NASCAR Racing

[Terry S]

I recently had the incredible experience of attending my first ever NASCAR race. Unbelievable time.
Although I am a veteran of over 50 years of attending races in Oz, this was a whole new world.
I thought some random thoughts may be of interest to readers. I accept that this is not racing history, but please indulge me:
------The race was the “Duck Commander 500” at Texas Motor Speedway. Many may not be aware of the sponsor, but very big over there. They are the Roberston family who have made their fortune from their Duck Commander duck decoys, hand-made from cedar. The father started business in 1973. Last year they sold 500,000 at retail price of $200 each. They are also big into guns, knives and all forms of camouflage clothing and gear. Family estimated to be worth over $100M. You may have seen them on the TV reality show “Duck Dynasty”, in OZ on pay TV. They have just started a Duck Dynasty musical in Las Vegas. Unusual sponsor names are not rare for NASCAR. A recent race was the “SpongeBob SquarePants 400”.
-----The track was the Texas Motor Speedway, in middle of nowhere between Dallas and Fort Worth. It was built in 1996 and cost $250M to build. A lap is 1.5 miles long, and NASCARS complete in about 30 seconds. The private boxes etc. are unbelievable. There is a ten story hotel on the back straight which is angled over the track. The top 6 floors are fully glassed suites, with fantastic views. The track can hold 183,000 spectators, but for NASCAR races the back straight seats are is not open, so capacity reduced to 113,000. It was pretty full this night. On the back straight is the world’s largest HD LCD screen. It is 218 feet wide and 95 feet high. The clarity is incredible and it can be seen from all spectator areas. The parking areas around the track are massive, stretching as far as eye can see.
-----The track is very fast. This year’s pole sitter Kurt Busch averaged 312 kms per hour, a time of 27.857 seconds. The fastest times ever recorded were during a CART/Indy car event in April 2001. With new regulations they were not sure how fast they would go. Their fastest lap was over 370 kms per hour. Unfortunately 21 of the 25 drivers complained of dizziness and disorientation from sustained G forces of over 5G. Their race was stopped 2 hours before scheduled start.
------As an indication of the variance between the tracks NASCARs run at, the previous week they ran at Martinsville, which is only 0.85 kms long. Pole time was average of only 158 Km per hour, about half of TMS. And that track only holds 55,000 spectators.
------The seats we had were very good, being in the seventh row at turn one. You could see the whole track plus of course the big screen. All seats include the obligatory cup holder and seem wider than in Oz for American rears. You are allowed to take in a Cooler (Esky) or back pack but it must be less than 14 x 14 x 14 inches. This didn’t seem strictly enforced. No glass is allowed. Beer at the track was $8 a can, which is expensive especially considering they were only 12 ounce cans and not the 13 ounce that we are used to. The noise of the cars is unbelievable and extraordinary. They seem to have no mufflers and with 43 cars on track and laps of 30 seconds it is soon completely deafening. For those complaining that latest F1 cars are too muted they should go to a NASCAR race. I guess being in the middle of nowhere there are no neighbours. They supply ear plugs when you go in, but the best course is to rent full earphones at the track. These similar to on aircraft and completely cover the ears. Each car has an observer high above the grandstand who communicates with their driver and pit crew. With the headphones is a number pad where you can dial in number of the car you want to listen to, or the race commentary. You can change this at any time. A great idea.
----- There seems to be a misconception in OZ that the crowd is mostly rowdy “rednecks”. This is not the case. The people around us seemed to be of all ages, and well dressed and behaved. Everyone was very friendly, and many families with young kids. Everyone left in an orderly fashion and no fights etc.
------A great feature of the track is the large poles which show the top twenty runners by car number. There are two of these and each is four sided so details can be seen from around the track. These enable you to follow a driver coming back through the field, for example. They make a 334 lap race with multiple pit stops very easy to follow. They should be compulsory at all race tracks. Motor racing in Oz must be the only sport that does not have a scoreboard clearly visible. Imagine following a 5 day cricket match with no scoreboard.
------A large part of the infield is filled up with large RV’s (we call them motor homes) mostly the size of busses. They come prepared with all mod cons. Many had a ute towed behind and on the ute was a golf buggy. Several on the fence opposite us had brought scissor lifts to improve their views and these had up to ten people each going up. It looked precarious.
------There were 43 starters in the race. Makes our V8’s at 25 starters look a little pathetic, and this on a 1.5 mile track.
------The emphasis is very much on the drivers. Their car make is almost irrelevant. Indeed in the 136 page glossy program there is no mention of what cars being driven by the drivers. The cars are apparently distinguished by having different grilles and fronts, but when they go past at 300 kph you can’t see this. All you can see is the large numbers on their doors. And the crowd cheers for their favourite drivers, and seem to know a lot of the numbers e.g. 48 for Jimmie Johnson, 24 for Jeff Gordon and 88 for Dale Earnhardt Jnr. NASCAR has apparently learnt from experience that car manufacturers come and go at will, so don’t rely on them. Dodge was the last to leave and Toyota the latest starter. Maybe our V8’s should follow this lead. The results list the car makers, and in this race there were 21 Chevs, 14 Fords and 8 Toyotas.
------The race was over 334 laps and lasted over 4 hours. They don’t publish the time as I guess depends so much on yellow flags. The race is run on Saturday night starting at 6:30 pm. The gates open at 2:30 pm and at 4:30 pm they have a rock concert on the front straight. There is only the one race. The secondary series the XFINITY Series runs a 300 mile race on the Friday night. At the finish there is another rock concert for an hour mainly to allow the crowd to disperse, and a big fireworks display.
------I don’t pretend to understand the NASCAR rules, however the one I find the strangest is that during a safety car period that it seems lapped cars are allowed to go around and unlap themselves.
------The money awarded is incredible, and published with the results. They pay for places plus laps led. The winner Jimmie Johnson received USD 524K, which included leading for 128 laps. Second got USD 390K. Even the last placed in 43rd received USD 65K. Incredible. It’s a pity our V8 Taxi mob don’t publish prize money.
------Earlier in the year legend Richard Petty complained of Marcos Ambrose not getting the best out of his car on ovals. Well his replacement Sam Hornish Jr is not doing any better. Hornish won the 2006 Indy 500 and was 3 times Indy car champ in 01, 02 and 06. So should be familiar with ovals. At this event he qualified 29th and finished 26th. So maybe Ambrose wasn’t so bad.
-----At the finish the winner drives his car onto the podium and there seems no order then. You couldn’t see on the big screen even where the winner was amongst the horde of people. The winner gets trophy and two 6 shot pistols to fire into the air whilst on podium. (Americans love their guns). I think it disappointing that 2nd and 3rd placegetters appear to get no recognition as far as podiums concerned. I think the current F1 podium is far better being high above the crowd for all to see, and enable driver interviews.
-----In conclusion may I strongly suggest if you haven’t been to a NASCAR race that you put it high on your bucket list. It’s an experience you won’t forget.

[paul lancaster]

Hi terry, thanks for your insight to nascar, which is something that I watch, without fail.
whenever I bring nascar up , or motorsport is brought up in conversation, the majority of people think that it is a boring form of motorsport, because they just "go round and round",but as you will know, there is way more to an oval race than that.
strategys, tyres , fuel and dear I say, the best pit crews in the world, sure a f1 pit stop might take 3 seconds these days, with 15 guys, nascar pitcrews around 7 guys, with 5 nuts per wheel.and fuel as well.
I have never been to a nascar event, but have been told by those who have, that, you dont realize how fast, and how loud these things can go.definately on my bucket list

[Noo Noo]

Terry

I found this really interesting. The sort of background detail that doesn't get into race reports.




When I was young our car club would show motor sport movies on clubnights and sometimes they were NASCAR.
One night in 1969 we had one on the Darlington 500. The commentator was a slow talking "good ol' boy" (he was probably putting it on) who talked in a conversational way. He told us about how the drivers at the end of the straights would slide their car up into the barriers on the outside of the bends and keep them them there all the way around until the next straight. They showed the sides of cars after the race and they were just mangled sheetmetal. We got told they were called "Darlington Stripes"

So I'm wondering if they still do that?. Perhaps not. I mean, Duck Commander Stripes doesn't have the same ring to it.

David Hunter

[Grant Ellwood]

Hey David, that "good ol' boy" drawl is pretty normal, I live in southern Virginia, one of my neighbors is retired NASCAR driver Ward Burton (Daytona 500 winner, the holy grail of NASCAR) and you would need a chainsaw to cut through his slow and thick southern drawl.
Another neighbor is Bill Hill, not famous for anything except for being my neighbor, and his name is pronounced Bee-Yill Hee-Yill, regular southern practice to make at least two syllables out of one.

[Bondy]

Hey David, that "good ol' boy" drawl is pretty normal, I live in southern Virginia, one of my neighbors is retired NASCAR driver Ward Burton (Daytona 500 winner, the holy grail of NASCAR) and you would need a chainsaw to cut through his slow and thick southern drawl.
Another neighbor is Bill Hill, not famous for anything except for being my neighbor, and his name is pronounced Bee-Yill Hee-Yill, regular southern practice to make at least two syllables out of one.

Here's a sample of Ward


https://youtu.be/pyGbR_aSAG4

[CUSTAXIE50]

I recently had the incredible experience of attending my first ever NASCAR race. Unbelievable time.
Although I am a veteran of over 50 years of attending races in Oz, this was a whole new world.
I thought some random thoughts may be of interest to readers. I accept that this is not racing history, but please indulge me:
------The race was the “Duck Commander 500” at Texas Motor Speedway. Many may not be aware of the sponsor, but very big over there. They are the Roberston family who have made their fortune from their Duck Commander duck decoys, hand-made from cedar. The father started business in 1973. Last year they sold 500,000 at retail price of $200 each. They are also big into guns, knives and all forms of camouflage clothing and gear. Family estimated to be worth over $100M. You may have seen them on the TV reality show “Duck Dynasty”, in OZ on pay TV. They have just started a Duck Dynasty musical in Las Vegas. Unusual sponsor names are not rare for NASCAR. A recent race was the “SpongeBob SquarePants 400”.
-----The track was the Texas Motor Speedway, in middle of nowhere between Dallas and Fort Worth. It was built in 1996 and cost $250M to build. A lap is 1.5 miles long, and NASCARS complete in about 30 seconds. The private boxes etc. are unbelievable. There is a ten story hotel on the back straight which is angled over the track. The top 6 floors are fully glassed suites, with fantastic views. The track can hold 183,000 spectators, but for NASCAR races the back straight seats are is not open, so capacity reduced to 113,000. It was pretty full this night. On the back straight is the world’s largest HD LCD screen. It is 218 feet wide and 95 feet high. The clarity is incredible and it can be seen from all spectator areas. The parking areas around the track are massive, stretching as far as eye can see.
-----The track is very fast. This year’s pole sitter Kurt Busch averaged 312 kms per hour, a time of 27.857 seconds. The fastest times ever recorded were during a CART/Indy car event in April 2001. With new regulations they were not sure how fast they would go. Their fastest lap was over 370 kms per hour. Unfortunately 21 of the 25 drivers complained of dizziness and disorientation from sustained G forces of over 5G. Their race was stopped 2 hours before scheduled start.
------As an indication of the variance between the tracks NASCARs run at, the previous week they ran at Martinsville, which is only 0.85 kms long. Pole time was average of only 158 Km per hour, about half of TMS. And that track only holds 55,000 spectators.
------The seats we had were very good, being in the seventh row at turn one. You could see the whole track plus of course the big screen. All seats include the obligatory cup holder and seem wider than in Oz for American rears. You are allowed to take in a Cooler (Esky) or back pack but it must be less than 14 x 14 x 14 inches. This didn’t seem strictly enforced. No glass is allowed. Beer at the track was $8 a can, which is expensive especially considering they were only 12 ounce cans and not the 13 ounce that we are used to. The noise of the cars is unbelievable and extraordinary. They seem to have no mufflers and with 43 cars on track and laps of 30 seconds it is soon completely deafening. For those complaining that latest F1 cars are too muted they should go to a NASCAR race. I guess being in the middle of nowhere there are no neighbours. They supply ear plugs when you go in, but the best course is to rent full earphones at the track. These similar to on aircraft and completely cover the ears. Each car has an observer high above the grandstand who communicates with their driver and pit crew. With the headphones is a number pad where you can dial in number of the car you want to listen to, or the race commentary. You can change this at any time. A great idea.
----- There seems to be a misconception in OZ that the crowd is mostly rowdy “rednecks”. This is not the case. The people around us seemed to be of all ages, and well dressed and behaved. Everyone was very friendly, and many families with young kids. Everyone left in an orderly fashion and no fights etc.
------A great feature of the track is the large poles which show the top twenty runners by car number. There are two of these and each is four sided so details can be seen from around the track. These enable you to follow a driver coming back through the field, for example. They make a 334 lap race with multiple pit stops very easy to follow. They should be compulsory at all race tracks. Motor racing in Oz must be the only sport that does not have a scoreboard clearly visible. Imagine following a 5 day cricket match with no scoreboard.
------A large part of the infield is filled up with large RV’s (we call them motor homes) mostly the size of busses. They come prepared with all mod cons. Many had a ute towed behind and on the ute was a golf buggy. Several on the fence opposite us had brought scissor lifts to improve their views and these had up to ten people each going up. It looked precarious.
------There were 43 starters in the race. Makes our V8’s at 25 starters look a little pathetic, and this on a 1.5 mile track.
------The emphasis is very much on the drivers. Their car make is almost irrelevant. Indeed in the 136 page glossy program there is no mention of what cars being driven by the drivers. The cars are apparently distinguished by having different grilles and fronts, but when they go past at 300 kph you can’t see this. All you can see is the large numbers on their doors. And the crowd cheers for their favourite drivers, and seem to know a lot of the numbers e.g. 48 for Jimmie Johnson, 24 for Jeff Gordon and 88 for Dale Earnhardt Jnr. NASCAR has apparently learnt from experience that car manufacturers come and go at will, so don’t rely on them. Dodge was the last to leave and Toyota the latest starter. Maybe our V8’s should follow this lead. The results list the car makers, and in this race there were 21 Chevs, 14 Fords and 8 Toyotas.
------The race was over 334 laps and lasted over 4 hours. They don’t publish the time as I guess depends so much on yellow flags. The race is run on Saturday night starting at 6:30 pm. The gates open at 2:30 pm and at 4:30 pm they have a rock concert on the front straight. There is only the one race. The secondary series the XFINITY Series runs a 300 mile race on the Friday night. At the finish there is another rock concert for an hour mainly to allow the crowd to disperse, and a big fireworks display.
------I don’t pretend to understand the NASCAR rules, however the one I find the strangest is that during a safety car period that it seems lapped cars are allowed to go around and unlap themselves.
------The money awarded is incredible, and published with the results. They pay for places plus laps led. The winner Jimmie Johnson received USD 524K, which included leading for 128 laps. Second got USD 390K. Even the last placed in 43rd received USD 65K. Incredible. It’s a pity our V8 Taxi mob don’t publish prize money.
------Earlier in the year legend Richard Petty complained of Marcos Ambrose not getting the best out of his car on ovals. Well his replacement Sam Hornish Jr is not doing any better. Hornish won the 2006 Indy 500 and was 3 times Indy car champ in 01, 02 and 06. So should be familiar with ovals. At this event he qualified 29th and finished 26th. So maybe Ambrose wasn’t so bad.
-----At the finish the winner drives his car onto the podium and there seems no order then. You couldn’t see on the big screen even where the winner was amongst the horde of people. The winner gets trophy and two 6 shot pistols to fire into the air whilst on podium. (Americans love their guns). I think it disappointing that 2nd and 3rd placegetters appear to get no recognition as far as podiums concerned. I think the current F1 podium is far better being high above the crowd for all to see, and enable driver interviews.
-----In conclusion may I strongly suggest if you haven’t been to a NASCAR race that you put it high on your bucket list. It’s an experience you won’t forget. Don't recall what year it was.but some good old boys from Wellington had plans to build a Nascar track at Queen Elizabeth Park how good would that have been.I did read somewhere that they are working on the Nascar track in Melbourne to bring it back to race on.

[Allan]

What about AUSCAR?

[Grant Ellwood]

I recently had the incredible experience of attending my first ever NASCAR race. Unbelievable time.
Although I am a veteran of over 50 years of attending races in Oz, this was a whole new world.
I thought some random thoughts may be of interest to readers. I accept that this is not racing history, but please indulge me:
------The race was the “Duck Commander 500” at Texas Motor Speedway. Many may not be aware of the sponsor, but very big over there. They are the Roberston family who have made their fortune from their Duck Commander duck decoys, hand-made from cedar. The father started business in 1973. Last year they sold 500,000 at retail price of $200 each. They are also big into guns, knives and all forms of camouflage clothing and gear. Family estimated to be worth over $100M. You may have seen them on the TV reality show “Duck Dynasty”, in OZ on pay TV. They have just started a Duck Dynasty musical in Las Vegas. Unusual sponsor names are not rare for NASCAR. A recent race was the “SpongeBob SquarePants 400”.
-----The track was the Texas Motor Speedway, in middle of nowhere between Dallas and Fort Worth. It was built in 1996 and cost $250M to build. A lap is 1.5 miles long, and NASCARS complete in about 30 seconds. The private boxes etc. are unbelievable. There is a ten story hotel on the back straight which is angled over the track. The top 6 floors are fully glassed suites, with fantastic views. The track can hold 183,000 spectators, but for NASCAR races the back straight seats are is not open, so capacity reduced to 113,000. It was pretty full this night. On the back straight is the world’s largest HD LCD screen. It is 218 feet wide and 95 feet high. The clarity is incredible and it can be seen from all spectator areas. The parking areas around the track are massive, stretching as far as eye can see.
-----The track is very fast. This year’s pole sitter Kurt Busch averaged 312 kms per hour, a time of 27.857 seconds. The fastest times ever recorded were during a CART/Indy car event in April 2001. With new regulations they were not sure how fast they would go. Their fastest lap was over 370 kms per hour. Unfortunately 21 of the 25 drivers complained of dizziness and disorientation from sustained G forces of over 5G. Their race was stopped 2 hours before scheduled start.
------As an indication of the variance between the tracks NASCARs run at, the previous week they ran at Martinsville, which is only 0.85 kms long. Pole time was average of only 158 Km per hour, about half of TMS. And that track only holds 55,000 spectators.
------The seats we had were very good, being in the seventh row at turn one. You could see the whole track plus of course the big screen. All seats include the obligatory cup holder and seem wider than in Oz for American rears. You are allowed to take in a Cooler (Esky) or back pack but it must be less than 14 x 14 x 14 inches. This didn’t seem strictly enforced. No glass is allowed. Beer at the track was $8 a can, which is expensive especially considering they were only 12 ounce cans and not the 13 ounce that we are used to. The noise of the cars is unbelievable and extraordinary. They seem to have no mufflers and with 43 cars on track and laps of 30 seconds it is soon completely deafening. For those complaining that latest F1 cars are too muted they should go to a NASCAR race. I guess being in the middle of nowhere there are no neighbours. They supply ear plugs when you go in, but the best course is to rent full earphones at the track. These similar to on aircraft and completely cover the ears. Each car has an observer high above the grandstand who communicates with their driver and pit crew. With the headphones is a number pad where you can dial in number of the car you want to listen to, or the race commentary. You can change this at any time. A great idea.
----- There seems to be a misconception in OZ that the crowd is mostly rowdy “rednecks”. This is not the case. The people around us seemed to be of all ages, and well dressed and behaved. Everyone was very friendly, and many families with young kids. Everyone left in an orderly fashion and no fights etc.
------A great feature of the track is the large poles which show the top twenty runners by car number. There are two of these and each is four sided so details can be seen from around the track. These enable you to follow a driver coming back through the field, for example. They make a 334 lap race with multiple pit stops very easy to follow. They should be compulsory at all race tracks. Motor racing in Oz must be the only sport that does not have a scoreboard clearly visible. Imagine following a 5 day cricket match with no scoreboard.
------A large part of the infield is filled up with large RV’s (we call them motor homes) mostly the size of busses. They come prepared with all mod cons. Many had a ute towed behind and on the ute was a golf buggy. Several on the fence opposite us had brought scissor lifts to improve their views and these had up to ten people each going up. It looked precarious.
------There were 43 starters in the race. Makes our V8’s at 25 starters look a little pathetic, and this on a 1.5 mile track.
------The emphasis is very much on the drivers. Their car make is almost irrelevant. Indeed in the 136 page glossy program there is no mention of what cars being driven by the drivers. The cars are apparently distinguished by having different grilles and fronts, but when they go past at 300 kph you can’t see this. All you can see is the large numbers on their doors. And the crowd cheers for their favourite drivers, and seem to know a lot of the numbers e.g. 48 for Jimmie Johnson, 24 for Jeff Gordon and 88 for Dale Earnhardt Jnr. NASCAR has apparently learnt from experience that car manufacturers come and go at will, so don’t rely on them. Dodge was the last to leave and Toyota the latest starter. Maybe our V8’s should follow this lead. The results list the car makers, and in this race there were 21 Chevs, 14 Fords and 8 Toyotas.
------The race was over 334 laps and lasted over 4 hours. They don’t publish the time as I guess depends so much on yellow flags. The race is run on Saturday night starting at 6:30 pm. The gates open at 2:30 pm and at 4:30 pm they have a rock concert on the front straight. There is only the one race. The secondary series the XFINITY Series runs a 300 mile race on the Friday night. At the finish there is another rock concert for an hour mainly to allow the crowd to disperse, and a big fireworks display.
------I don’t pretend to understand the NASCAR rules, however the one I find the strangest is that during a safety car period that it seems lapped cars are allowed to go around and unlap themselves.
------The money awarded is incredible, and published with the results. They pay for places plus laps led. The winner Jimmie Johnson received USD 524K, which included leading for 128 laps. Second got USD 390K. Even the last placed in 43rd received USD 65K. Incredible. It’s a pity our V8 Taxi mob don’t publish prize money.
------Earlier in the year legend Richard Petty complained of Marcos Ambrose not getting the best out of his car on ovals. Well his replacement Sam Hornish Jr is not doing any better. Hornish won the 2006 Indy 500 and was 3 times Indy car champ in 01, 02 and 06. So should be familiar with ovals. At this event he qualified 29th and finished 26th. So maybe Ambrose wasn’t so bad.
-----At the finish the winner drives his car onto the podium and there seems no order then. You couldn’t see on the big screen even where the winner was amongst the horde of people. The winner gets trophy and two 6 shot pistols to fire into the air whilst on podium. (Americans love their guns). I think it disappointing that 2nd and 3rd placegetters appear to get no recognition as far as podiums concerned. I think the current F1 podium is far better being high above the crowd for all to see, and enable driver interviews.
-----In conclusion may I strongly suggest if you haven’t been to a NASCAR race that you put it high on your bucket list. It’s an experience you won’t forget.

Terry, first class essay about NASCAR. Regarding the noise issue, I don't think any of the tracks regulate noise. Even on road tracks in my region I can run the Chevy with no mufflers, it is painful inside the car though, even with ear plugs. And regarding lapped cars changing positions during a caution period, NASCAR lets the first of the lapped cars un-lap themselves each time the yellow flag is shown, the un-lapped driver is called the Lucky Dog.

[GD66]

Like drag racing, there's a lot to like about the Nascar race rules : what folk have come to detest is the artificial race finishes caused by a full-course caution in the closing laps for something trivial like a piece of seat foam thrown from a window. They tamper too much with what has been a fantastic race package, and what Terry has pointed out about the courtesies shown to the spectators like spacious seats, lap scoring towers, plenty of info and radio scanners has worked well for them for a long time. Pics from the old Winston Cup days show jammed stands at virtually every venue, unfortunately those sorts of figures have dwindled progressively, not least because of the domination of six-time champ Jimmie Johnson, whose five-in-a-row had the same effect as the domination of Whincup in the V8s, took the excitement out of the racing. If the France family listen to the teams (historically not often the case) they will keep it happening at the top of the scale. Thanks for taking the time to write that up Terry, that trackside buzz that you got should be sampled by race promoters everywhere instead of quaffing champers in an airconditioned suite high above the racetrack. Very enjoyable, mate.

[bry3500]

Thanks Bondy - that put a smile on my face :D
Here's a sample of Ward


https://youtu.be/pyGbR_aSAG4