Helton speaks on bump drafting
Here's what NASCAR prez Mike Helton had to say at the driver's meeting today. Dustin Long transcribed it. Emphasis in bold is mine:
"Many of you we’ve had conversations with over the course of the last few races here in Daytona about bump drafting. This action by NASCAR isn’t as much about bump drafting as it is about aggressive driving. Bump drafting as many of you recall in the conversations were actions that would have been and is better off if the drivers on the race track control that. And do it properly if you’re going to do it at all.
Helton continues after the jump ...
"Through the conversations, we've always said and most of us have agreed when the conversations was over with, it would be better if NASCAR was not involved in this because it will be a subjective call. It’s a gray area that we cannot prove to anybody that we made the right decision but if we have to, we'll get into. So, today is your warning: we're getting into it."It’s not about bump drafting as much as it is about what has evolved from bump drafting into very aggressive driving.
"The way we're going to do it is we’ve got three areas on the race track that we’re going to pay particularly close attention to. It doesn’t mean the rest of the race track will be ignored. It could come from the rest of the race track but the areas we will particularly pay close attention to is in the tri-oval from the beginning of the grass to the end of the grass, from pit road to the frontstretch.
"Going into turn 1 at the end of the grandstand from the frontstretch through turn 2 where the superstretch grandstands begin.
"At the end of the backstretch near the chicane to the turn 4 area where the grandstand on the frontstretch begins.
"Again, I'd like to remind you that this is not as much about bump drafting as about aggressive driving. It could be side-by-side contact. Certainly the conversations the last three or four days has been labeled as bump drafting, but we have seen happen and I think a lot of it has to do with the evolution of, 'OK I did this once and Now I'm going to do it again and I'm going to do it a little differently' added to the feature that we've got a lot of drivers with a lot of experience on the race track but we have a lot of drivers with not so much experience on the race track seeing what someone else does and thinks its pretty neat and I want to do it, too and they may not know how to do it right because they're in too big of a hurry.
"So, starting today is getting into that gray area that we don’t want to get into and you don't want us to get into but we’ve reached a point where we feel like we need to. So this is it. This is a warning. The penalty is a minimum a pass-through penalty. It could be much more severe than that depending on what happens on the race track.
"The best way to police this, I still maintain and I think everybody in this room should agree on it, is for you to do it yourself. If you drive with a respect for each other on the race track and you also drive managing your experience level out on that race track and learn from others that you're racing with and earn their respect, then we won’t have a problem.
"But if anything happens and we make a call, it's over with. You can argue all you want to when you come in after the race is over with, but it’s too bad. It is what it is."
Shorter Mike Helton: Kyle Busch, you and the rest of the NASCAR Noobs need to learn how to drive a superspeedway between now and 2 p.m.
Previous coverage of bump-drafting and aggressive driving here and here. The Tony Stewart comments that started it all are here.
Comments (2)
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While I don't agree with another move in the direction of more "NASCAR police" something, somewhere had to be done. And unfortunatly NASCAR is late to the party and theri normal mode of operation.
The lastest, as you probably know is changes prior to Talladega that will remove all the extra bumper support thqat teams have been using the last few years. It's the only effective way to solve the problem and puts the "policing" where it belongs, in the drivers seat.
Hit a car too hard your on pit road, just like old times.
Posted on February 16, 2006 6:18 PM
Getting rid of the bumper braces is the quickest fit for this particular problem. As far as bump-drafting goes, I think NASCAR is hoping the Car of Tomorrow will take ultimately take care of some of the pack problems at the restrictor plate tracks. In other words, don't expect any drastic changes in 2006.
Where NASCAR has itself in a corner is with the drivers themselves. They're banking on the younger stars to goose the sport. The problem: Some of them can't drive at Daytona. Kyle Busch, for instance, as good as he is elsewhere, is an accident waiting to happen at Daytona. He was always in the wrong place in the Shootout, it seemed.
Was he any better today? I saw nothing of today's duels.
Posted on February 16, 2006 6:31 PM