Retirement

SpeedPagan

SpeedPagan

The iRacing Guru
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Man, I gotta say these rash of retirement the last couple of years have been kind of overwhelming. Jeff Gordon is gone, Tony Stewart, Danica may have one foot out the door, Kenseth has a big press conference planned for Wednesday. Kind of makes me wonder how long Jimmie Johnson has until he stops racing. I don't know who I'd cheer for after 7-UP retires.
 
SpeedPagan said:
Man, I gotta say these rash of retirement the last couple of years have been kind of overwhelming. Jeff Gordon is gone, Tony Stewart, Danica may have one foot out the door, Kenseth has a big press conference planned for Wednesday. Kind of makes me wonder how long Jimmie Johnson has until he stops racing. I don't know who I'd cheer for after 7-UP retires.
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And Jr probably isn't to far behind either. Chase is my second favorite driver so once Jr is done I got me a driver lined up.
 
Root for these guys

IMG_9239.JPG
 
SpeedPagan said:
Man, I gotta say these rash of retirement the last couple of years have been kind of overwhelming. Jeff Gordon is gone, Tony Stewart, Danica may have one foot out the door, Kenseth has a big press conference planned for Wednesday. Kind of makes me wonder how long Jimmie Johnson has until he stops racing. I don't know who I'd cheer for after 7-UP retires.
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How could you omit Edwards.
 
Edwards is comin' back to drive the 5 next year.

Rogers'll be on the box.
 
I think it's great.

It opens the door to fabulously talented young hot-shoes who are penniless, have no corporate or personal sponsorship of any kind and have never met anyone even remotely connected to auto racing at any level. I believe the word "deserving" is often used.
 
ChexOrWrex said:
Root for these guys

View attachment 26128
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It's great seeing young folks enjoying life. While a lot of good drivers have and will retire I can't remember a time when there has been so many young drivers in a position to carry NASCAR for many more years. It just seems that you see Blaney out there with everyone really having a great time.
 
aunty dive said:
I think it's great.

It opens the door to fabulously talented young hot-shoes who are penniless, have no corporate or personal sponsorship of any kind and have never met anyone even remotely connected to auto racing at any level. I believe the word "deserving" is often used.
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Pretty sure Chase Elliot and the Dillion Brothers dispel that notion.
 
aunty dive said:
Six week old chickens everywhere rejoiced.
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In spite of the great talent I was always opposed to the presence of John Wes on the track because of my principles.
I just can't abide those genetically altered boneless chicken farms.
And any free range claims by them would be bullsheit, a boneless chicken is immobile it can't walk or fly, hence it can't ever be free.

They can't even procreate with the assistance of a special handler. It just aint right.
 
Nothing wrong with keeping your eyes on a few young guns to replace your current driver after time catches up with them.
If you are going to last as a life time fan, you have to know nothing last forever, we are on all borrowed time, including those drivers that make it fun.
Cherish the memories, but turn the page when the time comes. Having the racing fever makes one relate racing to life, and life to racing, they can seem and feel interchangeable.
There is no need wasting the current daylight and time you can't replace, by being lost on or to it over what happened previously.

And it can be fun to watch the young ones mature, they all need to be naturally fast. But they all usually need some refinement and work at reducing mistakes. That journey is a fun thing to watch too, it makes getting the ultimate win so much better, imo.
 
Greg said:
Nothing wrong with keeping your eyes on a few young guns to replace your current driver after time catches up with them.
If you are going to last as a life time fan, you have to know nothing last forever, we are on all borrowed time, including those drivers that make it fun.
Cherish the memories, but turn the page when the time comes. Having the racing fever makes one relate racing to life, and life to racing, they can seem and feel interchangeable.
There is no need wasting the current daylight and time you can't replace, by being lost on or to it over what happened previously.

And it can be fun to watch the young ones mature, they all need to be naturally fast. But they all usually need some refinement and work at reducing mistakes. That journey is a fun thing to watch too, it makes getting the ultimate win so much better, imo.
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I've gone through this transition recently from Jeff Burton to Kyle Larson, and this sums it up perfectly.
 
aunty dive said:
I think it's great.

It opens the door to fabulously talented young hot-shoes who are penniless, have no corporate or personal sponsorship of any kind and have never met anyone even remotely connected to auto racing at any level. I believe the word "deserving" is often used.
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You mean, "Racers." :cheers:
 
Greg said:
Nothing wrong with keeping your eyes on a few young guns to replace your current driver after time catches up with them.
If you are going to last as a life time fan, you have to know nothing last forever, we are on all borrowed time, including those drivers that make it fun.
Cherish the memories, but turn the page when the time comes. Having the racing fever makes one relate racing to life, and life to racing, they can seem and feel interchangeable.
There is no need wasting the current daylight and time you can't replace, by being lost on or to it over what happened previously.

And it can be fun to watch the young ones mature, they all need to be naturally fast. But they all usually need some refinement and work at reducing mistakes. That journey is a fun thing to watch too, it makes getting the ultimate win so much better, imo.
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Since Bill Elliot retired I've had no favorite driver, I do like Chase, Martin Truex, Blaney, and a few others, but to say I have a favorite....nope. Don't think I ever will either.
 
SpeedPagan said:
Kind of makes me wonder how long Jimmie Johnson has until he stops racing.
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I don't really think Johnson is gonna retire before he wins his 8th title. And I think he will try to win no.8 as long as he's competitive.
Blaze88 said:
And Jr probably isn't to far behind either.
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Jr's retirement would be terrible for NASCAR as the number of spectators will probably reduce drastically after Jr retires.
 
Mopardh9 said:
Since Bill Elliot retired I've had no favorite driver, I do like Chase, Martin Truex, Blaney, and a few others, but to say I have a favorite....nope. Don't think I ever will either.
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I know what you mean Rusty was my favorite for Year, I noticed alot of younger fans coming into the sport are fans of many different drivers, drivers on different teams and even manufactures. With Social media now people are more pulled to personality over ability sometimes IMO
 
There is a thread about Harry Gant; he was rookie of the year at age 39, won his 1st Cup race at 42, won his last cup race at 52 and retired at 53 (he went on for a few more years in other series). I guess the younger old drivers don't last as long as they used to.
 
What happened to the days of drivers racing till they are in their 60s? Not too long ago, we had drivers like Dave Marcis racing well into his 60s, and the rest of the field being generally older. Now everyone is retiring much earlier by 40. Soon enough the sport will be unrecognizable and the fan base will dwindle to a very small fraction of what it once was.
 
paradigm said:
What happened to the days of drivers racing till they are in their 60s? Not too long ago, we had drivers like Dave Marcis racing well into his 60s, and the rest of the field being generally older. Now everyone is retiring much earlier by 40. Soon enough the sport will be unrecognizable and the fan base will dwindle to a very small fraction of what it once was.
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Yeah, mid-40's seems to be the walking away point now. Maybe it's because the drivers have been getting started earlier the last couple decades. Jeff Gordon was only 44 when he retired (not counting the handful of races he ran last year), but by then he had nearly a quarter-century of Cup experience.
 
ToyYoda said:
Yeah, mid-40's seems to be the walking away point now. Maybe it's because the drivers have been getting started earlier the last couple decades. Jeff Gordon was only 44 when he retired (not counting the handful of races he ran last year), but by then he had nearly a quarter-century of Cup experience.
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Yea, I think that's it. I mean, most of the new drivers coming in are 17 and 18 when they make it to Cup, they're barely a legal adult when they hit the big times.
 
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