Bull

Exactly!

Many people don't like "different", so declare it to be "wrong". I enjoy any kind of motor racing, just some more than others (I think the 13/13 rule sucks as applied in its current form). Comparing a modern Porsche set up for a road course to the NASCAR road course cars is funny! Just like taking that same Porsche and running it on a super speedway and comparing to a NASCAR car would be funny.

Anyway, excellent question Dell!

LVDell

Thanks Bob. As well, your point is very valid. These cars are not exactly road course cars. I deal with these guys ALL THE TIME at VIR member days. On the full course they (the better drivers) are several seconds faster than me but when we run the north course (the layout NASCAR actually tests on) they are a couple seconds SLOWER. On the north course they don't have the benefit of the FULL bridge straight nor the way long back straight to flex that 800+hp muscle.

I'd be curious what the times of the faster PCA guys running the same layout at Sears Point are and then see how that matches up with the NASCAR guys.

By the way, didn't it irritate anybody else that they kept reporting the lap times in average mph rather than the ACTUAL time to get around the circuit???

sbelles

For those with short memories, NASCAR drivers finished 1, 2 and 3 at the Daytona 24 hr race this year.

BrianKeithSmith

The NASCAR drivers drive much cleaner when the purse is small (like the 24).

Kinda like the PCA guys I guess - the purse is small, so no reason to push it too hard

Yesterday's purse was $5.6M - heck I'd beat and bang to get my share of that too

Bryan Watts

There appear to be more than a few racers in here who actually understand just how good these NASCAR guys are and just how tough their job is to pilot those cars around a road course. When you start making comparisons of driving a Winston Cup stock car around a road course to you driving your street Porsche at a DE, you just aren't going to win many battles.

Key question: Do you honestly believe that you could jump in their car and drive faster? And vice-versa, do you think they couldn't jump into your car and go faster than you? These are guys who earn millions of $$ per year to drive race cars...no matter how bad you think they look, they're good. Not only do the "road course ringers" rarely dominate when they are brought in to drive, but the NASCAR guys have been VERY successful when they venture out into road racing in Grand-Am against guys who road race sports cars for a living.

And, as has already been said: when you're racing for the kind of $$ these guys are racing for, you tend to race a little harder than when you're racing for a $10 trophy in 13/13 pretend racing (said as someone who happily participates in lots of 13/13 pretend racing). I suspect that most of the NASCAR regulars would do just fine at a PCA Club Race.

Professor Helmüt Tester

Amen.

Think "190mph school bus", because that's exactly what they handle like. If you haven't driven one of those things, don't judge. Had some sessions in a Busch-series car (back in the V6 era) and in a Cup car, and all I can say is "those guys have incredible skills and big nutz" to drive'em as fast as they do.

Bryan Watts

I haven't driven a Cup car, but I have raced a school bus around a 1/4 mile oval track.

MTosi

I agree with most of the points made in this thread, and have tremendous respect for the Cup guys on ovals. However on road courses I have a very different view point. Something actually swayed my opinion alot during the race, and that was the onboard they showed with Elliot Sadler (Running 5th or 6th at the time) He was driving with his hands on top of the wheel like grandma, just coasting and steering through the esses like he was out for a Sunday ride. At that moment in time he was actually catching Marcos Ambrose, no matter how hard you try, I will never be convinced that Elliot Sadler is a better road course racer in anything than a two time Australian Touring Car champ.

When the Cup guys get to a road course they have 20 years of setup data, the best equipment and best motors in the field. The road racers are often stuck with sub par equipment (never Hendrick, Roush, RCR, etc,), and are usually punted off by the Nascar regulars (ie. Marcose, Pruett, Fellows). In addition to that when they get to the Glen they run the shortcourse which has basically all right handers, allowing them to corner weight the car for right hand corners (when the glen comes around watch how much time the road racers gain on the one real left hand corner). If they were to run a real road course (Glen, w/boot, Laguna, Elkhart, etc) the road racers would do far better.

Not to mention the common example of how well Nascar guys do in Grand Am is bogus, first of all they are running with 3 other road course racers in the same car, second they are running endurance races where raw outright speed is not as important, third they are running against alot of pay for your riders, and they are running Daytona with alot of banking which is their specialty (when Earnhart ran daytona with Vette he was 2 full seconds quicker around the banking than the regular drivers). Lets put a Nascar boy in a F1, ALMS, DTM sprint race (no road racers to back them up) and see how great of road racers they are............... Despite my tremendous respect for the Cup drivers, I get sick of these bogus assuptions and snide remarks by many in the Nascar community, that they are some how "better" than road racers, when there has never been a true comparison...

BrianKeithSmith

A few years ago Tony Stewart and Dale Jr were on the same team at the 24 with Andy Wallace as I recall in a DP Prototype. During the night it rained.

Here are 2 guys who don't run in the rain, nor run on road courses very often, nor do they drive "sports car" type cars with tons of downforce, etc.

And I distinctly remember the SPEED commentators specifically pointing out that both Stewart and Jr had the fastest laps of ANYONE during the night - IN THE RAIN.

We could argue this stuff until the cows come home, and its been argued/discussed on here at least twice per year (around the time of the Sears Point and Glen races) every single year since I joined Rennlist in 2000.

Brian

Bull

Around here we can go to Pocono and do the "NASCAR Experience" (about 1.5 hours away), where they get you in a detuned NEXTEL Cup car and do a fairly fast follow the leader run around the tri-oval. People who do it are amazed at what a handful the cars are, even at 40-50mph less than the pros drive them.

Bull

And for many years prior to that! Everyone has their anecdotal evidence from which they draw broad, sweeping generalizations that serve to support their opinions. Ain't it fun????!!!!!

Benton

p a r a g r a p h s

JimB

Wandering back to the original topic, I use the club version of the KoolBox. It works great. Having fresh cool air in your helmet in fantastic and, unlike the coolsuit, never runs out of cool air.

The only time I didn't like it was sitting on the grid angle parked next to Norm at Sebring. The back of his car was right next to my air inlet. I was kicked back enjoying the nice fresh air when he fired up his breast and filled my system with whatever that thing burns.

MTosi

Done... Thats was one big half awake incoherent monday morning rambling....

993inNC

I'm not comparing my 993 (just as much track prep'd as street now, thanks) to a Cup car. I'm mearly commenting on the style of driving a few of the racers chose to take. I assure you some of the stuff I saw has absolutely nothing to do with the car, it was ALL driver! I raced for years and held a regional and national SCCA license so I think I understand a racing "incident" and an un obtainable "cheap shot" attempt.

I would hope for their sake that they would be able to jump in my car and drive better! That is what someone was saying earlier (their cars not being as capable at road racing as our cars would/could be). As for me, I have no idea if I could go faster, the point at hand is the lack of clean racing practices, not the capability of the car. I completely agree in that anyone who can strap into a car and go round and round for 4 hours without a break is quite a human being. I can assure you I couldn't do that with the level of concentration, hell I couldn't do it period But we are talking about a short road race not 4 hours of roundy round.

Not sure I agree with that last comment, I do agree about the racing harder, also helps that they aren't paying for anything like we do, but still. Lets face it, Nascar (like it or not) is the Gene Simmons (Kiss), the WWF of the racing world. Its about the money and the spectacle, if it wasn't they wouldn't run restrictor plates (oh I know the speed/safety factor, I know)