Forum: HoseHeads Sprint Car General Forum (go)
Moderators: dirtonly  /  dmantx  /  hosehead

Correct

Wrong

Its not by points, its by time.

Can someone post where it's all written down for us?

-Thanks

https://www.knoxvilleraceway.com/Event/knoxville-nationals

On the right, click on 'Format'

This is my 8th Nationals. Been going to supermods/sprintcar races since the 60's. I'm just saying the pill draw for 50 drivers helps more the good drivers than it does the great ones. If David or Donny qualify within the 1st 10 cars they probably would have fast time. I hear the same out of alot drivers on the podium after the race about the pill draw and they were lucky to get an early draw. I never have heard of a driver saying they were lucky to get a late draw. 

My opinion.

That was the first thing I looked at. It says who makes the A & B Mains, but not how they line up

Their website been that way ever since I started following sprint cars in 2010. You might think they would add the missimg info....

For as long as i've been watching this, I didn't  like that Top Qualifier got as many points as Qualifying nite A Main winner. It should be about the racing, right?

Now I'm starting to see their reasoning. Its like 2 separate paths to Saturday Final, Qualifying & racing. By doing an invert of 8 on both heats & Qualifying nite A Main, they make it really hard for fast Qualifiers to win the Wed/Th. A mains. The top point guys are the ones who can qualify fast AND fight thru the pack.... like Schatz, Gravel & Gio

Perfect score is an amazing achievement...

8 is a pretty tough invert to beat..... I'm not gonna suggest making it 6, so as not to provoke the "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" crowd....

Thought about going with don't "WoOin" it for the fans. Haha 

Year after year the top WOO and a few AllStars make the feature and are in the top 20 and every year there a a few cars that qualify and race well enough to make the A on Saturday that could be considered underdogs.It is still the Crown Jewell of sprint cars due to the racing atmospere,track prep, purse,and fan support.Even making the B isnt easy as the cars are so equal.Bobby Allen became a legend be winning the Nationals with an under funded team.Now you expect the WOO or Larson to take home the money!

Format is perfect. People who want to change it don't understand it or either have never gone or went once or twice. The reason why there are 100 cars is because guys like Jake Bubak can qualify for a prelim night and the reason the fans show up is because you force guys like Schuchart to come from 21st to 7th. The racing is intense every lap, and cream always rises, they just need to work a lot harder at it than normal.

This type of thread is evergreen for the early to middle weeks of August.  Leave the format the fuck alone. That is all, good day.

I don't understand why this comes up every year?  With a 50 lap feature and at least one guaranteed open red, does it really matter where someone would start anyway?  A few years ago Donny Schatz won it after coming from the B-main and how many times have we seen the alphabet soup climb?  So in theory I think it's possible for Kyle Larson to start in the E-main and win it, I'm not saying it would happen, I just think it's possible.  Has there been any time where anyone thinks someone "lucked" into winning because of where they started?  This race isn't going to cost anyone a championship, its a special race.  It's funny I never hear drivers complain about the format,just the fans.  

Could they tweak the format, yeah (I have even thrown out a few ideas in previous years). Do they NEED to tweak it, NOPE! The cars and drivers with the best chance to win will always be starting the "A" at the end of the week.

It probably shouldn't be easy to win $200,000. I think the purse us big enough you'll always have enough teams. Ut needs to be exciting enough to attract fans.

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

The cream always rises to the top...Don't dick with it!

Member of this message board since 1997

Format is fine...leave it

like most outlaw shows, the great racing is all about the feature especially when they get in traffic

Despite all the fans saying, "it ain't broke, don't fix it", there have been changes over the years. Didn't they invert 10 at one time? I know they changed Friday format.... Which makes me curious: Does anyone recall original format for the 1st year?

I attended the Knoxville Nationals every year from 1976 through 1991.  I can't speak for the "first" year, but the early ones that I attended had a C, B and A dash, and a C, B and A main, on Saturday.  That was the full program, if I remember correctly.  Anyone who didn't make at least the last row of the Saturday C ran on Friday, which was non-qualifiers night.  A couple, or maybe more, transferred to the Saturday program.  Everyone else went home. It was probably close to the early '90s when Knoxville changed the format so that all of the the non-qualifiers from Friday rejoined the Saturday show.    

Again, going from memory, in those early days the track in Des Moines ran a competing program on Friday, which some of the name drivers attended.  It also took some of the fans along with them, who didn't want to watch a program consisting only of those who didn't make the Saturday show. That's when Knoxville started adding the Race of the States and other gimmicks to try and keep all of the drivers at the track on Friday. 

Thanks

Were there still super mods running with sprint cars back in 76?

What about inversions?

I'm sure there are others on here who have a better recollection of those days who can answer those questions.  I don't personally recall any super mods in the field. Seems to me all the cars had traditional sprint tail tanks. The CA and AZ cars were pretty impressive to look at.  Lots of chrome and fancy paint jobs.  No flat black tail tanks back then!  I can't offer any details on the inversions.  I'm assuming that the dashes had something to do with the 3 feature lineups. I had all of the Knoxville National programs from 1976 thru 1991, and could have used the earlier ones to provide some answers, but I sold them all last year to start cleaning out the closet.