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Brad Keselowski on playoff financial considerations // Bob Francis on NASCAR’s big win// LaineBuice of ARCA taking it all in
By Roy J. Akers– Joliet, Illinois
With drivers racing near the Windy City for the first time since 2019, over half of the field was NOT in the series seven years ago. They sound off about it in this edition of They Said It.
We have such a larger sample size of season behind us to look at how the racing has evolved or changed with this championship format. There was a lot of talk going into this year about how maybe there’s not going to be as much going for broke or maybe there will be because of the 15 extra points for winning a race. Has this format changed, in any fundamental way, how you guys approach a season or try to build towards winning a championship or contending for a championship?
William Byron: “Yeah, I think to look at it optimistically — I mean, look at what’s happened between the top-two the last four or five weeks, so I think there’s a lot of a lot of reward for winning races. You know, we’ve always tried to get as many points as we can. I think the points system has made that more conscious through the field. But we’ve still seen a lot of chaotic races, too, where it seems like the emotions of the race and kind of being in the middle of the pack is just even more chaotic than ever. The way the Next Gen races play out, you just have to be really aggressive to get track position, so I feel like it’s every bit as much of a crash fest in the middle of the field than it’s been. But yeah, there’s just an emphasis on stage points, and if you can win a few races, it’s a big deal. It changes the points a lot.”
Kyle Larson: “Yeah, for me, I’ve felt this way all year — I know a lot of media keeps trying to push this narrative that the racing is different now that points matter, but I don’t think the racing has changed at all. I think it still is, as he mentioned, as chaotic as it has always been. We were still racing for points before.
I will say, though, that what I’ve appreciated throughout it is I can pull up Jayski right after the race and see the points and actually know where everybody’s at. It was really confusing before. With the old system, you basically just waited until after Daytona and see where you’re at. Now, it’s fun to follow along; see what drivers are around the cutoff to make the Chase and all that. So, yeah, you pay attention to the points more, but I wouldn’t say the points are any more important than they were and the racing has not changed.”
Denny Hamlin
How have you seen how the championship is shaping up this year with the Chase format as opposed to what we’ve seen the last several years with the elimination format and eventually the Championship 4 at the end of the year?
“I certainly feel like the destination of where you want to go is more in your hands. The sample size is bigger. This thing could come down to a green, white, checkered at Homestead, we don’t know. But at least there are other races and restarts that happened that counted just the same, the nine races before that. I like it for that reason that I don’t think that one freak race or incident or win just completely changes the outlook of your championship hopes. I’m very optimistic from the standpoint that generally the bigger the data set the better off our chances are going to be.”
SVG on how much SIM work has done going into Chicagoland
Roy J. Akers covers NASCAR for www.skyviewsports.net and is the host of High Banked Fury the podcast. Subscribe to both, they are free and Skyview Sports YouTube Channel has plenty of coverage and YouTube shorts.
