With Preseason Thunder in full swing, NASCAR has been handing down new rules and regulations for all series left and right. The biggest changes seem to be handed to the Nationwide Series and Camping World Truck Series.
Here is how the changes break down: QUALIFYING: Adopting a method similar to that in Formula 1 and road courses, single car qualifying runs are now a thing of the past. Although the specific detail have yet to be released, the qualifying format for the lower tiers in NASCAR’s major touring series will be set in a new qualifying format. “I can tell you that the Camping World Truck Series and the Nationwide Series will not be single-car qualifying at all this year, and we’re still working on some of the final details of that,” NASCAR’s Vice President Robin Pemberton said during a media briefing at Daytona. The logistics and specifics of the new qualifying format will be announced later in January or early February but many are predicting a group qualifying format or a qualifying race. Although no qualifying changes have been announced for the Sprint Cup Series yet, Pemberton says they are “finalizing everything and we’re working on it.” DRAFTING: NASCAR eliminated tandem drafting in the Sprint Cup Series with the new cars and now, tandem drafting is banned from the Nationwide and Camping World Truck Series as well. Told of the change last year, Pemberton says this is crucial. If it is determined that teams are using the tandem draft during a NASCAR race, the teams in question will be black-flagged. If the infraction occurs during practice, the teams will be black-flagged and their times disallowed. “They can draft,” Pemberton said Saturday at Daytona. “You can bump draft; you can bump draft a guy up (through the field), but you can’t hook up on the bumper and just lay on the bumper.” Pack racing, which has been the familiarity at Daytona and Talladega, will still remain and drivers will still be able to break off on a run but hooking up to someones bumper has now become a thing of the past. With two major changes being handed down from NASCAR and a month until the season officially kicks off in Daytona for Speedweeks, rumors of points changes and possible qualifying changes in the Sprint Cup Series are still circling. Are these changes for the better? We will have to wait and see. Original Post: Click Here
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After rain ruined practice Thursday, teams were working hard today to go gather data and speed as they gear up for the Daytona 500.
The No.3 was back on track at Daytona for the first time in NASCAR’s highest series since the tragic death of Dale Earnhardt back in 2001 and in good fashion: it was P1 on the charts. Austin Dillon topped the speed charts today with a top speed of 195.109mph. Dillon is running for Rookie of the Year in 2014 and will make his second Daytona 500 start. He finished 31st last season after an accident with just a handful of laps to go. The 2013 Daytona 500 pole winner was near the top of the charts once again. Danica Patrick will be making her third career Daytona 500 start and after an impressive run in the Great American Race last season, she is on the list of possible winners in 2014. Patrick finished the day 10th on the charts with a top speed of 193.063. Hall of Fame driver Rusty Wallace jumped back in the Blue Deuce at Daytona after an invitation from Brad Keselowski. Wallace went out for multiple runs throughout the day and by the smile of his face, he was having the time of his life. Keselowski, Wallace and the No.2 Penske Ford ended the day P20 on the chart. Richard Childress Racing had the fastest cars at Daytona’s Preseason Thunder. Brian Scott was piloting the No.33 for the organization and ended P2 at the end of the night. Matt Crafton, filling in for a missing Paul Menard, followed up with a P3 finish putting three of the four RCR cars at the top of the board. Although Preseason Thunder is just a test session, it can give us a good indication as to who just might be in line for the pole in February. Original Post: Click Here A surprising announcement today left Dale Earnhardt Jr. needing a Crew Chief for the 2015 season.
NBC Sports Network announced today that Crew Chief Steve Letarte will be one of their new broadcast analysts starting in 2015 joining driver Jeff Burton and play-by-play announcer Rick Allen. Although Letarte refused to speak to the press on Thursday in Daytona, a statement was released by NBC showing his excitement about this opportunity. “Their excitement, along with my love for racing, solidified my decision to move away from the pit box and into the broadcast booth,” Letarte said. “I want to thank Rick Hendrick and everyone at Hendrick Motorsports for the opportunities they have given me over the last 18 years, and I want to reaffirm my commitment to Dale Jr. and the entire 88 team to go win races and challenge for the championship in 2014.” Under contract with Hendrick Motorsports through 2014, Letarte’s role with “Junior Nation” won’t change in 2014. Hendrick Motorsports released this statement about Letarte’s departure Thursday afternoon. “You never want to see a talented and all-around quality person like Steve (Letarte) move on, but we understand this is an exciting opportunity for him and his family. He has all the tools to be a terrific broadcaster, and I know our fans will enjoy hearing his perspective. “We’re looking forward to a successful year in 2014 with Steve and Dale (Earnhardt Jr.) leading the No. 88 together. They have some of the best chemistry in the garage, and we know they’ll build on last season and continue to be a championship-contending team. We don’t expect to address the crew chief position until after the season. Everyone with the team is focused on 2014 and committed to having another great year.” Letarte has been with the Hendrick Organization since the age of 16 and has been on top of the pit box for both Earnhardt Jr and Jeff Gordon. His absence at HMS in 2015 will definitely be felt. Original Post: Click Here From the crowd you hear, “are you engaged?” to which Danica Patrick replies “no, not engaged Jenna” as she holds up her ringless hands. Jenna Fryer hoping to break the latest news in the world of Danica and Ricky.
With a smile on her face and witty remarks rolling off her tongue, Danica Patrick greeted the media center crowd ready to take any questions thrown at her. “I was getting ready in the hauler…I said, I’ve got to go talk to the media for the first time this year. They’re like, oh, of course. What are they going to ask you? The first question is going to be, how was your winter. And there it is,” she said after the moderator opened with a “talk about your off-season” question. Turning to racing and most importantly, her new teammates in Kevin Harvick and Kurt Busch for 2014, Patrick seemed optimistic. “I think that this is going to be a year for opportunity, really,” she said. “I think that for me I’m able to feed off of their (Stewart, Harvick, Busch) experience and making the car better.” Patrick and her Crew Chief Tony Gibson are in their second season together in the Sprint Cup Series and for the No.10 GoDaddy Chevrolet team, improvement is key in 2014. Patrick knows they will be better and acknowledges that there are many things that she needs to improve on but for her and her team, she knows 2014 will be a step ahead in the right direction. “We’re going to be better because I have more experience,” she said in her media availability at Daytona, ” because we have more experiences together as a team, because we have more resources and more people, because we have a new energy, because we’re going to use our resources better as a team. I think those are all reasons why we’re going to do better.” 2013 started off with a bang for Patrick in her Rookie year and after the Daytona 500, reality set in. With just one top-10 and 12 lead lap finishes, 2013 was a learning year for Patrick. This season, she is determined to show she’s improved and with the new resources and faces in the Stewart-Haas Racing shop, utilizing them will be important. “I think that the core focus (in 2014) is really preparing better cars and bringing as good a cars to the track as possible, and that comes through using our resources, being able to build them more similar to each other as they come out of production so we can keep up with the cars and we’re all driving the same thing,” Patrick said. “I think the weak areas tend to be the ones that for me I always have to work on. But improving on qualifying, which I think that we did through the end of the year last year a little more…For us it was a matter of not throwing big things at the car and not trying to throw the kitchen sink at it during practice but hopefully arriving with a close enough setup and then fine tuning. What we found was there’s so much balance in tiny little things, whether it be packer or just little adjustments.” “Between that and just kind of getting more ‑‑ what shows itself in getting more comfortable in those first laps qualifying, first start of the race, restarts, all those things, they all kind of go hand in hand, and those are the areas that I have to work on.” Patrick, Gibson and the GoDaddy team are prepared and ready for 2014 and with the Daytona 500 right around the corner, it’s another great opportunity to start the year off with a bang. With four big personalities in the race shop at SHR, 2014 is gearing up to be one heck of a ride. Original Post: Click Here 18 year old Chase Elliott will join the Nationwide Series full time in 2014.
The Associated Press announced today that the son of racing icon Bill Elliott will join JR Motorsports driving his fathers No.9 with sponsorship from NAPA Auto Parts. On top of the pit box for Elliott will be Greg Ives. News of NAPA’s return to NASCAR comes on the heels of its departure from Michael Waltrip Racing and its sponsorship with the No.56 team of Martin Truex Jr. Chase Elliott has been in the sights of many NASCAR greats since moving up the ranks of NASCAR with his father’s guidance. Elliott is a development driver for Hendrick Motorsports and drove the No.94 entry in the Camping World Truck Series. Elliott is the youngest to ever win an ARCA race when he won in Pocono Raceway in June of 2013. He became the youngest pole-sitter in Trucks history when he sat on the pole at Bristol Motor Speedway in 2013 at the age of 17. In September of 2013, Elliott went to Victory Lane at the Chevy Silverado 250 at the Canadian Tire Motorspost Park in the first Camping World Truck Series race at the track. Original Post: Click Here The 2014 season officially kicks off this week when testing begins at Daytona on Thursday.
Daytona testing may not mean much in terms of on-track racing but it proves to be an important first step for new teams and new driver/crew chief pairings. This season, there are multiple changes in the garage that will benefit greatly from the on-track time and by Saturday, we could have a glimpse of who might be in favor of the pole position for the first race of the season. For drivers like Kevin Harvick, Kurt Busch, Ryan Newman, and Martin Truex Jr., the on-track time is crucial for team chemistry and driver development. Moving to a new organization with new teammates and new guys on the wall can be a challenge to some but forging that bond early can prove to be a benefit later on. Take Matt Kenseth for example, Moving from the No.17 Roush Fenway Racing Ford in 2012 to the No.20 Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota in 2013 could have made for a mediocre year for the veteran driver. Instead, Kenseth and his new team forged a bond early in the 2013 season that led to one of the most impressive seasons Kenseth has ever had. Finishing runner-up in the Championship to now six-time Champion Jimmie Johnson, Kenseth and his team had nothing to hang their heads about. A team’s bond is one of the most important keys to success and that bond, whether new or one that has been in place for years, starts at Daytona. Daytona is the first real chance for teams to knock off the rust and get back into the swing of racing. Although teams never send their best cars to Daytona to test, the behind-the-scenes bonds formed over three days will prove to be priceless. Preseason Thunder will be held at Daytona International Speedway Thursday, January 9th through Tuesday, January 14th. Sprint Cup Series: Jan. 9 and Jan 10 Nationwide Series: Jan 11 and Jan 12 Camping World Truck Series: Jan 13 and Jan 14 In his second full season at Hendrick Motorsports, Kasey Kahne was pegged to be a Championship contender early in 2013. Fate had different ideas. Although he did rack up two wins, three DNFs and eleven finishes outside the top 20 proved that luck was not on the No.5 teams side.
Kahne went to Victory Lane at Bristol and Pocono in 2013 and even with two wins, had to rely on on the wild card to make it in to the Chase. Finishing 12th in a 13 driver Chase field, Kahne and the team were just wishing for the season to be over so they could focus on 2014. The new season should be a good one for Kahne and Crew Chief Kenny Francis. Sharing the shop with the No.24 team of Jeff Gordon, Kahne and his team have a veteran driver to play off of and with equipment like Hendrick’s, running at the front is expected. Kahne has the talent and equipment to be a Championship driver, but he will need a little luck on his side. For 2014, Kahne and his team need to focus on finishing races and racking up those top 5 and top 10 finishes. The teams downfall in 2013 was their lack of consistency. With an average finish outside of the top 15, Kahne had to fight his way up through the field more than he should have. Hendrick Motorsports is the perfect place for Kasey Kahne and he fits in well with the organization but things need to turn around in 2014 for the No.5 team and I believe, after the season they had in 2013, it will. Original Post: Click Here 2013 could be called a comeback year for Jimmie Johnson in a way because it had been two years since his last Sprint Cup Series Championship. After winning five in a row, a historic feat at that, taking a two-year hiatus seemed like an eternity for No.48 fans.
Kicking off 2013 with a win in the Daytona 500, it was clear to see that the No.48 Lowe’s Chevrolet was going to be a force to be reckoned with in the new Gen6 car. Johnson would go on to collect five more race wins in 2013 including Martinsville, Pocono, Daytona’s July race plus Dover and Texas in the Chase. Johnson’s top competition was Matt Kenseth and, in his first season driving the No.20, was tough competition right out of the gate. Battling all season long, it came down to the last race at Homestead-Miami before the winner was determined and a Champion was crowned. Johnson had an average starting spot of 9.8 with four pole wins and an average finish just outside of the top-10. With wins coming at many different styles of tracks, Johnson is a contender wherever he goes. 2014 should be no different for the six-time champion and with Crew Chief Chad Knaus on top of the box once again, the two masterminds will be hard at work before the season officially kicks off. Johnson will be a Championship contender in 2014 and if he can improve on what he did in 2013, he may just win Championship number 7. Which, haters beware, would put him right up there with Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt. Original Post: Click Here Matt Kenseth led 2013 with seven total wins followed by Jimmie Johnson with six, Kevin Harvick with four but there were some drivers that were winless or just barely caught that win in 2013 that must pull out a victory in 2014.
Dale Earnhardt Jr: He led the series with the most top-10 finishes in 2013 and was thisclose to visiting Victory Lane but unfortunately for Junior, the cards just didn’t line up. With two runner-up finishes at Daytona to his teammate Jimmie Johnson, Junior is in dire need for a win in 2014. Breaking a four year winless streak in 2012 with his victory at Michigan. fans don’t want to wait that long for him to reach P1 again. 2014 needs to see Junior in Victory Lane, especially with his consistency. Kurt Busch: Another driver where the cards just didn’t fall in their favor, the eldest Busch brother hasn’t been to 2011. With a new ride at Stewart-Haas Racing, Busch should have great equipment that he should be able to take to the top of the board. Busch is itching for that win after coming oh so close in 2013 with Furniture Row Racing. Denny Hamlin: He notched his only win of 2013 at the season finale in Homestead-Miami after a tragic season started with him missing a handful of races at the beginning of the season. Hamlin is a talented driver who is familiar with Victory Lane but 2013 left him with many battle scars, no pun intended. Hamlin needs to see Victory Lane in 2014 more than once and it wouldn’t surprise me to see him make a run for the Championship as well. Brad Keselowski: The 2012 Champion almost went winless in 2013 but pulled one out at Charlotte in the Fall. Keselowski had a new teammate, a new car, and also switched to Ford in 2013 and combining that with his teams trouble with NASCAR’s rule book, it left him looking in on the Chase come Chicago. Keselowski and the team are determined not to let that happen again in 2014 and he needs to visit Victory Lane multiple times next season if he wants to reclaim his spot on top of the board at Homestead-Miami. Tony Stewart: After a devastating injury left him sidelined for a third of the season, Tony Stewart needs to hit 2014 hard and a win would do just that. Stewart knows how to win and with two new drivers at his organization, he needs to prove that this injury didn’t hurt his career or his winning ways. All eyes will be on him when he finally returns to the track at Daytona. Ricky Stenhouse Jr: Coming off of his rookie year and a very public relationship with fellow driver Danica Patrick, Ricky Stenhouse is one of those drivers who needs to visit Victory Lane in 2014. The two-time Nationwide Series Champion came had some promising races in 2013 and towards the end of the season, made it look like a trip to the winners circle during his rookie campaign wasn’t out of the question. 2014 could be a big year for the 26-year old. Original Post: Click Here Formula 1 Champion Michael Schumacher is in critical condition after a skiing accident in the French Alps early Sunday.
The 44-year-old German fell and hit his head on a rock, said the director of the Meribel resort where Schumacher was skiing. Schumacher arrived at the hospital in a deep coma and was rushed into emergency brain surgery. According to reports, Shumacher was skiing on an unmarked path where he fell and hit his head on a rock. He was wearing a helmet. “We have to wait for a police report,” Resort director Christophe Gernignon-Lecomte said. “There is an open investigation going on. We insist on the fact that Michael Schumacher was skiing off-piste and his fall is not linked to an avalanche.” Schumacher’s spokesperson Sabine Kehm released a statement saying, “We ask for understanding that we cannot give continuous information about his health. He was wearing a helmet and was not alone. For his fall, no other person was involved.” Stay tuned to Beyond the Flag for more information as it is released. Original Post: Click Here |
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