NASCAR Time for GEN 7 Car

[gmsuv]

After yesterdays hype for a fantastic race with better racing NASCAR better get moving on a Gen7 car because Gen 6 ain't no better than the cars it was supposed to replace. As for the broadcast, Darrel Waltrip sure has a thing for the ponytail princess that it made me sick when they did show racing, 3 laps and a commercial, 3 more laps and 5 more commercial.

[oufanindallas]

I missed the after race interview.  If he ran that well on 7 cylinders, no wonder he was checking out from the field on all 8.  He's not as flashy as Kyle Busch, but he can drive the wheels off a car as well.  I don't personnaly like Kyle, but dayum if he can't drive anything with 4 wheels and make it exciting.

[dhascall]

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@oufanindallas wrote:

I missed the after race interview.  If he ran that well on 7 cylinders, no wonder he was checking out from the field on all 8.  He's not as flashy as Kyle Busch, but he can drive the wheels off a car as well.  I don't personnaly like Kyle, but dayum if he can't drive anything with 4 wheels and make it exciting.

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The plug wire made sense, as after all the repairs he hovered around 20th -23rd place but came on to get a top 15.  So when I heard about the plug wire, it all clicked.  No pun intended.

Mad Max Papis will drive Stewart's 14, this Sunday.  He would not be my first choice (Boris, Fellows, Owen Kelly) but Max is a BIG Chevy driver.  I'm sure that they helped Smoke with that decision. 

[dhascall]

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@oufanindallas wrote:

I saw that this morning. I wonder who's going to drive the #14 now.  Maybe Austin Dillon?

On a different note, Sunday's race was actually one of the better Pocono races in a while.  Can't believe the wreck at the drop of the green flag. It's a 400 mile race, why do they need to win it on the first lap?

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Well, Austin did get called up to the Majors but just a week later.  I personally would have prefered Regan Smith but I'm sure that Austin will do okay.  Ty may actually be better than he, however.

[oufanindallas]

Crazy week in NASCAR.  JPM out at EGR, possibly Regan for a year to give Kyle Larson another year to develop, possibly Mark Martin as a part time driver/mentor to Larson?  Newman to EGR or RCR?  Ku Busch to EGR? RCR? Stay with FRR?  Dillon was stoked when he got the call from Smoke.  The Dillon boys take a lot of flack because their grand daddy, but both can wheel a car.  I agree Ty may be slightly better than Austin, but I'd like both to be on my team. 

[dhascall]

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@oufanindallas wrote:

Crazy week in NASCAR.  JPM out at EGR, possibly Regan for a year to give Kyle Larson another year to develop, possibly Mark Martin as a part time driver/mentor to Larson?  Newman to EGR or RCR?  Ku Busch to EGR? RCR? Stay with FRR?  Dillon was stoked when he got the call from Smoke.  The Dillon boys take a lot of flack because their grand daddy, but both can wheel a car.  I agree Ty may be slightly better than Austin, but I'd like both to be on my team. 

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Mark Martin to replace Smoke for the rest of the year except for Dega.  Ever since Martin flipped the Hendrick (5) car, at Dega, he has refused to race there.

Since he is now a Chevy driver (again), he could fit in next year at EGR and maybe the 42 (or maybe Felix will bring back the 41 Target car) with Larson.  The 78 car could work for Martin/Larson as they are also a Bowtie team.  It is funny, I follow Martin on Twitter and he has already changed his profile photo to a Mobil1 pix.

[Anonymous]

If anyone can wheel a car it's Mark Martin.  I met him once at TX Motor Speedway and man is he short!!  But, he is the nicest fellow you'll ever meet.  Just as honest and humble as the day is long.......Must have talked to me for a good 5 minutes and that's a looooong time for one of them.  I have always had respect for him since then.  I think he will do a good job for the 14 team.

[oufanindallas]

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@dhascall wrote:

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@oufanindallas wrote:

Crazy week in NASCAR.  JPM out at EGR, possibly Regan for a year to give Kyle Larson another year to develop, possibly Mark Martin as a part time driver/mentor to Larson?  Newman to EGR or RCR?  Ku Busch to EGR? RCR? Stay with FRR?  Dillon was stoked when he got the call from Smoke.  The Dillon boys take a lot of flack because their grand daddy, but both can wheel a car.  I agree Ty may be slightly better than Austin, but I'd like both to be on my team. 

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Mark Martin to replace Smoke for the rest of the year except for Dega.  Ever since Martin flipped the Hendrick (5) car, at Dega, he has refused to race there.

Since he is now a Chevy driver (again), he could fit in next year at EGR and maybe the 42 (or maybe Felix will bring back the 41 Target car) with Larson.  The 78 car could work for Martin/Larson as they are also a Bowtie team.  It is funny, I follow Martin on Twitter and he has already changed his profile photo to a Mobil1 pix.

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Read something today that FRR may be changing to Toyota next year.  Yes they have an alliance with RCR but Toyota seems to have deeper pockets.

[dhascall]

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@BeeBeeSA wrote:

If anyone can wheel a car it's Mark Martin.  I met him once at TX Motor Speedway and man is he short!!  But, he is the nicest fellow you'll ever meet.  Just as honest and humble as the day is long.......Must have talked to me for a good 5 minutes and that's a looooong time for one of them.  I have always had respect for him since then.  I think he will do a good job for the 14 team.

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Yup, he is a good guy.  Been following him since 1980.  He moved to Indiana to build race cars in the late 70's and ran a lot around here.

This is one of the cars that put him on the map.  The old ASA prepped lots of guys for NASCAR, like all the Wallaces, Martin, Kulwicki, Tricjkle and so on.

[oufanindallas]

Back when stock cars were just that, STOCK.  I miss the old ASA races, those were fun to watch.  I also remember when it was the A, B, C to get a cup ride. Arca, Busch and then after you have proven yourself, a cup ride.  I applaud Richard Childress with the way he's handling Austin and Ty's career.  Minimum two years at each level before advancing to the next.  They have been born with a golden spoon, but grandpa is making them earn their rides.  

[dhascall]

Yeah and Richard made Ty and Austin start off in street stocks... on Dirt!  He made them learn how to take care and work on their stuff, too.

ASA is very near and dear to my heart.  The best series, ever, up until the late 1990's.  Better than any NASCAR division.  Their offices were 8 miles from where I used to live.  I used to work for Rex Robbins, the founder, as he was prt owner of Anderson Speedway, where I was the track's PR guy.  He started promoting Sprint car races in the mid 60's but found stock cars more "fan friendly."  He basically built the ASA stock car tour "Circuit of Champions" from Anderson's (aka Sun Valley Speedway) Late Model division.  Though they weren't called Late Models, they were basically a semi-professional racing chassis, with an actual stock car body, from the dealership or junkyard.  Up until the late 70's that was the ASA.  Then things went wild.  Martin's orange and white #2 had virtually nothing stock on it.  Fiberglass or aluminum body panels.  Lexan windshields, Dry-sump oiling systems with the oil tank in the trunk, Quick change rearends (not the Ford 9" rearends that NASCAR runs or GM 3/4 ton truck 12 bolt rears), made for racing steering and suspension pieces but the ASA of that era, I sorely miss.

ASA died because of three main reasons (plus others): Rex was getting older and wanted to retire, secondly they went with a crate motor and everyone ran the same speeds, so no passing and in 2005, the series was sold and never made it to 2006 due to a new owner who didn't know any better.

[Anonymous]

I used to go to San Antonio Speedway all the time back when it was in it's hayday.  It's a half mile banked oval and we used to see cars fly over the retaining wall in the corners.  Real racing.  Both Labonte brothers used to race there. 

The track WAS out in the sticks (county) but back in the early 2000's the city annexed the area and it basically shut them down along with the drag stip Alamo Dragway next door.  The city didn't want them there so they basically made it impossible for them to continue business as usual.  They had septic tanks for the rest rooms, wells for water, etc. and the city told them they had to, at their own expense, connect to the city water supply and sewer system, upgrade all of the concession stands to meet city health codes, upgrade all of the bleachers, etc. so the owners threw in the towel and the place sat and got run down for years.  Finally some of the local racers banded together around 2011 and brought it back to life with allot of donations from the local area.  They only put on about 3 or 4 races a year right now, but it's good to see the track at least operational.  The drag strip is all but gone though.

[dhascall]

I have heard alot about San Antonio Speedway.  They had a big Street Stock race there in 1985 and a guy from Northern indiana (Brian Ross) won it.  $10,000 was a lot for street stocks!  City leaders wanted to close the Indianapolis Speedrome down for noise reasons but they only got the track to run mufflers and shut the PA down, after 11 PM.  Anderson (Sun Valley) is right in the heart of Anderson and I'm not sure why they never had any issues.

Y'all have another Superspeedway in the Lonestar state besides Fort Worth.  Texas World Speedway, near College Station.  Modeled after Michigan but with even higher banks.  they use the roadcourse, still but the oval is in bad shape (weather and ground issues).  NASCAR and indy car ran there.

[Anonymous]

Yeah I remeber many years back some NASCAR teams used to use Tx World for practice sessions and tire tests.  Gone now as you mentioned.

[dhascall]

She's still there, the oval needs a complete resurface, down to the dirt that holds the banking up.

Great idea for a track of that size, just the wrong place and wrong time (late 70's).  Needed to be closer to a population cenrter.  Poor crowds are what killed it.  It is a twin of Michigan but TWS's banking was steeper and the speeds higher.  If they had built that near Dallas, it would have been awesome.  Fell into disrepair though they still have races on the road course and racing schools.  I subscribed to a newsletter that the current owners put out and I emailed them and they said that never would host a major race on the oval, again since NASCAR and Indycar want too high of fees.  I forsee a group of NASCAR owners buying it, fixing the oval and using it as a test track.  There are lots of tracks that are similar (1.5-2 mile).

[oufanindallas]

Well it's official, Kurt Busch will be driving a 4th car for SHR next year with Smoke, Happy and Danica.  Kinda took Smoke by surprise since he wasn't planning on expanding to 4 cars next year but since Haas is going to be the sponsor and Gene Haas is the other half of the ownership wasn't much Tony could do.  Nice to see Kurt clean up his act and land a top tier ride again.