2013 NASCAR Season Preview
A nail-biting finish at this year’s Daytona 500? That’s what NASCAR hopes for with the introduction of its new Gen-6 race car. *NASCAR: 2013* *Your …
A nail-biting finish at this year’s Daytona 500? That’s what NASCAR hopes for with the introduction of its new Gen-6 race car. *NASCAR: 2013* *Your …
_Welcome to the Frontstretch Foto Funnies! Ever see a photo that’s just begging for a caption? We see them all the time! Each week, we’ll pick a few, and our let our staff give it their best shot. Then we’ll post the best ones for you!_
_Want to get in on the fun? Each week, we’ll also designate one of the photos for fan captions. Leave your best ideas in the comments below or on our Facebook page. We’ll choose our favorite one and reprint the photo next week with its new caption! This week’s Fan Foto is Photo No. 1 (the one with Jimmie Johnson looking like he has a headache). Ready, set…caption that!_
*Come back every Thursday, to the website to get Jeff’s advice on who to pick for your team, all season long and see if you can beat your favorite staff members! More special announcements about this league to come.*
Daytona is just around the corner, so it’s time to rev up that NASCAR fantasy engine again. When it comes to playing fantasy sports, we all like to think we have some inside secret, or maybe some unique idea that can shoot us to the top. We like to think we know more than the other people we’re playing against.
But having played in many a fantasy league in many a sport (baseball, football, basketball, hockey, NASCAR) more often than not, having success is more about not making the huge mistake than coming up with a sleeper pick who comes up big consistently. So whether you are in league that limits drivers to a certain amount of races for the 36-race season (Yahoo gives drivers nine) or a where you have drivers for an entire season, one of the key factors is to not mess up that early “sleeper” selection.
*Saturday night was the induction ceremony for this year’s NASCAR Hall of Fame class… but only two of the five being honored were alive to receive their award. With so much history to catch up on, this sport seems to be in a pickle to induct many of their living legends before they, too pass away. Is it important for inductees to still be living when they receive this honor and, if so, how do the powers that be solve this problem? *
Summer: I’ve heard several people say induct as many as ten per year, but that would take away from the prestige, I think.
Amy: It’s more important for the most deserving people to be inducted. I think ten would have been the way to go the first year, maybe even the second, but not anymore.
*Did You Notice?…* The influx of young talent entering prime rides in 2013? The Frontstretch Staff “discussed this one”:https://frontstretch.com/tbowles/42294/ in the sixth and final part of our season preview but, instead of answering there I wanted to expand on the topic elsewhere. For me, it’s a copout because I have a hard time cutting down the drivers I’m watching to just one or two…
So, without further ado, here’s who you should put on the radar screen…
*10.* The Encore:* Choose what Juan Pablo Montoya will blow up THIS year!
*9.* New windshield name decals replaced with Twitter handles. The driver with the most new followers gets the victory.
*8.* Dunk the Dodo: Fans select one lucky driver to sit in a dunk tank during driver intros, while the rest take their best shot at him as they walk across the stage.
This year’s rendition of the NASCAR offseason was action-packed, to say the least. A new car model has been vigorously tested since the checkered flag last waved at Homestead-Miami, all while several of stock car racing’s biggest names hopped onto the Silly Season carousel, landing with new organizations. Some drivers were left out in the cold, while others look to flourish aboard their newfound rides with high-profile car owners. All of them, inside the garage will be dealing with changes, from one less manufacturer afoot, to new qualifying procedures and the addition of a historic dirt track to the Camping World Truck Series circuit. All of these combine to make the 2013 schedule one of the more highly anticipated we’ve seen since NASCAR’s peak in the mid-2000s.
Leave it to Bristol Motor Speedway to capitalize on its rough-and-tumble reputation in what was perhaps the most creative game of the day in terms of the actual racing at that track. Everyone has seen the carnival games where someone has to launch a beanbag or a ball through a deceptively small hole to win a prize. But for Bristol, could there be a more appropriate version of this one than a helmet toss, paying homage to, among other incidents, Tony Stewart’s display of anger toward Matt Kenseth last summer? Apparently not, because in order to win Bristol’s prizes, fans had to fire a miniature helmet smack through the driver’s side windshield of a cardboard racecar. Sometimes things are simply right, and this game was one of those times.
Today’s Season Preview Topic: The Nationwide and Truck Series have become rich with young talent once again. Give us the one driver from within those two series you’re watching in 2013, and why.
P. Huston Ladner, Senior Writer: Nelson Piquet Jr., in Trucks, and Travis Pastrana in Nationwide. Piquet has started to show that he is a worthwhile talent in oval racing, after spending the past few years converting his abilities from F1. His win last year shows this maturation and the possibility for more. This year, he’ll again be driving the same equipment as the Truck’s reigning champions, James Buescher, and he should be a contender for the title. A foreign-born driver taking the title would be a big splash for the series and might be the kind of factor to help it maintain its existence and grow.
Today’s Season Preview Topic: Bruton Smith has said this January start-and-parking is detrimental to the sport and must be stopped. Do you agree with that statement, and if so, jump in Bruton’s shoes and give us an idea to stop it.
Tom Bowles, Editor-In-Chief: I think start-and-parking has been a problem for years, done in part to make a profit and in part because teams feel hopeless. If you’re no better than a 35th-place car, and the difference between that and 34th in the purse won’t get you an extra set of tires then why finish the race?
I think that mentality was partially addressed by NASCAR through redistributing the purse. But cutting money for 39th through 43rd by $4,000 isn’t enough.