Joey hits the road, Chase gets a seat

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HardScrabble

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The BrewCo team has released Joey Clanton from the #27 TrimSpa ride effective now, and announced that Chase Montgomery will take the wheel for the rest of the season.

Joey had lots of good runs in the ASA, but has struggled a bit since moving to NBS. Chase is a real young' un currently running ARCA for the most part.

Just wondering if the push to bring too many young and relatively inexperienced drivers up is being taken just a bit too far. There were a few who more or less rocketed onto the NASCAR scene and made an immediate impact. But it does not follow that all of them can do that. It may not be a matter of talent so much as experience. Like in any other sport, the drivers mature at different rates.

The big problem is in my viewpoint, that a young driver with all the talent in the world who moves too far and too soon can very quickly become baggage. Through no fault of their own, it doesn't take much to get labeled as "can't get it done". Unfair. It takes just a little of that to get a young drivers confidence seriously shaken, and shaken confidence will make bad runs and yer right back to "can't get it done". Unfair. And there is the possibility with shaken confidence, a bad rap and failure that a young driver can adopt an attitude, perhaps worse than unfair, usually fatal to one's career.

The fair only comes to town once a year as I've been told, but seems some of these kids need a little guidance to know when it is in town.
 
hell yea that guy was wreckin almost time he got out there almost as bad as kerry earnhardt.
 
What they should do is put Randy LaJoie, Kevin Lepage, Elton Sawyer or another older veteran in that car. Chase didn't do any better than Joey when he drove earlier in the season, and I don't expect that to change now.
 
Ya see Joey is almost a prime example of what I'm seeing.

Good driver, but young not a lot of experience. The first 12 races he ran in this car, he crashed a total of one time. And generally finished in the top 20. That streak ended with his best finish of 5th at Pikes Peak.

But maybe that was not enough and some pressure was on to do better. Or maybe he just thought he should better. Either way, things changed.

In the next 6 races everything turned sour. In those races he crashed out 3 times. His finishes were again in the top 20 most of the time. But he wasn't finishing.

Now I don't know off top of my head how or why the crashes happened. Maybe just buzzard luck. But lots and lots of times, this indicates a driver who is pushing too hard. Pushing too hard leads to mistakes, and mistakes lead to pushng even harder, which leads to even more mistakes. Vicious circle and dem hard to break.

Next thing ya know folks are crying he crashes all the time. Ain't true, but the damage is done.
 
Clanton was doing fine this season with his experience level. I think success in nascar racing comes down to team chemistry. The teams that continue to change drivers just never develop enough team chemistry to win. Look at Evernham with the 19 car. Just when Casey Atwood starts to do well at the end of the season,Ray dumps him for Jeremy. Well.......two years later finally Jeremy and the team have some good chemistry and now things are going much better! Sure you need a good driver on your team.........but your not going to win without an entire team effort and some good chemistry!
 
True enough.

And if you look back at this particular team, it was not until Jamie's second season with them that any truly positive results began.

I'm sure the team is convinced it searching for the chemistry, that is the reason given for this later change, but it not often that a handful or even a double handful of races will reveal it.
 
If an owner puts a young, relatively inexperienced driver in the seat, he has to expect DNF's.

The current crop of youngsters who have succeeded beyond expectations doesn't mean that every young driver is going to make it.

I wish all these young drivers well, but at the same time I realize that at the top level the pressure to perform will weed them out.
 
oh geesh.....History repeats itself....again.

When Dave first went south he turned some heads and got a good ride. I think it was at the end of his 2nd best year ever that he got fired.

Then he goes to work for another team and at the last minute at Daytona, some dern youngin type rookie gets the better car. I think he drove the next couple years after that for Modoc but after that he went private as he had had with the fickleness of owners.

I think that as NASCAR has grown the number of folks thinking they can cut the mustard has grown and the more youngins that get the chance, the more are going to fail.

Personally, if I were an owner with all things being equal, I would have no desire at all to have an experienced backmarker or even a mid-packer in my car. While BAM has an exprienced mid-packer in their car, he is a popular guy who gets plenty of coverage. Kinda like Mikey. Not the best racer but the guy gets TV time.

There is a far greater talent pool than ever before. TV time is given to the young, good looking frontrunners. TV time equals sponsor happiness. Sponsor happiness means I can get more money. More money means I can field better prepared cars. Better cars means a better chance of winning....and the cycle continues.

Not every short tracker can adapt. Those that can are going to make millions. Those that can't at least had the chance to live a dream.
 
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