As speculated for the last year, last week it finally became official when NASCAR announced that Texas and Phoenix would each be getting additional dates for the 2005 NASCAR Nextel Cup season. This is another sign of prosperity for the fastest growing sports in the world. By adding two new dates to next years schedule, that means that 2 dates have to be taken away.
Two historical NASCAR tracks had dates taken away from them. Darlington Raceway, forever a staple in NASCAR history, will only be left with one date. For Rockingham, this is the second consecutive year that they've had a date taken from them leaving them with no dates now.
Just two years ago, the area of Darlington, Rockingham, and Charlotte, all within 100 miles of each other had 7 Cup races a season if you include the mid May all-star race.
Las Vegas didn't get the additional date we all hoped for, but Nevada's largest annual sports weekend does have a new date for 2005. Las Vegas Motor Speedway's NASCAR Weekend is scheduled for March 11-13, 2005, a week later than in recent years.
Again in 2005, the UAW-DaimlerChrysler 400 is scheduled to be the third stop on the NASCAR Nextel Cup tour. The 2005 event will mark the eighth visit of NASCAR's top series to Las Vegas.
We are very excited about this new date," said Chris Powell, LVMS general manager. "Even though we are just a few months removed from this past year's event, we already are in the process of renewing tickets for the 2005 event, and the renewals are coming in at a record pace."
So when will Vegas get a race? It's looking increasingly bleak for the near future, especially considering NASCAR and ISC just bought Martinsville Speedway, the oldest track on the NASCAR circuit. Chances are NASCAR will take one of the dates away from Martinsville for the 2006 season and give the date to one of their own tracks, likely to be Chicago or Kansas.
Seating at Martinsville has always been published at 91,000 by Martinsville, but it was revealed after the sale by ISC that Martinsville has just over 63,000 seats making it the smallest track in the Cup series.
Former track owner Clay Campbell had to see the writing on the wall and knew he would eventually lose the battle concerning two events at Martinsville. It was a smart sell for him.
"It's never really 'hung over me,' but it's always been in the back of my mind," Campbell said. "Obviously, with the way things are going now, with the newer tracks popping up all over the country, it's a concern now. But you can go back to the '70s and it was a concern then too. It's a continuing deal.
"It's always been in the back of our mind, being realigned. But I'll go to my grave fighting for the two dates. And from my standpoint I don't see any problem with the two. We're doing everything right, everything we should be doing. We've sold out both races each year for 10 years in a row. Now if we weren't doing that, I think we'd be on the hot seat."
It's bittersweet right now the way things are going in NASCAR. It's tremendous we're seeing NASCAR respond to the demand of it's huge fan base out West, but it's sad to see such wonderful tracks that are full of so many memories that endeared us all to the sport. It would be much easier to accept all the changes if the tracks that were getting additional dates had some character to them instead of being all the same. Why keep building these wide flat cookie cutter ovals? What's wrong with duplicating a Bristol, Martinsville, Rockingham, or Darlington? In many aspects, the trend we're seeing resembles what baseball did in the late sixties with the baseball parks. It took them 30 years to realize that the fans liked the cozy confines of a quaint ballpark. Hopefully it won't take NASCAR that long.
NASCAR All-Star Race
NASCAR's version of the all-star game is this Saturday at Lowe's Motor Speedway in Charlotte. The race consists of all the past winners from this season and last season. Another two drivers will come from the 30 lap qualifying race. One of the two qualifiers from the "Nextel Open" that will advance to the all-star race will be the race winner and the other driver will be voted in by the fans on line.
While the 90-lap/135-mile overall distance in the all star race is again divided into 40-, 30- and 20-lap segments, no longer will each segment result in some drivers being eliminated. This will ensure a full field of cars racing for the winner's purse of approximately $1 million. "It's an all-star event and all the stars should participate," said Lowe's Motor Speedway President H.A. "Humpy" Wheeler. "That's what the fans come to see - their favorite drivers."
Humpy Wheeler will be a person most in Vegas will want to listen to prior to the Saturday's race. He has correctly chosen the winner of the all-star event in 7 of the last 11 years. Look for the announcement of his selection on Thursday. That gives him time to walk through the garage area and talk with several of the teams before making his decision. What started out as just a comment on record about who he thought would win has turned in to an anticipated event with a press release and plenty of pressure to make good on his selection.
What we'll look for this week is the drivers who did well in Atlanta and Texas earlier this season. Charlotte is almost identical to the two tracks and all the set-up notes for the previous two races this year will still be valid for this race. Bottom line, if they did well then, they'll do well this week.
5 drivers finished in the top 10 at both Atlanta and Texas. 2 of them finished in the top 4 in each race and not coincidentally, they are the favorites this week.
Dale Earnhardt Jr(7/2) won in Atlanta and finished 4th in Texas. Kasey Kahne(4/1) finished 3rd in Atlanta and 2nd in Texas. Kahne is going to be the driver to keep an eye on this week. He is the perfect candidate because of the format. On short runs, he'll be tough to catch. He also fits the profile of recent past winners. Jeff Gordon, Junior, Ryan Newman, and Jimmie Johnson were all in similar situations as drivers attempting to break on through before they won this race.
A long shot to look at in this race is Brian Vickers(18/1). Vickers has been fast on these tracks, but hasn't been good for the entire race. The different segments will be an advantage for him. Last week at Richmond he performed well throughout and that should keep his confidence level beaming at a high level.
Indy 500 near
Most books are now releasing their Indy 500 odds and there should be a great opportunity for great prices on a few drivers that didn't qualify very well. The class organizations in Indy Racing are from the garages of Chip Ganassi and Roger Penske, both powered by Toyota, who have combined to win the last 4 Indy 500's and they've done so rather easily over the rest of the competition.
The Honda's dominated during qualifying and many books may overprice the Honda teams such Andretti-Green and Haas and undervalue the Toyota's of Penske and Ganassi. CastroNeves will garner respect no matter where he starts as will Hornish to a degree, but Ganssi's drivers will surely have strong value.
Scott Dixon should be considered a strong candidate to win the race. Right behind him in value is Dixon's Ganassi teammate, Darren Manning. Anything over 12 to 1 on Dixon is great value and anything over 25 to 1 on Manning is worth a shot.
Next week we will dissect the Indy 500 in detail and take a look at several proposition wagers that are available.
Editor's note: Micah Roberts continues to pick winners on a weekly basis in Nascar. Right now, you can gain access to his Top-Five Finish prediction every week by becoming a Gold Member. Click here to gain access now!
