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Will Tire Limits Improve Racing?
Will 2017 Tire Limit Rules Require Harder Tires? Back in the day, the only thing that limited how many sets of tires you could use in Cup-level racing was your budget. It was different in the lower...
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Safety vs. Speed: 2017 Changes to the Chassis
The Evolution of the Stock Car While many fans decried the look of the Car of Tomorrow, the most significant thing about the COT was a part you couldn’t see: The Chassis. The first time I was around a...
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Reverse Engineering NASCAR Stage Lengths
Stage Racing The 2017 NASCAR season brought us stage racing: Segmenting a race into three parts, each of which has a winner (and point reward). If you’re me, the first thing you wondered was not how...
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Did the All-Star Race Kill the Idea of Two Types of Tires in NASCAR for Good?
Not even the most talented publicity person could convince NASCAR fans that the idea of giving teams a choice of a ‘soft’ tire and a ‘regular’ tire was a good idea based on the sole data point we have:...
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Thermography: A New Weapon in the NASCAR Arsenal
What’s Wrong With this Cow? Can you tell? If you said the cow is the wrong color, you’re close. But there’s more to the story. And What’s That Got to Do with NASCAR? Competition in NASCAR is getting...
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Did Stage Racing Produce More Cautions Because Drivers Raced Harder?
One of the theories behind stage racing is that drivers would race harder to get stage points. That should theoretically be reflected by the number of cautions. Cautions appear to be up in 2017. Are...
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Data Sharing: Fact and Fiction
New for 2018: Data Sharing NASCAR announced (in a somewhat roundabout way) they would share the data collected by each car during races, qualifying and practice with all teams in the 2018 season. This...
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Jumping the (Air) Gun
(Air) Gun Control A lot’s changed on Pit Road this year. In addition to cutting the over-the-wall crew to five people, NASCAR decided (by majority vote of the Team Owners’ Council) that they would...
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How NASCAR’s “Enhanced Schedule” Affects the Race Teams
NASCAR’s enhanced schedule compresses three days on on-track activity into two. It’s designed to save teams time and money, but how will it affect the racing? What is an “Enhanced Schedule”? If you’re...
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Sciencing Out NASCAR Rules Changes
Rules changes in NASCAR are tricky. There’s really no way to test them before implementing them. You’re relying on the judgement and experience of the NASCAR team, with input from race teams, drivers,...
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The 2019 Rules Package: The Tapered Spacer
NASCAR announced the 2019 rules package last week. Reactions from fans ranged from wait-and-see to despair to a surprising amount of anger. The 2019 package is similar to the package was tested at the...
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Do Less-Experienced NASCAR Drivers Get More In-Race Penalties?
Your driver is running in the top five when he gets caught speeding on pit road. While early penalties can sometimes be overcome, late penalties can eliminate any chance to win. In most competitive...
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Cautions are Down in 2018: Are NASCAR Drivers Getting Better at Avoiding...
Cautions are down this year — again. And that’s despite adding around 70 cautions per season when stage racing was instituted in 2017. That same year, NASCAR introduced the damaged vehicle policy: If...
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NASCAR 2018: The Year in Charts and Graphs
This is the time of the year when everyone takes one final look back at the last year before turning to think about the new one. So, in this last blog of the year, I thought I’d summarize the season...
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NASCAR: Caps, Limits and Level Playing Fields
Every sport faces it: One, or a few, teams pull ahead because they can spend more money than anyone else. Those teams and their fans are fine, but it means the league has failed to ensure a level...
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NASCAR’s Penalty Box: Uncontrolled Tires
NASCAR changed the ‘arms-length uncontrolled-tire penalty’ after pressure from fans and drivers who complained that the rule was too subjective. Does the new rule solve those penalty problems? Does...
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NASCAR Numbers 2019: Part 2 — The Drivers
Sixty-four drivers in 46 different car numbers ran for 37 full-schedule and 10 limited-schedule teams in 2019. But how did they do? And how does that compare to 2018? In my last post, I examined the...
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One NASCAR Rules Package for All Tracks?
One of NASCAR’s major goals is cutting costs for teams by developing a rules package that, with minimal tweaking, can provide good racing at any track. The 2019 rules package met with mixed results....
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