How NASCAR Can Throw Caution(s) to the Wind

Much of the discussion around the NASCAR Cup Series of late has been the amount of time spent under yellow flags.

The sport has evolved in numerous ways over the last eight decades, some for the better and some for the worse. For whatever reason, the evolution of caution periods has seemed to move far to the side of devolving rather than evolving. Some of that has been for the sake of safety, but much of it appears, looking in from the outside, as self inflicted. Some of it will never be changed, but there are definitely ways to make things better.

Right off the bat, we’ll tackle the 800-pound gorilla in the NASCAR world: Stage racing has been a good addition to the sport. The people who call the shots and compete in the events figured out that David Pearson had it right. They don’t pay the check until the end of the race, so Pearson was notorious for not being visible at the front of the pack until the last 100 miles of the race. As a result, the races were turning into parades with no intense racing until the last laps of the events.

Stage racing put importance into the laps at the beginning and the middle of the race, along with the intensity of the final circuits before the checkered flag. The stages have improved the action of the sport and the intensity throughout the entire event. Unfortunately, the rule makers decided to put a caution period at the end of each stage. Whether it is driven by the broadcast partners or not, the bottom line is it is unnecessary. When the sport used to pay a prize for leading at the midway point of the race, the event didn’t stop to award a big check and take pictures. The racing continued on and didn’t let up until the finish. The time has come to get rid of the post-stage cautions.

The point that everyone makes due to the broadcast brainwashing about commercials is that we have to have the cautions because the TV partners need to sell ad space. This just in, they are running commercials throughout the events, not just at the stage breaks. Thankfully, the majority of commercials that are taking place during races in the last couple of years have been split screen. We don’t miss out on action like we used to during the early ESPN years. Ironically, some of the cautions during stage breaks are even side-by-side.

Not only are the unnecessary commercial breaks a burden to the fans and an addition to the wasted caution time, they are also a huge detriment to the strategy of races. Teams know when the caution is going to fly. They build most of their strategy around those two or three breaks in the race because they know exactly when they will happen. Eliminating predetermined yellows will open up the playbook to many more options for the teams to try and bring strategy into play on race day. Bottom line, stages are great but stage cautions are a plague that needs to go away.

Now that we eliminated the scourge that is stage cautions, let’s look at the ways to make the cautions that we do need more efficient. The first item on the agenda is how to get the field under caution quickly. Some tracks will have to do some alterations to make this work, but the best move to pick the field up quickly is with the pace car coming onto the track off of turn 2. When the caution flies, the pace car pulls onto the bottom of the track out of two and rolls, waiting for the leader. Once the leader is gathered up, the pace car proceeds to lead the field around the track slowly.

On tracks that are over one mile in length, the field will pull off into the pits as soon as they get to the entrance to pit lane. One mile and shorter tracks will be one lap and then the cars will enter pit lane. We will still have lead lap cars on the first time by and lap down cars the second time by. We’ll discuss rapid cautions in a minute. With the lap down cars in the pits, they will pull out onto the track once the lead lap cars go by. The lead lap cars will be heading to the frontstretch and the choose will begin. The field circulates back around and we go back to green.

Of course, there are extenuating circumstances for bigger wrecks and oil downs. In the end, if there needs to be oil dry on the track or there are more cars involved in the incident than there are tow trucks available, then the race is put under a red flag. We’ll get into red flags more in a sec. On short tracks, you take an extra lap to get onto pit lane; other than that, everything else remains the same. Four lap cautions will save an immense amount of time under yellow.

If there are more than 20 laps between cautions on tracks longer than a mile, then the caution rules will stay the same. If there are less than 20 laps, the caution will be a quickie. Everyone goes down pit lane on the first time by the pit entrance. As the cars exit pit lane, they will make their choice as they exit turn 2. The race goes back to green when the field returns to the start/finish line. That’s right, the caution will last two laps!

Again, it will need to be slightly longer for shorter tracks, so they will do their normal choose on the front stretch after exiting the pits and go back to green the next time on lap 3. Does this add immense pressure to crew chiefs and spotters? Absolutely it does. Do we probably see more pit road speeding penalties? Most likely, and we are all here for it.

Lastly, the dreaded red flag. There will probably be a couple more of these in races, but assuming we handle it properly, it should take no time. With red flags for weather, once the track is ready for racing, the cars leave pit road and stop on the backstretch. After pit lane is dry, the cars come around for a quickie caution and the race is back to green on the next lap. For race red flags, they are just that. They are not caution periods, they are a stop in the action. Once the reason for the red is cleared, the field starts up, returns to the start/finish line and the green flag flies. Does it go against the grain of what everyone is used to? Most definitely, but it will certainly make things more interesting.

The caution period in NASCAR has continued to get longer. It is time to turn the corner and get back to the focus of the sport: going racing.

There is no doubt that the teams would feel like they needed more time during cautions because they have become used to it. After a few races, they would be used to it and would adjust to the increased pace of the events. Some fans might dislike the fact that they won’t have built-in time to go to the bathroom or get items from the refreshment stand, but the limited cautions would more than make up for the minor inconvenience.

When it is all said and done, the objective is to put the yellow flag away and take laps in anger. The best way to do it is to rethink the whole process and throw caution to the wind.