Nascar considering "new" "elimination" format the chase

[38P]

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/report-nascar-considered-radical-chase-182135664--nascar.html

[NASCAR is reportedly considering]three major changes beginning with expanding the field from 12 drivers to 16 - meaning a win during the ''regular season'' would virtually guarantee a driver a spot in the field. . . . The field would be cut after the third, sixth and ninth races. The proposed eliminations would drop the lowest four drivers from title contention after the third, sixth and ninth races, leaving four drivers eligible for a ''winner-take-all'' race in the season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway. The four remaining drivers would go into Homestead with their points reset and tied in the standings.

Of course, under the current "chase" (not that there's any reason for any red-blooded American to watch the "Toyotathon" anymore), virtually all but two or three "chasers" are eliminated early on in the final ten.

So other than possibly adding one or two potential contenders to the final race of "Ford Championship Weekend" and dumbing down the math so that even the most brain-dead and/or drunken fan can figure it out, the proposed "elimination" scheme is merely rearranging the chairs on the watery deck of a still-sinking ship.

It wholly fails to address the lack of connection many fans feel with todays' homogenized cars and cold, corporate drivers.

It fails to address the overheated costs of attending a NASCAR weekend in person.

It ignores the corporate "superteam" problem.

It does not correct the traitorous "Toyota" mistake.

And it does nothing to address the over-proliferation of "cookie cutter" races, tracks, and broadcasts.

[Scott Liggett]

The traitorous Toyota pumped enough dough into the racing series to keep it from going completely belly up 5 years ago.

Most of the rest I agree with you.

[38P]

One wonders how NASCAR would have gone "belly up" with a $4.48 billion eight-year television deal with Fox, ESPN and TNT, that yielded average of $560 million a year. Note that the latest NASCAR TV deal, inked in August 2013, is an $8.2 billion, 10-year deal with NBC and Fox ($820 million/year).

However, during Toyota's unpopular participation in NASCAR, TV ratings declined 47% and track attendance is down 42%. Those are hardly numbers that anyone would claim are successful. http://www.sportingnews.com/nascar/s...c-deal-ratings

[RockJustRock]

I'm against "chases" and "countdowns". Epic Dominations well...... DOMINATE!

[Scott Liggett]

One wonders how NASCAR would have gone "belly up" with a $4.48 billion eight-year television deal with Fox, ESPN and TNT, that yielded average of $560 million a year. Note that the latest NASCAR TV deal, inked in August 2013, is an $8.2 billion, 10-year deal with NBC and Fox ($820 million/year).

However, during Toyota's unpopular participation in NASCAR, TV ratings declined 47% and track attendance is down 42%. Those are hardly numbers that anyone would claim are successful. http://www.sportingnews.com/nascar/s...c-deal-ratings

Toyota coming in right before the economy bubble burst couldn't have been a coincindance? During that time, did the attendance for baseball, football, hockey and every other major sport go up or down? How about leisure travel? Business travel? Concert attendance? Up or down?

[Bob Holmes]

Scott, those are also all Toyota's fault.

[Big Dave]

It's not Toyota's fault that the series sucks it's the dumb asses who run NASCAR. First thing they did was run off all the older viewers and supporters, who have the money and time to participate, from the series. They ran up the cost of racing all the while saying they were trying to reduce cost. Big Bill France, if still alive, would have fired his grandson along time ago and run off the rest.

[yellomalibu]

winner take all ... The four remaining drivers would go into Homestead with their points reset and tied in the standings.

Oh hell no. IMO, this is making a bad system even worse.
Sure, it gives 3 other drivers more of a chance to unseat the guy who has been consistently good throughout the chase, but in the interest of "fairness", I still think the way to reward any driver, athlete, or team for a year of hard work and consistency is to keep track of performance (points) throughout the year - period.

After thinking about this a few more minutes, perhaps they are trying to liken this to football playoffs or something similar. It's simply not the same. 4 car/driver/teams may be fighting for the championship, but the other 39 are still on the track with them - and any ONE of them could cause one of the four contenders to crash (lose) ... and that's no (fair) way to treat drivers/ teams that have been consistently good throughout the year.

Oh well... when NASCAR stopped making teams use "stock" bodied production vehicles for their race cars, it was the beginning of the slippery slope.

[SpiderGearsMan]

Link on toyota saving nascar please
If anything Toyota company hacks are cheapskates

[SpiderGearsMan]

They havent been stock bodies since 1966

[38P]

Toyota coming in right before the economy bubble burst couldn't have been a coincindance? During that time, did the attendance for baseball, football, hockey and every other major sport go up or down? How about leisure travel? Business travel? Concert attendance? Up or down?

The economy makes 47% fewer people tune in on television? A lot of rabid Toyota fans must have lost their cable. But then the free broadcast races are down in viewers, too . . . .

[38P]

They havent been stock bodies since 1966

That is mostly true. But at least in the old days, the bodies (not chassis) were based on OEM stampings, and weren't track-only "funnycars" with no production parts. It's been a slow decline from "stock" that greatly accelerated under the "leadership" of the hapless billionaire Brian France.

[38P]

It's not Toyota's fault that the series sucks it's the dumb asses who run NASCAR. First thing they did was run off all the older viewers and supporters, who have the money and time to participate, from the series. They ran up the cost of racing all the while saying they were trying to reduce cost. Big Bill France, if still alive, would have fired his grandson along time ago and run off the rest.

Yes it is.

Accommodating and facilitating Toyota's participation was at the heart of all of that. Giving Toyota a succession of non-production "spec" OHV NASCAR V8s and non-production "spec" NASCAR bodies (initially cribbed from decades of investment by other brands) alienated thousands of "older viewers and supporters." Competing with Toyota for superteams, drivers, and technical edges "ran up the cost of racing." Toyota singlehandly destroyed the myth of NASCAR as a competition among all-American manufacturers. Toyota helped escalate the pressure to garner ever more sponsor dollars, contributing to the bland corporatization of the sport and continuing homogenization of the automaton cyphers who drive for most teams.

[RockJustRock]

IMHO the decline started with IROC. The seductive appeal of the "driving only" format spoiled racing as a technology proving ground. NASCAR now is just Formula Big, Heavy and Simple Racetrack. The possibility of technology ever migrating BACK to production cars from it are nil. Look how painful the prep for EFI was in trying to keep everything "equal".

[38P]

The NAS-ROT goes back further than IROC. Spidey and I had a debate on here about the decline of NASCAR back in the fall of 2009. The point we seemed to be debating was when was NASCAR's "original sin" away from "stock."

Spidey pointed out that in 1965, the chassis of "stock cars" started looking an awful lot like '65 Galaxies, regardless of the sheet metal (it actually took a few more years than that for NASCAR to standardize the chassis specs)

It was some of what started us down this slippery slope that's crashed into the hideous "COT" heap. But at least the Holman-Moody "3/4 chassis" Fairlanes looked like something you could buy at your local Ford store. Too bad they were "reskinned" every year and/or ended up getting beat to death on some forgotten dirt track.

The COT looks like something that ought to be sitting out back with a recycling symbol on the side.

NASCAR, and to a lesser extent NHRA, have been horrible for automotive development in America.

Examples: Supercharger and fuel injection ban (don't even think about a turbo) [circa 1957], 7 liter displacement limit of the 1960s, rules against multiple values and overhead cams, rules against more than five speeds, IRS ban & the antique "truck arm" suspension. All of these things have hurt technology "trickle down" and market pressure for advancing the state-of-the-art in production cars.