Double Clutchin’-The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly From Dover
Written by Rocky Kitts · June 1, 2008
Well, when you have 36 races there’s going to be a snoozer or two in there somewhere, and this year’s Best Buy 400 certainly qualifies. This race was the equivalent of watching a 12-3 baseball game where every run is scored on singles and each pitcher walks a half-dozen batters apiece. There have been rumblings of Dover possibly losing a race, and after this race, I really wouldn’t have a problem with that happening, especially if it meant getting a race that didn’t put me to sleep halfway through. But, there were still a few moments worthy of being discussed, so let’s wake up and go through them shall we?
The Good:
Kyle Busch. Like him or not, he’s good for the sport. Busch is running so well that I’m pretty sure that you could replace his COT with a go-cart and he’s come in no worse than fifth and manage to wreck someone in the process. Busch isn’t racing on the same track as everyone else and it was scary how easily that he put this race in his pocket. Carl Edwards never had a real shot at catching Busch and Kyle avoided the late-race bad luck that other drivers have had recent problems with.
The Bad:
Boy, talk about a race getting the steam taken out of it early. When David Gilliland got into the back of Elliott Sadler it resulted in several drivers getting taken out of the race for all practical purposes. The two most notable of these drivers were Dale Jr. and Tony Stewart, as Junior was put 10 laps down by the wreck and Stewart was barely able to finish. The early exit of two of NASCAR’s most popular drivers was a bad thing for this race, which really could have used a little star power to keep it interesting. Whether anyone wants to admit it or not, I’m sure that there were many fans who changed the channel when it became apparent that Junior and Smoke were done for the day, and I’m interested to see what the ratings for the second half of the race will be.
Also, this leads me to a question that maybe some of you would care to comment on:
Would it be the worst thing in the world for NASCAR to allow teams to work on cars during red flags? I don’t really understand the need for that rule. If someone wants to fill me in on their opinion go ahead, I just think it’s kind of stupid. Shouldn’t NASCAR want to try to get cars back onto the track? If there’s an obvious reason that I’m missing give it to me, I’d like to hear it.
The Ugly:
I said this above. This race was for the most part, about as entertaining as watching a hamster run around in a little wheel while listening to Journey Cd’s set on repeat. There was very little drama in the racing, several key drivers got knocked out early, and only six cars ended up on the lead lap when the leader crossed the finish line. Carl Edwards finished 4.2 seconds behind Busch and that’s only because Busch got a little cautious in the final laps; and not a single driver in the rest of the top five finished within six seconds of the next highest position. It’s a long season, and we’ll see what next week and Pocono will do to bring the adrenaline back.
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Well Rocky, at least you didn’t blame it on the new car, or that “evil” Kyle Busch or something beside what it actually was.
A normal Dover event. A few cases in point:
Roll the tape: (Or DVR if you live in the modern world)
2007 Dodge Dealers 400 Sept. 23. Edwards won with only 5 other cars on the lead lap.
2007 Autism Speaks 400 June 4. Truex won with 12 others on the lead lap.
2006 Dover 400 Sept. 24. Jeff Burton won with only 8 others on the lead lap.
Lets go back a decade.
1998 MBNA Gold 400 Sept. 20. Mark Martin won with only 8 others on the lead lap.
1998 MBNA Platinum 400 May 31. Dale Jarrett won with only 3, count’em THREE others on the lead lap.
And another decade.
1988 Delaware 500 Sept 12. Bill Elliot won with 4 staying with him on the lead lap.
1988 Budweiser 500 June 5. Bill Elliot won and formed a TRIO of those that remained on the lead lap. Other “members” were Morgan Shepard and Rusty Wallace.
For those not counting that’s an average of 6.1 finishing on the lead lap spanning 20 years and the eight events I selected at random.
I since a pattern here, and it has nothing to do with today, the “car of today,” or the fact that 21st century NASCAR racing is “boring.”
I’m not ready to use Dover as a barometer to measure NASCAR’s excitement level as a whole, because I still watch more races that are interesting than that are not. I think that you do bring up good points about Dover, and I also believe that it’s more about the track than anything else. There’s just not much entertainment in watching a few guys race on the lead lap while not even close to each other, and like you pointed out, this is not a new deal at the D. It’s a good thing for NASCAR that Kyle Busch was the guy that won it, because at least that gives fans and pundits something tangible to talk about.
Regarding not working on cars during red flags, the obvious(?) reason is that a car may be caught up in a wreck and trapped by emergency vehicles or wreckage but it is still viable once it is returned to the garage area for repairs. If another car happened to make it back to pit road or the garage area that also was involved in the same wreck then they would have a very unfair advantage by being able to start their repairs earlier. NASCAR’s rules are almost all about keeping a level playing field and the “no repairs during a red flag” rule is a prime example of that. This rule does make sense.
Sterling Marlin got out of his car during a red flag and pulled the fender off of his tire and was penalized a few years back.
I get that, and I understand why the rule is in place, but aren’t those just the breaks? I just don’t see the need for a driver to be punished farther for being in an accident that wasn’t (in most cases) their fault or for an equipment malfunction that was probably just dumb luck. I just think that it would help by keeping more drivers on the track, and getting drivers on the track quicker. To me it’s like saying that doctors would have to stop working on a baseball player during a rain out. But I can see your point, it wouldn’t be even for all drivers because a red flag is such a rarity, and one or two drivers would probably have an advantage over cars that might be involved in wrecks or incidents later in the race that didn’t cause a red flag to come out. I’m really talking about it more in the case of rain delays when everyone is off the track and there isn’t really an advantage for any one team at that moment in time, and I think that everyone could benefit from the extra worktime. Appreciate the response.