Posts Tagged ‘Auto Racing’

How long before Hendrick steps in to save the 88?

Wednesday, May 27th, 2009

This last weekend at Lowes was painful to watch for two reasons: The rain and the 88.

I started watching NASCAR in 1997 and in that season, Dale Earnhardt Sr was the underdog. He wasn’t on good form and I started to support him, hoping he would improve and return to the days of competitiveness I had read about and seen on video highlights.

When Dale Jr came into the sport, I latched onto him and followed him through the Busch series. I supported his meteoric rise to the Cup series and like an awful lot of NASCAR fans I put my full support behind him after the death of his father in the 2001 Daytona 500.

After a few years of success with his fathers team, Dale Jr left and joined Hendrick motorsports. Last season at times Jr looked like he was a championship contender, but he slowly faded as the season went on and as we started the 2009 Sprint Cup season, he hardly raised his head. Dale Jr is a sleeping giant.

I think it’s quite shocking that Hendrick have let this continue for so long now. I also wonder why?

Dale Jr and Tony Eury Jr (Jr’s Crewchief) are cousins. I can’t imagine how hard it would be for Dale Jr to let his cousin go out of a job and that’s why it has to be time for Hendrick to do it for him. There’s plenty of room in the organization for him, but I think Jr needs someone else to help him.

Still, it isn’t unheard of for a superstar to have a bad year in a Hendrick car: During 2008, Jeff Gordon did not win a single race for the first time since 1993 (his rookie season). I really hope that Dale Jr has a similar turn around because this year, Gordon is flying.

Solution: Big Wrecks at Talladega and Danger to Fans

Tuesday, April 28th, 2009

You want to know what the best solution would be to the possible future fan fatalities at Daytona and Talladega? Put the grandstands on the infield.

You can’t see the track right infront of you anyway, because the angle is too great, while the rest of the oval is quite some distance away. Why not sit them on the infield, where the track is angled towards them and why because of simple physics – a car will likely never end up.

It is only a matter of time before the horrors of the year 1955 visit NASCAR…

New Formula One Points System

Tuesday, March 17th, 2009

Sometimes I think the FIA make rule changes just because they can. This time though, I have to say, it seems they thought about it and still made the wrong decision.

What are they thinking?

I’ve often supported the rule changes, being able to see the positive in things, but this just seems silly and counter-productive to what they have said they want F1 to be. You want to know? Well… The 2009 F1 Champion will be the person who has the most wins. So, theoretically if someone wins 3 times and fails to finish every other race, while the next best person wins twice, and finishes on the podium in every event, scoring 136 points (by the old system) more, they finish second. Nice, huh?

I just don’t get it.

If the 2009 F1 season produces the close competition the FIA want where multiple people get wins, you could have someone who only finished 3 events winning the championship!

How on earth is F1 now supposed to have a champion that is the best? It reminds me of a previous blog post I wrote where I felt that the A1GP series had shown me F1’s failures, where F1 simply was not a display of who was best, it was a display of who had the best car… Now, of course, it isn’t even a display of that!

TV Just can’t show you…

Sunday, November 16th, 2008

I’ve been a racing fan all my life. From a very young age in the UK I would be woken up at 3am by my parents to watch just two things: American Football and Formula One races from East Asia. I had to get to bed early so I could wake up early and unfortunately I was the only person I knew with an interest in those sports.

As I got older I continued to find that the only person crazy about auto racing, was me. When the internet came along it allowed me to find other people with similar interests at last and finally allowed me to find other people who raced simulations.

Until the Inaugural A1GP event at Brands Hatch in 2005 I had only ever seen any racetrack in either a racing game or on TV, I was so shocked to see just how different that fantastic British track was, compared to those games and the 2D image TV had given me.

I’ve been lucky enough during my time with iRacing to be sent to a number of racing facilities (as scanning team backup coverage in a scheduling emergency) and every single one of them I have been shocked by. Those little intricate details that are finally captured and used by the production team after they’ve been captured by the scanner, they’re all things that (having a photographer’s vision) I’ve analysed, trying to figure out how it’s going to affect the cars as they drive it.

This year I’ve been on two scan trips, both of them ovals. Each one amazed me for different reasons and gave me a whole new respect for what those who race on them actually do…

The first track had pretty high banking and as I was standing, gripping hard on the safer barrier for support, I actually realised that if I slipped, I was going to really hurt myself. The greasy sheen that the surface had (because it had newly dried from rain) meant that my sneakers gave me no grip whatsoever. I actually ended up coming down the banking each time with one foot tucked beneath my butt as I just scraped and controlled the inevitable slide down to the apron using my hands. The scale, just the sheer scale, left me in total awe.

So, as someone who isn’t actually afraid of heights, I had a pretty good appreciation after that. I realised that some of these ovals are the modern equivalent of the Roman Colloseum because – even if their life depended on it – some people just could not save themselves from competition or the location itself.

I’m sat in a hotel right now as I post this, I fly home tomorrow. I’ve been at another track this week which frankly looks lifeless and simple on TV, yet I’ve seen now a lot of the little elements that must make this track one of the most challenging facilities around. I think with the level of detail and the magic wand of those guys in the production department, this place could actually become my favorite track within the service.

As crazy as some events might look on TV, they are most certainly a sanitised version of what you see when standing beside the track as a fan, and they cannot possibly compare to the experience within the cockpit. I think that the level of track surface detail you have experienced after racing at Daytona in the Chevy Silverado with iRacing, finally gives fans like me and you a closer appreciation than we could get from standing in the infield. I know that each track I have helped the production dept. with, I have watched the next race there in a totally different way.

Justin Wilson talks about iRacing

Friday, August 29th, 2008

Justin Wilson, former Formula One driver and current Indycar driver talks about his hobbies, including his time spent racing with iRacing. The Interview is a ‘Podcast’ and available here.

Worst Crash Ever? Michael McDowell at Texas

Sunday, April 6th, 2008

It’s really amazing to see this kind of thing. A huge amount of safety has been added to these cars since 2001 and we probably just saw hundreds of them all working together to save this man’s life.


Michael McDowell hits the wall after over-correcting at 185MPH.

David Leslie dies in plane crash…

Monday, March 31st, 2008

David Leslie, former BTCC Champion, died in the plane crash that recently happened in Kent, UK. Also on-board was Richard Lloyd of Apex Motorsports – who was also killed in the crash.

What Made Me?

Thursday, February 21st, 2008

I was thinking today about some of the things that have led me to be who I am, where I am and what I do: It all comes down to my parents.

Just talking about what I do: I work for a software development company. So, how did my parents affect me to form what I do for work?

Well, my fondest memories growing up are ones where my parents played a computer game with me. I remember on the Commodore Vic-20, my parents joining in and playing a text-based adventure game with me. I remember on the Amiga and perhaps the PC, my parents playing the Monkey Island adventures with me.

What I think this did, is gave me attention, something kids obviously need. I don’t have fond memories of playing those games by myself, alone, I remember and have fond thoughts about my mum and dad being there with me. Additionally, my parents often watched motorsport with me, they often woke me up at 3am so I could watch the races in Japan or Australia… How interesting is that?

I believe just those few hours my parents spent with me, formed my love of computers, my love of ‘gaming’, helped with my love of motorsport and eventually, they led me to be working on what I am today.

This then made me think about my little brothers. Although I don’t think they share their gaming with my parents, they did have chance to share it with me. I feel guilty really not being there for them anymore, but I’m glad that they might have memories where I was, even if I was just in the room at the time. I’m really pleased that at an age where most kids didn’t have a computer I was able to provide them with upgrades from my old computers while I was attempting to keep the newest and latest in my own machines.

I sometimes wonder if people know just what an effect they have on those around them…

NASCAR Rules being enforced unfairly? Never!

Saturday, February 17th, 2007

I have to say, it is very unfortunate that NASCAR choose to enforce rules in such an inconsistent manner… For all their talk about cleaning up the sport, about stopping rule-breaking, it seems it was all nothing but hot air.

NASCAR officials have been throwing penalties at stock-car teams this week like baseball brushback artists.

So Thursday’s changeup – a no-call on Jeff Gordon after he had won a 150-mile qualifier with a car that failed post-race inspection – only added to the confusion in the Daytona International Speedway garage.

“I think everybody is confused,” a top crew chief said, asking not to be named. “Four crew chiefs were suspended and lost points. But Jeff Gordon, for the same ‘accidental,’ gets no penalty – he gets to keep the win and the prize money, doesn’t lose any points, and nobody is suspended.

“They’re not enforcing the rules the same for everybody. You just have to decide what is worth the risk? And right now it looks to me like it’s too big a gamble.”

Gordon, whose only penalty was being forced to the rear of the field for the start of Sunday’s Daytona 500, said he was very disappointed at the turn of events.

“We pride ourselves on making sure we’re within the rules,” Gordon said. “It just crushed me when I found out that we were going to be right in the middle of it all (the cheating scandals).

“We’re taking full responsibility. But it was a part failure. A bolt backed off. Because the car was low in inspection, I’m totally in agreement and understand what NASCAR did. I feel the crime fits the punishment, because there was no unfair advantage.

“Obviously this is a dark cloud. But we did win the race, and I feel we won it fair and square.”

That story didn’t sell in much of the garage, however. And teams said it was yet another mixed message from NASCAR. The big message NASCAR has delivered so far, according to some teams, is that it will continue to deal justice arbitrarily.

First, NASCAR has made a big deal out of all the teams that have been busted this week. But just a day after letting owner-driver Michael Waltrip off without a team suspension for using an illegal fuel additive in qualifying, NASCAR then let Gordon off scot-free, despite failing post-race height requirements at the rear quarter-panels. Having a lower-than-legal rear end is a considerable speed-booster, rivals said.

You can read the full article here.

2007 Bud Shootout

Saturday, February 10th, 2007

So, here we are with a new season of NASCAR. Tonight, it may be a non-championship event, but those guys want to win it just as much as ever!

With last years stunning drive, Denny Hamlin has to be the man to beat. During the 2006 season Hamlin showed again and again that he has a huge amount of skill and it’s wonderful to see someone kick-ass who is so new to the sport and not with the Hendrick team!

So, who do I want to win? Dale Earnhardt Jr. Who do I think will win? Denny Hamlin.