NASCAR Martinsville -- Rubbin' and Racin'

After two days of crappy weather NASCAR Cup racing returned to prominence Sunday. Five-hundred laps of beatin' and bangin' on the half-mile paperclip that's known as Martinsville!!!

For old fart NASCAR fans like myself that were introduced to Cup racing on 1/2 mile tracks, Martinsville is classic. I recall my first NASCAR Cup race on a Wednesday evening (I think) down at the old half-mile Beltsville Speedway in the late '60s. Racing was much different in those days with the cars being towed in on open auto trailers by PU trucks with boxes of tools and parts in the back. Night racing at Beltsville was wunnerful. I believe there is some kind of local college on the property today. Too many noise complaints from local residents eventually doomed the track.

If Fox would ever learn to take some time during telecasts to run thru the field and show all the cars and describe how each is performing, their race coverage would be much more interesting for all fans. Unfortunately, they fixate on the Top 10. Come Chase time for the final 10 races, ESPN/ABC will fixate on the 12 Chase participants. So basically, we have commercial...top 10...commercial...special promo...top 10..., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc.

Racing production guys are truly ignorant of fan interest and respond only to sponsor dollars and their own ego. Fans have no direct money contribution to TV. Until paying sponsors demand complete field coverage, we'll still be stuck with the same minimal exposure of teams beyond the top 10 in the race.

They never seem to learn that each NASCAR fan has a favorite driver and most drivers don't run regularly in the Top 10 during a race!!! And that little 'current position' crawl across the top of the screen is TV producers only admission that there are actually 43 cars in each race with 43 unique sets of fans...

Having done all that complaining, I personally think Martinsville was the best, most interesting racing of the season's first 6 races. As ol' Matt McLaughlin over at Frontstretch.com says, he gives it 6 beers. I concur wholeheartedly.

If you missed Martinsville yesterday, there's a truck race there today at noon on the SPEED channel. It's a makeup for Saturday's rainout. Truck racin' is ALL FUN all the time!!!

Enjoy at noon or set your DVR,
JD