The news earlier this week that 1997 Formula One champion Jacques Villeneuve was joining Bill Davis Racing in anticipation of running a full-time Cup schedule next year has left some NASCAR fans feeling a bit conflicted about where their sport is heading. Take a look at a few excerpts from this article by Michael Daly that ran yesterday on the Web site catchfence.com, titled "A Coming De-Americanization of NASCAR?"
It would seem that going to F1 and open wheel championship-style race drivers is a by-product of NASCAR's recent technology revolution. One need only look at this year's rookie battle - Juan Montoya has not consistently grasped racing a stock car, but he remains miles ahead of David Ragan, who looks completely and utterly clueless.
Which begs the question -- is NASCAR going to become de-Americanized? We saw it with the technology revolution of open wheel championship racing in the 1980s and then there is the proverbial dog that didn't bark -- what we AREN'T seeing is as telling as what we are seeing; in this case what we aren't seeing is any particular lobby for seat-of-the-pants short trackers to race Winston Cup cars.
Now this may be just a comparative fad; right now I don't particularly see Winston Cup becoming F1 lite as far as most of its drivers go. But I also don't see it getting back to the kind of seat-of-the-pants racers that are more worth embracing than the engineering conduits that F1-style drivers too often come out as. And given what the sport has already lost in terms of soul and competitive fire, losing that kind of racer will hurt it even more.
The F1 phenomenon presents a clear conflict for NASCAR fans. On one hand, the migration of the circuit's drivers to Nextel-Cup is a clear sign that stock-car racing, because of its competitiveness, has the sort of status it once lacked in comparison to other series. A few weeks ago at Watkins Glen, Juan Pablo Montoya said as much when he told me why he made the move to NASCAR, "There's nothing more exciting than driving a car in Formula One. But the racing in the Formula-One car is not that exciting."
But with NASCAR's newfound status, the circuit's hard-core fans -- the kind who worship at the altars of Petty and Earnhardt -- suddenly find themselves in the position of cheering for, in their eyes, a bunch of continental swells, men of the world who are more likely to own a home in Saint Tropez or Cannes than in Mooresville, N.C. Even worse, the coming breed of NASCAR star seems to be beholden to the technology in the car, making him less of a driver, in the classic sense. These are legitimate concerns, especially for a sport that, because of its roots in the moonshine business, might be the most American game of all.
But the situation may not be as dire as some fear. Yes, NASCAR has taken a quantum technological leap forward in the last few years, and engineers play a much bigger role than they used to, but I promise that there is still a tremendous amount of seat-of-the-pants driving going on. Heck, that's what Montoya is learning to do this year, to figure out how his car behaves at the beginning of a run as opposed to the end, and how that changes from track to track. You might say that the best drivers on the circuit today are the ones who've learned how to best drive by the seats of their fireproof pants.
Also, the Car of Tomorrow shows that NASCAR is serious about limiting the technological advantages that some of its bigger teams enjoy. Will the CoT do that? We don't yet know for sure. In a sport that comes down to fractions of a second, common sense says that the teams with the most resources will be the ones best able to squeeze the most out of their equipment. But at the very least, the CoT demonstrates that NASCAR knows that its competitiveness is what makes its racing special. That knowledge won't keep foreign drivers from invading the sport, but it should help ensure that they handle their cars like Americans once they get here.
How to Drive ...
Dale Earnhardt Jr. discusses the upcoming race at Fontana:
"We've really hit upon a set-up that works great here and at Michigan (the sister-track to California). We had a cut tire early in the race here in February and hurt the engine so we really couldn't show our cards. But we were second at this race last year, so I'm confident. This race is one of those rough late-afternoon starts, so the track starts off in the sunlight and in the heat of the day, and then as it cools we have to fight a wicked, blinding sunset as we head down the backstretch. And the track cools and changes as the darkness comes in. That makes it a challenge to keep making adjustments to the car that will match what the track surface is doing."
• 899:Career starts for Ricky Rudd, 50, who run in his 900th Nextel-Cup race on Sunday at California; both totals are the most among active drivers, and the second most all-time.
• 158:Points separating 13th-place Dale Earnhardt Jr. from 12th-place Kurt Busch in the Nextel Cup Standings heading into Sunday's race.
• 161:The maximum number of points a driver can make up in one race.
Lately, Kevin Harvick has been the gift that keeps on giving to the ol' meter. His tangle with Robby Gordon in the final laps at Bristol last Saturday night ensures that once again, the arrow is pointing straight up. And there is the prospect of future excitement. Though there didn't appear to be any clear proof that Harvick was at fault for spinning Gordon out, the two have a rocky past, and we could see the No. 7 car looking for payback sometime soon.
