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New News, Old News, And News So Ugly, You d Think It Was A Pair Of Bowling Shoes.

Hello again, gang.

This is a bit of part 2 , following the editorial from last time we met, and of course, even morecomments about the world of motorsports not fit to print.

This is a continuation of the August 2001 interview between Automobile Magazine, and then-NASCAR-director, Gary Nelson .and of course, my commentary afterward. I normally wouldn t print such aninterview, word-for-word, as doing so is usually boring to the point of wanting to claw one s own eyesout if forced to read such a thing, but this particular article has produced some eye-opening views intowhat NASCAR was supposedly thinking in 2001 .and what s happened since this interview took place 8years ago. Of course, I m not reprinting the entire article, I m just repeating some of the questions, andmore-interesting answers from the piece in question.

Automobile Magazine: The Enforcer , originally printed August, 2001.

A.M.: But so called stock cars have virtually nothing in common with street cars. Forget tube-framechassis. When was the last time you saw a new car with a carburetor?

G.N.: We get made fun of a lot because of our antiquated technology. But a guy who can tune acarburetor probably has a better understanding of an engine and the weather than the guy who burns achip [controlling the fuel injection]. When he jets the carburetor, he has to guess what the weather sgoing to be like halfway through the race. I m really proud of my guys for being able to do that. I mimpressed by how much my guys can get out of intake manifolds. It s not rocket science. A guy in theshop can take his grinder and work on it and put it on the dyno and see if it s better, which is not a badthing for the owner .

My comment: You know, I have a pretty simple answer for the tuning question, and the ability forteams to cheat with fuel injection: It s called the spec engine . The manufacturers supply the enginesand engine computers .and seal them up to where the teams can t monkey with the computer. On-board telemetry during the race can ensure that there isn t anything funny going on .and when therace is over? The engines come out (as they do anyway, after every race), and go back to themanufacturer for rebuilding. This isn t a new concept; for a simple example, Ford did this with theirIndycar engines for some time, supplying teams with new bullets and dyno sheets accompanying thefresh engines. There s only so much you can do with a sealed engine computer anyway .and since mostelectronically-fuel-injected cars have to have sensors to tell them what s going on in the engine, and in

the atmosphere .a team s resources can be focused more on simply making the car go around the trackfaster.

If the supplied engines don t work as advertised, or blow up all of the time .if enough teams switch toother manufacturers .whatever problem crops up can be resolved. The ASA has (or had, anyway)sealed crate EFI engines already .and we can t do this in Sprint cup?

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Oh, and something else, Gary? There i s rocket-science in designing an intake manifold, moron. I don twant to bore you, but there is a heck of a lot of engineering that goes into making an intake manifold,and I m a bit shocked that such a clueless statement was allowed to be released to the public. The guyin the shop who can take his grinder and work on it is only the end process of trying to tweak an intakemanifold for a few more horsepower .which also involves using a low-tech piece of equipment called

a flowbench .but hey, any guy in the shop can use one of those, right, Gary? Once again, I m visited byfunny mental images, this time and image of the after-hours shop janitor heaving running 5hp grindersat an intake manifold sitting on a bench, with aluminum chunks being snapped off and ricocheted off of the other side of the shop . But boss, don t fire me, Gary said that I m grinding an intake manifold !

You know, I m seriously wondering if we have a bunch of scared nancy-boys in upper-echelonmanagement, who think electronic fuel injection is going to cost scores of jobs and kill all of the first-born in Egypt if it s ever discussed in public, or bring about the Anti-Christ if it shows up on a race track. Ihave funny mental images of NASCAR management carrying around crucifixes and Holy Water (HolyWater sponsored by Dasani and Aquafina!), getting cases of the vapors if anyone ever dare say the EFI

word around Daytona Beach. Provided the engine computers are sealed .and on-board telemetry isprovided, this is a win-win situation. You simply tune around the existing engine combination .and

setup costs are reduced. Nobody s souls are consumed, and nobody loses their job, as they re nolonger spending millions of dollars on maintaining engine shops. If someone tries traction control, ortries hacking into the engine computer to alter timing or fuel maps .it can be spotted immediately.

I m not scared of carburetors .I own three vehicles that use them. I m not the smartest guy when itcomes to tuning carbs .but I do pretty well, as I ve spent the last 20 years working on various types of carbs in both a hobby and shop setting, so this is not an uninformed opinion I m giving. There s simplyno reason for running a carbed engine at this level of auto racing, not with the proven technology that s

out there today .most things you had to tune (barometric pressure, for example) for are taken care of by most aftermarket EFI systems, as most of these units adjust themselves for changing weatherconditions.

And finally .

A.M.: NASCAR permitted Toyota to race an overhead-cam v-6 (with a carburetor) in the Goody s Dashevents. How much longer before pushrods disappear from Winston Cup?

G.N.: We don t intend to upgrade technology for the sake of technology. One of the ways we keepracing affordable is to take parts that aren t too expensive and make them the only parts you can run.

We ve got car owners with millions of dollars in inventory in pushrod engines. Going to overhead camswould be a real expensive proposition. And you know what? When we got finished, we d still have carsrunning side-by-side on the track, just like we do now .

My comment: The more I read, the more I m not impressed with ol Gary. And we have side-by-sideracing now? Ol Gary speaks of taking parts that aren t too expensive and making them the only partsyou can run , but at the same time, he refused to allow parts that are even less expensive that everyoneelse i s runn i ng . Remember my discussion about using an 18 wheel .just like some of the other racing

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series out there? Gee, wouldn t that reduce costs? Gary is really intelligent here, speaking of inventories like they are f ix ed inventories, and never change. When one tries to justify a failed policy,

one of the tricks available for use is to try to convince the reader that millions of dollars will be lost if someone tries to change a policy .the problem here, is for Gary s comment to hold any water, you dhave to be really dumb and assume that team owners never had any eng i ne parts that wear out.

Oh, wait a minute: Engine i nventor i es have to be eventually replaced anyway, due to equipment gettingold and unuseable, right? Golly gee whillickers, Batman, it doesn t sound like ol Gary is in possession of all of the facts , now does it? Mighty convenient to be spouting off half-truths when keeping pushrodengines fits into NASCAR s political modus operandi, isn t it?

The problem here is that Ol Gary, at the time, was firmly ensconced into NASCAR-think , wherethoughtless rule changes by idiots in charge already cost team owners m i ll i ons to comply. I m simplysurprised that Ol Gary wasn t bothered by some rule changes requiring new equipment (and $$$), butwas appalled by forcing the teams to slowly implement new engine design into the picture, enginedesigns which are more in-line with what the particular manufacturer in question is already produc i ngon a global scale. I don t care which type of engine is used in NASCAR right now .I don t think anyoneelse does at this point, short of the guys who pay for the engines in question .engines which can onlybe used in NASCAR Sprint cup applications but last time I checked, forcing teams to run one-off-specialpieces which can only be used on one car, or even one series isn t my idea of cheap .

If I had to summarize everything that I ve seen since this interview was originally published, I d have tosay the following; NASCAR has been moving towards a Spec series since the 1980 s .and up until thedeath of Dale Earnhardt, they were simply too scared to try it. With the passing of #3 .this provided thesocietal nudge necessary to switch to a safer car .a car which just happens to look and perform likeevery other car on the track .this finally allowed a change in cars, to switch to a sort-of-spec car, inwhich the fans wouldn t eat each other alive when it showed up on the track.

The more I think about this, the more I think that NASCAR isn t so much interesting in providing a greatracing series so much as providing the appearance of a good racing series, with all of the extra (andunnecessary) buzzing in and around the pits .a proverbial white-trash soap opera involving cars andunnecessary drama instead of mobile-home parks and Uncle Frank hiding in Sissy s closet. This mode of thought would support what we ve seen of NASCAR racing lately, with allowing large groups of men toswarm all over the pit (9 men for each pit stall when it could be just as easily done with 5 or 6, using dry-break refueling and on-board air-jacks), and Holy Underwear, Batman! You just can t squeeze any TV-worthy drama from engine tuning woes if everyone s running unalterable electronic fuel injection,

right?

Last time I checked .close racing provides an excellent show. Close racing between two completelydifferent cars provides an even better show. Other racing series can pull it off, and do so, everyweek .but NASCAR can t pull it off? Or is it that NASCAR was caught trying to manufacture impossiblyclose racing for 500 miles .and it blew up in their face?

On a random note, read this and see if anything applies to NASCAR:

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http://lastturnclub.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=603&Itemid=51

Moving on with more news not fit to print .

N.A.S.C.A.R. stands for .National Association of Stock Car Auto Racing?

Nope, as of now, it stands for N obody h AS a C hance A gainst R ick Hendrick Motorsports.

The Whatever Race It Was 350 at Infineon Raceway aside .this season is going about as I predicted;Hendrick Motorsports dominating the season. It s going to be either Johnson, Gordon, or Martin as the2009 Sprint Cup champion. Earnhardt Jr.? No way he makes the chase.

W anted: Somebody, anybody to come and go NASCAR racing!!!

I was reading somewhere that NASCAR was talking to Hyundai about Hyundai going NASCAR racing.

They would be, wouldn t they.

Kudos to Mark Martin for showing Roush Racing what he s capable of with good equipment .

Yeah, this kudos is a week or two old .but here s to hoping the Old Man wins the championship . i n aChevy.

And in other news . Diesel W ins LeMans.

Something not noted very well in the American media? Peugeot wins LeMans .1,2. It s major news intwo ways; the Audi LeMans juggernaut was derailed .and the top-5 cars were all running turbo-diesels.Peugeot also hasn t won at Le Mans since 1993. Is Diesel the wave of the future? I don t know. There aresome rules-changes proposed to allow gasoline-powered vehicles to compete with Diesels again .

Something finally worth crying over .

Dan Binks, the crew chief for the #63 Compuware GT1 Corvette stood crying while his car crossed thefinish line .first place in GT1 class at the 24 Hours of LeMans. He s won countless times in the sameseries, and in other forms of auto racing .but this was the big one, which he has been trying to win forover a decade, with multiple teams. Don t know who he is?http://corvetteracing.com/team/danbinks.shtml

Here s to hoping that Chevrolet somehow has the you-know-whats to keep Team Corvette racing .asthis is probably the most prolific example of Manufacturer involvement in American motorsports .thiscomment also coming from a Ford guy .

Want to know how far ahead of 2 nd place that the #63 Corvette was? They had time to come into thepits, back into the garage, and wash the car before the final lap .and fly it to the U.S.A. and back forsome in-race pictures .

NASCAR Jokes .

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What do you do if you see a NASCAR official running around your yard, bleeding from several spots?Stop laughing, and shoot again.

House for rent, by NASCAR official, freshly plastered

A NASCAR official calls a local Jenny Craig to check into beginning their weight-loss program, as his wifehad just given him a wonderful birthday present, and he couldn t get into it. Don t panic, with ourprogram, we ll have you wearing that new suit in no time, sir! , replies a perky saleswoman, afterprocessing his order. He angrily replied, Who said anything about a suit? She just bought me a newLincoln!

Did you hear about how the NASCAR official got fired from his first job at a Dollar Tree store .becausehe couldn t remember the prices of any of the items?

See you next time.