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Congratulations to NASCAR on accomplishing a task I did not think possible.  The Daytona based sanctioning body turned a Talladega race into a bore.  How do you make 195 miles per hour boring?  You threaten drivers with penalties if they make on track aggressive moves.  I thought aggressive on track moves was racing. After his late race wreck, Ryan Newman said it all. “If you enjoy this kind of racing you don’t belong here.  Go home.” NASCAR and their TV partners continue to hype the drivers as the best in the world, so let them race. The sport is fast becoming another version of wrestling.

As he led the race driver Kevin Harvick kidded that he wanted cruise control for his race car. Boring. Tony Stewart wanted someone to say anything to keep him awake.  Boring. Lap after lap after lap of single file “racing” was what we for most of the first 160 laps of the race. Boring.  I wonder what Bill France Sr. and Bill France Jr. are thinking about all the next generation of their family is doing to the sport.  To, not for.  Big Bill France once got behind the wheel of a race car at Talladega as he was trying to create something magical for auto racing.  Grandson Brian France just turned Talladega into another Fontana, and that is about the worst possible insult I can think of for this track or any other track.

I switched to the New York City Marathon during the middle of the Talladega farce because the marathon was racier. An American man won the race and several others finished in the top ten. It seems like it has been forever since Frank Shorter and Bill Rodgers were dominating the marathon. I actually talked with Bill several times when I was chairman of the North Bend Old Settlers Road Race. We wanted to have him appear in our race, but he was going to be in an Omaha race a few weeks earlier and it didn’t work out. I remember him saying “I don’t know if I eat like I do so I can run, or run so I can eat like I do.” Just say at that time he was not the most nutrition conscious. I need to run.

Maybe NASCAR can continue to pass off thousands of empty seats at every race as “the economy,” but fans aren’t just voting with their dollars, they are voting with their channel changers too.  NASCAR ratings are down, down, down. A few more “tricks” like this Halloween weekend race, and even the hardest of hard core fans will jump ship too.  They say NBA basketball is getting better. At least the NBA TV ratings are up.

My son Matt thinks NASCAR should just run 25-30 lap races at Daytona and Talladega since “no one races until then anyway.” Matt also believes that the NASCAR truck division is the raciest of its “Big Three.” The trucks usually race 150-200 miles. Maybe if the Sprint Cup series did the same we would see action from the beginning. That won’t happen though. If the Sprint Cup races were shorter there would be fewer commercials and TV networks would pay less for race rights, meaning NASCAR elite might have to do with fewer jets, helicopters, and limos.

Due to a boneheaded last lap stunt by Brad Keselowski, basically taking out everyone who remained close to Jimmy Johnson in the Chase, Johnson can stroke it the last three races of the season.  The Chase should be over before the Sprint Cup series heads to Homestead, FL for its year end race.  Apparently his rookie status must have led to Keselowski’s right foot being disengaged from his brain. One moment Mark Martin, Jeff Gordon, and Juan Pablo Montoya were looking at a big points gain on Johnson, and thanks to the “Big Keselowski,” the next second Martin is flipping and Gordon and Montoya are pin balling off other cars. After Talladega Martin is a full race behind Johnson in points, Gordon is well over 200 points in arrears, and Montoya is even further back.  So yes, the final three races of the year are going to be boring.

Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: nascar, nascar sprint cup series, talladega