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NASCAR’s System Flawed?

by Tim Zaegel on February 26th, 2008

First off, I’d like to apologize for getting this week’s “DYN Imposes” topic out a day late. With the extended weekend out in Fontana, I didn’t have much time to prepare anything for Tuesday, and this week’s topic is one that I wanted to give the proper justice rather than rushing it. With everything that’s already happened in NASCAR’s highly anticipated, yet young 2008 season, you’re probably expecting to start reading about Robby Gordon’s penalties incurred from Daytona or the impressive showing from Toyota thus far. Well, you’d be wrong. Quite frankly, I’m tired of having the same ol’ Robby Gordon debate with people that’s been going on for the last week, and Kyle Busch and/or Toyota is/are mentioned in nearly every post or story regardless of where you’re reading. No, this week I want to talk about NASCAR’s system for determining provisionals, because if this season has taught us anything, it’s the severe repercussions that this system can have on our sport.

NASCAR currently uses the system the cars ranked in the top 35 in owner points are guaranteed to start each race, with the remaining slots to be filled via qualifying times. They also incorporate a Past Champion’s provisional, which means if you’re a former Cup Champion, you’re also guaranteed a start in the race if you fail to qualify on time – except that only one driver may use this provisional in a race. For the first five races of the season, the top 35 in owner points is determined from the previous year’s standings, and the only other caveat to the normal rules is for the Daytona 500 where the remaining spots after the use of provisionals is no longer determined by qualifying times, but rather by where the drivers finish in their respective Gatorade Duels after Qualifying. Pretty straight forward, right? (note the sarcasm)

If you’re new to this sport as a fan, trust me, it’s as complicated as it looks. Heck, chances are I may not have even explained it thoroughly and probably left something out. It can be tough to explain, it’s just one of those things that you know after awhile. Well, here’s where it gets really tricky … note the emphasis on the term owner points. These are different that driver points and are used because of situations where teams change drivers throughout the course of the season. This way team owners can still accrue owner points for that particular car. It’s also crucial to teams that hire new drivers in the offseason. For instance, this past offseason Regan Smith, Jeremy Mayfield, Travis Kvapil, and Dario Franchitti – all drivers that were previously not eligible for the top 35 provisionals – moved into cars that were, meaning guaranteed starts for them in the first five races of the year that would have otherwise not been available to them. In an even stranger situation, Penske Racing revived their no. 77 racing team to give rookie Sam Hornish Jr. a ride this season. Typically, Hornish would have begun the season outside of the top 35 in owner points, but Roger Penske convinced NASCAR to allow Kurt Busch to transfer his team’s points over to Hornish’s, thus giving him the coveted provisionals for those five races. The effect on Busch’s team is nil during that period – with the exception that he would begin in the back of the field for races that had qualifying rained out – because he already qualifies for use of the Past Champion’s provisional.

Okay, I know I’ve lost some of you at this point, but try to bear with me because the side-effects of all this that I’m about to lay out for you may help clarify some of this for you … or just add to your confusion. We’ll see. Let’s start with Daytona … Bill Elliott failed to make the race because Kurt Busch had already used the Past Champion’s provisional after failing to finish his Gatorade Duel. Had he not been able to transfer his owner points to Hornish, however, Busch would have still made the race based on the top 35 rule, and Hornish would have raced his way into the race anyway. Elliott finished 16th in his Duel, while Dario Franchitti finished 25th and Jeremy Mayfield finished 20th. Yet, they both made the race because of the top 35 rule. Even worse, though, is for AJ Allmendinger who qualified 19th overall and finished his Duel event in 13th, yet failed to make the race. It’s clear here where the effects of the transfer in owner points can have a huge effect on making these first five races.

Now, let’s forget about the transferring of owner points for a second and just focus on NASCAR’s use of the Gatorade Duels for making the Daytona 500. Had they used normal qualifying procedures for determining the starting grid at Daytona, Bill Elliott would have actually made the race via the champion’s provisional and Boris Said would have made the field from his 9th place qualifying run, whereas John Andretti and Kenny Wallace would have been shutout from the competition.

Well, that’s Daytona. It’s neither here nor there, because it is afterall, only one race. Taking that into consideration, maybe NASCAR’s system works, or at least works well enough to not make a huge fuss over it. But, what if the second event on the schedule gets qualifying rained out? That’s exactly what happened, and now due to a various combination of potential flaws coming together within the sport’s system,  two weeks into the season AJ Allmendinger, Boris Said, and rookie Patrick Carpentier haven’t yet had the opportunity to compete despite outstanding qualifying efforts at Daytona. Meanwhile, Mayfield, Franchitti, and Regan Smith would have failed to make the race at Daytona – whether determined by qualifying or the Duels – yet, each now has two more starts than the previously mentioned three drivers.

The effect of this goes much deeper than just the fact that these drivers did not get to compete in the first to races. It also puts them in a devastating hole that they’ll have to climb out of if they want any shot at regaining enough ground to finish 2008 in the top 35 so that they don’t have to go through this again next year. At the same time, you have the intangible of what it does with these drivers’ relationships with their team owners, and the effects that it has on the owners’ relationships with their sponsors. These simple flaws could see these drivers lose the necessary financial backing that it takes to compete on a competitive level, or even worse, cause them to lose their ride altogether. Am I being a little drastic? Perhaps, but trying telling that to Allmendinger. AJ’s currently in his second year with Toyota at the Cup level, and as horrid as 2007 was for him, he had the most accessible scapegoat known to man in the form of Toyota. This year that group’s got their act together and they’re running well, but we have no idea if Allmendinger can be as competitive as the rest of these guys, and neither does Team Red Bull. The question is, by the time anyone does realize, will it already be too late?

There’s a ton of different scenarios I could play out through the first two weeks regarding NASCAR’s provisional system, but I’ll spare you for confusion’s sake, and also because it really doesn’t matter since in reality it just is what it is. I just think that at this point it’s becoming blatantly obvious that there’s a few guys out there getting the shaft while others are getting free passes that they never earned. Travesty is the only word you need to sum it up.

DYN Imposes:  This week, Do You NASCAR also asks you …

1) Should NASCAR revise their top 35 rule to reflect the top 35 in driver points rather than owner points?
2) Should team owners be able to transfer points from one car to another?
3) Would NASCAR be better off to determine the starting grid for the Daytona 500 based on Qualifying rather than running the Gatorade Duels?
4) Overall, who has been the biggest gainer and the biggest loser so far in 2008 by virtue of NASCAR’s current system?

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