■ 05 November 2009 | 7:57 PM
What makes a good race to you?
The last couple of weeks there's been a lot of talk about the racing and where the sport is from the comments Kyle Petty, Jimmy Spencer and Larry McReynolds made me in the "Frankly Speaking'' series to comments about boring racing from some about last week's Talladega race.
I got the chance to sit down and chat with Eddie Gossage, president of Texas Motor Speedway. He's been in the sport for more than 30 years. He's seen the sport's highs and lows and now runs a track that will have the largest crowd of any of the 10 Chase races. He provides a perspective maybe not everyone has heard.
Here's a bit of what he said about racing. Take a look and then I want your opinion.
“You’re looking at statistics on that but people often won’t look at the statistics at things like margin of victory, lead changes, yada, yada when they’re talking about, oh, this car is terrible, the racing is bad. Again Terry Labonte finished (11) laps down in his first race at Darlington. That’s bad. Can you imagine the uproar here if the fourth place car Sunday was (11) laps off the pace?
“So, we’ve been spoiled with really good racing and good news and seems like every time something gets, not just talking about sports but life in general, things get built up and they get torn down. They get built up and they get torn down. It’s a cycle. I think we’re in a trendy cycle right now, down.''
(HOW DO YOU DEFINE A GOOD RACE)
“I’d argue that my viewpoint is probably completely in line with the fans and maybe you don’t have a realistic grasp on the fans.
“Here’s the problem. I keep talking about perception. They perceive it when in fact, it’s not bad racing. Maybe there was a time when it was better, but it’s not bad.
(GOOD AND BAD IS AMBIGIOUS SO NARROW IT DOWN – YOU BEEN IN IT 30 YEARS)
“There’s a race where there’s lead changes and some side-by-side racing, a pass in the last handful of laps and the margin of victory is a half second, quarter second or less. Because this is a soap opera, you had to have a couple of dramatic things that happened in the course of the race whether it’s somebody putting somebody else in the fence because they got made at them or somebody shaking a fist at somebody or it could be as simple as running out of fuel and all of a sudden they’re out of contention.
(YOU HAD THAT HERE IN THE SPRING WITH THE ROUSH CARS HAVING PROBLEMS ON P IT ROAD WITH LUG NUTS FALLING OFF LATE)
“Carl probably would have won that race.
“That’s some drama that has nothing to do with me wrecking you or us getting into a fight, but those kinds of drama things make the race interesting. So you’ve got to have the ebb and flow of human emotion plus you’ve got to have some competition that was exciting with a finish that was in doubt closet to to the finish of the race.
(SOME FANS GET FRUSTRATED WITH THE INTERMEDIATE TRACKS WHERE A LEADER CAN GET WAY AHEAD OF THE FIELD, HOW DO YOU LOOK AT THAT SINCE TEXAS IS A 1.5-MILE TRACK)
“Two years ago in this race you had dramatic battle down to the finish between (Matt) Kenseth and Jimmie Johnson and Matt could have wrecked Jimmie as big as day and Jimmie showed what a man he was and said “You know I’ve got a lot to lose, I’m going to challenge you for it.’
(IS IT ALL ABOUT THE FINISH)
Oh yeah.
(I DON’T RECALL WHAT HAPPENED FIRST 332 LAPS OF THAT RACE )
"Single most important part of a race is the finish. You can have a dog all day long and if you’ve got a great finish, the quality points on the race goes up substantially.
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I show you Gossage's comments to get you thinking about what makes a good race. Feel free to add your comments. Or you can e-mail me at dustin.long@news-record.com to have such comments considered for an upcoming story on the topic (please include name, city, state and a phone number please) or DM me on Twitter.
So what do you have to say? And folks let's be reasonable. I'm looking at what makes a good race to you, one that makes you wish you were there if you were watching on TV or one that would make you want to come back to that track or go to another race. So, what do you have to say?
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The Sprint girl
And why do we have to always see the 'Sprint Girl' with the pony tail and the big toothy grin at every race? I call her the 'Sprint Girl' because she always wears a mock racing uniform with 'Sprint' all over it. Oh yeah, we need her standing behind the winning driver while he is being interviewed to take our (us males anyway) minds off the boring races? Who is she anyway, if anyone knows? She looks better that the racing sometimes! Another example of how the 'real racing' has been overwhelmed by pandering to the audiences.
Hard and Fast
What makes a good race to me is this,i want good coverage and no fluff especially when drivers are being interviewed and commentators are just there for color.It would be great if MRN was in sync with telivised coverage,they do a great job.It seems to me that the majority of the field is just fillers and have a hard time competing its a money issue i know but nevertheless.To quote DW "if it ain't broke don't fix it" let the drivers race/battle(gladiator/chariot race type stuff)Drive it like you stole it.
this is the thing
If you can't chase down the leader, IE: the leader checks out on the rest of the field, it doesn't matter what is going on behind him. That's the one thing that really turns me off. Alot of the time the only passes for the lead take place on pit road. I try to enjoy all of the little races w/in the race, but when the leader checks out, I usually do too. I remember this year Lil' Schrub made a pass for the lead on a restart @ Bristol & what did he say? Goodnight Dick. As if, I just took the lead & ain't nobody gonna track me down, & they didn't. That race was over, wasn't even close, he was gone by a couple of seconds in just a handful of laps. And that's @ Bristol, just imagine how boring that is @ Pocono, Michigan, Loudon. So to me, if NASCAR wants to improve the racing, make it where the cars behind the leader have a chance to hunt him down. Get rid of that AERO-PUSH situation by allowing the teams to work on the COT like they did the old model. Improve the car, improve the racing. That's not that hard to figure out.
Im a racer.
I say it as if it flows in my veins within my hemoglobin. I thus like racing, and to me NASCAR has always proven to be its best form. I never got the NHRA, I never grew to like open wheels. NASCAR has always been more competitive, and it follows NASCAR should try to emphasize such competition. I think it does it well sometimes, like double file restarts. But it also does it bad, banning bump drafting. Rubbin' is racin', thats hopefully not going to change.
Too many rules
It would be pointless to even say what I would like because 'What you see is what you get'. But... I am in my 60s and my Dad used to build race cars with McCoy that McChesney drove at Chinese Corner. Joe Weatherly was there too. But anyway, I feel that there are too many rules. Rules to try to make things equal (this is nonsense to me) and rules to try to please the fans (also nonsense). If you have a car that can lap the field 10 times, go for it. You win the race. A REAL race - not one orchestrated for the fans.
I can remember (and have photos) being at Rockingham back in 1967 and watching Petty run. The things I saw there were real racing without all of the stupid rules. A real race that is beyond the comprehension of many of today's fans. Never to happen again.
Regress things about 40 years or so and we shall once again have something well worth watching.