NASCAR is in town, there must be a chance of rain.
With the first night race in Atlanta approaching, there is only one thing for certain on Sunday night. That would be a chance of a rain delay. I am starting to see these rain delays and rescheduling of races as a nice reminder of how out of control the real world is.
In our world we sit around happily in control of our lives and our environment, happily ignoring the things we have no control of. When it comes to racing the multi-million dollar operation that is a weekly televised race is as subject to the whims of the weather as any ancient hunter on the great plains. We are forced to live at the whims of nature.
I know other sporting events must do the same but really, who watches baseball. And football only stops the game when there is lightning. Something about not wanting to see millionaires being lightning rods on live TV.
So, when it comes to Sunday night and I settle back in my recliner ready to watch the first night race I will be ready for the hours of banter and explanations of how long it takes to dry the track. Even the 10 minute discussion about how the track dryers use jet engines and make the track slick due to the residue from the jet fuel. It is just part of being a race fan.
And oh, it is a 20% chance of rain right now.
NASCAR – Racing in the rain – Montreal PTSS
I have long been a proponent for NASCAR racing in the rain. Ask anyone that has been unfortunate enough to be around me when it starts to rain at a race. I am ready to admit I was wrong. There is no need to put on rain tires and a windshield wiper to have $100,000 racing cars smash into each other. It is not good racing, it is just luck. While it might be fun for a demolition derby fan that was a horrible end to a race, Sunday.
The drivers and fans would have been better served by a 1 hour delay and drying the track than to have the wreck fest ensue. I am sure Carl Edwards would differ, since he won, but he might be the only one.
Racing in the rain is something that Formula One does well, but even they have silliness when they have to put on the rain tires.
NASCAR is about drivers and pit crews doing their best with equal equipment. The wet race track just adds too much randomness to the racing. It gave the ESPN folks a story line to discuss all day. I am sure they are happy for that. Actually having to know something about racing is too hard for that crew, so they really come alive when they have some controversy to talk about. In this case, “Would NASCAR use the rain tires?”
NASCAR big wigs, ignore folks like myself when they say they want to see the racing no matter what. You should have ended the race or at least delayed it for track drying. We fans have no idea what we are talking about.
Football Fan Free Agency Is over. Falcons win.
I am not too proud to admit that I have been lured back into following my home team. The Dolphins could not match showing up at Brookwood High School and putting on an exhibition match. The Falcons have won with a little home town support. It also helps that they have a good, QB and the best Tight End in the game. The defense is more solid than ever and they have a real shot. So long as the Falcons do not make a silly move picking up another Vick like character and then making excuses for his bad behavior, they have my support. I know Arthur was holding his breath. He can go back to work now. My decision is made.
The move to WordPress just gets better
I am happy to find the the wordpress folks went ahead and pointed out how to use google apps for mail. I would have thought of it eventually, but they went ahead and listed the instructions. Though I will admit the majority of the mail I get to the domain is spam offering to help me increase site traffic. Not a reason the spend any real time or money on mail for the domain, but free and easy. I will take that any day.
New Host – New Site
I opted to just use wordpress for my main site. It met all of my goals and it is far cheaper than yahoo small business site hosting. If you have a product that needs a shopping cart, then yahoo is a good way to go. For me, wordpress is a perfect fit.
Announcing my Football Fan Free Agency
I am announcing my Football Fan Free Agency. The Miami Dolphins have not assigned me as a Franchise fan, so I am available to dabble in the Free Agent Market. If you want an additional super fan for your team I am open and ready to hear why I should be watching and pulling for your favorite team. Falcons fans don’t bother. I gave up my season tickets and replaced them with a NFL Sunday Ticket subscription.
Short Story for July 4th – First Strike on Kansas
I could not resist just tossing up this very short story in a blog post. It will age out soon and just be one of those things I toss in a collection of short stories one day.
First Strike On Kansas – A Short Story
First Strike on Kansas
By
J. Lee Ragans
© 2009 J. Lee Ragans
v1.0
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5 License.
To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.5/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, 543 Howard Street, 5th Floor, San Francisco, California, 94105, USA.
I will put money in the Helmet
If Suspended NASCAR driver Carl Long is standing helmet in hand at Atlanta Motor Speedway when they come back in the fall, I will drive out there just to help him pay this fine.
The 12 race suspension for an over sized engine being reduced to 8 races does nothing in this case to help the small time driver owner who does not even build the engines he uses. If NASCAR can prove that the oversized engine gave him a competitive advantage then I think the $200,000 fine would be fair.
However he did not make the race, his record is not impressive over his career with an average starting position of only 36.9 and a career winning total of only 1.4 million dollars since 2000. This fine is a death sentence for his race aspirations. I am no expert but it seems to me that the engine manufacturer should have been the one on the hook for all this.
All that said, NASCAR may know something here that they are not telling us, but then NASCAR has always been an overly secretive organization. Their rules are rarely obvious and always open from interpretation, so when they drop the hammer on someone we must assume that this person has done something severely wrong. This kind of corporate secrecy has served the sport well over most of its life, but with the free flow of information today it only seems suspicious.
I will admit that I don’t know Carl’s career as well as I know some of the other drivers, but something about this story seems wrong. A small team being effectively executed because of a problem that requires and engine to be torn down to detect just feels wrong. I have to ask, so what did he do to make NASCAR mad? If they are not mad at him, then they will soon be looking like Formula One with fewer and fewer cars running every race. Small teams will be tossed aside because of shrinking budgets and ridged requirements. More and more microscopic violations will be hard to avoid.
