The 2024 running motorsports thread

I am in the bottom 10% of NASCAR watchers, but doesn’t this happen every year?

 

24 car was so desperate to find a lane where his car actually worked so he switched about three times on the backstretch until he wrecked everyone behind him. I haven’t watched much since Jeff Gordon retired and now I know why. Only way to pass is to do something brutish or stupid. It used to make my day, week, maybe even year when the 24 won the Daytona 500. Now, not so much. Byron won by suffering the least consequences for the dumbest driving, though on the bright side he’s not advertising for bigots this week. I think it’s part of why F1 is eating their lunch. For the increasingly dwindling number of car enthusiasts, Verstappen, a prick, may win all the time but he’s incredible on the wheel and the car (all really) are marvels of engineering. And Monaco’s a bit prettier than Richmond.

 

LOL Formula 1 is not “eating NASCAR’s lunch.” Sure, they have higher viewership than they did before … but look how bad that viewership was before.

 

I watched the last couple of laps. The crash-fest? Right on time and no surprise. The ability of drivers to lose their wits and then defend it because "it's late and I'm goin' for it" is dumb and it's not just NASCAR. It happens with too much regularity in the Indy 500 of recent years too. Fans seem to like it, but it's not good race craft, but then the percentage of fans who watch for race craft is pretty tiny anyway. So I say, let 'em crash?

What was a surprise was how far Fox's coverage had fallen as I hadn't watched in a while. At first I was like, "who are these goobers with Mike Joy on the broadcast?" because they were just flat-out useless, before I realized it was Kevin Harvick and Clint Bowyer. Good Lord do they suckdillyuck. Joy has always been competent vanilla, but he soared like a broadcast legend over the top of his partners, who added nothing.

I guess I didn't realize the troubles Fox has had in filling the analyst role in recent years. For their flaws, Waltrip and McReynolds kept you engaged when they headed Fox's coverage.

The production seemed cheap, apart from the cool in-camera shots where you could see the brutality of the hits on the drivers caught up in the big one as their heads shook around in their headrests.

 

I just read something where a guy said hopefully some day fans will be able to pay their respects at Earnhardt's grave.
I promise you if Teresa allowed that to happen, fans would be paying more than respects. They'd be paying admission.

 

An interesting little nit between F1 and IndyCar that inexplicably keeps coming back: F1 has infringed on the Indy 500's "Greatest Spectacle in Racing" trademark several times in the last 18 months.

So far things have remained cordial, but at some point IndyCar will have to defend their mark if F1 doesn't stop.

Also, someone at NASCAR used that line on social media to describe the Daytona 500 last week, but it disappeared quickly.

https://www.indystar.com/story/spor...tacle-in-racing-formula-1-nascar/72732076007/

 

Atlanta has had some of the closest finishes in NASCAR history. I don't know how they get closer than that. Not sure I've ever seen three-wide to the finish line, separated by literally a couple of inches.

 

Heck of a finish

 

Still not a fan of the dumbassery that takes place at “drafting tracks,” but Atlanta always produces good racing.