re: 2024 NASCAR Season Thread - 2024-25 Offseason

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- Make the the Round of 8 a 4 race final round

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I'd like this. It gives enough of a sample size where I don't think there would be many complaints, even if a lower seeded guy snuck in and won it.

I also didn't hate Eric Estepp's suggestion of flipping the format, so you'd start with one wild card race where the top 8 seeds are already locked in, and 9-16 race for the round of 12. Then you have a 3 race final round for the championship 4. That would essentially preserve what we have now, but the single race gimmick comes at the beginning, and we get a relatively satisfactory champion at the end.

Either option seems relatively easy for NASCAR to implement without reinventing the wheel.

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Seriously curious--why did the popularity of NASCAR drop so far from their huge peak that they reached? I know several people who used to plan vacations around races and now they don't even watch...but none of them can give me a reasonable explanation as to why they suddenly lost interest.

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If I boiled it down to one reason it's because racing went from performance to entertainment. I used to watch every race, attended at least 3 - 4 a year. Was hands down my favorite sport / pastime. This year I watched one race (Bristol) and it sucked. Nobody could pass it was just an aero train.

The championship format is a gimmick and doesn't reward the best drivers. It makes most of the races meaningless. 16 drivers make the playoff now which is basically any half arse driver on a good full time team. That means the first 26 races are basically irrelevant unless your favorite driver is really struggling and is below 16th.

Like the format, the cars have been adjusted to make the casual viewer see closer racing but again at the cost to performance. The old cars were high horsepower and incredibly hard to drive. The tire wear played a huge factor. It may have looked boring to the casual viewer but drivers had give and take and could manage their cars for longer runs. There were no stages so drivers had race-long strategies. With the high downforce, low horsepower package it keeps the racing close but needs way less talent. The inability of this car to pass has ruined the best track (Bristol) and even at Phoenix the 12 was clearly faster but the 22 just aero blocked.

Add in that NASCAR brass continually just ignores what it's core fans want and caters to TV contracts and casual viewers. The 3 pm start times vs 1 pm, the constant playoff tinkering, inconsistent officiating etc.

If I was in charge of NASCAR I'd go back to a season long championship battle, 800 HP Low downforce cars, eliminate stages, and move start times back to 1 pm. Only change I would keep from the last 20 years is the choose cone.

I go to local short tracks a lot now and watch the CARS tour.

It's like basketball. A lot of guys don't drive as hard until the playoffs.
You can win a race, then slack off til the playoffs start.

Get rid of the yellows at the end of each stage and let teams play for points ir the win

Junior had a good idea about stages. To limit the amount of caution laps, if a caution happens near the end of a stage, just call the stage. Rather than waste 20 minutes of caution laps. How maddening are the all the unnecessary caution laps.

NASCAR even in the Winston cup days needed to clean up its point system, way too many points available for things other than just winning the race. I assume that was just the legacy of when NASCAR was more of an endurance racing series/cars were less reliable

I mean I agree. I’d like this whole system and stage BS scrapped. But we all know that will never happen. This would fix the caution laps for the sake of caution laps nonsense. Fans are getting robbed of green flag racing, and for what reason? You have to run to some arbitrary number? Nah. If you know the stage will end under yellow, call it there.

So who would have won this year without the following;
Stage points
Leading laps
Stage wins
All the other bs

Just pure finish points?
5 points to win
1 point per position

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So who would have won this year without the following; Stage points Leading laps Stage wins All the other bs Just pure finish points? 5 points to win 1 point per position

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This Twitter account keeps up with the points under the old Winston Cup Series championship format (i.e., pre-Chase). By their calculation, Bell would’ve won the title. Also, Logano would’ve finished 11th in the points standings.

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I like that site does the old points system to see who would win under it.

The problem with that is how teams and drivers race/prepare during the chase. If you didn’t make each cut the way you prep and race is different. The team pits all its resources into the ones who advance.

Even though it does show how dumb the chase is its never going to be completely accurate either.

It shows Bell winning by 5 over Chase. Had we been under that system all year the way both Bell and Chase raced would have been different leading up to final. The racers only raced vs current system not as a year long system. Once you won earlier in year you were licked in and raced differently. Maybe gave up some points or finishes to work in something for the chase.

Current system is broken. Too many get in and the too many arbitrary rulings by nascar.