Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
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Eldora certainly could run a Cup race. Is Knoxville a possibility?

Within hearing distance of Tri City Speedway

There won't be any Nascar events at Eldora anytime soon, if ever again.  Not sure if anyone saw it, but a few months back there was an article about what happened with Tony Stewart and Nascar.  Tony's vision had always been to bring a Cup race to Eldora and let Nascar know that when they originally made the deal to put the Trucks at Eldora.  Instead, Nascar backdoored Tony and went with Bristol without his knowledge.  When he did find out a few months ago - he did what Tony does best and tore his contract with Nascar to shreds.  I'm sure he was loving seeing Nascar struggle these past several days with the track surface at Bristol.  What a joke.

I watched the "high-lights"  yesterday and it looked your normal afternoon race to me.   Track was junk, and if you were a fan in the stands you would have been miserable.    Nascar should go all in on dirt (purpose buildt cars)  or leave it alone.   This trying to put a pavement car on dirt with minimal modifications is not working.   

It was a bit arrogant to think they could just change the tire and remove the splitter and all would be okay. Removing windshields, moving the race to the night time, potentially shortening the event, all good ideas. What I do know is more people were talking about racing on dirt this weekend than probably ever. And that should be good for the sport, especially when/if they see a real race, involving cars built for racing on dirt. 

Dirt races should be at night.  Dust is always a problem.  Hawkeye downs once has a 500 lap race on dirt.  Thank god that I was not there.  Have set thru several 200 lap races at Hawkeye Downs when it was dirt.  Took my girlfriend to one.  She was covered with dirt.  She still married me 58 yrs ago.  NASCAR dirt races should be on 1 mile tracks, but just a few left.

It was a good NASCAR race if a person went into it with an open mind not comparing it to Sprint Car racing.  The cars were pretty close and looked a lot like the IMCA Stock Car class that runs in the Midwest.  They put on some pretty competitive races and the Cup drivers were better than I expected on the dirt.  I follow Ryan Blaney and he had a helluva run bringing it back up to 8th after getting caught up in a wreck.  They split it into two 100 lap segments and a 50 lap final segment.  I have seen a lot of the big 100 lap dirt Late Model races so that wasn't an issue either.  I believe that ARCA has run the dirt miles with windshields so it does have a precedence.  The race could have started later to eliminate dust but I'm sure they will look at those things as they review how things went.  Those rain storms were of historic proportions so they had flooding and a lot to deal with.  Me and the cat that camped out on my lap gave it a thumbs up.  The way I look at it if I couldn't accept it for what it is I wouldn't have watched it.  I knew the cars would be neutered and the hype would be over the top, after all it's NASCAR.

Stan Meissner

I'm a die hard dirt guy that was still interested in nascar til the stages and cookie cutter tracks. That said I was highly entertained over the last few days. Sure they had problems but look at the cards they were dealt. As far as Tony crying I understand that because he's in love and pussy whipped.

Well if Tony and nascar had a falling out can Tony put the track back like Earl had it so the fast way isn't around the bottom at all.

I watched both the truck & cup races and I thought both sucked just like any nascar race. Just a lot of dust added. 

Is it true they are moving the Kings Royal to Bristol for this year?  Huh? 

First NASCAR race I watched in a while except for Daytona 500. Hillbilly heaven. Hope they have more dirt races.

A shame Sunday got rained out, TV ratings determine the future. 

 
 
 
They don't even know how to spell sprint car 
much less chromoly...http://www.ycmco.com

Doubtful. Isn't that an Eldora race, not a WoO race? I don't think they'll be moving the Knoxville Nationals to Bristol either. 

A coworker of mine said the hornets were running similar lap times to the NASCAR cars. Can anybody compare the lap times for various classes ?

Bristol Dirt was the first full Nascar race I've watch in maybe 30 years. Only because i wanted to see Bell and Larson domjnate, which they showed they were going to do. Kind of a follow the leader with not too much excitement. Was nice to watch a few drivers move up fast. Lost most of my interest when Bell took out Larson, then I stayed cause my plan was to sit on the couch anyway.

I think the lack of excitement came from the habits of asphalt drivers not looking for lanes and holes to make gains. Just my opinion.

The social.media was fun to read about the asphalt drivers joking and speculating about dirt like they just awoke from a time warp. Their excitement and silly comments were almost as entertaining as the race.

I enjoyed it but probably more due to its novelty than the racing .

Thought it was pretty cool.of Stenhouse to thank NOS energy drinks, didnt see that sticker on his car that day.

Even though I may not know you, I 
care what most of you think!

Personally, I loved the whole thing, except for the racing on Monday thing (thank goodness for streaming, I was able to watch it on my phone and  look like I was working lol).  I also would prefer that the race be run at night though.  Personally I love when NASCAR or I should say the racers are thrown a curve ball.  These are supposed to be the best drivers in the world so I'm all for watching them try to figure it out.  Was the racing good?  I guess that depends on what you'd call good racing, I was very entertained.  There was action all over the track.  As for the original question, I'm not sure Eldora or Knoxville could host a cup race but I'm guessing Knoxville in it's current state would be out, the only reason I say that is I thought I heard something about tracks having to have an "infield care center" facility?  Which I don't know what that is exactly, whether it be a permanent kind of trauma hospital or if it could be a temporary structure.  The other thing I wonder about is where you would land a helicopter at Knoxville on the track grounds?  Or if that's even an issue.  I don't really know what else they would look at but I don't think it would be impossible.

As for them making huge changes to the cars just for this race, I don't like it.  I say leave them alone, let them figure out how to make it work.  As far as I'm concerned the only real issue that needs to be addressed would be the mud on the windshield since I don't think anyone thinks it's a good idea for the racers to be driving blind.  So I think some sort of windshield cleaning device will be needed in the future.  Whether it be tear offs on the windshield that the drivers can somehow tear off from inside the car or something else.  As for the cooling of the engines, I say let the teams figure it out.

As for Tony being upset about Bristol having a dirt cup race and being upset, I can understand but he needs to understand a few things.  First of all, it was Bristol's idea from listening to Dale Jr's podcast Bristol was talking about this 2 years ago.  I don't know why Tony would think they would have to consult him about what a current track on the circuit might be doing when he doesn't have a track on the cup schedule?  Another thing is Bristol had a date already.  I'm not sure where Tony was going to get his race date from?  In the past people have bought tracks and shut them down just for their date on the schedule (Wilksboro and Rockingham for sure).  Also it's not like Bristol ripped off his idea from Tony, they did this long before Tony owned a track.  So I can understand why he might be upset because he was trying to talk them into this for 10 years or so but this really didn't concern him in my opinion. 

They already announced they're doing it again next year.  In the future I'd love to see Bristol fix their paved track (I see why they wanted to do this the racing has sucked since it got repaved) and have their spring and fall dates on pavement and have this race in the summer on a Saturday night.  I would love for them to go to other tracks like Eldora and Knoxville too.

20 172 sec = 89.233 mph was fastest lap by a cup car during cup race. Blaney turned it on lap 1.

I watched my full crap race in 3 yrs. I thought it was a good race. Do they need to make adjustments,  for sure, things always get tweeked after the first attempt.  Was I hoping a dirt guy could pull it off, yep. I was surprised how strong Lagano was, because his team mate sure wasn't.  Hummm, who has the most talent between those 2. I liked the interviews on the front stretch, the 22 was into it. The 11 had this look on his face like my drivers uniform is dirty and was brushing the dirt off his uniform. Water Denny, it works to clean your face.  As for having races on other dirt venues, never going to happen. There must have been a lot of people that went home after the storm because the crap powers to be wasted no time in saying we are doing it again next year. I'm sure things will be changed up. Will it be for the good or will they screw it up like they screw most things up with there stupid gimmicks. Guess we all just need to wait and see for 2022.

I did find these numbers from practice on March 13th:

21.577 Hornet
20.16 Stock car
19.189 Sport mod
18.836 modified
18.162 602 crate late model
17.319  Open mod
16.939 604 crate late model
16.06 Super late model

Was NASCAR time of 20.172 due to different track conditions?

Sidenote: If I'm ever at a track that has 8 classes of non-sprint cars racing, I'll know I woke up in hell.

Like I said, speeds and handling of the Cup cars were close to the IMCA Stock Cars that run pretty much everywhere that IMCA sanctions.  Their races are pretty good with a lot of side by side, three wide and the like but not as fast as Dirt Late Models or Modifieds.  I'd never compare them to Sprint Cars and didn't expect them to be 410 fast.  If a person went into it with the mindset that it's a NASCAR race but it's on dirt so it will be better than their typical race it was entertaining.  If their sole aim in watching was to criticize NASCAR then they got their wish because there was plenty to bitch about when looking at them through Sprint Car speed snob goggles.

The nap was good and I took a half hour away from the TV to cook up a burger and fries for dinner.  I wasn't rivited to the screen like I will be this weekend when the All Stars kick off their season.  The bigger problem I had with it was that I live 30 miles from Minneapolis and our local Fox affiliate preempted the Bristol race to cover the Chauvin trial.  Fortunately they moved it to a local affiliate Fox 9+ which isn't on our streaming package but I keep a powered antenna connected to my man cave TV in case the internet goes out during Vikings games.  It was available as Fox 9.2 in the Twin Cities metro and surrounding counties. 

I used to like watching the IMCA Stock Cars at Jackson back when a driver named Jason Krohn ran there before he moved up to USMTS Modifieds.  He was a hard charger and their races could be entertaining.  All of our fendered cars up where I live are mostly WISSOTA so I only saw the IMCA Stocks at Jackson and Arlington, Minnesota, which I didn't get to very often so it was fun to see something different for a change. 

PS, to Murphy, if you ever wake up to 8 classes of non-Sprint Cars you're either in hell or you're up here where I live in Minnesota and western Wisconsin.  That's damn near every track up here with few exceptions. 

Stan Meissner

I watched for the same reasons as have been expressed by many here. Wanted to see how much of an advantage Golobic, Windom, Briscoe, Larson, Bell, Stenhouse Jr. would have over the asphalt only guys. Stenhouse Jr. was the only guy who lived up to expectations. Windom was a victim of engine failure but the rest just ran into each other.

NASCAR probably should have brought in Bob Sargent for track prep. Sarge preps Springfield for the ARCA cars and there is very rarely any dust whatsoever and it's a day show in August. With that said, Springfield or Du Quoin would probably be a much better venue for the Cup cars. ARCA has regularly put on great shows at all the 1 mile dirt tracks. I understand this is a pipe dream and NASCAR isn't going to race Cup cars at a fairgrounds 1 mile track but the fact remains it would be a much better and less dusty show than what we saw at Bristol.