Now I pose the question above, last weekends Nextel All-Star Challenge resulted in the Windtunnel question of the week, who should qualify for the All-Star race? I noticed that one of the past all-star race winners was not in the race, in 1996, Michael Waltrip won the all-star race and despite the fact that Michael Waltrip is driving for a different team namely his own, he won the all-star race 11 years ago and should have automatically been in the all-star race no questions asked.
In addition to past winners, any year, the field should also include drivers who have won a race the past year and that year as well, followed by past Nextel Cup Champions.
With all that said, what an all-star race and the yet again changed format, this time is was:
- First quarter: 20 laps / optional pit stop during five-lap caution period.
- Second quarter: 20 laps / ten minute "halftime" break to make adjustments; no inversion of the field.
- Third quarter: 20 laps / mandatory pit stop (or "stop and go") during five-lap caution period.
- Fourth quarter: 20 green flag laps. (Credit: Wikpedia)
Winner of each segments gets $75,000 and the winner of the final segment namely the All-Star winner receives 1 million dollars.
Not a bad format, it had its moments and so did these races. Looking back at the Nextel Open where the winner and runner up advantages to the All-Star race, the action was simple being first on lap one when Juan Montoya started a huge 6+ car wreck coming off of turn 2 as he was just too over something. I don’t know what that guy was thinking, he was at fault plain and simple and then after wrecking the #38, he pulls out back into traffic and clips another car, yeah, someone needs to have a long talk with that guy.
Before the final 5 laps of the open, Carl Edwards ran away with it all, but things went away with Truex Jr and Sauter chancing Edwards down and passing him with a split move and Martin Truex Jr. ended up holding of Johnny Sauter for the Nextel Open victory. The fan vote, Vote in Kenny, and they did, Kenny Wallace wins fan vote. I don’t know what to think of the fan vote, but….
The Nextel All-Star race with none other than yellow walls… yeah that says Nextel. There was one big story going into the All-Star race, NASCAR losses stay and AT&T’s logo goes on to the #31 Jeff Burton car. I for one still couldn’t understand what NASCAR-Nextel are complanting about, but congrads to AT&T, now hopefully it stays on period. What a way to treat a long time sponser, just because Cingular merges/gets buyed up by AT&T, they can’t put the new logo on, come on, not cool. Check out these pictures that ATTNews.us sent me via email and the paint scheme will stay the same.Cingular, the new AT&T, they might just earn my business as I have Boost Mobile prepaid, if they only had one coverage map for every plan including the Prepaid wireless and there long distance wasn’t so weird. Does anyone use Cingular, the new AT&T prepaid wireless, how is it?
Moving on to the main event, the All-Star race, I will remember this race for tires vs track that doesn’t mix, hard to pass, three wide on the restart and mainly for two reasons, a sight that says look out as Kyle Busch wrecks brother Kurt Busch and on the radio blames brother for accident when making a pass though the grass and not giving enough room on entry, spins and collects his brother, that’s good. But the three wide pass on the restart for the final segment was it and it was all Kevin Harvick needed to hold off Johnson and win the Nextel All-Star Challenge. This race could have been better, but its not the drivers fault, they raced hard all night long and its not Johnson’s house this night, I wouldn’t beat against him in the 600.
NASCAR’s Car of Tomorrow goes full-time in 2008:
I like this idea and support it, despite the fact that “it doesn’t have that wow factor” (by DW), namely its ugly, the safety features and one car for just about every track out weights the everything else. Yes, I would have liked to see NASCAR fix up the current car, but lets face it, the COT created better racing so far and better finishes, plus it hurts Jeff Gordon’s bump and run move, the front and rear bumps are the same height and a bump only purpells the car forward when hit. Plus, owners couldn’t afford the regular schedule, two different cars was going to bankrupt some owners, just too much money. Hopefully everyone sees the benefits of the COT including less cost that now needs to start show results.
Now all we have to do is make the car look a lot better and have each car make have there own marks on the cars besides decals – words and grill layout. Heard that the hood, roof and rear deck is stamped differently for each car? Unknown on that. Well that’s it here, See Yeah!
