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Did NASCAR Level The Playing Field?

An Opinion



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November 8, 2010

By Allen Madding

Allen Madding

On the final lap of the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Mountain Dew 250 at Talladega Superspeedway, Kyle Busch went below the yellow line and violated NASCAR’s Superspeedway “out of bounds” zone to make the final pass and win the race.

Up until last Saturday, NASCAR had always firmly enforced no passing below the yellow line at Talladega and Daytona. But this time around, Busch passed below the yellow line and NASCAR stood silent and awarded him the win.

Conspiracy theories immediately began whirling around the country while fans expressed their outrage at the apparent inconsistencies of the rule enforcement by the sanctioning body. Numerous theories have been aired all week long in email, blog posts, Twitter, and Facebook.

One theory that was repeated by many was that NASCAR was taking a play from wrestling promotions.

Wrestling has always had a bad guy that the fans loved to hate. The bag guy comes out into the ring and reveals he has a steel bat in the sleeve of his robe. But the referee in the ring does not see it. The crowd starts shouting, “he has a bat!” But the bad guy hides it and the match goes on. The bad guy eventually uses the bat to knock the good guy out cold and then hides the bat. The referee declares the bad guy the winner. And the crowd is outraged and goes home to talk about it all week.

This theory seems the most plausible out of the myriads of others. The bad guy got away with something and the fans have talked about it all week.

So Saturday, coming to a green-white-checker finish in the NASCAR Nationwide Series Texas Nationwide 300 at Texas Motor Speedway, Kyle Busch is lined up with Carl Edwards. There are a set of red lines painted on the outside wall that defines the restart area. Two corresponding white lines are painted on the apron at the inside of the track which can be clearly seen from NASCAR’s control tower, from the grandstands, and on TV from an overhead shot, which the networks just happen to use on restarts. Carl Edwards jumps in the throttle three car lengths before the restart area.

When the field crosses the start/finish line, Edwards has a significant lead. Everyone looks to the flagstand for the black flag to be waved. But nothing happens. Most expect NASCAR will display Edwards’ car number on the two digit display board below the flagstand and wave the black flag when he comes by on the white flag lap. But again, nothing happens. The white flag waves and Edwards leads another lap back to get the checkered flag.

Interestingly enough, the TV broadcasters do not show a replay of the restart. They do however mention to Edwards that Kyle Busch was claiming that he jumped the restart. Edwards’ reply, “Did you see the big check I got?”

Busch erupts into a verbal tirade with Performance Racing Network (PRN), which had to use the 10-second delay to bleep out his expletives from radio broadcast.

Busch then goes to the Media Center and erupts into another profanity laced protest of the final restart.

Meanwhile NASCAR does what it has always done so well. It remained quiet about the issue and the TV broadcasters did not attempt to interview NASCAR officials regarding the final restart.

Why, you ask, did they allow Edwards to clearly jump in the gas before reaching the restart area, clearly painted on the track? (If anyone doubts his guilt, the video of the restart is on YouTube.)

Remember last week’s truck race at Talladega?

NASCAR let Kyle Busch get away with one there and get a win that he was not entitled to.

This week, by allowing Edwards to jump the restart, they just kind of set things straight.

NASCAR giveth and NASCAR taketh away.

You can contact Allen Madding at .. Insider Racing News
You Can Read Other Articles By Allen Madding

The thoughts and ideas expressed by this writer or any other writer on Insider Racing News, are not necessarily the views of the staff and/or management of IRN.

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