Ignore The Bear Stears Study, Plus Other Post-Pocono Miscellenea
The thrill isn’t gone.
Now, going to races again and
again can dull the thrill over time, but on occasion something
happens that re-lights the fire within. In 2000 the events that
re-lit NASCAR’s fire were the October events at Charlotte and
Talladega. Daytona this February repeated Talladega’s competitive
ferocity, but its disastrous ending sent the sport into a mini-tailspin.
The fire was re-lit at Atlanta one month later.
For myself, trips to Thompson and
Stafford, CT this season have been fun, but the thrill really
returned at Pocono. Amid since-refuted rumors of a pending track
sale, the Pocono 500 proceeded after a Saturday night downpour.
The race was a radically mixed bag – a measly thirteen lead
changes is a damnable number for a racetrack that can, and ought
to, see 49 a race. When the lead did change hands, though, it was
a spirited affair with some breathtaking moves, allowing us to
forget the more ho-hum affairs at the cookie-cutter tracks to
which Pocono has occasionally been unfavorably and unfairly
compared.
Pocono sees the 30th anniversary
of its debut as a superspeedway this year, and its been a rocky
road but also a road with many memorable moments – the
controversy-plagued 1975 Summer 500, the table-turning 1976 500,
the 1977 shootout, the rain-delayed Monday 500 of 1979, the 1980
event promoted by Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the rain-soaked
debut of Pocono’s June event in 1982, the July 1982 thriller, the
rally of Tim Richmond in July ’86, his comeback in June ’87, and
on.
Amid media stress on a possible
third straight Jeff Gordon victory – media stress that flirted
with outright advocacy – came yet another memorable moment for
Pocono, as Ricky Rudd ended 88 races without a win, and did it
with a damaged transmission that made him race the track without
shifting – and the fact he won handily without shifting suggests
an overrated quality to the annoying practice. "Shifting is
a pain in the butt," Terry Labonte noted in 1992. Rusty
Wallace likewise noted then that it interfered with ability to
pass cars, since shifting means racing the track rather than each
other. Perhaps drivers will find less reason to shift at Pocono
now – we should hope so, since Pocono should be raced as an oval,
not as a road course.
The win came on Father’s Day 2001
– four years to the celebratory day after the last win by the ex-Ranier
Racing #28, by Ernie Irvan at Michigan, the final win for Ernie,
at the track that almost killed him in 1994 and which would end
his career two scant years later. The ironies were not lost on
anyone.
Pocono proved to be particularly
frustrating for Dodge – Sterling Marlin timed second and finished
fourth, somewhat surprising as his #40 seemed to struggle the
entire race. Dave Blaney in Bill Davis’ #93 had a respectable
effort. The remainder of the Dodge fleet, however, had one
problem after another, with five of the bottom six in the final
rundown being Dodges. Ray Evernham and Petty Enterprises had it
worst of all – Casey Atwood battled in the top ten for much of
the day but then broke, while Bill Elliott struggled. Kyle Petty
likewise struggled all day despite excellent pit work that
repeatedly gained him track position, Buckshot Jones ran
reasonably well but got waylaid in a mid-race crash, and John
Andretti ran to the front early, pitted late under yellow for a
broken shock, erased a ten-second gap to the entire field under
green, then was swept into the big crash off the Tunnel Turn.
Also involved was Ward Burton, capping a self-described bad
weekend.
One other team with an adventurous
weekend was Jim Smith’s Ultra Motorsports #7 – Mike Wallace was
quasi-officially axed from the car and Ted Musgrave qualified it
well and ran well early on, though his finish wasn’t too hot.
———————————————————————-
So Winston Cup wrapped up its
first Pocono and will race at Sears Point, Daytona, Chicago, and
New Hampshire before it returns to the Magic Triangle. The
Triangle’s location between New York and Philadelphia gives it
position in two strong markets – a fact apparently overlooked in
a new Bear Stearns study of NASCAR’s schedule that advocates
dumping dates at some southeastern tracks in favor of more West
Coast dates. Pocono is mentioned in the study as a track that
ought to give up one of its two dates, never mind that two dates
at a racetrack are always better than one, that Pocono has good
position mentioned above, and that the sport’s growth was never
impeded by "over saturation" in the southeast. A
similar lack of sense is used in the study’s advocacy that New
Hampshire should lose one of its two dates, never mind the
track’s proximity to Boston.
Further undercutting the anti-Pocono
slant in part of the study is its conclusion that Meadowlands and
Denver area tracks are unlikely – if a Meadowlands track cannot
be built (and frankly one strains to find much justification for
one in any event) then Pocono’s two dates acquire all the more
reason for keeping.
"We would also argue that
tracks like Martinsville, Pocono, and New Hampshire should not
have two dates each when tracks like Texas, Las Vegas,
California, and Kansas have only one each," the study says.
So what? The study’s solution – major changes to the schedule –
is a laughable solution. The study’s estimates of race date
market values looks powerful on paper but historically have made
zero difference in real life, as sponsor exposure at Darlington,
Bristol, and Martinsville isn’t all that different from places
like Texas and Fontana.
So the Bear Sterns study should be
largely ignored. Wall Street marketing is not more worthwhile
than loyalty and tradition. The markets should go to the
racetracks, not the other way around.