Schadenfruede?

[Ciro Pabón]

At Nascar's Daytona, AJ Allmendinger out, Jacques Villeneuve out, Carpentier out. Even Bobby Said was out: he seemed he was going to cry on the radio, explaining he cannot afford to miss qualifying.

Given the many posts I've to put up, belittling NASCAR, I don't know... what's the word? Schadenfruede?

Poor Villeneuve, a bump and he's out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=enKJabeFwxA

It seems like he tried to put the car on the track again. Ooops. Why didn't he turn left?

Maybe Jacques should have tried the more methodical approach of Juan Montoya. I quote: "His NASCAR education began not with 42 other cars on the racetrack and thousands of people in the grandstands, but on barren test ovals with only his team members in attendance. They'd change the track bar, send him out, bring him in, and change the track bar again. They'd do the same thing with the sway bar, with the A-frame, with the steering box, making incremental adjustments over and over so Juan Montoya could learn how they affected the feel of the car."

Another quote from Juan, at his Rookie Award ceremony: "Never in my life I've run so hard to finish 20th". The last one: "I understand now that when you suck, you really suck. The word 'sucking,' until you drive a stock car, you don't know what it means." Of course, I have to mention (patriotism also sucks...) that Juan broke the track record at Las Vegas, first time a track record is broken in a COT.

On the other hand, Roger Penske's team won. Sam Hornish got a 15th place. Well done.

[bettonracing]

It seems like he tried to put the car on the track again. Ooops. Why didn't he turn left?

Lol! It's those darn overdeveloped right muscles! Eventually these road racers will learn that turning right in Nascar is a no no [-X
[/ignorant comments]

Regards,
Kurt

[dumrick]

It seems like he tried to put the car on the track again. Ooops. Why didn't he turn left?

Same thing happened with Nelson Piquet many years ago at Indy (if i recall correctly), in the crash that effectively ended his competitive career. A little snap from the back and he corrected the slide to the right, in fact ending up by pointing his car to the top barrier. Old habits are hard to lose and driving in ovals is a motorsport of its own. That's the reason JPM had to learn driving from scratch to begin to be competitive in Stock Car racing. A good thing comes from this, though: Villeneuve will be back at "civilized" car racing, at Le Mans this year.

...the downside for him is that the paycheck is probably a lot thinner.

[Belatti]

It seems like he tried to put the car on the track again. Ooops. Why didn't he turn left?

A natural instinct...

[checkered]

Here's Elliot Sadler giving

advice to his rookie team mate, Patrick Carpentier:

When you first go out you need to run around the top of the track. You've got to take care of that right front tire. You can't be runnin' 'round the bottom. When you do that, you're overloadin' the right front. That's what you're doin'. You're tearin' up the right front in the first laps of the run so you're no good at the end. You've gotta bring the tires in carefully. Then you can go to the bottom.

What you've got to do is lift early in the corners, not at the end. If you lift at the end of the corner everyone's just going to run away from you and you'll lose the draft, like you're sayin'. So you've got to lift in the middle of the corner, get the car settled down and be flat coming off the corner. That way you'll stay in the draft and the car will be settled down so you can look in your mirror coming off the corner and be able to block. You've got to look high and look low and be ready to block.

You'll be spending about seventy percent of your time looking in the mirror and blocking coming off the corner. And about thirty percent looking ahead, checking where you are to the guy ahead.

Ovals are an alien world to me, I find them interesting, the social aspect intriguing, but that's just not what I grew up with and it's not closest to my heart. I can't see the reasoning behind the different features of the COT. Gordon Kirby's The Way It Is/ Dario Franchitti and Patrick Carpentier discuss their early NASCAR lessons is worth a read anyway, besides Sadler, Franchitti especially has some interesting comments on the NASCAR learning curve ... for instance, I found out that currently, between Dario and me, I'm working out more!

[Ray]

"His NASCAR education began not with 42 other cars on the racetrack and thousands of people in the grandstands, but on barren test ovals with only his team members in attendance. They'd change the track bar, send him out, bring him in, and change the track bar again. They'd do the same thing with the sway bar, with the A-frame, with the steering box, making incremental adjustments over and over so Juan Montoya could learn how they affected the feel of the car."

So let me get this straight. A Formula 1 World Champion is bitching and moaning about not getting enough testing time? How much do you need? It's only NASCAR after all. I thought he was a Champion, not a whiner? Besides, the world over thinks NASCAR are a bunch of overweight taxi cabs. They should be easy to drive for such an exalted, highly experienced driver right? For someone who kissed his own ass so often about how good he is, and how much he deserved a seat in F1, he has sure bombed in NASCAR so far. Good riddance JV. We hardly knew ya.

As a side note. He's out of NASCAR for the time being because of sponsorship
.

[Carlos]

Are you OK Ray? Besides the rant you are right -- JV needs some sponsorship. This may be an F1 site but I think there's a lot of appreciation for NASCAR here. JV's record has shown he has talent; although he's no longer at the beginning of a career. I think he still may have something to offer.

You haven't moaned about a thing? [-X Never? Ever? In your whole life?

WOW

Even I do on occasion.

[Ray]

You haven't moaned about a thing? [-X Never? Ever? In your whole life?

Nope. Never!

I just think it's a lame excuse is all. Schumacher came back in testing this winter and seemed to master the new Bridgestones in a matter of days. Why can't JV be a little better? Though the accident was unfortunate. I don't wish him ill will, I do want to see him succeed at least a little, but I don't want to hear him complain. I want him to pull Kimi and keep his mouth shut and put his nose to the grindstone.

[Ciro Pabón]

Ray, the "complain" is not by JV, is by David Caraviello, NASCAR journalist. I think Mr. Caraviello wants to remark how important is to take one step at a time, contrasting the more pedagogic approach of Ganassi's team with the "I'll take it for a race right now" approach of other teams.

I imagine that if you're the "best in the world" at something is because you prepare yourself in the best of ways. I also think Mr. Caraviello is "complaining" about JV's team and how they thought that "hey, he's a Formula One champion" was enough, not giving JV enough learning time, not to mention the fact that there are dozens of drivers who have the abilities and who are looking for JV's position.

The times of "the guy doesn't need any help, he's a natural" are well in the past for any series. People starts to prepare themselves since they are 8 years old, if they want to suceed. After all, at NASCAR you may spend 30% of the time looking ahead, but it seems that 90% of this 30% you spend trying to control the car from the bump you received in the straight, after you blocked. It seems that's hard to do at such speed if you don't have a lifetime of practice.

Checkered, I confess I like NASCAR. It might be the most competed series in the world. The comments by Juan are, well, sincere: when you suck at NASCAR, you suck big time.

Carlos, you're right, this is a Formula One site, but it has a "sub-forum" called "Other series". I wait for some comment from you and the rest of my friends here on the IRL-ChampCar fusion and Le Mans next race, specially when the movements from one series to another shows their relative strength among fans and sponsors.

I think this is a relatively new trend, and it shows how patently F1 has become a technical competition in the last decade, where only a handful of cars have the chance to win. For drivers that are feed up with this fact and cannot find a competitive team, America is becoming a natural "race-scape".

I also think this will become more evident if IRL-Champ Car fusion produce a series that compete somehow with F1 and NASCAR. I've already posted graphs on overtaking that show how acute is this trend. They go from 900 overtakings per year in the 80's to 250 overtakings per year in 2000's.

[Ray]

Ray, the "complain" is not by JV, is by David Caraviello, NASCAR journalist. I think Mr. Caraviello wants to remark how important is to take one step at a time, contrasting the more pedagogic approach of Ganassi's team with the "I'll take it for a race right now" approach of other teams.

I need your help Ciro. Do I insert my foot before or after I open my mouth? My mistake, I used your quote thinking it was from the horses mouth. I still think he's out of his league though. Not that they are better than him, I just think he's in over his head. I hope it gets better for him. More competition, especially from good drivers, is always welcome to me. Only a few good cars/drivers/teams gets boring. Even in my beloved NASCAR!

[teecof1fan]

I'm glad to hear from checkered and Ciro that NASCAR isn't hated by everyone and it may even be appreciated a little bit I'm just a casual fan, so I too don't understand all the different lines around the track and the technicalities of the draft (especially in the COT). But I found some interesting comments from JPM:

http://www.dawgrant.com/rant/messagetopic.asp?p=701921

Sorry I couldn't find the direct link to R&T magazine This is from some other forum, but all the quotes from JPM are in the first post on the page. It may be a little old but I found it really interesting. Cheers!

[modbaraban]

Why is this type of racing called 'stock car' racing? These generic-looking soapboxes look nothing like stock... I can't tell a Toy ota from Dodge



Wouldn't this sort of stock cars be more attractive and appreciated?

[teecof1fan]

Here are some from the 60's...Much more 'stock' than today's cars!

http://www.gt350h.com/pearson/pearson.html

I can only guess that the level of competition and money (sponsorship) brought about all these changes. Like I said, I'm no expert, so maybe we can get some more insight from someone else. Cheers!