April 19, 2010
By Matthew Pizzolato
Matthew Pizzolato
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A new age has dawned in stock car racing – the era of manufactured excitement. It's nothing more than a sign of the times. Due to the economy, NASCAR has been plagued recently by declining ticket sales and dropping television ratings.
A lot of changes have been made since the beginning of the season, some that were needed and some that were not. But perhaps the biggest change and what is quickly becoming the most controversial is the new green-white-checkered rule that officials have instituted, where three attempts will be made to end the race under the green flag conditions.
The idea is to keep more fans around for the end of the race, but is it possible that NASCAR is shooting themselves in the foot by trying to do too much? What's the purpose of racing 500 miles and then having a shootout to determine the winner?
NASCAR has already tried the same theory when they changed the point format from the old system to the Chase for the Championship. So far the only result has been complete dominance by Jimmie Johnson, who may very well be on his way to his fifth consecutive championship.
At Martinsville, Jeff Gordon found himself in a position to win, only to have the chance snatched away by a caution flag and the ensuing green-white-checkered finish. The finish at Phoenix could have worked in his favor had he not spun the tires on the final restart, allowing the 39 car of Ryan Newman to get past him.
There are those that believe Newman stole a victory, but he did nothing more than benefit from the new rule change, and the decision by Tony Gibson, his crew chief, to take just two tires.
"Gibson wanted to put four [tires] on it," Newman was quoted as saying in a Mark Aumann article for nascar.com. "I said, 'put two on me.' I didn't want to get jumped by a bunch of guys that did two. As it turned out, I don't know where the first guy was that finished on four tires. I don't know if he was even in the top five. He made the ultimate call."
It would seem that crew chiefs have been regulated to nothing more than riverboat gamblers. Gone are the days of late race strategy, of pitting out of order, or of fuel mileage. Race wins are a product of out-gambling the competition, by taking two tires or four, or not pitting at all under the final caution before the green-white-checkered finish.
Having one attempt at finishing under green is fine and admirable. No one likes to watch an entire race only to have it end under caution. But three attempts may be pushing the envelope a little too much.
It doesn't help matters any that NASCAR has been accused of creating GWC finishes by throwing unneeded cautions, similar to the phantom debris yellows that some critics say officials use to bunch the field back up when the leaders get too much of gap on the rest of the field during the races.
Instead of having the effect that NASCAR officials intend, could all of the manufactured excitement be driving fans away? Because a GWC finish every week is quickly becoming trite.
Granted, the new rule can create an exciting finish, but also angers fans whose favorite driver has been dominate the entire day yet winds up losing the race in the final laps in the name of "excitement."
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