Holding a Pretty Wheel: A Little NASCAR Magic in An Unexpected Place
Racing is many things but good racing isn’t predictable. Most NASCAR races this year are anything but, the best we could hope for in the sport’s Next Gen era.
Holding A Pretty Wheel
Holding a Pretty Wheel: NASCAR Next Gen Holds Promise, Questions So Far
What have we learned so far about the Next Gen car, and what questions have arose since its debut?
Holding A Pretty Wheel: That Time NASCAR’s Points System Showed the Playoffs for What They Are
Way back in 2004, NASCAR devised a playoff system with hopes of one thing: attracting a demographic whose attention span, raised on information meted out in colorful bursts, was decidedly shorter than that of the long-term, traditional fans. The sport was riding a high as the water-cooler fad of the moment and wanted the wave …
Holding A Pretty Wheel: NASCAR’s Storybook Scenario Wouldn’t Be a Happy Ending
Saturday night’s (Sept. 18) race at Bristol Motor Speedway marks the final race in the first round of the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series playoffs, and four drivers will be ending their title bids when the checkers fall. Barring a true Hail Mary win, one of those drivers will be Michael McDowell, perhaps the underdog story …
Holding a Pretty Wheel: A NASCAR Summer of Endless Possibility
After more than a decade of sultry and seductive Southern summers, it was easy to forget how the season manifests in New England, with blazing days and gentle nights, but it was also easy to forget how fleeting they are. Already the trees are beginning to lose their summer green. But as this summer begins …
Holding a Pretty Wheel: Perception, Reality & NASCAR’s Million-Dollar Problem
There was once a young driver with a reputation for winning. He built a name for himself at the local bullrings, racing — and sometimes winning — against drivers twice his age and who had been racing before he was born. He scraped together what sponsorship he could, and put more than he could probably …
Holding a Pretty Wheel: Goodbye to Hollywood, NASCAR
Do you remember when everything NASCAR touched turned to gold? Those halcyon summers when the sport was booming? Everything was right in its world and it was magic. But nothing stays the same. Summer romances fade in the winter cold, and so too has our love affair with NASCAR. It’s easy to say it’s only …
Holding a Pretty Wheel: Too Early to Engrave the NASCAR Cup Series Trophy
Martin Truex Jr. certainly put on a show at Darlington last Sunday, leading 248 of 292 laps on the way to his 30th career victory and third of 2021. He’s the only driver with more than one win through 12 races this season. So, with the halfway point of NASCAR’s regular season this weekend at …
Holding a Pretty Wheel: Can NASCAR’s Return to Dirt Resurrect a Ghost From Its Past?
NASCAR is a sport where ghosts abound. It’s more difficult with every passing year to find a racetrack that’s not, in some way, haunted by the past. Races won and lost, drivers come and gone, the past is everywhere, all the time. You can feel it on the wind in Martinsville, Darlington, Charlotte, Daytona: whispers …
Holding a Pretty Wheel: Is It Time for NASCAR to Change Tires?
A lot has changed in NASCAR over the past couple of decades. Next year will mark the fourth incarnation of a Cup car since 2000, and today’s schedule is a far cry from the slate of races in the 1990s. Just two of today’s regular Cup drivers raced against Dale Earnhardt in the top series. …