These are not the palmy days for NASCAR, which once bestrode the American motorsports scene like a Colossus and now bestrides it like a Colossus who shrunk in the dryer. And now Colossus is all faded, too.
Consider, for instance, what's happened in the last month, and especially in the last four or five days:
* Hendrick Motorsports, one of NASCAR's pillars, partnered with McLaren to give Kyle Larson, one of NASCAR's biggest stars, a shot at the Indianapolis 500.
* Because of that, when rain soaked Indy on race day and delayed the start of the Spectacle by four hours, Hendrick and Larson decided to stay and run the 500 rather than bail for Charlotte to run the Coca-Cola 600.
* Because of that, NASCAR has to decide whether or not to waive the rule for Larson that stipulates Cup regulars must run every race to qualify for the playoffs.
* Then there was the 600 itself, which NASCAR declared a race with 151 laps still to run and the track damp with rain. Like so much else in the NASCAR biosphere, this got some folks crabbing that NASCAR quit on its Memorial Day centerpiece, and that it instead should have waited out the wet and finished the race, even though it would have stretched into the wee hours of Monday morning.
* Last but hardly least, Stewart-Haas Racing, another NASCAR pillar, chose the day after Memorial Day to announce it is shuttering its NASCAR operations at the end of this season. This is not like the Bubba 'N' Them Family Of Car Washes race team pulling the plug on its deal, mind you; it removes from the series a 15-year-old entity that has won two Cup titles and 69 races since its formation.
Hell of a month. Hell of a last few days. And not in a good way.
Even before Tuesday's announcement, after all, NASCAR observers were saying allowing NASCAR teams to set up deals with outside entities to let NASCAR regulars run outside events is a slippery slope of the first magnitude. If they're gonna do it for the 500, what's next? LeMans? The Monaco Grand Prix? What?
The Blob's take on this is everyone should drop those pearls they're clutching, because the 500 is the 500 and everything else is not. It's the oldest, largest and most iconic motorsports event in the world, and not by a little. It's why F1 and NASCAR drivers have for decades been making the pilgrimage to Indianapolis in May.
Back in the 1960s, for instance, F1 stars Jim Clark and Graham Hill won the 500, and Jackie Stewart, Jochen Rindt, Denny Hulme and Jack Brabham raced in it. And between 1970 and 1973, Cale Yarborough, LeeRoy Yarbrough, Donnie Allison and Bobby Allison all ran the 500 as a side hustle from their stock-car racin'.
The world didn't end. NASCAR didn't suffer from their brief absence. Cale and LeeRoy and the Allisons didn't suffer, either.
And, yeah, it's different now, because what was then called the World 600 didn't go head-to-head with the 500. On the other hand, Cup racing was strictly a points deal in those days; nowadays, the points accrued in any given race are only a means to an end -- the playoffs -- and Larson will have plenty of chances to make up for any points he lost by staying in Indianapolis. So there's that.
Truth is, this is NASCAR's fault, or rather the fault of NASCAR's hubris. It could easily solve the problem by moving the 600 to Memorial Day itself, or run it Saturday night instead of Sunday night. But this would be admitting the 500 is the bigger event, and too many in NASCAR are still laboring under the delusion that it's 25 or 30 years ago, when NASCAR was that aforementioned Colossus, and the 600 was bigger than the 500.
Those days, clearly, are long gone. IndyCar may still be the 500 and a largely anonymous bunch of street and road races, but NASCAR is a diminished presence itself. It's a case of aggravated living in the past to believe it can still go head-to-head with the Indianapolis 500 and win.
Not the palmy days, no, sir. Not the palmy days at all.
No comments:
Post a Comment