Richard on Dega and Plates

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HardScrabble

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More questions than answers from Richard, but that is the problem with the restrictor plates and the reason they exist.

By Richard Petty, Special to Turner Sports Interactive
October 2, 2002

10:59 AM EDT (1459 GMT)

I'm not a big fan of restrictor plates.

I don't think I'm alone in that regard. There aren't many drivers who are, and certainly not many fabricators. The plates bunch the cars up a good bit and everybody sits around waiting for "the big one." And when it comes, it's pretty incredible what it does to cars, and sometimes drivers.

From a car owner's standpoint, it's a tough deal. I have three cars and a lot of repair bills to worry about. From a sport standpoint, I'm concerned about injuries and how they affect what we're trying to do. From a human standpoint, I have a son and a lot of friends out there.

The thing is, without the plates, there is no telling how fast these cars would be capable of going out there right now. The last race at Talladega we ran without plates Bill Elliott qualified at 210 miles per hour. That was some 15 years ago. Would we be running 220 now? 225? Could we run those kinds of speeds?
As slick as these cars are these days and as much as we use aerodynamics as part of the setup, the speeds would be downright scary. As a driver, I didn't think much about speeds, slow or fast. As a car owner and as a person, those kinds of speeds are concerning.

NASCAR isn't in an easy position. Nobody likes the plates, but nobody really wants to take them off either. Not yet, anyway. I think everyone in the sport is looking for an alternative. The problem is, I don't know there is one.

Historically, whatever NASCAR has done to slow the cars down, we've worked as hard as we could to get the speed back. If they changed this, we went to work on that. If they changed that too, we found something else.

It's a cat-and-mouse game, with NASCAR trying to be one step ahead; but the teams trying to be one step ahead too. Right now, their job is to slow us down; our job is to speed us up. We're always looking for an extra tenth of a second. We're working as hard as we can to gain those tenths. Meanwhile, NASCAR is working not just to keep us slowed down but to keep us slowed down equally among car makes.

Tough job, huh?

The problem with the plates is throttle response. It takes over a full lap at Talladega -- 2.66 miles -- to get the car up to speed. You're racing with the gas pedal mashed to the floor so if you lift just a little bit, it takes a long time to get back to where you were. In other words, lift just a bit and you lose 10 or 15 spots on the race track.

That keeps everybody bunched together, where the real danger lies. If the car up front gets sideways, everybody gets into it. When you are running a football field a second, it's tough to miss a car spinning. Go back further in the field, and you have to miss eight or 10 cars. Pity the poor guy in the back of a line of 25 cars. There is nowhere to go and no way to miss it.

The answer? I have ideas just like everybody else, and I know NASCAR is searching for a way to go. What direction that is going to be, well, at this point is anybody's guess.
 
How about a V6 engine?????????


They used to run them in Busch. They make a whiney noise but Oh well it was still liveable!!!!!!!!!!
 
I think the idea is too speed them up too around 200 MPH but no more! That will spread the cars out and bring the driver back into the game and it will still be safe!

200 MPH at Daytona and Dega is surely safer than 190 MPH at Atlanta!

Common Sense applys here!

Banking is what makes Nascar so exciting and also what allows the fans to see the cars on the track much better!!!!!!
 
Personal opinion I guess.


I really think the speeds are too low. Buddy Baker went 200 MPH in 1970 at Daytona and in the year 2002 the cars are only going like 183 MPH.

Daytona and Talledega are suppose to be the premier tracks on the circuit but the speeds are not nearly the fastest of the tracks that they run on!!! The slow speeds are what is causing the danger now a days. If you watch a race from the 80's on Speedvision you will see that the cars aren't all bunched up and you will see more passing for the lead (particularly at the end of the race) The famous Sling Shot move is "Awesome"!!!

Not as many people were seriously injured back then either. With the new safety devices and better fencing around the tracks there is no doubt that the cars could go as fast as 200 or 205 with no problem at all!

I think nascar is just too scared to make a change like this! They are set in their ways and won't try new things !!

Heck IRL cars go 225 at Indy! Did you ever see how small these cars are????? Nascar should certainly be able to handle more speed than they currently have!

Oh yeah: I still luv ya Race Lady :D

Guess we can agree to disagree!!!!:D :D
 
Fine with me, TS1. :)

Just don't forget, that the cars you are talking about were the big, boxy models. That has a lot to do with how the cars handled on the track. ;)

IRL ---- don't forget those little cars have a ton more downforce than stockers. Plus, the much wider tires offer more grip.
 
What about Indy Cars ??? They are the smallest cars of all??????????????????????????

The big cars only had seatbelts for safety. Not much of anything else like todays cars do!
 
Seems like a mandated gear ratio would regulate top speeds. but then the teams would figure out how to get more RPM's in which case NASCAR could just change the ratio again. Endless circle.
 
The name of the game is get there first. While I sympathize with those drivers (and fans) that are concerned about ever increasing speeds, they are part and parcel to racing.

Tracks that allow cars to go as quickly as possible give new meaning to "Go fast or go home". I say take the plates off, let safety device research and development do it's thing, leave the tracks as they are except for the introduction of soft walls and better fencing and......Go fast or go home.
 
Off topic but you'd think they would spend a little money and smooth Talledega out. That track is horrible. I remember when the teams were allowed to run on bump stops during qualifying and some of the drivers were wearing mouth pieces so they would not chip their teeth. Running a V6 to slow down is like college babeball using aluminum bats to save money. It is just not the same.
 
Just an idea N2 Racin. How many Monte Carlos and Intrepids have V8's in them anymore????????

Nascar needs to just go ahead and try something. Get creative and go for it! They are a bunch of chickens!
 
I think TRL has it EXACTLY correct


but na$car would never spend the money
 
I would be surprised to see the banking come down at Daytona or Talledega, somewhere in my mind I see teh hard hits these rivers take on the flat tracks when things go wrong and have to wonder if even that is a good idea. Sort of an unformed thought, but it seems lower banking results in harder impacts when things go awry.

As for how fast the cars go, I've posted this before. There are serious problems with these enclosed cars when they turn sideways or backwards at the speeds possible with unrestricted engines. They fly. Indy cars do not experience the same problem because there is no roof and the bottoms of the cars are designed entirely differently.

Just read a statement that Steve Hmiel made of this subject as well.

"We tried real hard last summer to put bigger plates on the cars and reduce the downforce and that may work. The problem we had was we didn't go to big enough plates and small enough downforce. In other words, we upped the plates a little bit and that's cool. We took a little downforce away but they could still run wide open. So when you go to drafting you've got more horsepower and the cars can still run wide open and you're gonna run way over the 200 mph limit that everybody talks about -- and that limit is based mostly on how our roof flaps work.

So if we could get our roof flaps to do a better job at 190, 200. We could run a little bit faster but you probably don't need to go a whole lot faster. My idea would be to open up the plate even more so there was enough power in the car that you could pull out and pass on the straightaways but you'd have to reduce the downforce so you'd have to lift off the gas in the corners and that will make more of a race of it.

You could still run 195 mph, but the difference in speed on the straightaways and in the corners would be a lot greater than what we're seeing right now. You do that by taking away downforce to slow 'em down in the corners and open up the plates to speed 'em up on the straightaways."
 
Interesting! It sounds like they could spend some more of that money they make and come up with something that would result in around a 200 MPH limit!

They are worth tons of cash. They should use a small chunk of it to fix the plate problems at DIS and Dega !

Indy cars fly too. Didn't you see the movie "Driven"

LOL :D
 
Saw "Driven", fotunately CMS kicked in properly and I have absolutely no recollection of the movie except for occassional bouts of nausea.

Some type of additinal or modified roof flap system was rumored to have been scheduled for inclusion in the testing at Daytona a month or so back. Rain shortened the testing schedule and as far as I know no such testing occurred.

More astonishing to me, these tests were intended to explore methods by which to improve the racing and safety at the restrictor plate tracks. The testing was to include larger greenhouse cars, reduced downforce cars, and other modifications with rumors of larger plates and better engine characteristics being one of the goals.

Despite this NASCAR had trouble recruiting teams willing to come and participate in this testing. A couple of teams had quotes citing the cost of the test would be around 10 to 20 thousand for their tema and they did not want to spend the money. When Goodyear was attempting to test tires at Richmond to investigate the possibility of the new tire being part of the "selaer problem" at that track this spring, they too had trouble recruiting testers and were turned down by several teams.

Next time anyone thinks about jumping NASCAR for not doing tthe "right thing" (whatever that is) one might wonder about the teams as well.
 
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