Only 10 cars to be in Sundays race

The title above is an exageration but if this practice keeps going the same way it might just happen.
Sprint Cup practice is underway at Las Vegas and so far five cars have crashed. All but two of these teams have went to a backup.
So far Patrick Carpentier, Juan Montoya, Bobby Labonte, and Reed Sorenson have all went to backup cars while Kasey Kahne and Sam Hornish Jr. are still using the cars the same cars.
This is the most backup cars we have ever seen being used with the Car of Tomorrow. Last year only one team used a backup car in the 16 COT races. That was the 99 team of Carl Edwards.
The Sprint Cup drivers aren't the only ones having trouble with the slick track. In the Nationwide practice a few drivers had run ins with the outside wall.
Lets hope that the track cools down when qualifying starts at 6 p.m. Eastern.

Fontana

Ok, for todays race, if it goes off, I am going to pick Carl Edwards. He did very well in testing here and I think he will pull off the victory.

Who do you think will win? Leave me a comment in the comment section to let me know who you think will win.

Enjoy the race.

Daytona Picks

Every Sunday I am going to post who I think will win the race. If you think another driver is going to win, post who you think will win in the comments. Also list why you think they are going to win.
Alright, lets get down to business.
For this week, the Daytona 500, I am going to take Tony Stewart. After seeing Stewart run in the Gatorade duels and the Nationwide race last night, I think he is going to sweep both races like Harvick did last year.
That number 20 Toyota is making an incredible amount of horsepower. Not to mention that Stewart knows how to get around this track.
I think Toyota will get their first points race win today and Stewart will get it for them.

Dont forget to post who you think will win.

Thanks for reading and hope you all enjoy watching the Daytona 500.

Good call NASCAR

Finally, NASCAR has made a great call. Today NASCAR announced the penalties for Kurt Busch and Tony Stewarts on track and off track fiasco where Busch apparently got "smoked."
Last Friday while practicing for the Bud Shootout, Busch tried to block Stewart which led to both of them crashing. After the initial wreck, Busch used his car to take shots at Stewart’s car which in my opinion is out of line. And NASCAR apparently agrees.
This year NASCAR claims that they are going back to their roots and the penalties they enforced show just that. After the wreck and the bumps by Busch, both drivers were called to the NASCAR trailer for a meeting. In the meeting, Stewart apparently threw a punch that landed on Bushes’ face. And this is where the good call by NASCAR comes in.
The penalties that were released Tuesday, Feb. 12, were probation for six races for both drivers. NASCAR only penalized the drivers for their on-track altercations. No fines or penalties were given for what happened in the trailer, and that’s what I like to hear.
NASCAR should not fine or penalize the drivers for taking out their aggression on another drivers face. These are grown men who are responsible for themselves and their actions. If Kurt Busch wants to run his mouth off to a much bigger guy, then let him. If he wants to fight another driver who wrecked him, let him.
These drivers are so passionate about they do for a living it is hard for them to bottle up the emotion after being wrecked. Before, they had to hide this emotion so they wouldn't get fined and points taken away by NASCAR. Now, if NASCAR lets them fight things out, you will see the true side of the drivers come out. Like Carl Edwards giving Matt Kenseth the old' flinch test last year.
Let them fight it out NASCAR.

Daytona qualifying crapshoot

So we found out yesterday that Jimmie Johnson will start on the pole and Michael Waltrip will start on the outside pole. Yes, I said Michael Waltrip.
Last year Waltrip had a bad start to the year after being penalized for an illegal substance being found in the engine of his car. It ruined his season because he was never able to come back from the points that he had deducted.
Anyway, while watching qualifying I wondered how the heck they came up with this crapshoot they call qualifying. Who thought this would be a fair way to get into the race. I mean it does make it more interesting for the fans. Well, for those of us who are fans of the drivers in the top 35. The rest of the fans, and the drivers for that matter, will be biting their nails until they try to race their way in on Thursday.
NASCAR needs to use the same type of qualifying they use for every other race. It is going to be very upsetting for the go-or-go-homers like Boris Said, who would already be in the show if this was another race. Now he doesn't have to worry about his driving skills, but that of 2o plus other drivers vying for the same spot.
Even though it is very entertaining, NASCAR has to rethink the entire Daytona qualifying. They should also rethink the top 35 rule but thats another story for another time.

Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed. Leave me some feed back or write your own opinion and send it to me and I might post it. biggestnascarfan@gmail.com

What a great preview

If the Bud Shootout is any indicator of how the season is going to go, it is going to be filled with close races, Toyota will get their first win and Dale Jr. will win the championship.
Even though the COT is not liked by many, it made the Shootout very interesting. The COT allowed for door-to-door racing the entire race. Throughout the race no one seemed to have a particular advantage, besides Jr. leading for 40 something laps. No one car could pull away and leave the pack. It also handled well in crisis mode.
When Kurt Busch got a little loose, his car stuck to the ground instead of going airborne like the old car would have. This is due to the side plates on the spoiler. When the car steps out in the rear, the spoiler side plates put added down force and allow the car to straighten out.
Alright I'm getting way off topic.
Toyota had a great run with Tony Stewert and Dave Blaney. Yesterday I wrote that Stewert would give Toyota their first win. But seeing Blaney man-handle that Toyota up front all night he may be the man for the job. He performed well last year but I think this year he may be a force in the Toyota camp.
And now for the topic everyone has been waiting for, Dale Jr. will battle for the championship this year. I know that Jr. is very good at plate racing, but I think he will show his true potential with Hendrick. Jr. showed an excellent display of team work, which they are all about at Hendrick. Close to the end he didn't leave Jimmie Johnson to block Stewert like he would have before and it cost him a position to Stewert, but ended up giving him the win.
I think Jr. will show his true potential as a driver at Hendrick. Not just because Hendrick has the COT down, but because Jr. is a great driver. He will learn a lot from the hated but very talented Jeff Gordon, and Jimmie Johnson. He didn't have a role model to learn from at DEI so if he wanted to win a championship he had to make the move to another team and he knew it.
Can't wait until the 500

Thanks for reading, hope you come back and visit.

Who will give Toyota their first win?

As I sit here in front of the television watching NACAR practice, I am starting to think that Toyota may have a great season. Toyota will get their first win, and that win may just come in the Daytona 500.
Right now in practice, 3 of the top 5 cars are Toyotas. And two of top three Toyotas are from the team that will give Toyota their first win. Tony Stewart is fastest and Denny Hamlin is third. I know these practices don't mean much but it shows a little.
Toyota teaming with Joe Gibbs is the best move they have made since coming to NASCAR. Gibbs has great drivers that know how to win. They also have loyal fans that will support their favorite driver no matter what kind of car they drive.
Lets start with Tony Stewart, the driver who has the best chance of giving Toyota its win in the 500. Tony is a very aggressive driver, but at the same time knows how to get the job done at any track, especially Daytona. In 2005 and 2006 Stewart had five wins and in 2007 he won three. Tony could win a race in my grandmas Buick Skylark.
Next is Denny Hamlin. In his three years in the Sprint Cup Series Hamlin has three wins, 20 top fives and 41 top 10's. He will have a good season and will give Toyota at least one win.
Next for Gibbs is new-comer Kyle Busch. In four seasons he has four wins, 30 top fives and 51 top 10's. This young, talented and very aggressive driver also knows how to get it done on the track.
I think the Gibbs team will get at post at least four wins for Toyota this year. Toyota should have came in NASCAR with a good team like Gibbs instead of putting all their time and money into new teams without the credentials.

Is NASCAR getting too expensive for everyone?

Is David Gilliland going to drive an unsponsored car in the Bud Shootout Saturday? With the season almost underway more than 10 drivers are still without primary sponsors for the season.
Is this do to the fear of a recession or are corporations moving away from NASCAR because of the rising cost of team sponsorship?
I think it may be the latter. Even though signs of a recession are showing, some major corporations are increasing their advertising budgets for the upcoming year.
Last week Proctor & Gamble Co., Colgate-Palmolive Co., Kraft Foods, and Kellogg Co. all boosted or maintained their marketing budget for the year. This is no small amount of money either.
Accoding to adage.com, last year Kellogg increased their marketing budget to about nine percent of sales, or about $1.1 billion.
These companies have a lot of money to spend but they have to do it wisely. It cost more than $20 million a year to be a primary sponsor in the NASCAR Sprint Series. Even though NASCAR has the most loyal sponsor purchasing fans, these companies have to look at their return on investment.
In advertising, companies use CPM, which stands for cost per thousand (you thought millions huh). This is used to find out how much it costs to reach 1000 viewers. The CPM may have gone up too much and the sponsors are finding other ways to reach more viewers for less money.
NASCAR should look for a way to lower the teams cost. O yeah, they did that already. It's called the Car of Tomorrow. But is it really going to work? We will find out when the first full season with the COT is over.