Do You Ever Get Tired of the Fast Laps?
by Charlie Turner
I'm Charlie Turner co-host of the syndicated, mostly NASCAR radio show On Pit Row. Thanks for stopping by OnPitRow.com and the Bench Racing with Steve and Charlie blog. Oh yeah, Steve is an idiot.
July 29, 2008 12:10 pm CDT 4 CommentsIf you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!
Nineteen heat races and a ten lap feature. That Allstate 400 at the Brickyard was more like what we’re used to at the Friday and Saturday night short track races around here than one of NASCAR’s biggest extravaganzas.
I’ll bet Jimmy Johnson doesn’t care about that though. Johnson had the best car all day, even if he only got to show it off in ten lap sprints. But with his win, you have to look at Jimmy as one of the guys who may be able to challenge Kyle Busch, once we get to the Chase for the Sprint Cup. Throw Carl Edwards into that mix too.
Goodyear’s tire woes made for a less than satisfying Brickyard race. But this stuff has happened before, and with the continuing development of the New Car, it’s likely to happen again.
There was plenty to talk about after the race. Toss your opinions in on these four Fast Lap questions and place your bets on whether the Pocono tire will be better.
1: Will Tony Stewart be able to successfully juggle his responsibilities as driver of the #20 and as owner of the #14 through the rest of 2008?
2: Would an open test at Indy have been able to head off the tire problems before the race weekend?
3: NASCAR’s attempt to cut Toyota horsepower in the Nationwide Series didn’t slow down Kyle Bush on Saturday. Is engine restriction the best way to regain parity?
4: Did Rusty Wallace lose some of his credibility by saying Ryan Newman was fired by Penske; then have Roger turn around and say he wasn’t?
Limit your answers to 100 words or less, but come back throughout the week to defend your ground and throw some tire debris those not as smart as you. This is the Fast Lap comment blog and we will be taking selected questions and responses to use in an upcoming video feature for OnPitRow.com and Bench Racing TV.
Photo credit: Icon Sports Media, Inc.
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About the Fast Lap blog
Fast Laps! Welcome to the On Pit Row Fast Lap blog. Every week On Pit Row we pose four Fast Lap questions. Four corners - four questions. On the radio show, Steve and I have 30 seconds each, to give our response to each of the four. If you are a listener, you already know that we rarely agree on any answer. The Fast Lap is NASCAR debate. Hannity and Colmes. Lincoln and Douglas. Wronkowicz and Turner. OK, maybe not Lincoln and Douglas. We have more fun than Lincoln and Douglas. Here's the challenge. We will post our Fast Lap questions some time each Monday. Four questions on topical NASCAR related subjects. Your mission is to comment with your answers and each answer is limited to 100 words. The questions, answers and comments will form the basis of this blog for that week. Comment on the Fast Lap questions. Comment on the comments. Insult the commenters. Witty ridicule is rated at least as highly as cogent commentary. Just remember that you have limited words and penalties are severe. Or not. Steve and I will select worthy blog entries to be featured on an edition of On Pit Row. That's the plan. I'm sure we will have some other things to post about each week but the intention is to pose most posts as questions. I want to argue with you! Bring it on.
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1. Sure, why not, he’ll just push an official and cut a 10k check if there are any problems.
2. Little doubt about it, and the test should have been in conditions as close to race day temps and cloud cover as humanly possible to predict.
3. There was parity, except for the Gibbs team.
4. Who knows except the players involved. It’s just as easy to suggest Penske lost credibility and Wallace’s statement was correct.
Heh. You know my thoughts about the fiasco this past weekend.
Granted, do the best with what you’ve got, hindsight is Stewart/Stewart (for now, but not in 09), and all that Jazz.
But, WTF? NASCAR new it was different, and they had the chance to err on the side of caution, not Caution Flags.
GoodYear shipped more tires out there, so why wasn’t it something harder? They knew it needed it, yet tried to skate around the issue.
On with the show.
1) I think it could be a slight distraction, although I’d bet he either hasn’t taken over the reins seriously yet, or has someone to make the day to day decisions for him right now. Will it effect his Chase? It could, but we’ll see.
2) Yes, it would have. They would have been able to see that with all those cars running that the track still wasn’t coming in. Knaus said it best on this one. Lack of down force brings less rubber into the track. Result: Last Weekend.
3) They slighted the straightaway, but just made them better in the turns. We’ll see what happens when the track gets a little longer.
4) I don’t think so. He went with what someone told him. Was his source wrong? Apparently so, but it’s not the first or last time someone’s source will be wrong.
Only the people that were there know, and they ain’t talkin.
1: Will Tony Stewart be able to successfully juggle his responsibilities as driver of the #20 and as owner of the #14 through the rest of 2008?
Yes. He does it already with his Sprint teams and tracks, so why would this be different?
2: Would an open test at Indy have been able to head off the tire problems before the race weekend?
Yes! Whithout a doubt!
3: NASCAR’s attempt to cut Toyota horsepower in the Nationwide Series didn’t slow down Kyle Bush on Saturday. Is engine restriction the best way to regain parity?
No. They should have given everyone else Toyota engines instead.
4: Did Rusty Wallace lose some of his credibility by saying Ryan Newman was fired by Penske; then have Roger turn around and say he wasn’t?
Yes, a bit, - but he does not rank as high as Bob Dillner after his RCR laser cut rim fiasco.
1. It sure looks to me like something is affecting Stewart’s performance. What else would it be? He drives for the team with arguably the best equipment. He is, in most opinions, one of the three or four most talented drivers in the sport. Summer is “his time to shine”. Yet he is about to fall out of the top twelve in points. I say he has a focus problem, and may not even realize it himself.
2. Not if they brought the wrong tires anyway. Goodyear and NASCAR assumed too much. They paid the price. Or NASCAR fans did. This was a major F-up.
3. If, by parity, you mean; is it the best way to stop Kyle Busch and Gibbs from running away with the NNWS, then the answer is an obvious, no. Why don’t they just make the Gibbs cars run on the Indy tires? That would fix ‘em.
4. You would think that Rusty has some inside access to Penske doings. I guess he doesn’t. I give him credit for trying to be informative. It doesn’t always work out.