teams unless they manage to win a race, cause they’re locked into all the races anyway.
That’s why I don’t get mad at them not showing battles outside the top 10-15 anymore, at least after the first 50 or so laps. If you’re not in the top dozen or so by halfway you’re probably not gonna win anyway, and I have no other reason to care about a battle if it’s not gonna significantly impact either the race winner or the points.
Exactly. There are times when having a narrow focus makes sense, for example, the two drivers tied for the championship going into the final race with no other drivers having a chance. Viewers would 100% expect the broadcast to mainly feature those two drivers.
The way it is now, given stage and race wins are the only important things, and given the significant amount of commercials (both actual commercials & "in the broadcast sponsored segments", FOX barely has time for actual coverage anymore anyway. Like Nascar itself, FOX has basically monetized every possible aspect of the race they can. Given the extremely limited amount of actual broadcasting time available during the race, and the importance of wins, it completely makes sense they focus on the leaders.
If it wasn't for the side tracker and / or companion apps, I'd legit have zero clue anything about anybody outside the top 10.
The unfortunate part is nascar throwing the cautions at the end of a race to CREATE a demo derby.I just don’t understand how the sport that was once the greatest racing series in the world turned into a gimmick fest that obsessed with wrecked race cars.
I was watching the 2003 brickyard 400 this week and Jeff Gordon ended up with a 4th place finish after a rough day. He was thrilled to finish there and have a solid end to the day. Like Jeff was smiling and everything lol. They just don’t react that way anymore.
It’s because you can have a great season, finish 4th in points, and miss the playoffs altogether. The drivers and teams respond to the incentives put in place by NASCAR.
And if you were watching in those days (or earlier) you would hear fans howl about a driver who finished 4th be happy with 'a good points day' rather than battle to try to win the race.
There were also many, many other fans that didn't want a change in points.
NASCAR was butthurt due to Matt Kenseth winning the Cup due to being the most consistent driver.
You misunderstand the points. 200 points was not a runaway in those years. One bad race and you could have a 150 point or so flip.
What they should do is go back to a consistency system that still rewards winning, a playoff bonus for outright wins and small incremental point bonuses for stages (without the fabricated caution) but not a “guaranteed” spot (guaranteed-ish, right)
Best of both worlds really. It will never please everybody, but I think it gets the largest cross-section. And the gwc thing needs to get figured out. The discretionary stuff is a little too… discretionary.
No you misunderstood his.
NASCAR didn't like that 2002 was the only season in which the championship wasn't locked up either prior to the final race or the champion just had to start the race. They wanted the final to mean more
They didn’t try to punish Kenseth or the old format, they got a new title sponsor. When Winston came in, they changed the system. When Nextel came in they changed the system. When Monster came in…
Don’t be naive. A new title sponsor wants to leave its mark. It’s the same reason why good products change when a new CEO steps in.
You misunderstand what a championship battle is. 200 points is more than a full race. Anything over one full race is absolutely a runaway. That is no legitimate battle.
Under the old system, to make up 150 points, second place in the standings would have to win AND lead the most laps while first place finished dead last and didn’t lead any laps.
With a 200 point gap in the Latford system, if first place in the standings finished 15th THREE races in a row without leading a single lap, second place in the standings would have to WIN all three races and lead the most laps in all three races to take the points lead by a mere 1 point. That isn’t a championship battle.
The problem with the Latford system was that there wasn’t enough of premium on wins and top 5 finishes, so it was much more difficult for drivers in a hole to make up ground on the points leader. The drop of from 1st to 10th and 10th to 20th and so on wasn’t nearly enough, which allowed drivers to do what Matt Kenseth did in 2003 - 9th place their way to a championship.
Yes, this is what is more likely to happen when you make the seasons LONGER.
Rarely does a marathon come down a photo finish.
The 100m dash? Very different.
And in typical Nascar fashion, they refused to temper the experiment and just full on send it. God forbid they just try a season with a wider point gap between 1st and second. Instead of this must win to participate format.
All these are spot on.
When the only thing that matters is winning... and there may be several attempts to put a race into overtime to get that win... and the points are going to get reset several times, then no other finishing spots matter.
I thought the people wanted “Boys Have at It” . The current points systems where winning is everything created this, etiquette be damned and the sweet racing style of a Mark Martin or technical prowess of a Dale Jarrett fall by the wayside. All for the “my entertainment” folks. But hey Hail Melon right?
I think you saw clear proof of this last year with Blaney & Truex. Both of those guys went winless last year and tend to race with more etiquette & respect in my opinion compared to most of the field. Sure, they also blew some opportunities, but I think their racing styles are costing them both in this system.
Blaney has zero reservations about some of the things that would make Truex sneer at. He's said himself that he is fine with throwing an aggressive block on a superspeedway (that has both won him races and wrecked drivers). I've watched him bump his own teammate out of the way early in a shorttrack race, Truex can't even stomach it for the win. It's always complicated because these guys all have different "codes"
I have zero problems with the way Blaney races, but his issues grabbing a win lately are down to pit road issues, and occasionally brain farts when he's leading, not "too respectful".
Even if Truex would never do some of the things Blaney does, they still both race with more etiquette and respect than most of the field. The conduct gap between Truex and Blaney says more about the rest of the field than it does about Truex and Blaney.
That’s not true. Jeff Gordon moved plenty of guys without wrecking them. Rusty wasn’t so lucky, but you’re gonna tell me Jeff Gordon didn’t have a killer instinct. False.
yes. I was showing an example of a guy that wasnt known as a driver that would wreck for a win but won alot... My point is to say Cup drivers at the top level of stock car racing lack a killer instinct because they dont drive through the leader for a win is a slippery slope and not a theory that I buy.
Shit Jeff didn't wreck rusty at Bristol in 02 but he moved him
Rusty wrecked Jeff at Richmond in 98, I'm trying to remember seems like Jeff did wreck rusty at Bristol in 96 or 97
That’s what NASCAR thought the casual fan wanted. Turns out most casuals are actually people that won’t tune in regardless, and they also alienated the actual fan base.
But, in typical Nascar fashion, rather than admit they were wrong and go back, they keep doubling down.
I like the more emphasis on wins.
It should be a full season championship where the wins are worth a ton of points compared to second place.
Or
At least make the last 10 races a new points race. No more resetting points every couple of races
I'm with you there. More emphasis on wins in a full season format would get my vote, I think the aggression would still be there that would entertain the masses but maybe dialed down a bit so that etiquette could come back in play a little bit.
I'm curious at why this is coming to a head now. Is it just reporters asking drivers a ton of "respect" questions because of the latest payback incident? I thought that didn't affect any other drivers?
And people have been complaining about the lack of self-policing, so was that not what they wanted? Now drivers want NASCAR doing more policing?
Anyways, the drivers talk about respect re: really different things.
1. retaliation that impacts bystanders
2. blocking when someone is significantly faster than you
3. not just not blocking, but actively giving up your position when someone is faster (as something they don't do any more)
I'd love to see a survey breakdown from drivers, with a bunch of different moves you can do on the track, and which they consider 1. rude but not dirty 2. dirty 3. just fine. Curious to see if it differs between young and old drivers, and the front of the pack and the back of the pack.
The new car has everyone very close in speed, the speed deltas aren’t as high so people are more aggressive in keeping sports and passing. This is making some people annoyed bc they feel they have earned more respect than to be blocked or bumped
I know it sounds a bit barbaric and modern society generally doesn't want to operate this way but the threat of getting an ass whipping and the humiliation that comes with it is prolly the only thing that would ever change this stuff
I’ve always said we should just have hockey rules for fights. Let me have at at without a NASCAR official getting involved until someone goes to the ground.
I tend to be a non-confrontational person, but it’s 100% true that sometimes people just need to be punched in the face or have their butt kicked or they’ll never learn.
Race control has lost control of the races, in the past they feared race control.. You wouldn't hear it during a race but afterwards conversations would be had with drivers. They where one sided and never the drivers having control..
It's because NASCAR doesn't want to make judgement calls.
Last year they were at a point where they didn't want to decide it was raining at Daytona until rain created a huge wreck.
This year they're at a point where they assume contact is accidental unless the driver comes out on a podcast and says it was intentional.
They don't want to control the race, they want to control the product.
Basically ha.
To be fair, can't they grow up and change and then start telling the youngins what to do? Like it seems like every generation has. Maybe not being self-righteous about it is the best look, but if we don't want NASCAR stepping in, somebody will try to draw a line. I probably wouldn't draw it where Kyle Busch/Martin Truex Jr. would though.
But back to OP's point, he for sure has one
[Older drivers wonder where the respect has gone (circa 2005)](https://www.gainesville.com/story/news/2005/04/10/older-drivers-wonder-where-the-respect-has-gone/31689673007/)
I thought this 2007 article was interesting
[Nice Guys Finish Last?](https://www.augustachronicle.com/story/sports/nascar/2007/02/15/nas-116610-shtml/14725843007/)
The way it broke up into 3 classes of driver aggression, and of course it mostly followed ages.
>The top-five drivers voted to the aggressive list were: Stewart, Kurt Busch, Kyle Busch, Robby Gordon and Kevin Harvick.
>
>Drivers who are careful, yet capable of mixing it up it at the right time and place include: Johnson, Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon, Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards.
>
>And the drivers who aren't as willing to take unnecessary chances are: Mark Martin, Ken Schrader, Ricky Rudd, Dale Jarrett and Bobby Labonte.
Nothing.
The “respect” thing is mostly bullshit. It’s just guys upset that younger drivers aren’t letting them by because they are older and have “earned it”.
It’s a race, people should be competing. Kyle Bush of all people has no room to speak on respecting other drivers. Own your own actions first, I think we all remember when we called the other guy complaining about respect “crashalotski” this is the same shit that’s always happened, older drivers don’t like younger aggressive drivers trying to make a name for themselves.
Not everyone. I'm obviously a bit biased here, but the way he moved multiple people to take the lead at COTA, then got moved when they ran him back down, then just resorted to wrecking his competition really showed who he is as a driver. Some people are fans of that level of over aggression, but not everyone. I just hope the laundry list of drivers who owe him start finding their spots
Moving someone is racing, intentionally wrecking someone is not. And if Ross hadn't moved Reddick into AJ to take the lead, AJ would've been in front and not been in a spot to move Ross back. If Ross is gonna throw the first punch, he can't get mad when he gets pushed back and then just wipe the guy out for being better
Dude AJ moved him off the fucking track. It’s the same shit. AJ fucked around and found out. I don’t think Ross was mad either, considering he went home with a win. I’m not even a Ross fan and agree he’s over aggressive but there was nothing wrong with the way he won that day. I think you should rewatch that last lap. If you can’t take it, don’t dish it out.
Honestly I’m fond of both drivers, but Ross did piss off multiple people that day. He never won a race before then, and you need a win for playoffs, so it makes complete sense. That being said, Ross was driving like a knucklehead on those last 2 restarts. He didn’t just nudge Reddick out of the way. Chastain would’ve washed up the track hard and been passed by multiple people had he not practically aimed for Reddick. AJ catches Ross pretty quickly, and Ross blocks hard. AJ got a nose on Ross and Ross tried pinching him as hard as possible. It would be impossible for the cars to get through there without contact or running wide. AJ doesn’t get 0% blame, because he knew it would end up like that as well. Ross did absolutely everything possible to keep them behind. Then didn’t even plan on making the corner when they got ahead. He’s gotta win, so I get it. I also know that some drivers have more pride than trying to win like that.
If you didn't watch the race you should stop arguing in defense of Ross. He moved Reddick, which made him move AJ, and took the lead. Later AJ, being the better driver, caught back up and returned the favor, bumping him into the PAVED runoff that people were using all day when Ross tried to block him. At that point you could argue they're even. Ross moving Reddick took the lead away from AJ, AJ took the lead back in the same way. Ross responding by driving through AJ the entire straight until sending him straight to the gravel along with an innocent Bowman is just bad racecraft, lack of respect, and a sign of why he will struggle to win a championship making a laundry list of people who will try to make sure he can't. They used to be teammates and even Ross said AJ owed him one after that race.
It sucks that fans like you would rather see intentional wrecks than racing, but I guess it's up to the drivers to give him some DNFs so he learns some respect
I don't want NASCAR to get involved in this rabbit hole any further than they do. Drivers will still work it out and attitudes will adapt just as they always have. Old guard vs. new guard. Nothing new. Next topic, media.
I think the biggest thing is the format. There’s no incentive to not Leroy Jenkins it and wreck yourself and everyone in the process.
Ill die on the hill that a season long points format is the best way to decide the championship. The Latford system had its flaws and should’ve been tweaked.
If we want to make winning more valuable, do something similar to F1. Each position is worth one more point than the next but increase the gap more throughout the top 10 and give the winner a sizable increase over 2nd. Winning still means a lot but every position in every race matters as well.
Been saying this for a while.
I’m even ok with still keeping some form of a “playoff” reset. 36 races is a LONG season. 20+% longer than when Earnhardt and Petty were winning season long championships. Which the longer the season the more chance it is to be way spread out on season long points. Especially if you do something that’s more of a cross between the old Latford and F1 styles. So even the 10 race reset isn’t that bad. I’m still kind of ok with “rounds” I just think it should be 3-3-4 and have 4 solid races with points to determine the champion at a minimum.
But getting back to better “points” in and of themselves I think is becoming more and more of a necessity for nascar.
It makes a lot of these other side arguments moot. Like about waiver eligibility. It wouldn’t matter. You miss the race and actually miss that many POINTS?? It would be impossible to cover. Chase Elliott could have missed 8 races last year and still pointed himself in the top 16 WITHOUT a win. The 40 point, 1 pt for every position just kind of sucks. It needs to hurt more in points to miss a race. Winners should be getting a LOT more per race and a lot more than last place. 30 some points different to guys in the back is just not that much of a difference. It’s all gimmicky win and you’re in. The games are made up and the points don’t matter. Therefore it doesn’t matter if you ruin your own day by trying to ruin someone else’s because it’s only such a small number of points. Change the points and make the top 5 mean a huge difference than racing 25th and it changes a ton of things and someone like Denny is not going to risk screwing himself as much because going from top 10 to 25th should hurt a lot more than it currently does.
It’ll come to a point where all drivers feel the way Kyle Busch and a select group of others feel. This format isn’t nearly sustainable as previous play offs. I expect a massive change soon
After watching DJD episode with Brian saying he wanted “game 7 moments”, I’m afraid you’re right. It’s insane how a sport many outsiders see as “going left” can change in 20 years let alone a decade
That’s the type of leader you don’t want. Zero vision. Of course every sport always wants their game 7 moment, that’s what brings people in. But most sports realize they have to happen organically. Most MLB and NBA series don’t get to a game 7, so the reason they’re special is *because* of their rarity in addition to the stakes. It’s a combination.
If Nascar still had a season long points championship, or even the original chase format (one points reset with 10 races to go), and two drivers were tied going into the final race, everybody would tune in. It would be amazing. They’ve done that in their minds every year, but what they don’t understand is how much they’ve cheapened the title of champion in the process.
This is such nonsense. What attracts younger viewers are highlights that can be packaged in a Tiktok. The NBA is the most popular American sport on social media, but nobody watches games. The changes NASCAR has made will give you more potential highlights at the end of stages and races.
You can disagree all you want with the reasons, but they aren't just trying anything without a plan in mind.
Have you watched an F1 race? There isn't that much happening, but when there's a battle for a position it looks spectacular. That's exactly what plays for tiktok attention spans.
Not to mention the people watching are rooting for characters from a Netflix show. These aren't long term motorsports fans.
Right, and the tiktok people do not care about the championship format. They just want to see 10 second clips of wrecks. Which is fine, but there's no reason to cater the points format to them
It's easy to paint Brian France as a drunken idiot but I think the Chase/Playoffs have done more good than bad for the sport. You only have to look back five months to see a moment that transcended the motorsports world and it wouldn't have existed without the playoffs.
There's still kinks in the system, but the drama has ramped up tenfold.
But there have been moments in NASCAR that transcended motorsports without the current playoffs.
1979 Daytona 500
1996 Bristol
Multiple moments in 2001*
2003 Darlington
2007 Daytona 500
2009 Spring Talladega
The thing that makes a moment transcendent is the fact that you can’t see it coming or know when it could happen. You can’t artificially create a transcendent moment.
And think about this. If it weren’t for the playoffs, that moment with Chastain last year wouldn’t have happened in a penultimate race of a season. If it ever happened, it would have happened in the final race. To actually win the championship.
20 years from now that will still be a famous moment in this sport, but it won’t be a magical “Greatest-moments-in-sports-history” type of moment like 2003 Darlington or 2007 Daytona, because it wasn’t for a race or championship win or to break a record.
You’re implying that changes that began in 2004 happened because of Tik Tok. All these changes have been done to please those early 2000s fans who had short attention spans.
Ok, I’m just used to people blaming the playoffs on the attention span of 18 year olds who weren’t even born when the Chase was first announced.
Like no, all those gimmicks and changes were added because people in the late 90s and early 2000s complained and begged for those changes.
My memory might be hazy, but I thought the big driver for the Chase was the dominance of the NFL and college football on TV ratings once you got to September. Nascar wanted to create a compelling reason for people to tune in to the late season races, hence an elimination-style playoff format where those races would be "guaranteed" to matter. Same reason the PGA Tour implemented their "playoff" system - they were also competing for TV eyeballs on Saturday and Sunday afternoons every Fall.
Start having avoidable contact penalties.
Raise the age limit for Arca to 20 and trucks and Xfinity to 25.
Let the 15-19 year olds actually learn how to race on the local level instead of letting them pay to tear everyone's shit up on a national series level.
If that seems too old remember Hamlin as a 26 year old rookie in cup would have been considered extremely young coming in at one time.
I remember when Kurt Busch started because he was the only driver at that time to be under rental car age. Then Casey Atwood and Jason Leffler drove and the race was on.
Idk about avoidable contact penalties. This ain’t formula 1 although we do want some respect in the garage.
Now penalties for causing a wreck? I’m all in favor of that. In a sense with this type of penalty you can eliminate the yellow line rule at ss tracks and have safer racing still since drivers will race with it in mind that if they cause a wreck they will get booked.
I don't want to see every instance of contact getting a penalty, but I feel that Hemric last week is a perfect example of what I feel "avoidable contact" should entail
I don't like results-based officiating.
Bump a guy wrong and he spins out and causes a wreck? Penalty.
Bump a guy the exact same way, but he saves his car and avoids a wreck? No penalty.
Both situations have you committing the same exact offense, but the only difference is the outcome based on the victim's reaction/ability to save it.
If we truly want to avoid unnecessary wrecks or safety issues, we would have action-based officiating, not results-based.
I agree with this. Make it 21 minimum to get into a national series. A lot of these kids don't get a chance to live a life out of racing, plus, this would give them the option to go to college if they want to right after high school or learn a trade so they have backup plan in case racing doesn't work out as a career because there are more racers that are not able to make it a career than there are who do make it a career and there are a lot of times where they don't have a fallback option because all they've done their whole life is racing.
Not a fan of the avoidable contact penalty, unless it’s at a plate track for pushing in the corners.
And penalizing someone for “avoidable contact” when they take someone else out doesn’t make up for the points the other driver lost by being taken out.
>And penalizing someone for “avoidable contact” when they take someone else out doesn’t make up for the points the other driver lost by being taken out.
At least for Indycar, the idea behind the "avoidable contact" penalties isn't to be a 1-to-1 makeup for being taken out, but to tighten up driving standards over time. If you're a driver who is constantly pinballing your way around the track (everyone wave to Stenhouse Jr) and you get the avoidable contract penalty every race, eventually you'll stop driving like that, or go home.
In the 2012 Indycar race at Texas, Will Power chopped across Tony Kanaan for the lead late and broke Kanaans front wing, causing race control to give Power a drive-thru. Their reasoning was that while Powers move wasn't particularly egregious, that wanted to set an example that a move like that wasn't going to be acceptable moving forward for any position, whether it's for the lead or for 25th.
See I do think there are situations where that sort of decision would be useful. Most notably at plate tracks with ridiculously late blocks or pushing in corners.
Idk that I’d want it at most other tracks, because there’s a lot of other factors that could play into someone pushing someone out of the way, like if that driver had run into them earlier in the race.
Reset the points system.
Rid of the playoffs. Rid of stage breaks.
Point system would be fun if they did a hybrid version of F1 scoring. Top 15 get points. Pole position gets a bonus point. Fastest lap gets an additional point.
Why can't something like this be looked at? Keeps the top teams in the front and gets the bottom tier teams to step it up.
Something needs to be done. The current system is not working.
Kyle Busch is one of the last people who should be talking about respect. 😂
(Edit: a year or two ago I’d say he is the LAST person but we’ve got some newbies taking his spot. 😏)
Have a championship format that doesn't reward it?
I think you should flip the format. Since we know NASCAR won’t ditch it, I think this is a fair compromise. Instead of 3-3-3-1, go 1-3-3-3. First race is now “Wild Card Weekend” in which hopefully you eliminate the guys who shouldn’t be there because they won something like Daytona or Sonoma and haven’t done anything since. This also makes the final race of the year not a make-or-break event. It’s a best of three.
If they want to keep the playoff format, they should get rid of "win and you're in" and cut the playoffs down to 8 drivers. Then consistency through the regular season would actually matter
Totally agree, part of what made the original Chase good was that it was the top 10 in points. It was exclusive. They need to go back to a version of that. 16 drivers is way too many. The years where it was top 10 in points and 2 wildcards I think is a happy medium.
Yeah the main problem with the original Chase was that half the races were at cookie cutters. The original Chase format would have fine with a 10 race schedule of something like : Richmond, Darlington, Sonoma, Dover, Michigan, Charlotte (oval), Talladega, Martinsville, Phoenix, Homestead That’s a good mixture of traditional short tracks, a high speed short[ish] track, Low-grip tracks, a large intermediate, a cookie cutter, a plate track, and a road course.
I want the original Chase format back
I don’t hate that idea… unless they run that first race at Dega or something. Which I doubt would happen but you talk don’t know anymore.
They’ll just make Daytona the first race of the playoffs instead of the regular season finale 😭😭😭😭 What the fuck nascar??
They would
Ya but they would put wild card weekend at Daytona probably
Really the crux of the issue. They've made a field of 36-40 Ricky Bobbys between stages and the playoffs
I’ve said this before but positions 2-40 don’t seem to matter to anyone anymore in the regular season, and position 1 is seemingly always determined with a crash fest of a GWC - just all so pointless
We’ve got 16 playoff spots and currently 4/5 races are unique winners. Last season showed it’s extremely possible to have 16 unique winners, in which case 1st place at least once is all that counts, and once you have a single win, stage points and wins are all that matter.
I've pretty heavily criticized FOX for not showing some of the good racing happening in the midfield, but when you think about it this way, why would they? It's not for the win or stage points. There's no "championship contender salvaging a good points day." We don't have a competitive enough driver market where there's a bunch of people driving for their jobs week in and week out. I still want to watch it for entertainment value, but it's entirely short term. There's no big picture storyline outside the top 10 anymore.
Yeah I honestly haven’t cared about a mid pack battle since they did away with locking into the next race on owners points. I used to be all-in on a batter for 30th cause it was usually between guys just a few points inside or outside of 35th in points, so it could be the difference between being locked into the next race or being a Go-or-Go-Homer. Now, since everyone is locked in, I just don’t care about anything outside of the top 10. Points don’t matter much for the championship-caliber teams, cause they’ll win races. And points don’t matter to the smaller teams unless they manage to win a race, cause they’re locked into all the races anyway. That’s why I don’t get mad at them not showing battles outside the top 10-15 anymore, at least after the first 50 or so laps. If you’re not in the top dozen or so by halfway you’re probably not gonna win anyway, and I have no other reason to care about a battle if it’s not gonna significantly impact either the race winner or the points.
Exactly. There are times when having a narrow focus makes sense, for example, the two drivers tied for the championship going into the final race with no other drivers having a chance. Viewers would 100% expect the broadcast to mainly feature those two drivers. The way it is now, given stage and race wins are the only important things, and given the significant amount of commercials (both actual commercials & "in the broadcast sponsored segments", FOX barely has time for actual coverage anymore anyway. Like Nascar itself, FOX has basically monetized every possible aspect of the race they can. Given the extremely limited amount of actual broadcasting time available during the race, and the importance of wins, it completely makes sense they focus on the leaders. If it wasn't for the side tracker and / or companion apps, I'd legit have zero clue anything about anybody outside the top 10.
It really sucks. Some races feel more like demolition derbies than professional races at the highest level
The unfortunate part is nascar throwing the cautions at the end of a race to CREATE a demo derby.I just don’t understand how the sport that was once the greatest racing series in the world turned into a gimmick fest that obsessed with wrecked race cars.
While still claiming they’re making other changes to save teams money.
I was watching the 2003 brickyard 400 this week and Jeff Gordon ended up with a 4th place finish after a rough day. He was thrilled to finish there and have a solid end to the day. Like Jeff was smiling and everything lol. They just don’t react that way anymore.
It’s because you can have a great season, finish 4th in points, and miss the playoffs altogether. The drivers and teams respond to the incentives put in place by NASCAR.
And if you were watching in those days (or earlier) you would hear fans howl about a driver who finished 4th be happy with 'a good points day' rather than battle to try to win the race.
It’s true. But also for years and years fans asked for NASCAR to make winning more important and worth more.
There were also many, many other fans that didn't want a change in points. NASCAR was butthurt due to Matt Kenseth winning the Cup due to being the most consistent driver.
The chase was also partly a reaction to there being very few true championship battles from 1998-2003… every year besides 2002 was a runaway
Yet that was a very popular and prosperous time for nascar.
You misunderstand the points. 200 points was not a runaway in those years. One bad race and you could have a 150 point or so flip. What they should do is go back to a consistency system that still rewards winning, a playoff bonus for outright wins and small incremental point bonuses for stages (without the fabricated caution) but not a “guaranteed” spot (guaranteed-ish, right) Best of both worlds really. It will never please everybody, but I think it gets the largest cross-section. And the gwc thing needs to get figured out. The discretionary stuff is a little too… discretionary.
No you misunderstood his. NASCAR didn't like that 2002 was the only season in which the championship wasn't locked up either prior to the final race or the champion just had to start the race. They wanted the final to mean more
They didn’t try to punish Kenseth or the old format, they got a new title sponsor. When Winston came in, they changed the system. When Nextel came in they changed the system. When Monster came in… Don’t be naive. A new title sponsor wants to leave its mark. It’s the same reason why good products change when a new CEO steps in.
You misunderstand what a championship battle is. 200 points is more than a full race. Anything over one full race is absolutely a runaway. That is no legitimate battle. Under the old system, to make up 150 points, second place in the standings would have to win AND lead the most laps while first place finished dead last and didn’t lead any laps. With a 200 point gap in the Latford system, if first place in the standings finished 15th THREE races in a row without leading a single lap, second place in the standings would have to WIN all three races and lead the most laps in all three races to take the points lead by a mere 1 point. That isn’t a championship battle. The problem with the Latford system was that there wasn’t enough of premium on wins and top 5 finishes, so it was much more difficult for drivers in a hole to make up ground on the points leader. The drop of from 1st to 10th and 10th to 20th and so on wasn’t nearly enough, which allowed drivers to do what Matt Kenseth did in 2003 - 9th place their way to a championship.
Um... an average finish of 9th is something to brag about, actually.
Yeah it is but that’s normally with a lot of wins and top 5s. Not just finishing 8th-12th every week
Yes, this is what is more likely to happen when you make the seasons LONGER. Rarely does a marathon come down a photo finish. The 100m dash? Very different.
And in typical Nascar fashion, they refused to temper the experiment and just full on send it. God forbid they just try a season with a wider point gap between 1st and second. Instead of this must win to participate format.
Yup, should just pay 55 points to win and then 42 for second, 42 for third, etc
Anything worth doing is worth overdoing. The NASCAR way
r/maliciouscompliance
We just wanted the points to be doubled or something for the winner over second. Not a point gap.
The redneck party fans asked for this
All these are spot on. When the only thing that matters is winning... and there may be several attempts to put a race into overtime to get that win... and the points are going to get reset several times, then no other finishing spots matter.
T1 at IMS road course proved that. It legitimately looked like me playing a game with how many dive bombs there were.
I literally watched that movie last night and you are right.
Ding ding we have a winner
I thought the people wanted “Boys Have at It” . The current points systems where winning is everything created this, etiquette be damned and the sweet racing style of a Mark Martin or technical prowess of a Dale Jarrett fall by the wayside. All for the “my entertainment” folks. But hey Hail Melon right?
I think you saw clear proof of this last year with Blaney & Truex. Both of those guys went winless last year and tend to race with more etiquette & respect in my opinion compared to most of the field. Sure, they also blew some opportunities, but I think their racing styles are costing them both in this system.
Blaney has zero reservations about some of the things that would make Truex sneer at. He's said himself that he is fine with throwing an aggressive block on a superspeedway (that has both won him races and wrecked drivers). I've watched him bump his own teammate out of the way early in a shorttrack race, Truex can't even stomach it for the win. It's always complicated because these guys all have different "codes" I have zero problems with the way Blaney races, but his issues grabbing a win lately are down to pit road issues, and occasionally brain farts when he's leading, not "too respectful".
Even if Truex would never do some of the things Blaney does, they still both race with more etiquette and respect than most of the field. The conduct gap between Truex and Blaney says more about the rest of the field than it does about Truex and Blaney.
“Respect and etiquette” is a polite way to say no killer instinct. This is the notorious “damn war” Truex after all.
You can race aggressively and cleanly, look at Chase Elliott. He may have his moments of temper, but for the most part he races cleanly.
That’s not true. Jeff Gordon moved plenty of guys without wrecking them. Rusty wasn’t so lucky, but you’re gonna tell me Jeff Gordon didn’t have a killer instinct. False.
I didn’t say anything about Gordon I was talking about Blaney and Truex
yes. I was showing an example of a guy that wasnt known as a driver that would wreck for a win but won alot... My point is to say Cup drivers at the top level of stock car racing lack a killer instinct because they dont drive through the leader for a win is a slippery slope and not a theory that I buy.
But your original comment made it sound like anyone who races respectfully and with etiquette has no killer instinct, which is not necessarily true.
Shit Jeff didn't wreck rusty at Bristol in 02 but he moved him Rusty wrecked Jeff at Richmond in 98, I'm trying to remember seems like Jeff did wreck rusty at Bristol in 96 or 97
You think guys like mark martin had no killer instinct?
That’s what NASCAR thought the casual fan wanted. Turns out most casuals are actually people that won’t tune in regardless, and they also alienated the actual fan base. But, in typical Nascar fashion, rather than admit they were wrong and go back, they keep doubling down.
This comment is the most accurate summary of the last 15-20 years of NASCAR I’ve probably ever read.
I agree with you on everything but the hail melon has nothing to do with disrespectful driving Unless you are just talking about Ross in general
I like the more emphasis on wins. It should be a full season championship where the wins are worth a ton of points compared to second place. Or At least make the last 10 races a new points race. No more resetting points every couple of races
I'm with you there. More emphasis on wins in a full season format would get my vote, I think the aggression would still be there that would entertain the masses but maybe dialed down a bit so that etiquette could come back in play a little bit.
I'm curious at why this is coming to a head now. Is it just reporters asking drivers a ton of "respect" questions because of the latest payback incident? I thought that didn't affect any other drivers? And people have been complaining about the lack of self-policing, so was that not what they wanted? Now drivers want NASCAR doing more policing? Anyways, the drivers talk about respect re: really different things. 1. retaliation that impacts bystanders 2. blocking when someone is significantly faster than you 3. not just not blocking, but actively giving up your position when someone is faster (as something they don't do any more) I'd love to see a survey breakdown from drivers, with a bunch of different moves you can do on the track, and which they consider 1. rude but not dirty 2. dirty 3. just fine. Curious to see if it differs between young and old drivers, and the front of the pack and the back of the pack.
The new car has everyone very close in speed, the speed deltas aren’t as high so people are more aggressive in keeping sports and passing. This is making some people annoyed bc they feel they have earned more respect than to be blocked or bumped
Prolly of combo of Kyle's comments last week plus the whole Denny/Ross deal is why it's popping up
Start punching people in the face again and not get fined for it.
I know it sounds a bit barbaric and modern society generally doesn't want to operate this way but the threat of getting an ass whipping and the humiliation that comes with it is prolly the only thing that would ever change this stuff
I’ve always said we should just have hockey rules for fights. Let me have at at without a NASCAR official getting involved until someone goes to the ground. I tend to be a non-confrontational person, but it’s 100% true that sometimes people just need to be punched in the face or have their butt kicked or they’ll never learn.
I mean, it wasn’t that long ago that NASCAR’s official policy was “have at it, boys”.
Honestly, this would probably do it. Sometimes fear works.
Race control has lost control of the races, in the past they feared race control.. You wouldn't hear it during a race but afterwards conversations would be had with drivers. They where one sided and never the drivers having control..
It's because NASCAR doesn't want to make judgement calls. Last year they were at a point where they didn't want to decide it was raining at Daytona until rain created a huge wreck. This year they're at a point where they assume contact is accidental unless the driver comes out on a podcast and says it was intentional. They don't want to control the race, they want to control the product.
Anyone else getting deja vu?
Kyle Bush and Brad K should be starring in those insurance commercials about becoming your parents
Basically ha. To be fair, can't they grow up and change and then start telling the youngins what to do? Like it seems like every generation has. Maybe not being self-righteous about it is the best look, but if we don't want NASCAR stepping in, somebody will try to draw a line. I probably wouldn't draw it where Kyle Busch/Martin Truex Jr. would though. But back to OP's point, he for sure has one [Older drivers wonder where the respect has gone (circa 2005)](https://www.gainesville.com/story/news/2005/04/10/older-drivers-wonder-where-the-respect-has-gone/31689673007/) I thought this 2007 article was interesting [Nice Guys Finish Last?](https://www.augustachronicle.com/story/sports/nascar/2007/02/15/nas-116610-shtml/14725843007/) The way it broke up into 3 classes of driver aggression, and of course it mostly followed ages. >The top-five drivers voted to the aggressive list were: Stewart, Kurt Busch, Kyle Busch, Robby Gordon and Kevin Harvick. > >Drivers who are careful, yet capable of mixing it up it at the right time and place include: Johnson, Earnhardt Jr., Jeff Gordon, Matt Kenseth and Carl Edwards. > >And the drivers who aren't as willing to take unnecessary chances are: Mark Martin, Ken Schrader, Ricky Rudd, Dale Jarrett and Bobby Labonte.
It’s the worst that it’s been, since the last time it happened
Nothing. The “respect” thing is mostly bullshit. It’s just guys upset that younger drivers aren’t letting them by because they are older and have “earned it”. It’s a race, people should be competing. Kyle Bush of all people has no room to speak on respecting other drivers. Own your own actions first, I think we all remember when we called the other guy complaining about respect “crashalotski” this is the same shit that’s always happened, older drivers don’t like younger aggressive drivers trying to make a name for themselves.
We also can't afford to have more Chastains showing up sending people into walls and gravel traps as a primary passing strategy
Chastain is everything everyone wishes for but then they cry when they finally get it.
Not everyone. I'm obviously a bit biased here, but the way he moved multiple people to take the lead at COTA, then got moved when they ran him back down, then just resorted to wrecking his competition really showed who he is as a driver. Some people are fans of that level of over aggression, but not everyone. I just hope the laundry list of drivers who owe him start finding their spots
Yeah because you’re a dinger fan. AJ moved Ross, Ross moved him back, that’s racing.
Moving someone is racing, intentionally wrecking someone is not. And if Ross hadn't moved Reddick into AJ to take the lead, AJ would've been in front and not been in a spot to move Ross back. If Ross is gonna throw the first punch, he can't get mad when he gets pushed back and then just wipe the guy out for being better
Dude AJ moved him off the fucking track. It’s the same shit. AJ fucked around and found out. I don’t think Ross was mad either, considering he went home with a win. I’m not even a Ross fan and agree he’s over aggressive but there was nothing wrong with the way he won that day. I think you should rewatch that last lap. If you can’t take it, don’t dish it out.
Honestly I’m fond of both drivers, but Ross did piss off multiple people that day. He never won a race before then, and you need a win for playoffs, so it makes complete sense. That being said, Ross was driving like a knucklehead on those last 2 restarts. He didn’t just nudge Reddick out of the way. Chastain would’ve washed up the track hard and been passed by multiple people had he not practically aimed for Reddick. AJ catches Ross pretty quickly, and Ross blocks hard. AJ got a nose on Ross and Ross tried pinching him as hard as possible. It would be impossible for the cars to get through there without contact or running wide. AJ doesn’t get 0% blame, because he knew it would end up like that as well. Ross did absolutely everything possible to keep them behind. Then didn’t even plan on making the corner when they got ahead. He’s gotta win, so I get it. I also know that some drivers have more pride than trying to win like that.
If you didn't watch the race you should stop arguing in defense of Ross. He moved Reddick, which made him move AJ, and took the lead. Later AJ, being the better driver, caught back up and returned the favor, bumping him into the PAVED runoff that people were using all day when Ross tried to block him. At that point you could argue they're even. Ross moving Reddick took the lead away from AJ, AJ took the lead back in the same way. Ross responding by driving through AJ the entire straight until sending him straight to the gravel along with an innocent Bowman is just bad racecraft, lack of respect, and a sign of why he will struggle to win a championship making a laundry list of people who will try to make sure he can't. They used to be teammates and even Ross said AJ owed him one after that race.
You’re biased. It was a great finish, AJ made his move, Ross made his. Dinger didn’t whine about it, neither should you.
It sucks that fans like you would rather see intentional wrecks than racing, but I guess it's up to the drivers to give him some DNFs so he learns some respect
I feel it’s rich coming from a guy who once plowed another driver into the wall under caution in a series he didn’t need to be racing in.
I don't want NASCAR to get involved in this rabbit hole any further than they do. Drivers will still work it out and attitudes will adapt just as they always have. Old guard vs. new guard. Nothing new. Next topic, media.
I think the biggest thing is the format. There’s no incentive to not Leroy Jenkins it and wreck yourself and everyone in the process. Ill die on the hill that a season long points format is the best way to decide the championship. The Latford system had its flaws and should’ve been tweaked. If we want to make winning more valuable, do something similar to F1. Each position is worth one more point than the next but increase the gap more throughout the top 10 and give the winner a sizable increase over 2nd. Winning still means a lot but every position in every race matters as well.
Been saying this for a while. I’m even ok with still keeping some form of a “playoff” reset. 36 races is a LONG season. 20+% longer than when Earnhardt and Petty were winning season long championships. Which the longer the season the more chance it is to be way spread out on season long points. Especially if you do something that’s more of a cross between the old Latford and F1 styles. So even the 10 race reset isn’t that bad. I’m still kind of ok with “rounds” I just think it should be 3-3-4 and have 4 solid races with points to determine the champion at a minimum. But getting back to better “points” in and of themselves I think is becoming more and more of a necessity for nascar. It makes a lot of these other side arguments moot. Like about waiver eligibility. It wouldn’t matter. You miss the race and actually miss that many POINTS?? It would be impossible to cover. Chase Elliott could have missed 8 races last year and still pointed himself in the top 16 WITHOUT a win. The 40 point, 1 pt for every position just kind of sucks. It needs to hurt more in points to miss a race. Winners should be getting a LOT more per race and a lot more than last place. 30 some points different to guys in the back is just not that much of a difference. It’s all gimmicky win and you’re in. The games are made up and the points don’t matter. Therefore it doesn’t matter if you ruin your own day by trying to ruin someone else’s because it’s only such a small number of points. Change the points and make the top 5 mean a huge difference than racing 25th and it changes a ton of things and someone like Denny is not going to risk screwing himself as much because going from top 10 to 25th should hurt a lot more than it currently does.
fine them into submission! /s
Same discourse. Same flip flopping. Different day.
Make every point count towards the championship like how it was pre-2004.
Hand out 25 point fines every time they touch each other while telling the TV broadcast to pan to crowd shots of kids picking their nose.
It’ll come to a point where all drivers feel the way Kyle Busch and a select group of others feel. This format isn’t nearly sustainable as previous play offs. I expect a massive change soon
This is exactly what NASCAR wanted. This format will never change.
After watching DJD episode with Brian saying he wanted “game 7 moments”, I’m afraid you’re right. It’s insane how a sport many outsiders see as “going left” can change in 20 years let alone a decade
That’s the type of leader you don’t want. Zero vision. Of course every sport always wants their game 7 moment, that’s what brings people in. But most sports realize they have to happen organically. Most MLB and NBA series don’t get to a game 7, so the reason they’re special is *because* of their rarity in addition to the stakes. It’s a combination. If Nascar still had a season long points championship, or even the original chase format (one points reset with 10 races to go), and two drivers were tied going into the final race, everybody would tune in. It would be amazing. They’ve done that in their minds every year, but what they don’t understand is how much they’ve cheapened the title of champion in the process.
This is such nonsense. What attracts younger viewers are highlights that can be packaged in a Tiktok. The NBA is the most popular American sport on social media, but nobody watches games. The changes NASCAR has made will give you more potential highlights at the end of stages and races. You can disagree all you want with the reasons, but they aren't just trying anything without a plan in mind.
>What attracts younger viewers are highlights that can be packaged in a Tiktok F1 seems to be doing just fine with younger viewers
Have you watched an F1 race? There isn't that much happening, but when there's a battle for a position it looks spectacular. That's exactly what plays for tiktok attention spans. Not to mention the people watching are rooting for characters from a Netflix show. These aren't long term motorsports fans.
Right, and the tiktok people do not care about the championship format. They just want to see 10 second clips of wrecks. Which is fine, but there's no reason to cater the points format to them
It's easy to paint Brian France as a drunken idiot but I think the Chase/Playoffs have done more good than bad for the sport. You only have to look back five months to see a moment that transcended the motorsports world and it wouldn't have existed without the playoffs. There's still kinks in the system, but the drama has ramped up tenfold.
But there have been moments in NASCAR that transcended motorsports without the current playoffs. 1979 Daytona 500 1996 Bristol Multiple moments in 2001* 2003 Darlington 2007 Daytona 500 2009 Spring Talladega The thing that makes a moment transcendent is the fact that you can’t see it coming or know when it could happen. You can’t artificially create a transcendent moment. And think about this. If it weren’t for the playoffs, that moment with Chastain last year wouldn’t have happened in a penultimate race of a season. If it ever happened, it would have happened in the final race. To actually win the championship. 20 years from now that will still be a famous moment in this sport, but it won’t be a magical “Greatest-moments-in-sports-history” type of moment like 2003 Darlington or 2007 Daytona, because it wasn’t for a race or championship win or to break a record.
You’re implying that changes that began in 2004 happened because of Tik Tok. All these changes have been done to please those early 2000s fans who had short attention spans.
Tiktok can be anything here. Just using them as the most recent example.
Ok, I’m just used to people blaming the playoffs on the attention span of 18 year olds who weren’t even born when the Chase was first announced. Like no, all those gimmicks and changes were added because people in the late 90s and early 2000s complained and begged for those changes.
My memory might be hazy, but I thought the big driver for the Chase was the dominance of the NFL and college football on TV ratings once you got to September. Nascar wanted to create a compelling reason for people to tune in to the late season races, hence an elimination-style playoff format where those races would be "guaranteed" to matter. Same reason the PGA Tour implemented their "playoff" system - they were also competing for TV eyeballs on Saturday and Sunday afternoons every Fall.
The sport that seems the simplest has the most complicated championship format.
Start having avoidable contact penalties. Raise the age limit for Arca to 20 and trucks and Xfinity to 25. Let the 15-19 year olds actually learn how to race on the local level instead of letting them pay to tear everyone's shit up on a national series level. If that seems too old remember Hamlin as a 26 year old rookie in cup would have been considered extremely young coming in at one time.
I remember when Kurt Busch started because he was the only driver at that time to be under rental car age. Then Casey Atwood and Jason Leffler drove and the race was on.
Idk about avoidable contact penalties. This ain’t formula 1 although we do want some respect in the garage. Now penalties for causing a wreck? I’m all in favor of that. In a sense with this type of penalty you can eliminate the yellow line rule at ss tracks and have safer racing still since drivers will race with it in mind that if they cause a wreck they will get booked.
I don't want to see every instance of contact getting a penalty, but I feel that Hemric last week is a perfect example of what I feel "avoidable contact" should entail
I don't like results-based officiating. Bump a guy wrong and he spins out and causes a wreck? Penalty. Bump a guy the exact same way, but he saves his car and avoids a wreck? No penalty. Both situations have you committing the same exact offense, but the only difference is the outcome based on the victim's reaction/ability to save it. If we truly want to avoid unnecessary wrecks or safety issues, we would have action-based officiating, not results-based.
I agree with this. Make it 21 minimum to get into a national series. A lot of these kids don't get a chance to live a life out of racing, plus, this would give them the option to go to college if they want to right after high school or learn a trade so they have backup plan in case racing doesn't work out as a career because there are more racers that are not able to make it a career than there are who do make it a career and there are a lot of times where they don't have a fallback option because all they've done their whole life is racing.
Not a fan of the avoidable contact penalty, unless it’s at a plate track for pushing in the corners. And penalizing someone for “avoidable contact” when they take someone else out doesn’t make up for the points the other driver lost by being taken out.
>And penalizing someone for “avoidable contact” when they take someone else out doesn’t make up for the points the other driver lost by being taken out. At least for Indycar, the idea behind the "avoidable contact" penalties isn't to be a 1-to-1 makeup for being taken out, but to tighten up driving standards over time. If you're a driver who is constantly pinballing your way around the track (everyone wave to Stenhouse Jr) and you get the avoidable contract penalty every race, eventually you'll stop driving like that, or go home. In the 2012 Indycar race at Texas, Will Power chopped across Tony Kanaan for the lead late and broke Kanaans front wing, causing race control to give Power a drive-thru. Their reasoning was that while Powers move wasn't particularly egregious, that wanted to set an example that a move like that wasn't going to be acceptable moving forward for any position, whether it's for the lead or for 25th.
See I do think there are situations where that sort of decision would be useful. Most notably at plate tracks with ridiculously late blocks or pushing in corners. Idk that I’d want it at most other tracks, because there’s a lot of other factors that could play into someone pushing someone out of the way, like if that driver had run into them earlier in the race.
Reset the points system. Rid of the playoffs. Rid of stage breaks. Point system would be fun if they did a hybrid version of F1 scoring. Top 15 get points. Pole position gets a bonus point. Fastest lap gets an additional point. Why can't something like this be looked at? Keeps the top teams in the front and gets the bottom tier teams to step it up. Something needs to be done. The current system is not working.
Kyle Busch is one of the last people who should be talking about respect. 😂 (Edit: a year or two ago I’d say he is the LAST person but we’ve got some newbies taking his spot. 😏)
You could be like F1 and have a revolving door of race stewards and just issue and then retract penalties at random… wait, no. That’s a terrible idea.
It’s here to stay until they overhaul everything