NASCAR Discussion

Smus wrote:At least in F1 in the past you pretty much know they pull for Ferrari...



Oh, and I was wondering, is Michael Waltrip a commentator?

Yes, Michael Waltrip is a commentator. He calls for the truck series and he's an analyst for speed, and Inside NASCAR on Showtime. Obviously he's a car owner/driver too.

Simcik wrote:BTW, where the hell are the rest of the NASCAR fans? This is not the Tux vs. Sim NASCAR thread... How about some other input?

I like the vehicles, can't say much for the actual racing though. Pick me up one of those Roush motors and I may become a NASCAR fan.

I was going to reply after watching the race (we recorded it, watched it late Sunday), but there were 3 pages of replies and I wasn't about to read all that. Interesting brawl, have you guys covered any penalties / fines that might have been dished out? I've been so busy doing everything else that I haven't seen anything.

They fined Gordon $100K and 25 points. They also fined Hendricks 25 Owner points.

They fined Bowyer's crew cheif $25K.

They fined Keselowski $25K for having a cell phone in the car.

So, to recap, they slapped Gordon on the wrist, fined Bowyer's crew chief for letting his guys go crazy (He'll make them all pay him back somehow, I'm sure.), and they gave Kes. a B.S. fine 'cause they didn't like him calling out their bias in the press conference.

Seriously, NASCAR has been saying all week that "well, we really like the publicity that BK's phone (and Twitter account) got us after the JPM jet-dryer crash, but we then learned that you might be able to use a phone like a small computer, so we said "no phones." Sounds viable, right? WRONG! I was listening to BK's scanner on the NASCAR website (after hearing it at Texas, I am hooked...) and during the Red Flag, Wolfe (BK's crew chief) comes on the radio and says "Hey, just heard from Dale Jr.'s crew cheif. Dale wants to know how many Tweets you've sent?" "Just one so far," was the response. After several seconds of delay, you hear Wolfe again "Dale said he's disappointed that you've only done one and it's a re-Tweet..."

Really, you think if the drivers had been explicitly told by NASCAR that cell phones weren't allowed, that BK and Dale Jr. would be having that conversation? And would Brad just pull out his phone (in front of two on-board cameras)? No. NASCAR never made this rule understood to the drivers until Monday night when they fined Brad... What chickenshit...

Heck yeah!

Yeah, that shoud be a fun one! They are replacing the Montreal race with Mid-Ohio.

And the Trucks are going to Eldora to play in the dirt.

Replacing Circuit de Villeneuve with MidOhio? Meh. I would think that you would get better racing from Montreal due to the fact that the track at least appears wider and i think it has full garages on site. I love MidOhio for sport cars but I wonder if it'll be to narrow? Although seeing all the cars power downthe back straight iinto madness would be awesome. Guaranteed lap 1 wreck. It would he nice if they had them both.

Sucks Keselowski got fined for having his phone, it's not like he uses it while driving, can't understand the ruling on that one.

Gordon that seems a bit extreme, considering the Martinsville race this spring when he was on the receiving end of Bowyer's inability to drive.

Bowyer's crew chief, I'm surprised that's all he got fined. Well, the FCC might fine him also, he did swear on tv.

Smus wrote:Replacing Circuit de Villeneuve with MidOhio? Meh. I would think that you would get better racing from Montreal due to the fact that the track at least appears wider and i think it has full garages on site. I love MidOhio for sport cars but I wonder if it'll be to narrow? Although seeing all the cars power downthe back straight iinto madness would be awesome. Guaranteed lap 1 wreck. It would he nice if they had them both.

Oh yeah Smus. Montreal is a fantastic track. But it was being eliminated regardless. They decided on Mid-Ohio to fill the spot. I'm happy with their choice. I would rather see Montreal, but I love road courses and this one will suffice.

Remember when Michael Waltrip won the Daytona race in Feb of 2011, the one where his spoiler fell down on the last lap to win it?

Soooooo, I just got done watching the Speed TV special "Kurt Busch Outlaw". I have to say. After watching it, there is something to like and understand about Kurt. I think everyone knows he's a world class driver, but he's also a little misunderstood. He was wrong alot, but he was also fighting the media shitstorm which made it seem worse than it really is. He appears to be learning from his mistakes. I'm excited to see how he does next year with Furniture Row. That's my take. There's a full version of it on YouTube.

I always thought Kurt got a little too much held against him. I'm with you on this one, Tux.

Congrats to Brad, the 2 team, Roger, and all of the fans! Great to see Penske get that Cup championship. Brad will make a great champion.

So now my biggest question? When is Brad's contract with Penske up? And when that time comes, will he stay with them, or will he continue to develop his own race team and just race for himself? If he does that, which manufacturer?

And now, with a Championship under their belt, and Penske talking about how reliable the engines had been this season, when will Dodge be back???

I'm having a heck of a time trying to find all four parts to this series. But here's part one of Jimmie Johnson 24/7 by HBO. It's an incredible series, especially for NASCAR fans. It was one of the first "real" looks inside what makes a successful NASCAR team tick. For all you Jimmie haters, this is still interesting and watchable. Who knows, you might learn something.

http://www.nascar.com/video/cup/2010/hbo_247/01/28/cup.hbo.247.johnson.1.nascar/index.html

TuxTshirt wrote:I'm having a heck of a time trying to find all four parts to this series. But here's part one of Jimmie Johnson 24/7 by HBO. It's an incredible series, especially for NASCAR fans. It was one of the first "real" looks inside what makes a successful NASCAR team tick. For all you Jimmie haters, this is still interesting and watchable. Who knows, you might learn something.

http://www.nascar.com/video/cup/2010/hbo_247/01/28/cup.hbo.247.johnson.1.nascar/index.html

AND you get to listen to Chad Knaus throw F-bombs all day long. It's a really good program for NASCAR.

So I just found this awesome video of Paul Menard at Daytona last year in testing. This video is the best representation I have found so far of what your vision looks like while driving a stock car at high speed. I experienced something very similar to my vision at Pocono. Enjoy.

Really? Granted I haven't gone 200, but at 140, it wasn't like that. You loose perripheral vision, but you shouldn't be seeing the shaking and blurred objects in front of you, only to the side. Why did they mount the camera on the wheel anyway? Put it on the roll bar or dash next time...

Yeah, my vision was blurred. The vibrations were normal, but the frequency blurred my vision a bit. I hit 150mph.

I guess doing it on a track would be a little different too. Lots of close-in objects and what not.

Why did the car sound like it was dieseling on pit road?

Well, what did you do 140 in? And, what time in the video are you talking about?

The Road Runner - on a deserted country road in central Texas. And I got close in my dad's '09 Charger before my Diablosport got stolen...

I was in a racecar. BIG difference. Race cars transmit much of the NVH to the driver. More than any road car, especially a squishy Road Runner.

TuxTshirt wrote:I was in a racecar. BIG difference. Race cars transmit much of the NVH to the driver. More than any road car, especially a squishy Road Runner.

True - it was pretty squishy. Gotta love leaf springs and torsion bars!!! (It was a long, straight road - rows and rows of corn on either side...)