The NASCAR Whelen Series banquet on Friday night in Las Vegas was the last remaining item on the 2008 agenda and now it is time to seriously consider 2009. Mr. Vokey has already started to preview the 2009 LLM contenders but I have something else that I’d like to see some discussion on.
If Barrie is going to continue to participate in the NASCAR Whelen Series then it seems to me that some changes need to be made to give our guys a chance in the overall standings. Our best ranked 150th in the National Standings compared to Edmonton Raceway’s Erica Thiering in 48th and Autodrome St Eustache’s Jonathan Bouvrette in 20th.
The NASCAR points are calculated based on your best 18 finishes and the points per race are determined by the number of starters up to a maximum (I think it is 24). Many of the tracks in the US run fast cars to the front every night and they get lots of starts in. Series Champ Philip Morris had 28 starts and an impressive 14 wins while runner-up Brian Harris had 38 starts and 20 wins.
Barrie only managed to get in 16 features with all the rain. But wait a minute, didn’t it rain in Quebec too? How did St. Eustache manage 24 starts?
The answer is they ran double features every night that the top division was racing.
My suggestion is to eliminate the often boring double-heat races for a egular program of time-trials and double features.
The first feature would be lined-up fast cars to the front on times. The second feature would be an invert of the time trials for either a set number of cars i.e. 12-14-16 or you could do something like you need to qualify within x percentage of the fast time to earn the invert. That way if you are half a second slower you will start at the back until such time as you are quick enough to run at the front.
In either approach I think it is important that one of the features is an invert start because I think that the champion has to be able to come through traffic and the fans deserve to see it.
Now people will point out that this is a very biased approach because my brother happens to have a quick car and is particularly skilled at getting a fast lap in. I get that. What I am trying to counteract is that many of our NASCAR Whelen competitors start fast cars up every single night. My approach would provide a balance between fast cars up and fast cars to the back.
A few other points:
a) The influence of heat races on the points standings where the results are often pre-determined by the luck of the draw. I think I was around 90% of picking the heat winners prior to the race start. How exciting is that for the fans?
b) It would eliminate the feature wins for guys who run lousy for two nights and then win from the front because of their low percentage. I’m not a fan of the three night handicapping. Back in the day, your handicap was based on the entire season. When Shaughnessy and Wardle had those amazing feature win seasons they started every race from the back.
c) There would be no points for qualifying, it would just set the field. Yes you could sandbag to get a good start in the second feature but you would still have to race both of them.
d) It would mean that new and/or slower guys would be forced to start at the back until they are competitive enough to run at the front. I don’t see anything wrong with this. We saw far too many accidents last season caused by inexperience at the front of the field.
e) I think you would have to allow guys to run different cars in the features and collect points for both. But if you change a car for any reason you start scratch in the second one.
So if you don’t like the time-trial and fast car up approach here’s another approach, set the start of the first feature with fast cars to the back by handicap (but please make it at least 5 nights) and then the second is an invert of the top 12-14 cars in the first feature finish.
I believe that the key benefits are the double-features both for the fans and for the guys to have a shot at a more representative placing in the NASCAR Whelen Series.
Maybe it would even reduce some of the accidents and increase the car counts and that too is needed if there is ever to be a chance at that overall title.
A few issues possibly:
-Cost? Tires cost money! 15 more laps makes a differnece...
-payout? How do u payout? Just individually for each feature or an overall payout like in motocross with the second race being the tiebreaker...
-attrition--The simple fact is that features have mvre wrecks than heats..noone wants a 10 car second feature...
With that all said i think, personally, it is a great idea and should be adopted. TT's are a pain tho...if u wanna do that start them at 630
The NASCAR Whelen Series banquet on Friday night in Las Vegas was the last remaining item on the 2008 agenda and now it is time to seriously consider 2009. Mr. Vokey has already started to preview the 2009 LLM contenders but I have something else that I’d like to see some discussion on.
If Barrie is going to continue to participate in the NASCAR Whelen Series then it seems to me that some changes need to be made to give our guys a chance in the overall standings. Our best ranked 150th in the National Standings compared to Edmonton Raceway’s Erica Thiering in 48th and Autodrome St Eustache’s Jonathan Bouvrette in 20th.
The NASCAR points are calculated based on your best 18 finishes and the points per race are determined by the number of starters up to a maximum (I think it is 24). Many of the tracks in the US run fast cars to the front every night and they get lots of starts in. Series Champ Philip Morris had 28 starts and an impressive 14 wins while runner-up Brian Harris had 38 starts and 20 wins.
Barrie only managed to get in 16 features with all the rain. But wait a minute, didn’t it rain in Quebec too? How did St. Eustache manage 24 starts?
The answer is they ran double features every night that the top division was racing.
My suggestion is to eliminate the often boring double-heat races for a egular program of time-trials and double features.
The first feature would be lined-up fast cars to the front on times. The second feature would be an invert of the time trials for either a set number of cars i.e. 12-14-16 or you could do something like you need to qualify within x percentage of the fast time to earn the invert. That way if you are half a second slower you will start at the back until such time as you are quick enough to run at the front.
In either approach I think it is important that one of the features is an invert start because I think that the champion has to be able to come through traffic and the fans deserve to see it.
Now people will point out that this is a very biased approach because my brother happens to have a quick car and is particularly skilled at getting a fast lap in. I get that. What I am trying to counteract is that many of our NASCAR Whelen competitors start fast cars up every single night. My approach would provide a balance between fast cars up and fast cars to the back.
A few other points:
a) The influence of heat races on the points standings where the results are often pre-determined by the luck of the draw. I think I was around 90% of picking the heat winners prior to the race start. How exciting is that for the fans?b) It would eliminate the feature wins for guys who run lousy for two nights and then win from the front because of their low percentage. I’m not a fan of the three night handicapping. Back in the day, your handicap was based on the entire season. When Shaughnessy and Wardle had those amazing feature win seasons they started every race from the back.
c) There would be no points for qualifying, it would just set the field. Yes you could sandbag to get a good start in the second feature but you would still have to race both of them.
d) It would mean that new and/or slower guys would be forced to start at the back until they are competitive enough to run at the front. I don’t see anything wrong with this. We saw far too many accidents last season caused by inexperience at the front of the field.
e) I think you would have to allow guys to run different cars in the features and collect points for both. But if you change a car for any reason you start scratch in the second one.
So if you don’t like the time-trial and fast car up approach here’s another approach, set the start of the first feature with fast cars to the back by handicap (but please make it at least 5 nights) and then the second is an invert of the top 12-14 cars in the first feature finish.
I believe that the key benefits are the double-features both for the fans and for the guys to have a shot at a more representative placing in the NASCAR Whelen Series.
Maybe it would even reduce some of the accidents and increase the car counts and that too is needed if there is ever to be a chance at that overall title.
I go to Barrie all the time and back in the 80's my hubby raced LM there and I don't agree with having TIME TRIALS on a regular Saturday night as it's soooooo boring for many fans not just me 🙂
They need to race for their spot in Feature !
maybe doing a few midweek specials in the season and adding the LLM would help out. but making double feature every week would seem a little too much. But they definately need to get some more racing in.
With the transponders the time trial process doesn't actually take that long to run off but I agree it can be less than entertaining for the fans but then again there are those predictable heats 🙂
Thayne hit the nail on the head on the cost issue, there is very little likelihood of getting a sponsor to ante up the purse for a second feature and there is nothing in it for the track other than cost to have two.
The best answer would be to get more cars out each night, that would improve the show and give the guys more NASCAR points for each feature.