Daily NASCAR

NASCAR’s first team test of the new spoiler at Talladega led the news this week. Officials with NASCAR said they were pleased with the results of the test and said the spoiler would officially be implemented next weekend at Martinsville. Echoing NASCAR’s sentiment many drivers said they were eager to see spoiler in effect during a race. In other news, NASCAR legends Larry Pearson and Charlie Glotzbach were injured in a wreck during an exhibition race at Bristol on Saturday. Pearson suffered a compound fracture of his left ankle, a fractured pelvis and a fractured right hand. This is the NASCAR week that was March 14 to 20, 2010.

NASCAR legend faces surgery after wreck

Planning a race weekend takes months of calculation

Whatever Happened to Mr. Excitement?

Feuding Carl Edwards, Kevin Harvick could be the next two drivers to ‘have at it.’

The ABCs of Flying Cars: Aerodynamics, Brad and Carl

NASCAR confirms spoiler will return at Martinsville

Vintage Insiders

NASCAR Families

What Have You Done For Me Lately

**Remember if you have a NASCAR blog or website and would like a recent article you wrote featured in this section email me and you could be part of next week’s NASCAR Week That Was. Please only send stuff you have written.**

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I don’t understand JR Motorsports. They spend an awful lot of time complaining about their money situation. Dale Jr. advertised how much the wrecks cost him at Daytona; and they seem to constantly be advertising their struggle to find sponsorship (welcome to the club). And lest you think otherwise their team spokesman is more than willing to underscore how much Jr. is putting into the team out of his own pocket. So what do they do? They decide they’re going to run a car full time that they don’t appear to have fully funded. What!?

Apparently it was just too good of a team not to run full-time. And That’s fine. I’m happy for Scott Wimmer. Certainly Wimmer is a proven winner in the Nationwide Series and he’s a little easier sell to sponsors. When he’s in good equipment he’s shown he can be competitive. But why the sudden change in rhetoric?

Maybe they do have money lined up for this team. Maybe this weekend is a way for them to cement some deal. Or perhaps they lined something up for the #88 and had enough money from another deal to keep this thing going. I don’t know.

If they don’t though I hope for their sake they’re not going to try the ‘let’s run well and hope we impress a sponsor strategy.’ We saw how well that worked for Ganassi, not once but twice. Ask Aric Almirola and Dario Franchitti (and all the people who got laid off). Or how about RAB Racing, a team that really doesn’t have any money, trying to make a go at a full-time run this season with Scott Riggs (right now their asking fans to help sponsor their ride). This strategy generally has one certain result: lost money.

Unfortunately waiting and hoping you can quickly put a deal together just isn’t very realistic, especially in the Nationwide Series. You can get away with running a competitive truck team (and not lose your ass) by piecemealing different small deals; it’s substantially harder in the Nationwide Series (unless Junior is willing to lose some money).

It’s fine if they want to run a team full-time without full funding. I don’t care. But quit talking about your money issues and how much everything is going to cost you. We get it at this point.

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by Holly Cain

Filed under: Other Racing Series

David Brabham is one of the most accomplished racers of his generation, with a Formula One ride in the early 1990s followed by victories at LeMans and Sebring and an American Le Mans Series championship last year. Well traveled and worldly wise, Brabham was born in England, raised in Australia and has competed everywhere in between.

Brabham, 44, is a big picture kind-of-guy who is as passionate in raising money to fight malaria as he is dedicated to his successful racing career. He could be driving a Ferrari around town, but chooses the more efficient Volkswagen Golf.

On his driver’s suit, where most drivers wear a flag representing their home country, Brabham instead has a patch of the planet Earth.

“We are human beings, we don’t belong to a country, we all live on the planet Earth. … it just works for me to think that way,” he explained.

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They don’t get any TV time and you have probably never heard most of their names, but a position within the race teams that continues to gain in importance is the pit crew coach.  Many teams have full time coaches, while others have part time or contract coaches.  But no matter the level of employment, these guys can really help set a team apart from the competition.

Since they don’t get much coverage, I will throw a few names at you of coaches at the bigger teams: Richard Childress Racing has Matt Clark; Mike Lepp coaches at Joe Gibbs Racing; Greg Morin, Mark Mauldin, and Walt Smith lead the Hendrick crews; Eric Wilson and Andy Ward lead the Petty/Roush conglomerate; Greg Miller is at Michael Waltrip Racing; Lance Munksgard coaches Red Bull; and Trent Cherry coaches at Penske.

During the week, coaches spend their time breaking down the film of the pit stops from the previous weekend and running practices.  Some will also work with their pit crews in the gym, leading workouts and training sessions.  At the race track, (if they don’t go over the wall themselves) they will be looking over the tape of recent pit stops and helping with advice or small adjustments during the race.

Coming up in your career, you encounter all different types of coaches.  And just like any other sport, some coaches are really good, and some are not.  Many come from athletic training backgrounds, while others are ex-changers, carriers, and/or jackmen.

As is the case in most sports, you learn to absorb as much as you can from the really good coaches, and try really hard to not let a bad coach screw you up completely.  The good coaches are the guys that can watch just a few stops and be able to see the small things that either make you good or hold you back.  They know when to step in with some coaching, and when to say nothing.  The bad coaches are just the opposite.  They could watch pit stops for days and never be able to tell you definitively what you are doing right or wrong.  All these guys are good for, is holding the stop watch.

Coaches do have a tough job, because they are often the first person a crew chief or manager searches out when a stop goes wrong.  They have to be able to take the flak from an angry crew chief and translate that into advice or adjustments that will help the crew be better.  And like I said earlier, some are better with this stuff than others.

For me personally, it can be very difficult to listen to a coach who has never been over the wall (trust me, some haven’t).  Racing is such a different sport, that the coaching means a lot more coming from a guy who knows what it’s like to step off the wall during a green flag stop, while your driver is leading.  I’m not saying actual race experience is essential, because some coaches are good at what they do even without that knowledge, but it certainly helps.

As the Cup and Nationwide cars head to Bristol this weekend, I would encourage you to really watch the pit stops during the races.  Bristol’s pit road can get interesting, because of the setup and small pit stalls, and pit stops will be very important to success at Thunder Valley.  When your favorite driver’s team busts off a 12.60 stop and sends him out in the lead, don’t forget about the pit crew coach who helped them do it.

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by Holly Cain

Filed under: Other Racing Series

Every time 26-year-old Morgan Lucas climbs into his 8,000-horsepower, nitro-fueled, super-charged Geico/Toyota Top Fuel dragster to ready himself for a 325-mph run down the narrow 1,000-foot drag strip, his nerves are on end, his adrenaline is flowing and his heart is pounding.

But it’s nothing compared to what the National Hot Rod Association’s (NHRA) youngest Top Fuel driver experiences standing at the start line watching his nearly 60-year-old mother, Charlotte Lucas, race down the same track at 170 mph in the Super Comp class, driving a miniature version of Lucas’ dragster.

“She always gets so nervous watching me, and now I know how she feels,” Morgan Lucas said. “I get that same nervousness watching her race.

“She wanted to see the passion and learn why I was always so excited to get in the car. And now she gets it.”

Boy, does she.

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