All Wet

Far be it from me to complain about NASCAR making decisions that are way above my pay grade, but yesterday was painful. Delay after delay after delay sucked every drop of momentum out of what was a wonderful Speed Weeks. Think about it. Coming out of Daytona fans had already seen 2 Jr. wins, Toyota become a solid contender, and a very exciting finish to the 50th Daytona 500.

What now?

That's easy to answer...frustration and a lack of caring. NASCAR can control everything from the camber on your tire to where you park your motorcoach, but they can't control the weather. Mother Nature decided to quite effectively rain on everyones parade. It's her right, it has to be frustrating doling out the weather to the entire world...however, it's no more frustrating than watching Fox fill time by trying to get drivers to name that gopher.

Sunday seemed to drag on forever and ever. This is coming from someone who gave up at 11:30pm and refused to set around until 2am to get the official word. It seemed like the track officials weren't ready for this and that is unacceptable. It's your track and it's your job to make the experience everything it can be. However, that's not what I'm wanting to focus on right now. My concern is with the total dissipation of momentum we've now seen.

Everything was wonderful. Ratings were up and the build was on. It was only a couple of days before the 500 that I had realized the annual (and ridiculous) week off after the 500 had vanished. I've always hated it because of the halt it puts on the excitement. Right now a week off seems like a highschool kegger compared to what California has been. Denny Hamlin, Casey Mears, and Dale Jr. were eliminated quickly due to water "weeping" into the track. Couple that with the lifetime of gopher coverage and it's a bad day. Finally throw in the fact that we cut completely away from the race for several hours while they tried to decide what to do and you've got the air let out of the casual fans collective balloon. I'm watching next week. I'm recording the race this afternoon and I'll watch the Nationwide race tonight, but I'm not the fan they're trying to attract...they had me at hello. They're trying to keep the casual fan interested and I believe this weekend was a sucker punch that may have ko'd some people.