I've also wondered why
Funny, because those are the tracks with two races that are actually able to sell out both dates (well, maybe not Dover). If you want to cut second dates from tracks to make room, cut the empty tracks like Martinsville, Bristol, pocono, and loudon. You personally might like watching that kind of racing on the TV, but that's kind of the problem now isn't it?
TV brings in more money than attendance. But, of course, Bristol is on NBCSN, Martinsville is on FS1 and NBCSN and the road courses are on FS1 and NBCSN. The only races on Fox or NBC are boring, cookie cutter races at boring, cookie cutter tracks. So, naturally, those races record higher ratings.
I used to live about 45 minutes away from Martinsville Speedway. The reason the attendance isn't as good as it should be is because that track has two terrible dates. Clay Campbell has bitched about those dates for years too. The Martinsville "Spring" race went from being run in late April to late March or early April and the "Fall" race went from being run in September to being run in late October or early November.
****, I joked with the track one time that NASCAR should just hold the championship race at Martinsville because the weather wouldn't be any worse. It's already 20 degrees on race morning at that race, why not run it three weeks later?
In other words, Martinsville suffers from one of the biggest problems Rockingham always had. NASCAR actually moved the Bristol Spring race back an entire month because it was too cold on the dates they had been running it.
Martinsville isn't going to lose a date, not now, not ever. Honestly, it's probably the only track that could survive having races on two terrible, ****** dates. If there was a blizzard the night before the race, the fans would help dig the track out the next morning so they could race.
As far as Texas Motor Speedway, if that track doesn't sell more than 100,000 seats, it should be taken off the schedule. It's located in the middle of not one, but two of the biggest cities in the country. It's the Bowman Gray of NASCAR. Located in a densely populated area, so populated that not even Brian France could kill attendance. Not to mention, Eddie Gossage is the best promoter in the business. He knows how to get fans excited about races at what is possibly the most boring racetrack ever constructed. I just hate all the political stuff he pulls.
Dover was the main beneficiary of this locking in tracks to this stagnant schedule stuff. Not even four years ago, NASCAR was hinting, in pretty pubic ways, that Dover might lose a race (and Dover has stated publicly that they wouldn't be able to stay open with only one race). Not a fan of the races there either.
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