LDN - Sports

Driving fighting to get handle on new format

[March 14, 2017] By Jonathan Ingram, The Sports Xchange

To fight or not to fight? That appeared to be the question at the Las Vegas Motor Speedway.

Kyle Busch came in swinging on the pit road. Joey Logano did his best to avoid the punches behind a protective barrier of his crewmen from Team Penske.

The two had tangled in Turn 4 on the final lap coming to the checkered flag and Busch got the worst of it Sunday in the Kobalt 400 -- in terms of dropping 18 positions after his spin and in the fight with the stand-in crewmen afterward.

Perhaps the better question concerns what was the point? Two drivers without any past major issues wrecked each other over fourth and fifth place. Maybe there is something to the new scoring system that rewards a regular-season points champion with a playoff berth and playoff bonus points.

The facts are that Busch nearly wrecked Logano going into Turn 3 on the last lap as each sought to avoid the faltering Ford of Brad Keselowski. Logano did not back off and did not avoid banking his Ford off Busch's Toyota to get through Turn 4.

Logano came home fourth behind winner Martin Truex Jr. and Busch went spinning, ending up on pit road and then chugging across the line as the last car on the lead lap in 22nd place.

The speculation is whether this same incident would have happened under last year's "win and you're in the Chase" system? The answer is most likely no.

Under the previous scheme, there wasn't much difference if a driver finished fourth or fifth in terms of either his paycheck or his prospects for winning a championship. For the first 26 races of the season, the main object was to win a race to gain entry into the Chase and to get three bonus points for each victory. If a victory wasn't to be had, there wasn't as much reason to fight for the remaining positions when it came to actually winning a championship.

This year, 61 playoff bonus points will be divided up among the top 10 finishers in the points at the end of the regular season. The regular-season champion will carry 15 bonus points through the first three rounds of the playoffs before the one-race finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway.

The regular-season runner-up will receive 10 bonus points, the third-placed driver eight, etc. This provides a relatively big incentive to make every position count in each regular-season race, because it can have a direct bearing on making it to the final round at Homestead-Miami.

That's the reason Keselowski was trying to carry a car with serious front suspension problems to the checkered flag and why his slowing car created the fracas between fourth-placed Busch and Logano entering Turn 3.

NASCAR is on to something with the scoring system change. For one thing, it reassures fans that drivers are not just loafing around if they're having a bad day. It also recalls the bygone era when drivers -- and their fans -- could take some satisfaction in salvaging a decent points day in a race where they either missed the set-up, had mechanical issues or suffered from mistakes. It kept everybody's head in the game -- participants and fans alike.

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The more radical change, known as stages, also came into play in Las Vegas. Due to the 1.5-mile track's relatively forgiving asphalt, more teams tried different tire strategies than on the worn asphalt of Atlanta. Although Truex Jr. also ended up winning the 10-point bonus for each of the two stages -- along with a playoff bonus point -- it wasn't for the lack of competitors trying two-tire strategies or skipping a trip down the pit road.

Truex Jr. eventually gave up the lead to Keselowski and the longer final run to the checkered flag, primarily due to his track bar adjuster breaking. With Truex Jr. unable to adjust his handling on longer runs, Keselowksi went to the front before his car suffered the suspension problem, enabling Truex to return to the lead with two laps remaining.

Without the pressure to race hard for the points in the first two stages, would the two front-running cars have held up better in the 107 laps of the final stage? In terms of the race for the overall victory, as well as the race for fourth place, it's possible to put a dramatic finish in Las Vegas down to the new system for determining the Monster Energy NASCAR Cup champion.

Teams may revert to some conventional wisdom when it comes to stage strategies as the season progresses. But even if the two opening stages so far have resulted in predictable caution periods instead of slam-bang affairs as happened between Busch and Logano, they will sustain an emphasis on the value of points as the season progresses.

Once into the postseason, the points and every position will still matter as drivers seek to keep advancing.

When it comes to spinning and then fighting, NASCAR is likely to seek to keep a lid on the emotions getting out of hand and turning into crashing fists. But will officials fine the instigator Busch by subtracting points?

As for the scoring on the fight, there's much that was familiar. The younger Busch has been backsliding toward the old days of volcanic anger as his 2015 championship season grows smaller in the rear view mirror. His flailing did not land a single blow.

Logano continued to talk a good game afterward with the media. But absent standing toe-to-toe with one's adversary, a good verbal game generally fails to pass muster.

So, this titanic struggle ended in a draw. Inglorious as it was, the fight bore no resemblance to the ultimate NASCAR fisticuffs in 1979, when brothers Allison and Cale Yarborough went after it in Turn 3 following the Daytona 500. That one launched the live television era in a big way.

But in its own way, the Las Vegas "fight" may have landed an historic punch. It could well mark a knockout of the old Chase approach and the beginning of a format that better connects with fans who want to be reminded the drivers bring some passion to their high-speed jobs.

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