Wow, that was pretty awful.
I'm seeing on social media that a lot of my friends chose to spend their Saturday night as a date night, maybe I should have done the same thing because the Monster Energy Cup Series All-Star Race was pretty boring. I'm not one of those old grumpy guys that will criticize NASCAR every time they change something nor will I be the negative Nancy that will say "NASCAR is a dying sport". You could make an argument that all professional sports with the exception of the NBA are slowly dying, at least in terms of popularity. The All-Star Race seems to get more painful to watch every year. It's time for NASCAR to make some changes.
Like maybe move it away from Charlotte?
I know that wouldn't be a popular choice among the inner-circles of NASCAR because it being in Charlotte basically gives them a bye week before the Coca Cola 600, but the All-Star Race is about putting on a show for the fans. Tonight's race failed to do that. The cars got way too spread out on long runs, which meant that there wasn't the door to door action that race fans love to see. Wouldn't it be more interesting if NASCAR moved it to a track like Bristol or Richmond? NASCAR could also have tracks bid on the rights to host it just like every other professional sports league does. What would be wrong with seeing it at a different track every year? It would create new sets of fans that would go to the All-Star Race. I'm personally not going to drive all the way to Charlotte for it, but I might if it's in Kansas City or Chicago.
The format for tonight's race also helped contribute to the boredom. Let me start off by saying, that I am a fan of the stage racing and I had no problem with only 10 advancing to the final stage, but taking the average finish of each stage made it confusing for fans to follow. What NASCAR should have done is reverted back to a format that they used in the early 2000's.
For example-If you have 20 cars like they did tonight, give everybody a freebie in the first stage, that way you don't punish somebody for their poor starting position or for winning the Open. Then trim the field down to 15 cars after the second segment and down to 10 after the third segment. This makes it more racy and less mathematical.
A lot of people made a big deal about the softer "option" tires. Even I thought it could be interesting, but it turned out to have a minimal impact because everyone used their set in the earlier stages. The rules for the tires also made it confusing. Clint Bowyer tried to mix and match two sets of tires and that didn't work. Brad Keselowski put his softer tires on under caution, then changed them on the same caution, only to not be allowed to re-use them which meant he used up his four sets of tires in the first three stages meaning he didn't have tires for the final stage.
I get why NASCAR did this. They wanted to add more of a strategical facet to the race and it gave it some intrigue, but it failed. If NASCAR really wanted to make it interesting, they could do what a friend of mine suggested and either take some aerodynamics away from the cars, or give them tires that have less grip (no-way Goodyear will ever do that). It could certainly make it more interesting and it's not possible to have made it more boring.
With that being said, some quick thoughts on the actual race itself
THE OPEN
I think that The Open was actually more exciting than the main event. The future of NASCAR fiercely battled it out in the final stages to advance. The battle at the end of stage three between Daniel Saurez, Chase Elliott and Erik Jones is something that I would be totally fine seeing for the next decade. Jones had the fastest car until he tried to take a shortcut throughout the grass.
THE MAIN EVENT
It was Kyle Larson's race to win. Larson hands down had the fastest car and led 39 of the first 40 laps, but he failed to be able to get out front on pit stops, putting him behind the eight ball towards the end. Larson probably would have caught Kyle Busch if the race would have been about five laps longer. The kid will win at least one in his career. He's that good.
KYLE BUSCH WINS
Kyle Busch finally won a race at Charlotte. That's one statistic that had barely even crossed my mind because I just kind of assumed he had. Busch has had the car to beat a couple of times in the past, but came up just short or been caught up in an accident, so it was pleasant to see Busch finally get a win at Charlotte, but the coverage of his wife Samantha was annoying.
GET HIM OFF MY TV
Michael Waltrip might be the worst NASCAR personality on television. I get that he's fun and goofy, but he's too goofy and useless. His pre-race interviews where he has the silly camera attached to his head, while he just walks up to drivers with Bryson Byrnes holding the suitcase full of money was pretty painful to watch because Waltrip isn't a good interviewer. He also provides little to no real insight on what's going on. Time to get the Waltrips (both of them) out of the booth.
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