Holding a Pretty Wheel: & Another Thing, After Martinsville
Here you have it, clearing out the desk, post-Martinsville edition.
Here you have it, clearing out the desk, post-Martinsville edition.
Should all NASCAR touring series wins be counted when looking at a driver’s career total?
When a schedule change put Martinsville Speedway on the Cup schedule a week after Auto Club Speedway, it spotlighted the contrast between two different NASCARs
Southern California has contributed to NASCAR quite admirably. Most notable of late, the area has given the sport five-time Sprint Cup champion Jimmie Johnson.
The Nationwide Series, once a thriving series with its own identity, flounders in the shadow of the Cup Series.
To continue the upswing, NASCAR needs to produce an exciting product. The problem is, 1.5-mile tri- or quad-ovals don’t generally provide that.
Sometimes making history comes quietly, and what Wendell Scott did for NASCAR is irreplaceable.
“Did that really just happen?” Those were my words (though I’m pretty sure I’m not alone on that) after Sunday’s Daytona 500.
Longtime Dale Earnhardt Inc. employee Steve Hmiel said it best in the days after Dale Earnhardt’s death: “It’s like a compass that’s lost its true North.”
Will it ever end? Following a 2010 season in which the seemingly impossible happened, as Jimmie Johnson won his fifth Cup title in a row, coming to rest dangerously close to the sport’s all-time greats, we’re all left to ask one question: Can he possibly do it again?
A lot of fans are probably hoping to see Johnson’s streak come to an abrupt end this year, and some even go so far as to argue his titles are “bad for NASCAR.” (A ridiculous argument, by the way. NASCAR survived Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt relatively unscathed and it will survive Johnson, too.) But whether Johnson can continue his remarkable streak is up for debate. There is plenty of reason to think that 2011 will be same old, same old. But there is also plenty to think that this time, he won’t. As the new season looms, the title question is already at the forefront. Here are six reasons why Johnson will – and won’t – hoist his sixth straight Cup this year.
NASCAR came so close to getting it right. The 43-1 points system has potential to create excitement from the green flag at Daytona all by itself.
The real elite owner in racing isn’t named Hendrick or Roush or Gibbs, or even Penske. It’s Chip Ganassi.
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