Rate the race

Originally posted by HardScrabble
No clue what "real racing" passes are.
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You don't?

Imagine three lines of cars going single file. As one line moves a little faster, every car in that line "passes" every car in the other two lines.

Not real passing. They get marked down on paper as "passes" so that people can say, "Wow! 12 lead changes!!".
 
I'm lost here.....Does a race have to have passing to be a real race?

I fail to see how passes have any bearing. There was a green flag Sunday, and there was a checkered flag. What happened in between was a race. Well at least that's what the folks in race control would like us all to believe.:rolleyes:
 
Obviously not, though for years I thought I did.

We have two cars battling for the lead. Lap after lap they go at it neither driver capable of gaining the upper hand for long. They get close , they nearly touch, still these two hang on. Finally one prevails and the other , well the other does not.

Great racing right?

But if we put some number of cars in behind each of these two drivers it is transformed into boring racing,. Frankly no I don't get it.

Two cars nose to tail are come off turn two and down the back stretch, the leader has had the dominant car all day and is likely the faster of the two, but the draft holds the second place man in position. Through turn three and down to the apron they go, suddently the second place car swings out and the draft propels into the lead and down the stretch to the flag they come The once leader swings low and is blocked, can't make the move. Great racing? Without the draft it never would happen, nowadays the draft is a bad thing and those that play it well are not good drivers, just in better cars. Frankly I don't get that one either.
 
Originally posted by HardScrabble
Obviously not, though for years I thought I did.

We have two cars battling for the lead. Lap after lap they go at it neither driver capable of gaining the upper hand for long. They get close , they nearly touch, still these two hang on. Finally one prevails and the other , well the other does not.

Great racing right?

But if we put some number of cars in behind each of these two drivers it is transformed into boring racing,. Frankly no I don't get it.
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Because all those cars behind those two leaders aren't there because of good racing. They're there because the engines are restricted.

Originally posted by HardScrabble

Two cars nose to tail are come off turn two and down the back stretch, the leader has had the dominant car all day and is likely the faster of the two, but the draft holds the second place man in position. Through turn three and down to the apron they go, suddently the second place car swings out and the draft propels into the lead and down the stretch to the flag they come The once leader swings low and is blocked, can't make the move. Great racing? Without the draft it never would happen, nowadays the draft is a bad thing and those that play it well are not good drivers, just in better cars. Frankly I don't get that one either.
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Again, how did those cars get away from the rest?

Personally I don't buy that all the cars are all lined up at Talladega and Daytona because the racing is "that close". It's an illusion, made to sell tickets and MTV videos.
 
Originally posted by be9ak7ts16
All i can say is that I had more fun cleaning my garage than watching the race. And if you saw my garage..................
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That's precisely what we were doing! Well, not cleaning your garage, we were cleaning our own, but you get the picture. MRN to the rescue. Makes for good background noise, you at least know when someone drops out, and you don't have to look at it. The only way to plate race!
 
Well, It was too cold to clean my garage....and my Vikings didn't get to lose this weekend...so I suffered through it
 
Originally posted by paul
Because all those cars behind those two leaders aren't there because of good racing.  They're there because the engines are restricted.

 

Again, how did those cars get away from the rest?

Personally I don't buy that all the cars are all lined up at Talladega and Daytona because the racing is "that close".  It's an illusion, made to sell tickets and MTV videos.
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Somewhat different issues.

The cars are there and they are passing, one is passing another because at that point in time he (or she) is faster. That's Racin'

That having been said, we get closer to heart of the issue for me. I repeat myself yet again to say I do not like restritor plate racing. There are plenty of passes and the field is highly competitve. For my head all raing in any professional series is restricted. The only place I know of right now with truly unrestricted racing is down on Fairgrounds Road most every Saturday night. Here you can run what ya brung if ya can find somebody to race ya.

The probelem with restrictor plate racing for me is that it removes too many options for the driver. The team owner and CC and thsoe guys have a whole slew of options pretty equal to those they have at any other race, but not the driver.

The driver may be able to turn his car to the low side better than anyone else out there, but he dare not do so because alone he has no shot. The same with usijng a higher groove.

A driver cannot ease off early, swing low in the groove get the nose under and back on the button sooner off the corner. That is not possible.

The driver can't stay in the throttle that extra beat and run high on the track, carry momentum through the center of the turn and then take away the groove on to the straight and make the pass.

The driver can't open the door underneath, knowing his opponent is carrying too much speed, brake hard swing back to the inside and retake the spot.

The list goes on, but hopefully the point is clear.

IMHO, there are a whole slew of reasons not to like plate racing, but lack of passing just won't hold up as one of them. And the legislated deal is only a matter of degree. Professional racing is legislated, other wise it is street racing.
 
Plate Racing didn't used to be as bad as it is now. Since the fuel cell rule change though they have further removed the driver drom the equation. Now fuel mileage becomes the deciding factor in a race that really was based on who spent the most money at the wind tunnel and who was able to get the other drivers to work with them. As far as driver skill..look how McMurray ran in his first run there. Who knows how he would have finished, had he not run out of gas.
 
I'm saying pretty much the same thing as HS. It had a green, it had a checker. The sanctioning body put on exactly the kind of race they wanted to put on.

Did I like it? Yea, I liked it. No yellows and nobody got hurt. Couldn't ask for a better race from the saftey standpoint.

Was it boring? Not with the fuel thing thrown in and not with wondering when the big one would happen. I don't have a lot of fear of drivers getting hurt. I've seen cars take hits and been totally amazed that anyone could walk away. Of course I've also seen little bang bangs that have dern near killed folks. The Winston Cup car is one of the best built on the planet. Very seldom does a WC driver not walk away.

But now for the big question. The one that really matters. Would I watch a replay? Depends on what my other choices were but if I had to choose between nascar's Dega and ASA's Winchester, I would watch Winchester. Even our local access Late Model thing would get the nod over yesterday's Dega thing, and half the local thing is Legends.

Bummer is that I love the big tracks. But Indy and Pocono are the only ones left worth watching imo. Dega and Daytona's July race hold my attention because there is nothing in the world like seeing 5 million dollars worth of racecars get torn up in less than 30 seconds.

But watch a replay when there ain't no Big One? No way.
 
I guess I was at different track Sun.;) The fuel cells did get the cars strung out more. The longer into the race the more small packs of cars there were. I have been to races at dega where 1st thur about 30th place was just over a second. Sun. the top 10 were all close nose to tail at the finish line. I like the idea of the crews having a factor in the outcome of the race, and with the extra pit stops they did. They could have very easliy lost the race as well as won.
 
Some races are just a losing battle with some fans. I still say it's an eight smilie!!:D To each his own.
 
Everybody has their favorite kinds of racing to watch. I personally love Martinsville, Bristol and many other short tracks. I've heard some people say Martinsville sucks (although they had enough sense not to say that within striking distance). To each his own. I'm just to the point where plate "races" just don't interest me at all. That's ok though, I still have like 35 races a season. Not bad really.
 
The race was a parade at the end.

The only reason there was not a big pack at the end is because several teams could not make it on fuel mileage.

The race, in a word, sucked. And the guy I cheer for did well.

Zero smilies.
 
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