NASCAR 2023 Season Thread

[infrared41]

4 minutes ago, Glover said:

Yesterday's race wasn't great, but I generally love the road course races. They're some of the tracks I look forward to most each season. But I am a Chris Buescher fan, so that definitely helps since he is usually competitive in these races. 

 

So you're the one.

[Glover]

2 minutes ago, infrared41 said:

 

So you're the one.

[gosioux76]

9 hours ago, mcj882000 said:

I very much get the impression that NASCAR is extremely insecure about being "the sport of dumb hillbillies watching cars go in circles for hours", based on the decisions they've made with the sport. "Look at the clean-cut, corporate-friendly drivers we have!" "Look at how close these races & championship battles are now!" "Look at all the road courses we run on now!" And it's all to appeal to an audience that will never be into stock car racing, who are not willing to see it as more than just "dumb hicks driving in circles". It's one thing to try and appeal to a casual audience, every major league/franchise/IP does that nowadays for better and for worse; after a while it starts to feel like NASCAR is sacrificing their diehard fans in an attempt to court an openly hostile audience, and it's gone about as well as you'd expect it to.

 

As someone who's never quite understood the appeal of NASCAR, I found this to be really insightful. 

 

It seems pretty clear the Chicago road race was a fail for NASCAR, but I believe posts like this help explain why they're pushing to expand the appeal. As much as some of you might want NASCAR to stick to what it's good at, what was once America's fastest-growing sport feels like it's regressing. Recognizing that, it makes sense to try to latch onto to some of the appeal of F1 — which, with Netflix's help, has succeeded in attracting non-motorsports fans like myself onto racing. 

 

You can criticize the results, but I can 't really blame NASCAR for trying. I've never had interest in a NASCAR race, but this Chicago race -- as gimmicky as it may be -- at least caught my attention, now that I'm fully indoctrinated into the F1 universe. I'm sure NASCAR was hoping they could catch more audience in F1's slipstream.

[sky1324]

6 minutes ago, gosioux76 said:

It seems pretty clear the Chicago road race was a fail for NASCAR,

Does it? It's clear not everyone liked it but almost everything I've seen online has been extremely positive. I'm sure attendance was great and I'd bet TV numbers were great as well, even with the rain delay.

 

The race wasn't the best NASCAR race I've seen but it was pretty good. Wet conditions definitely helped. Definitely a racier track than most (myself included) expected. It was an exciting race without much of the buffoonery that usually goes on at road courses (looking at you, Indy). I'm not going to say it was perfect and I don't really agree with how NASCAR handled the darkness thing, but their hands were tied and by modifying the length during the race instead of just calling it around lap 75 they at least provided teams a way to strategize around that, even if it did kind of screw over several drivers. There wasn't any winning there.

 

NASCAR got shortchanged by the weather this weekend. Without the rain, fans get to see the concerts, the races, everything would have gone better than it did, but the weather is out of NASCAR's hands. They did everything they could to let the fans see the race and at least they were able to end on a high note.

 

As for "disregarding their old fanbase" - yes, NASCAR is trying to branch out. But this time, it seems to be working, at least, better than their attempts in the 90s and 2000s. Having been to both LA races, the event itself was a huge success with a pumped and packed crowd, even though the racing in my opinion was pretty boring. Plus, literally two months ago NASCAR was at North freakin' Wilkesboro for a race that was, in my opinion, worse than what Chicago just put on! They're trying to return to Nashville Fairgrounds! Rockingham could make a NWB-style comeback! It's pretty obvious to me at least that NASCAR is trying to reach new markets, but they're also trying to reconnect with their roots to make sure the old fans aren't left behind like they did 20 years ago.

 

I'm not even a road course fan. I think the Cup Series has too many. I hate that Road America lost its date. I'm from Charlotte, North Carolina, literally the absolute heart of NASCAR. But I love to see NASCAR doing new things. They're bringing attention to themselves in great ways that also bring racing to their fans, new and old. I'm not sure they've struck the right balance yet but I'd rather see them try than stagnate, walling themselves off in the Southeast.

 

I hope NASCAR continues to branch out. I want to see them try racing in Montreal again. I want to see them in Mexico City. I want to see them overseas, going back to Japan or Australia or trying something in France or Germany. The only problem is that they only have so many weeks to race. I don't want to see them doing all of this in a year. Rotate street courses. Rotate international races. Make sure you hold on to your diehard fanbase.

 

Great to see Shane van Gisbergen as well. He ran a stellar race, was one of the best drivers all race long, and was rewarded for it. The level of parity is part of what makes NASCAR interesting as a series. I hope this gets even more international stars interested. SVG himself said after one more year in Supercars he may be interested in a full-time Cup Series ride and I welcome him. The sport is better when we have guys like Marcos Ambrose on the track.

 

Plus, this is badass. If you hate this, then I don't know what to tell you.

[GrayJ12]

3 hours ago, Dalcowboyfan92 said:

He was flat out better than everyone. When you're two full seconds faster than the leader, it's not a matter of if you'll catch them, but when.

 

Haley drove his heart out. He got lucky the first time because a caution came out. He did manage a crossover to get the lead back, but the amount of talent, combined with the rocket ship was too much for Justin, or anyone else for that matter, to overcome.

It's great to see other talent from other series to come over and to try their hand at NASCAR. SVG did an amazing job yesterday, and I hope projects like Project91 and Kamui Kobayashi doing a one-off with 23XI will help entice other high-level drivers into the sport.

For the race, it was actually good, and I'm glad they were able to salvage something from the awful weather. Yes, it was a wreck fest, but it's what some of these road course races have divulged into. Also doesn't help that they only had 50 minutes of practice.

Additionally, I'm super proud of Justin Haley. Drove his absolute butt off with older tires and brought it home in 2nd.

[infrared41]

1 hour ago, gosioux76 said:

As much as some of you might want NASCAR to stick to what it's good at, what was once America's fastest-growing sport feels like it's regressing. Recognizing that, it makes sense to try to latch onto to some of the appeal of F1 — which, with Netflix's help, has succeeded in attracting non-motorsports fans like myself onto racing. 

 

Assuming you're referring to the boom of the 90's, it was unsustainable because it was way more of a fad than actual growth. Ideally, NASCAR would have realized that retaining 25% of those new fans would been a huge win and used it to continue growing the sport at a sustainable pace.  Instead, when the bubble inevitably burst, NASCAR panicked and started desperately chasing gimmicks in hopes of getting back to the level of the 90's boom. Each failure has resulted in more desperation and here we are. Had the sport stuck to what it's good at, it wouldn't be in the position it's currently in - which is not gaining many new fans while simultaneously losing core fans. F1: Sedan Circuit is not the solution to that problem. NASCAR's best bet going forward is to be NASCAR. The culture of the sport is what caused the 90's boom in the first place. Lean into that culture. Rednecks, while not fashionable, are still plentiful and their dollars are worth the same amount that David and Karen's from Barrington Hills dollars are. Maybe it's time to stop driving the rednecks away.

[infrared41]

1 hour ago, CDCLT said:

As for "disregarding their old fanbase" - yes, NASCAR is trying to branch out. But this time, it seems to be working, at least, better than their attempts in the 90s and 2000s.

 

Is it really working this time? How many of these "new fans" from yesterday do you think will be tuning in for Atlanta next week? Even if some of them do, they won't last 20 minutes watching actual NASCAR instead of F1: Sedan Circuit.

[Dalcowboyfan92]

This is one of those situations where you can't really get mad, all you can do is just tip your cap. Shane drove an absolutely perfect race, his first time racing in the series.

 

He came, he saw, he conquered.

[tigers]

1 hour ago, Dalcowboyfan92 said:

This is one of those situations where you can't really get mad, all you can do is just tip your cap. Shane drove an absolutely perfect race, his first time racing in the series.

 

He came, he saw, he conquered.

 

He aint no one horse show.
Loads of talent, he could make a motza in the US driving NASCAR.

[Needschat]

The only complaints coming from the drivers and crew chiefs were about the timing of telling everyone that the race was being shortened. 

 

The Australian Supercars are what this generation of Cup car is based on, so it was not a major step for SVG to overcome. 

 

And there's a butthurt DBC personality who needs to just be quiet. 

[tigers]

18 minutes ago, Needschat said:

The only complaints coming from the drivers and crew chiefs were about the timing of telling everyone that the race was being shortened. 

 

The Australian Supercars are what this generation of Cup car is based on, so it was not a major step for SVG to overcome. 

 

And there's a butthurt DBC personality who needs to just be quiet. 

 

So when was the last time a North American driver conquered the other way around?

 

Differences for starters are the tracks, and the directions of tracks in particular.
Next is speed, brakes, wheels and setups, weights, gearboxes and gears, engines are way different in power, fuel, seating position, steering wheel position, racing formats and probably more.

I guess it's better to say they have less in common than you'd think, besides the wheels being black and having doors.... wait no NASCAR don't have doors.
 

[infrared41]

11 hours ago, tigers said:

 

He aint no one horse show.
Loads of talent, he could make a motza in the US driving NASCAR.

 

Let's see how he does at Atlanta this week before we declare him to be the next Dale Earnhardt. Wait, that's right, he's not running Atlanta this week. Look, I'm as impressed as anyone by SVG's performance in Chicago. It was really fun to watch, but we need to tap the brakes on this guy being the next big thing. Ask Marcos Ambrose about the differences between winning on road courses in a Cup car and winning on an oval track. Wait, that's right, he never won on an oval track.

 

I'd love to see SVG take a shot at running Cup full time, but until then, he's just a road course ringer who kicked everyone's ass on a road course.

[The_Admiral]

On 7/3/2023 at 12:33 AM, mcj882000 said:

I very much get the impression that NASCAR is extremely insecure about being "the sport of dumb hillbillies watching cars go in circles for hours", based on the decisions they've made with the sport. ...  And it's all to appeal to an audience that will never be into stock car racing, who are not willing to see it as more than just "dumb hicks driving in circles". It's one thing to try and appeal to a casual audience, every major league/franchise/IP does that nowadays for better and for worse; after a while it starts to feel like NASCAR is sacrificing their diehard fans in an attempt to court an openly hostile audience, and it's gone about as well as you'd expect it to.

 

Waffle House Bettman

[The_Admiral]

20 hours ago, CDCLT said:

Plus, this is badass. If you hate this, then I don't know what to tell you.

 

If I wanted to watch people in Chicago drive recklessly, I'd get on the Edens and save everyone the setup time

[tigers]

19 hours ago, infrared41 said:

 

Let's see how he does at Atlanta this week before we declare him to be the next Dale Earnhardt. Wait, that's right, he's not running Atlanta this week. Look, I'm as impressed as anyone by SVG's performance in Chicago. It was really fun to watch, but we need to tap the brakes on this guy being the next big thing. Ask Marcos Ambrose about the differences between winning on road courses in a Cup car and winning on an oval track. Wait, that's right, he never won on an oval track.

 

I'd love to see SVG take a shot at running Cup full time, but until then, he's just a road course ringer who kicked everyone's ass on a road course.

 

Hence my he could make a motza.
You don't have to be a one horse pony on an oval track to make money in NASCAR, ask Marcus Ambrose.

 

How well have Will Power and the other Southern Hemisphere drivers done in Indy and on ovals as well.

[dont care]

10 hours ago, tigers said:

 

Hence my he could make a motza.
You don't have to be a one horse pony on an oval track to make money in NASCAR, ask Marcus Ambrose.

 

How well have Will Power and the other Southern Hemisphere drivers done in Indy and on ovals as well.

Are you really trying to compare a guy who has run open wheel his entire career and has been in Indy car almost just as long to a guy that raced their entire career in supercars other than this one race.

[infrared41]

13 hours ago, tigers said:

 

Hence my he could make a motza.
You don't have to be a one horse pony on an oval track to make money in NASCAR, ask Marcus Ambrose.

 

How well have Will Power and the other Southern Hemisphere drivers done in Indy and on ovals as well.

 

Sam Hornish made money in NASCAR. Ain't no one out there saying he was a great Cup driver.

[tigers]

12 hours ago, dont care said:

Are you really trying to compare a guy who has run open wheel his entire career and has been in Indy car almost just as long to a guy that raced their entire career in supercars other than this one race.

Most of his career, most.

 

8 hours ago, infrared41 said:

 

Sam Hornish made money in NASCAR. Ain't no one out there saying he was a great Cup driver.

Nice deflection.

 

[dont care]

53 minutes ago, tigers said:

Most of his career, most.

 

Nice deflection.

 

Most? He has raced absolutely 0 races on an oval. It’s drastically different then winning a street course where everyone else on the track has never raced on anything like it.

[infrared41]

2 hours ago, tigers said:

Nice deflection.

 

Deflection from what? Which part of what I said wasn't true?