Bob Barnard Track Engineering

Was anyone else underwhelmed by the new qualifying session for NASCAR? Unlike F1, which this is presumably based on, starting on pole is meaningless in NASCAR, so not really any sense of excitement. The first session saw cars backing out into pit lane, blocking other drivers, and then parked at pit out, effectively blocking that. Not a good arrangement in my mind. I know they are trying to build the show at the track, but the old system was actually more exciting with one car on the track, but with the speed tracker showing us where the car was at all around the track, and the fast guys in practice going last. Let's see what NASCAR does to tweak this.

My last blog talked about the lack of spectators, and there were certainly none at PIR yesterday, but they did show up for the 500 on Sunday, on the front stretch at least, only to sit in the rain, lightning and tornado warning. See what the Weather Channel thought of their severe weather response.

http://www.weather.com/news/nascar-daytona-500-severe-weather-did-track-officials-do-enough-20140223

Not good enough from what should be our best track operator.