Happy Hour: RCR’s appeal, the All-Star Race and more
Throughout the week you can send us your best questions, jokes, rants and just plain miscellaneous thoughts to [email protected] or @NickBromberg. We’ll post them here and have a good time.
Richard Childress Racing released a statement Thursday about its appeal of the penalties levied towards the No. 31 team for tire manipulation at Fontana.
“Our appeal is scheduled for Thursday, April 16. We feel confident we have a very compelling case to present to the appeals panel. We strongly believe in the intent of the rules and the integrity of our own teams while following those same rules. Out of respect for the appeal process, we will have no further comments until after the hearing.”
intriguing, isn’t it?
We also can’t help but think back to RCR’s last big penalty. It happened in 2010 when Clint Bowyer’s No. 33 team was penalized 150 points after the car’s left rear didn’t meet template specifications following Bowyer’s win at New Hampshire. The penalty essentially ruined Bowyer’s Chase.
RCR felt it had a pretty rock-solid case back then, bringing in an accident reconstruction expert to testify how damage from the tow truck that pushed Bowyer to victory lane after he ran out of gas. However, NASCAR’s appeals board upheld the penalty and upon final appeal, RCR lost.
We’re not saying RCR is going to lose this one too. But we’re not optimistic about their chances, especially not knowing the details of the case. Why? NASCAR penalties are upheld far more than they’re overturned.
When the news of the All-Star Race’s addition of laps came out earlier in the week, we posed a question on Twitter. Does the $1 million purse to the winning team serve as an All-Star Race selling point to you?
We’ve heard and completely understand the argument that watching multi-million dollar drivers and teams race for $1 million isn’t a draw for a lot of us that aren’t banking seven figures. But we wanted to know how pervasive the thought was. So here’s a sampling of your comments.
We like the charity idea. While fans have been drawn to All-Star Race teams before, why not do it like the Prelude to the Dream was set up? Each team or groups of teams could have a charity and the winning charity gets $1 million.
Here’s another issue you can bring up about the marketing of the $1 million. It’s a tacit admission that drivers and teams need further incentivization to win. Without the prize, they wouldn’t take the race seriously enough to try to win it.
And that’s seeped into the NASCAR regular season with the idea that “winning is everything” and drivers and teams would try harder to win races in the current Chase format than they would have otherwise.
It’s all garbage. Racers race to win. And if you can’t win, you want the best finish possible, especially as we’ve seen how the points format excruciatingly punishes bad finishes. While the prize money is a nice carrot for participating teams, it should be far from the only reason a team wants to win.
This is an intriguing thought. What if the race was for a bigger winner’s purse (like say $2 million) or a Chase spot? Teams and drivers who are in the Chase would have a nice cash reward and it’s another way for someone else like Jamie McMurray to get into the Chase.
And if you’re going to respond that this idea is gimmicky, save it. Look at the Chase format already.
This was also a common theme. Not only do more short tracks need to be on the schedule, we agree the All-Star Race should be at one too. But which one? It’s admittedly an idea much easier said than done.
Oh, we’d jump at the chance to be guest starter. And do we want to ruin our beautiful hair? We’re going to have to debate that one. It’s still funny every week to see the NASCAR official starter with a helmet and looking like a stormtrooper while the honorary starters have no head protection at all. Why there haven’t been any steps to rectify the inconsistency over the first six weeks is quite odd.
We’d go with a Royals helmet, but may also have to support the alma mater too. A football helmet would be fun, especially if we’re the guest starter at a race in SEC country. Would have to do some trollin’.
Before we go, we feel obligated to give an update to our Easter candy Power Rankings. We backed up our words and bought a lot of Cadbury Creme Eggs after Easter. So many, in fact, that we reached triple digits. As we type these words, 96, or one eaten per day, are left.
– – – – – – –
Nick Bromberg is the editor of From The Marbles on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at [email protected] or follow him on Twitter!
