Ovals, restarts, colourful cars, loud V8s, tyre smoke from burnouts – can’t get any more American than that. The States’ obsession with the stock-looking silhouette racers is a larger than life phenomenon. In the recent weeks, I dug myself into it, too. This is what I’ve found.
Let’s not kid anyone here: NASCAR is primarily entertainment and a motorsport in the second place. There are a dozen things I don’t like about it. First of all: the cars. More precisely, their designation: ‘stock cars’. There’s nothing wrong with a pack of fire-breathing, V8-powered, thundering silhouette cars going 200+ mph on an oval track, but the Sprint Cup series has been the one once to be called the ‘Strictly Stock’ class, which is a – least to say – interesting evolution of the cars and the terminology. The other thing I don’t fancy about NASCAR is the TV-broadcasts, or American advertising habits in general. No, I don’t want to listen to a driver praising his/her sponsors that are written all over him/her and the car, switching caps every 5 seconds and finishing off drinking a Coke – being the main sponsor. All that between a horrific crash and a medical check-up. Same goes to commercial breaks that have the recurring omen of starting when the race is boring and ending when a yellow flag is out with cars being piled upon each other.
Apart from that there are a million things average Europeans would duck the corner of their lips for, highlighting stone-age technology of the cars, the ‘boring’ ovals, the lengthy races, etc.
Despite all these very American features, NASCAR has become one of the most followed motor sport behind F1 on a global scale.
So what can one like about it?
Let’s start with the basics: there are three series to begin with: the Sprint Cup (i.e. F1), the Nationwide (i.e. F2/GP2), and the Camping World Truck series (i.e. F3/GP3) with no real difference between the cars of them. Hence adding them up, there are almost no weekends when there is no racing, making up almost exactly 100 individual races per year altogether. Yes, one hundred. In addition, the top drivers of the Sprint Cup series tend to show up in the other two as well, despite the fact that points are not awarded for them since the beginning of this year. A blessing and curse at the same time, because it really blurs the already fine line between the three leagues. But again, all these serve the purpose of making the hardcore fans watching all races out there for expanded advertising.
Although the Sprint Cup is the top class of the sport, a European viewer would be much more comfortable watching the Nationwide Series for various reasons. First, the looks of the cars. Although mechanically the cars are virtually identical, the external shells are now designed to be more distinctive, resembling their road-going variants to a greater extent. Moreover, the featured cars are more exciting, too. While Sprint Cup features Ford Fusions, Dodge Chargers, Chevrolet Impalas and Toyota Camrys, Ford took a bold step and introduced the Mustang for the Nationwide series, and Chrysler recruited the Dodge Challenger as the basis for their ‘stock car’. This latter one turned out to be imminently great as from various angles it is virtually indistinguishable from the real car. Also, races are considerably shorter than in the top class. Most continental nerves would begin to give out during a 4-hour plus race. But most of all, guest drivers from entirely different series are not uncommon bot in Nationwide and Camping World Truck series from time to time – may it be IndyCar, Formula 1 or even motorcycle racing.
All these being the surface only, let’s now face the real content, racing itself. I do not wish to attempt explaining the points system and I do not assume anyone would be able to understand. There are winners at the end of each race and the end of the year. Enough to know that.
On the other hand, if we take a closer look at the cars and the racing itself, it all seems familiar.
It turns out, NASCAR racing is very much like Grand Prix or Indy racing from back then. Purpose built cars made for flat out speed only, to reign the long straightaways. No one knew or cared about aerodynamic downforce. As long as you had a powerful engine, you were good to go. Brakes, general handling was not an issue. The tracks were built to please the audience with stellar top speed with ferocious banked turns. The similarity is even more apparent when the series visits a road course from time to time (including tracks that [have] hosted F1 races as well). As cars struggle to cope with their own weight before turning into a sharp corner, the back end shaking from left to right, going through the corner relatively slow.
Vintage racing is very much like that, except for NASCAR not being an open-wheel category (that would be IndyCar, the only problem is that the Indy series is losing oval tracks recently), and people don’t actually die as frequently.
So if there is a word or two to say about velodrome racing with carriages for a European, this would be the final word. Dig back in history, watch old footage and you’ll see what I’m talking about.
And now, the most famous words in motorsports history: “Drivers, start your engines!”
