| Author | Message | ||
     Ulynut |
Is it just me, or did NASCAR really screw up a good thing? I was a lifetime NASCAR fan. As a matter of fact, when I was a kid, my favorite driver was David Pearson (just to show how far I go back). Back then, it was down and dirty, hairy chested, high-octane no b-s racing. And I loved it. Today, it seems like corperations took over, and you no longer have the best drivers in the top level of American auto racing, but the most politically correct, camera friendly, product spokesmen they can find. The "car of tomorrow" really sucked the life out of the sport if you ask me. Yes, it saves the teams money, but if I wanted to watch IROC racing, I would watch IROC. It takes away too much of the innovation. Add to that the feel good rules like the "lucky dog" rule and the "chase", and you have a homoginized mush that used to be American stock car racing. This is the first 500 that I have no interest in. Bring back the good old days. rant over | ||
| Froggy |
I am watching it right now and I agree. They are showing clips from the 70's, it is a night and day difference. I havent watched it regularly since Toyota entered. | ||
| Panhead_dan |
What about the bike race? Does anybody know when it it (was)? Is there any video of it at all? I know it's not on TV but maybe youtoob or something? Google gave me nothing. | ||
| Dick8008 |
Yes, it's way to mellow. I used to be into it big time. No I'll watch it if nothing else is going on. They need a drive to speak his mind, correct or not. C'mon, they dictate the spring rate?????? | ||
| S2pengy |
According to web site Daytona 200 motorcycle race is Friday March 6th.. First ever night race???? | ||
| Panhead_dan |
That sounds exactly like what I read on there last year. | ||
| Ulynut |
Well it won't be long before thats messed up too. Daytona Motorsports Group (the ones who own NASCAR)took over AMA racing as well. Expect the same for motorcycle racing in the next year or so. | ||
| Lost_in_ohio |
the daytona 500 was today???????? More mindless left turns | ||
| Ulynut |
Get out there and try it. I did. It aint so easy. | ||
| Crusty |
Spoken by someone who has never raced. | ||
| Teddagreek |
That was pretty cool crash a minute ago.. | ||
| Paint_shaker |
Uly, I agree with you 100%!! | ||
| Just_ziptab |
This IS Nascar. All else sucks. Watch the finish! The best Nascar finish you will ever see.......THAT'S how it done! Petty # 43 and Woods Brothers #21 Mercury...1976. | ||
| Jerseyguy |
I still enjoy it. They are about the only professional athletes I have any respect for any more. | ||
| Ulynut |
Ziptab, you rock! That is my favorite clip from "the good old days". Somewhere in my mothers house, theres a picture of David Pearson riding me around on his shoulders in the pits at Bristol Speedway. Probably around 1974. | ||
| No_rice |
give me rally racing anyday. i would be all over that in a heartbeat. id sell off everything i own to find a way to get started in that. just never been a fan of the lefts...... and lefts.... and lefts..... and lefts... | ||
| Ulynut |
I wish SPEED still had rally racing on. Those guys are nuts! | ||
| Buellfighter |
Way-to-go Harvick!!! from 38th to 2nd and probably would have won if it weren't for the rain delay!!! Oooops...wrong forum!!  | ||
| P47b |
I'm just getting back into it. When Buddy Baker retired I lost interest in it. I think that they need to get rid of the R/P and drop the CI displacement. Yes, I think they need to slow the cars down. But when the pack is together the whole race. It's just not the same, it's not a race any more. It will come down to more car pile-ups. The whole thing changed in the 80's when they got away from the true meaning of a stock car. Go Bowyer!!! | ||
| Bbbob |
I'll show my age...I lost interest as the cars started looking less & less like the ones on the street. | ||
| Badlionsfan |
Dale Sr was the last of the old school guys. He was my favorite driver growing up. When he died, NASCAR did too. I still watch and try to get into it, but it's just not the same. It didn't matter if he was leading or 3 laps down, he always did something to get that 3 car on tv. | ||
| Bo_sox |
Each off-season I can't wait for the NASCAR & baseball seasons to begin. My 2 favorite sports are both just beginning or about to - bring on those summertime sports! Also, nothing makes me happier than a 'FORD' in victory lane!!! Sorry GM, Mopar, & Toyota fans, but FORD is spoken here! | ||
| Froggy |
Ford hasn't spoken, a rain delay and then a bribe to the officials has spoken. Dale Jr would of won if he learn how to pit. | ||
| Garyz28 |
I liked NASCAR back in the late 60's and early 70's when they were basically street cars with a roll cage. 200mph with drum brakes on all four corners. I don't understand how they can call these tube chassis race cars "Stock Cars". | ||
| Froggy |
Because they are stock from the Car Of Tomorrow factory! | ||
| Teddagreek |
The Car of tomorrow has carburetors... | ||
| Froggy |
Yea because NASCAR can't figure out how to get a restrictor plate into a fuel injected throttle body. | ||
| Bluzm2 |
Hey at least our car (#33 Cheerios) took 4th! Best placing our car has done for years! | ||
| Just_ziptab |
Riverside 500.........now this is jalopy racing! | ||
| Jerry_haughton |
Way-to-go Harvick!!! from 38th to 2nd and probably would have won if it weren't for the rain delay!!! Buellfighter, here's a Kevin Harvick story for you.  his home track is (was) Mesa Marin Speedway in Bakersfield, California. Harvick was scheduled to race there one Saturday night many years ago following that day's Busch race at California Speedway. he had made a name for himself well outside of Bakersfield by that time, so ticket sales for the race at Mesa Marin that night were brisk. yes, including one to yours truly. anyway, coolness for him he won the Busch race at Fontana that afternoon, so with all the post-race hoopla surrounding his win, he was wayyyyyyyyy late getting on the helicopter for the flight up to Bakersfield. they delayed the start of the race for him, natch, and none of us fans were upset that we had to wait and wait and wait for "our" star to show. his helo finally landed right at the track, and then even more festivities and delay ensued as they interviewed him at length in front of all his people and for local TV. well, since he showed up so late, he never got to run any qualifying laps. i don't know who built the car for Kevin, but he'd never seen it before, much less driven it, and he had to climb into it "cold," so to speak, with no first-hand input whatsoever on set-up for the race. not only that, since he hadn't run any qualifying laps he had to start at the very back of the 29-car field (no, the number of cars in the race was not a coincidence...) Mesa Marin is (was) a tiny little paved oval, a half-miler to be exact, and there wasn't a bad seat in the house – no matter your vantage point, you were right on top of the action, and on a track that small and tight there's always something going on. get this: Harvick passed three cars by turn two of the FIRST lap. think about that for just a moment. on this teeny little track, not much bigger than a football field, he somehow timed the green flag just so (home-field advantage surely didn't hurt, but everyone he was racing that night knew the track just as well as he did) and figured out a way to get around not one, not two, but three cars in the first ten seconds of the race. it was an incredible feat. and the excitement didn't stop there. he didn't have much time – 29 laps on a half-mile track go by pretty fast – and every lap he'd take a car, or two, or three, or four... his competitors that night were NOT giving him the race. everyone there wanted very badly to beat The Man at his home track, but they were simply powerless to stop him, so methodically, so precisely, so surgically did he carve his way through the field lap after lap. his car was bottoming HARD on several corners, throwing up impressive sparks every time it did, but that didn't slow him down a bit. and so, in a car he'd never seen before, in a race in which he started dead last, in a battle of mere minutes, not hours, he wiggled and squirmed and levered his way around every car in the field and took the win, just slipping by his final rival in Turn Four of the last lap to take the checkered flag. it was a truly incredible thing to see (and smell and hear and feel!), an absolutely brilliant display of driving against some of the best local stock car drivers in the region. you couldn't have scripted a better show for us fans, and the place was literally abuzz afterward, one of those nights where everyone in the stands is your buddy, beery high-five's and hugs all around, where everyone knows they've just witnessed the truly impossible. yep, i've still got my ticket stub. this one was special. Ferris |
